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AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1450 on: August 20, 2019, 08:12:55 PM »
The linked reference indicates that looking a paleoclimate values of ECS over the past 35 million years is not the best way to estimate possible future values of ECS.  Thus, I would be happy if for AR6 that the IPCC downplay the importance of paleo estimates of ECS and instead emphasize the CMIP6 projections.  Furthermore, I remind readers that none of the CMIP6 models consider MICI-types of mechanisms and if the WAIS were to significantly collapse in the coming decades than the effective value of ECS this century would be much higher than preliminary CMIP6 projections estimate:

A. Farnsworth et al. (29 July 2019), "Climate sensitivity on geological timescales controlled by non‐linear feedbacks and ocean circulation", Geophysical Research Letters, https://doi.org/10.1029/2019GL083574

https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1029/2019GL083574

Abstract: "Climate sensitivity is a key metric used to assess the magnitude of global warming given increased CO2 concentrations. The geological past can provide insights into climate sensitivity; however, on timescales of millions of years, factors other than CO2 can drive climate, including paleogeographic forcing and solar luminosity. Here, through an ensemble of climate model simulations covering the period 150‐35 million years ago, we show that climate sensitivity to CO2 doubling varies between ~3.5‐5.5°C through this time. These variations can be explained as a non‐linear response to solar luminosity, evolving surface albedo due to changes in ocean area, and changes in ocean circulation. The work shows that the modern climate sensitivity is relatively low in the context of the geological record, as a result of relatively weak feedbacks due to a relatively low CO2 baseline, and the presence of ice and relatively small ocean area in the modern continental configuration."
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AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1451 on: August 20, 2019, 10:42:12 PM »
The linked reference concludes that: 'Our results demonstrate that stratospheric ozone changes play a considerable role in shaping the atmospheric circulation response to CO2 forcing in both hemispheres, and should be accounted for in climate sensitivity studies.'  This indicates that consensus climate models have more uncertainty regarding climate sensitivity than they publicly admit.

Gabriel Chiodo and Lorenzo M. Polvani (2019), "The response of the ozone layer to quadrupled CO2 concentrations: implications for climate" Journal of Climate, https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-19-0086.1

https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JCLI-D-19-0086.1?af=R

Abstract: "The quantification of the climate impacts exerted by stratospheric ozone changes in abrupt 4×CO2 forcing experiments is an important step in assessing the role of the ozone layer in the climate system. Here, we build on our previous work on the change of the ozone layer under 4×CO2, and examine the effects of ozone changes on the climate response to 4×CO2, using the Whole Atmosphere Community Climate Model. We show that the global mean radiative perturbation induced by the ozone changes under 4×CO2 is small, due to nearly total cancellation between high and low latitudes, and between longwave and shortwave fluxes. Consistent with the small global mean radiative perturbation, the effect of ozone changes on the global mean surface temperature response to 4×CO2 is negligible. However, changes in the ozone layer due to 4×CO2 have a considerable impact on the tropospheric circulation. During boreal winter, we find significant ozone-induced tropospheric circulation responses in both hemispheres. In particular, ozone changes cause an equator-ward shift of the North Atlantic jet, cooling over Eurasia and drying over Northern Europe. The ozone signals generally oppose the direct effects of increased CO2 levels, and are robust across the range of ozone changes imposed in this study. Our results demonstrate that stratospheric ozone changes play a considerable role in shaping the atmospheric circulation response to CO2 forcing in both hemispheres, and should be accounted for in climate sensitivity studies."
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AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1452 on: August 21, 2019, 08:21:29 PM »
In the linked article I believe that Zeke Hausfather has done a good job of explaining consensus climate scientists position that BAU emissions will like fall (roughly) between the RCP 8.5 the RCP 6.0 forcing scenarios, and he even note that uncertainties in climate models with regard to carbon cycle climate feedbacks may justify leaning towards use of RCP 8.5 by recent studies.

