Max Planck Institute - Climate Changes In Next 100 Years Sweeping, Rapid

[hatrack]

Berlin: The climate will change more frequently than ever in the next 100 years because of global warming, say researchers in Germany.

Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology in Hamburg, led by Erich Roeckner, reached at this conclusion through the first model calculations for the future of climate, according to a release in the institute website.

The global temperature could rise by up to four degree Celsius and the sea level could rise by as many as 30 centimetres on average. Under certain conditions, the sea ice in the arctic will completely melt, concluded the study.

In Europe, summers will be drier and warmer, and it will affect agriculture. The winters will become warmer and wetter. Another consequence of the heated atmosphere will be extreme events like heavy precipitation with floods, they said. The significant result of these future scenarios is the progressive raising of mean global temperatures and the movement of climate zones in connection with that. Almost everywhere on earth, the forestry industry will have to husband different types of trees than it has until now, they said.

The finding of the study will be presented in the report from the IPCC, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. It is developed every five years, on the commission of the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). In total, 1,000 scientists worldwide are working on the fourth edition of the progress report, due for release in 2007. The scientists are commissioned by their governments to participate in the comprehensive, independent climate status report.

EDIT

http://www.newkerala.com/news.php?action=fullnews&id=28607

[ixion]

1. global warming is just a theory, like evolution...

:eyes: :sarcasm:

[orwell]

2. I'm Sick

...of these "reality based" scientists.

Now, where did I leave my Hummer keys...

[Dogmudgeon]

3. 100 years? I doubt it.

With all due respect to the Max Planck Institute, it will be a lot quicker than that.

Most climatologists now agree that global climate change events occur over time periods of 5-50 years; even Wallace Broecker, who discovered the link between oceanic thermohaline circulation and the ice ages, thinks that such changes take place on a scale of about 65 years.

What we're seeing now is global warming happening on its own. The Arctic has become a giant engine for increasing biogneic greenhouse gasses (CO2, Methane (CH4), Ammonia (NH4), and water vapor) as the now-unusual summer thaw brings billions of kilograms of microbes to life. This process has overtaken anthropogenic (human-caused) global warming, and the curves of the data for global temperature, CO2, and weather changes, have begun to accelerate. Instead of taking 100 years for these changes to happen, they could be here in less than a decade.

What happens after that depends on the mechanism by which a new balance is achieved. In a Heinrich Event, the trend is a cool-down; in a Dangaard-Oeschger Event, the trend is to maintain the warm-up. These are not gentle climatic returns to normal but episodes of violent change. Global temperature swings of 15C and CO2 level changes of 50% (upwards of 200 ppm) are probable, within as little as ten years.

As we heat up, not only does the Arctic become more active, but more water vapor migrates toward the poles. Although the increase in equatorial hurricanes have been a major "inconvenience", the development of a zone of highly active northern storms would be disastrous, bringing blizzards and flooding rains depending on the season.

Right now, we're on the upswing of the curve, and based on other such events seen in data proxies -- ice cores and tree rings -- we're more than halfway to the top of the "spike". A rapid re-normalization of temperature and atmospheric gasses would be a tremendous challenge to civilization, to say the least.

All of this has been triggered by human "forcing" of the climate by approximately 2C over a period of 180 years. Even two years ago, I held out hope that we could stop the process by stopping our addition to global greenhouse gas. Today, I think we're past the point of no return. However, as our response to Hurricane Katrina illustrated, the real killer isn't the weather so much as the way we handle it. An era of violent weather change need not be a major killer if we take appropriate steps to reduce our exposure. That's the real challenge. Based on recent experience, I'm pessimistic, but based on the overall history of Humanity, I'm optimistic. All it will take is the political and social will -- and that may be history-making in itself.

--p!

[bloom]

4. "When the Ice Melts – Everything Changes"

"...And now the news. The online edition of the Times of London reported in May that the Gulf Stream slowdown is no longer theoretical, but is already occurring. Peter Wadhams, a professor of ocean physics at Cambridge University, visited the Arctic ice cap on Royal Navy submarines and discovered “that one of the ‘engines’ driving the Gulf Stream – the sinking of supercooled water in the Greenland Sea – has weakened to less than a quarter of its former strength. The weakening, apparently caused by global warming, could herald big changes in the current over the next few years or decades. Paradoxically, it could lead to Britain and northwestern Europe undergoing a sharp drop in temperatures.”

Says Wadhams, “Until recently, we would find giant ‘chimneys’ in the sea where columns of cold, dense water were sinking from the surface to the seabed <1.8 miles> below, but now they have almost disappeared. As the water sank, it was replaced by warm water flowing in from the south, which kept the circulation going. If that mechanism is slowing, it will mean less heat reaching Europe.”

Dr. Gagosian says that a shutting down of the Gulf Stream would mean that “average winter temperatures could drop by five degrees Fahrenheit over much of the United States, and by ten degrees in the northeastern United States and in Europe. That’s enough to send mountain glaciers advancing down from the Alps; to freeze rivers and harbors and bind North Atlantic shipping lanes in ice; to disrupt the operation of ground and air transportation; to cause energy needs to soar exponentially; to force wholesale changes in agricultural practices and fisheries; to change the way we feed our populations. In short, the world, and the world economy, would be drastically different.

...Look at a couple of impacts. Most severe weather takes place when cold air and hot air meet. The tropics are getting warmer, Europe and the northeastern United States and Canada are getting colder. When air masses over the temperate and tropical zones meet, there will be more extreme weather. The water that has been locked into Arctic ice is now merging with the oceans. More water means sea levels rise. That doesn’t even begin to address the impact on the food we eat and where it is grown (and how it gets here), or the wood we use for construction. And then there are the increased costs of energy and transportation systems. So maybe we should start thinking about growing more of our food now, and importing less.”

http://caymannetnews.com/2005/08/907/ecocommentary.shtml