That said, here I position out a few (of many) reason for believing the Hausfather's logic errs on the side of least drama (ESLDs):

a) The recent CMIP6 results indicate that cloud feedback is primarily leading to ECS values on the order of 5.3C (as opposed to 3C).  Thus, Hausfather's focus on carbon cycle uncertainties ESLDs; and both Hausfather and CMIP6 ignore the ice-climate feedbacks characterized by Hansen et al. (2016) for abrupt ice sheet collapse.

b) The authors of RCP 8.5 defined it based on 90% percentile of the published peer-reviewed literature as the “very high baseline emission scenario” available at that time; and then Hausfather distorts this definition in to the "high-end of possible baseline emissions scenarios", which it is not.  In this regard, Hausfather downplays the importance of methane emission and methane's chemical interactions in the stratosphere to increase the GWP (global warming potential) of emissions from such sources as: hydrofracturing of shale deposits; lakes, and agriculture; particularly over the 20-year timeframe when the GWP for methane emission could be as high as 105 time that of carbon dioxide.

c) The AR5 definition of pre-industrial global mean surface temperature almost certainly ESLDs (due to historical errors in measured land and sea temperatures); thus we are likely already closer to conditions that will support a cascade of feedback mechanisms than Hausfather conveys in his article.

Title: "Explainer: The high-emissions ‘RCP8.5’ global warming scenario"

https://www.carbonbrief.org/explainer-the-high-emissions-rcp8-5-global-warming-scenario

Extract: "A sizeable portion of recent studies on future climate impacts have focused on a warming scenario called “RCP8.5”. This high-emissions scenario is frequently referred to as “business as usual”, suggesting that is a likely outcome if society does not make concerted efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions.

According to the researchers who developed it, RCP8.5 was intended to be a “very high baseline emission scenario” representing the 90th percentile of no-policy baseline scenarios available at the time.

The creators of RCP8.5 had not intended it to represent the most likely “business as usual” outcome, emphasising that “no likelihood or preference is attached” to any of the specific scenarios. Its subsequent use as such represents something of a breakdown in communication between energy systems modellers and the climate modelling community.

The literature around the development of RCP8.5 makes it clear that the scenario represents the high-end of possible baseline emissions scenarios rather than the most likely “business as usual” outcome. The original paper outlining the RCPs suggest that there is no reason to think that a high-emission RCP8.5 baseline would be any more likely than a lower emission RCP6.0 baseline in a no-policy world.

However, its position as the only non-mitigation scenario considered in the IPCC AR5 along with relatively poor communication between energy modelling and climate modelling communities led to a widespread misperception both in the media and in the academic literature that RCP8.5 was the expected “business as usual” outcome in a world without any future climate policy.

While worst-case outcomes are important to take into account, particularly given the uncertainties in the magnitude of carbon cycle feedbacks, it is important that they not be considered in isolation. Taking the range of possible baseline outcomes from 6.0 to 8.5 W/m2 forcing would provide a more realistic set of scenarios for studying climate impacts in a no-policy future."
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sidd

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1453 on: August 21, 2019, 08:49:10 PM »
Re:  AR5 definition of pre-industrial global mean surface temperature almost certainly ESLDs (due to historical errors in measured land and sea temperatures);

cite for these errors ?

sidd

AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1454 on: August 21, 2019, 09:13:40 PM »
The recent increase in Amazon basin wildfires is bad news:

Title: "Amazon fires: Record number burning in Brazil rainforest - space agency"

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-49415973

Extract: "Brazil's Amazon rainforest has seen a record number of fires this year, new space agency data suggests.

The National Institute for Space Research (Inpe) said its satellite data showed an 84% increase on the same period in 2018."
« Last Edit: August 21, 2019, 10:39:23 PM by AbruptSLR »
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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1455 on: August 21, 2019, 09:25:40 PM »
Re:  AR5 definition of pre-industrial global mean surface temperature almost certainly ESLDs (due to historical errors in measured land and sea temperatures);

cite for these errors ?

sidd

At a minimum see Reply #724 about Ed Hawkins' work:

Ed Hawkins et al. (2017), "Estimating Changes in Global Temperature since the Preindustrial Period", BAMS, https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-16-0007.1

https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/full/10.1175/BAMS-D-16-0007.1

Also, see Reply #1448, which discusses how the Hadley Centre has recently shown that the SSTA is about 0.1C higher than previously assumed.
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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1456 on: August 21, 2019, 11:32:13 PM »
It is interesting to note that during the Eemian period large areas of the Kara Seas shelf was above freezing, which are currently still frozen (see the accompanying image).  This raises the risk of methane emissions from portions of the Kara Sea shelf as we collectively approach Eemian conditions:

Gavrilov, A., Pavlov, V., Fridenberg, A., Boldyrev, M., Khilimonyuk, V., Pizhankova, E., Buldovich, S., Kosevich, N., Alyautdinov, A., Ogienko, M., Roslyakov, A., Cherbunina, M., and Ospennikov, E.: The Current State and 125 Kyr History of Permafrost in the Kara Sea Shelf: Modeling Constraints, The Cryosphere Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-2019-112, in review, 2019.

https://www.the-cryosphere-discuss.net/tc-2019-112/

Abstract. The evolution of permafrost in the Kara shelf is reconstructed for the past 125 kyr. The work includes zoning of the shelf according to geological history, compiling sea-level and ground temperature scenarios within the distinguished zones, and forward modeling to evaluate the thickness of permafrost and the extent of frozen, cold and unfrozen rocks. The modeling results are correlated to the available field data and are presented as geocryological maps. The formation of frozen, cold, and unfrozen rocks of the region is inferred to depend on the spread of ice sheets, sea level, and duration of shelf freezing and thawing periods.
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AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1457 on: August 21, 2019, 11:46:32 PM »
I note that the linked open access reference finds that during Dansgaard-Oeschger events '… retreat processes to be faster than the buildup processes within a glacial cycle'; primarily due to '… the nonlinear dependence of the SMB on the temperature'.  This should reminds us that when looking a paleo-data what scientists consider to be climate noise can have a marked impact of Earth's coming conditions:

Lu Niu et al. (12 August 2019), "Climate Noise Influences Ice Sheet Mean State", Geophysical Research Letters, https://doi.org/10.1029/2019GL083717

https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2019GL083717

Abstract
Evidence from proxy records indicates that millennial‐scale abrupt climate shifts, called Dansgaard‐Oeschger events, happened during past glacial cycles. Various studies have been conducted to uncover the physical mechanism behind them, based on the assumption that climate mean state determines the variability. However, our study shows that the Dansgaard‐Oeschger events can regulate the mean state of the Northern Hemisphere ice sheets. Sensitivity experiments show that the simulated mean state is influenced by the amplitude of the climatic noise. The most likely cause of this phenomenon is the nonlinear response of the surface mass balance to temperature. It could also cause the retreat processes to be faster than the buildup processes within a glacial cycle. We propose that the climate variability hindered ice sheet development and prevented the Earth system from entering a full glacial state from Marine Isotope Stage 4 to Marine Isotope Stage 3 about 60,000 years ago.
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sidd

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1458 on: August 22, 2019, 06:24:30 AM »
So Hawkins is redefining preindustrial to be 1720-1800 instead of 1850-1900. So of course it would show greater warming, but the underlying observations havent changed. That doesnt mean that sensitivity has gone up, it just means that we compare with a lower baseline.

One difficulty with Hawkins baseline is that measurements are scarcer the further back you go in time. So i can see why people use 1850-1900.

sidd



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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1459 on: August 22, 2019, 07:59:01 AM »
So Hawkins is redefining preindustrial to be 1720-1800 instead of 1850-1900. So of course it would show greater warming, but the underlying observations havent changed. That doesnt mean that sensitivity has gone up, it just means that we compare with a lower baseline.

One difficulty with Hawkins baseline is that measurements are scarcer the further back you go in time. So i can see why people use 1850-1900.

sidd
(bolded text by me)

Hi sidd, I think the pre-industrial baseline should be the best possible approximation of the point where the long term Holocene cooling trend changed because of anthropogenic emissions.
The bolded text in the quote means you have to go further back to the point before that warming. Am I correct in that?
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kassy

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1460 on: August 22, 2019, 03:11:36 PM »
So Hawkins is redefining preindustrial to be 1720-1800 instead of 1850-1900. So of course it would show greater warming, but the underlying observations havent changed. That doesnt mean that sensitivity has gone up, it just means that we compare with a lower baseline.

One difficulty with Hawkins baseline is that measurements are scarcer the further back you go in time. So i can see why people use 1850-1900.

sidd

But Hawkins is working from a more sensible baseline because we know the the 1850-1900 period already includes human influences:

However, some anthropogenic warming is estimated to have already occurred by 1850 (Hegerl et al. 2007; Schurer et al. 2013; Abram et al. 2016) as greenhouse gas concentrations had started increasing around a century earlier (Fig. 1).

Sensitivity did not change but if you start from the wrong baseline it looks lower...

Þetta minnismerki er til vitnis um að við vitum hvað er að gerast og hvað þarf að gera. Aðeins þú veist hvort við gerðum eitthvað.

AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1461 on: August 22, 2019, 04:17:59 PM »
While I have pointed this out numerous times in previous posts, the measured ocean heat content is rising faster than consensus climate scientists previously assumed; particularly in the Southern Ocean.  This confirms both that climate sensitivity is currently higher than consensus climate scientists have been assuming, and that the WAIS has a greater risk of collapse this century than previously assumed:

Title: "Ocean heat hits record high: UN"

https://phys.org/news/2019-03-ocean-high.html

Extract: ""2018 saw new records for ocean heat content in the upper 700 metres," a WMO statement said.

The agency said the UN had data for heat content in the upper 700 metres (2,290 feet) of the ocean dating back to 1955.

Last year also saw new heat records for the ocean's upper 2,000 metres, but data for that range only goes back to 2005.

The previous records for both ranges were set in 2017.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres described the latest findings as "another strong wake-up call" for governments, cities and businesses to take action.

"It proves what we have been saying that climate change is moving faster than our efforts to address it," he said at UN headquarters in New York.

The WMO report said the highest rates of ocean warming are occurring in the southern ocean, where warming has also reached the deepest layers."
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AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1462 on: August 22, 2019, 04:44:07 PM »
So Hawkins is redefining preindustrial to be 1720-1800 instead of 1850-1900. So of course it would show greater warming, but the underlying observations havent changed. That doesnt mean that sensitivity has gone up, it just means that we compare with a lower baseline.

One difficulty with Hawkins baseline is that measurements are scarcer the further back you go in time. So i can see why people use 1850-1900.

sidd

Your posts make it sound like you think that climate uncertainty is your friend; which entitles you to ignore any uncertain data that you feel like doing.  However, the linked article, and the associated image, makes it clear that the Paris Agreement's targets are baselined to mean 'pre-industrial' global temperatures.  Thus, given the uncertainties associated with determining the 'pre-industrial' baseline, the risk is greater that we may have already past the 1.5C target than consensus climate scientists are telling the public and decision makers:

Title: "Uncertainty in warming since pre-industrial times"

https://www.climate-lab-book.ac.uk/2017/uncertainty-in-warming-since-pre-industrial-times/

Extract: "Recent work, such as Hawkins et al. (2017) and Schurer et al. (2017), have looked to assess and quantify this uncertainty in light of future targets. The magnitude of this uncertainty, although small, becomes important when you consider the amount of warming left between today and the 1.5°C target."
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AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1463 on: August 22, 2019, 04:57:00 PM »
The linked article discusses new research indicating that Canada's boreal forest may already be a net source of carbon emissions due to the recent trend of more frequent wildfires:

Title: "Bigger, more frequent wildfires turning Canada’s boreal forest into source of carbon: researchers"

https://globalnews.ca/news/5794851/wildfires-climate-change-boreal-forest/

Extract: "Bigger, hotter wildfires are turning Canada’s vast boreal forest into a significant new source of climate-changing greenhouse gases, scientists say.

The shift, which may have already happened, could force firefighters to change how they battle northern blazes, said Merritt Turetsky, an ecologist at the University of Guelph and co-author of a paper that appeared in the science journal Nature on Wednesday."
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nanning

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1464 on: August 22, 2019, 07:13:25 PM »
<snip>
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres described the latest findings as "another strong wake-up call" for governments, cities and businesses to take action.

"It proves what we have been saying that climate change is moving faster than our efforts to address it," he said at UN headquarters in New York.

The WMO report said the highest rates of ocean warming are occurring in the southern ocean, where warming has also reached the deepest layers."

Consider the bolded text by me.

We do know better by now, don't we? Governments and businesses won't act!
These people must live in some kind of dreamyland.

sorry for being off-topic.
I write this because I think we are in an alarming phase and should sound the alarm. These U.N. people need to wake up to reaity.
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AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1465 on: August 22, 2019, 08:24:19 PM »
The linked reference discusses the negative feedback associated with biogenic volatile organic compounds (BVOCs).  While it is nice that future BVOCs are projected to reduce future global warming by about 13% (assuming that vegetation is not significantly degraded by climate change); we should all remember that the AR5 projections & hind casts do not meaningfully consider the impact of BVOCs; which implies that recent climate sensitivity values are at least 13% higher than reported by AR5 (without considering other feedbacks discounted by AR5 such as cloud feedback).

Sporre, M. K., Blichner, S. M., Karset, I. H. H., Makkonen, R., and Berntsen, T. K.: BVOC–aerosol–climate feedbacks investigated using NorESM, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 4763–4782, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-4763-2019, 2019.

https://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/19/4763/2019/

Abstract

Both higher temperatures and increased CO2 concentrations are (separately) expected to increase the emissions of biogenic volatile organic compounds (BVOCs). This has been proposed to initiate negative climate feedback mechanisms through increased formation of secondary organic aerosol (SOA). More SOA can make the clouds more reflective, which can provide a cooling. Furthermore, the increase in SOA formation has also been proposed to lead to increased aerosol scattering, resulting in an increase in diffuse radiation. This could boost gross primary production (GPP) and further increase BVOC emissions. In this study, we have used the Norwegian Earth System Model (NorESM) to investigate both these feedback mechanisms. Three sets of experiments were set up to quantify the feedback with respect to (1) doubling the CO2, (2) increasing temperatures corresponding to a doubling of CO2 and (3) the combined effect of both doubling CO2 and a warmer climate. For each of these experiments, we ran two simulations, with identical setups, except for the BVOC emissions. One simulation was run with interactive BVOC emissions, allowing the BVOC emissions to respond to changes in CO2 and/or climate. In the other simulation, the BVOC emissions were fixed at present-day conditions, essentially turning the feedback off. The comparison of these two simulations enables us to investigate each step along the feedback as well as estimate their overall relevance for the future climate.

We find that the BVOC feedback can have a significant impact on the climate. The annual global BVOC emissions are up to 63 % higher when the feedback is turned on compared to when the feedback is turned off, with the largest response when both CO2 and climate are changed. The higher BVOC levels lead to the formation of more SOA mass (max 53 %) and result in more particles through increased new particle formation as well as larger particles through increased condensation. The corresponding changes in the cloud properties lead to a −0.43 W m−2 stronger net cloud forcing. This effect becomes about 50 % stronger when the model is run with reduced anthropogenic aerosol emissions, indicating that the feedback will become even more important as we decrease aerosol and precursor emissions. We do not find a boost in GPP due to increased aerosol scattering on a global scale. Instead, the fate of the GPP seems to be controlled by the BVOC effects on the clouds. However, the higher aerosol scattering associated with the higher BVOC emissions is found to also contribute with a potentially important enhanced negative direct forcing (−0.06 W m−2). The global total aerosol forcing associated with the feedback is −0.49 W m−2, indicating that it has the potential to offset about 13 % of the forcing associated with a doubling of CO2.
« Last Edit: August 22, 2019, 09:44:46 PM by AbruptSLR »
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sidd

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1466 on: August 22, 2019, 09:55:44 PM »
Re: preindustrial baseline

There is a large body of work by Ruddiman, whom I have referred to before, arguing that the preindustial baseline should really be a pre-agriculture baseline, since humans began to affect climate around the time agriculture was adopted.

sidd

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1467 on: August 22, 2019, 10:03:12 PM »
Re: climate sensitivity, aerosols

Shouldnt climate sensitivity include all feedbacks including aerosols ? The work on BVOCs indicates that the negative feedback from biogenic aerosols and induced secondary aerosols is a 13% stronger negative feedback than previously assumed, so that naively one might say that the non aerosol feedbacks ought to be that much more positive. But the devil is in the details, these individual feedbacks cannot be considered in isolation, for they combine non linearly. So it is probably  incorrect to say that one can simply subtract the BVOC effect from the remainder and get a 13% increase ... the climate effects are not a simple sum of individual effects.

sidd

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1468 on: August 22, 2019, 11:28:16 PM »
Re: climate sensitivity, aerosols

Shouldnt climate sensitivity include all feedbacks including aerosols ? The work on BVOCs indicates that the negative feedback from biogenic aerosols and induced secondary aerosols is a 13% stronger negative feedback than previously assumed, so that naively one might say that the non aerosol feedbacks ought to be that much more positive. But the devil is in the details, these individual feedbacks cannot be considered in isolation, for they combine non linearly. So it is probably  incorrect to say that one can simply subtract the BVOC effect from the remainder and get a 13% increase ... the climate effects are not a simple sum of individual effects.

sidd

The IPCC classifies aerosols in the same category as GHGs as a radiative forcing component, rather than as a feedback.
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AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1469 on: August 22, 2019, 11:30:59 PM »
Re: preindustrial baseline

There is a large body of work by Ruddiman, whom I have referred to before, arguing that the preindustial baseline should really be a pre-agriculture baseline, since humans began to affect climate around the time agriculture was adopted.

sidd

However, the Paris Agreement does not define targets from a pre-agricultural baseline, but rather from a pre-industrial baseline.
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Tom_Mazanec

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1470 on: August 23, 2019, 01:35:14 AM »
Re: climate sensitivity, aerosols

Shouldnt climate sensitivity include all feedbacks including aerosols ? The work on BVOCs indicates that the negative feedback from biogenic aerosols and induced secondary aerosols is a 13% stronger negative feedback than previously assumed, so that naively one might say that the non aerosol feedbacks ought to be that much more positive. But the devil is in the details, these individual feedbacks cannot be considered in isolation, for they combine non linearly. So it is probably  incorrect to say that one can simply subtract the BVOC effect from the remainder and get a 13% increase ... the climate effects are not a simple sum of individual effects.

sidd

The IPCC classifies aerosols in the same category as GHGs as a radiative forcing component, rather than as a feedback.

WOW! Total RF nearly doubled 1950-1989, then nearly doubled again by 2011.

sidd

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1471 on: August 23, 2019, 01:40:20 AM »
I fear the Paris agreement doesnt spell out what the preindustrial baseline is ...

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1472 on: August 23, 2019, 06:51:41 AM »
The linked reference discusses the negative feedback associated with biogenic volatile organic compounds (BVOCs).
<snip>

I had to look up VOCs:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volatile_organic_compound
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Shared Humanity

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1473 on: August 23, 2019, 02:35:52 PM »
The linked article discusses new research indicating that Canada's boreal forest may already be a net source of carbon emissions due to the recent trend of more frequent wildfires:

Title: "Bigger, more frequent wildfires turning Canada’s boreal forest into source of carbon: researchers"

https://globalnews.ca/news/5794851/wildfires-climate-change-boreal-forest/

Extract: "Bigger, hotter wildfires are turning Canada’s vast boreal forest into a significant new source of climate-changing greenhouse gases, scientists say.

The shift, which may have already happened, could force firefighters to change how they battle northern blazes, said Merritt Turetsky, an ecologist at the University of Guelph and co-author of a paper that appeared in the science journal Nature on Wednesday."

I believe that we need to better understand the natural shifts in ecosystems that will occur due to warming and assist in this transition so as to mitigate the damage done during the transition. For example if warming and drying in a region will result in existing forest turning into grasslands and the natural mechanism is forest fires, we should clear cut these regions, preventing fires, securing this carbon in the now logged trees and encourage a more rapid transition to healthy grassland ecosystems.

If the thawing of permafrost in northern regions will result in the slow transition from boreal forests to wetlands and the transition is achieved in large part by fires in the decaying forest, we should again assist in the clearing of forest to speed this natural transition. This could minimize the damage to peatlands caused by these ridiculously hot forest fires.
« Last Edit: August 23, 2019, 02:49:21 PM by Shared Humanity »

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1474 on: August 23, 2019, 03:45:25 PM »
Unfortunately the changes are faster than we can study them...

rboyd

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1475 on: August 23, 2019, 06:28:09 PM »
Unfortunately the changes are faster than we can study them...

We have a scientific process designed for a stable Earth System, now being rapidly left behind by that system.

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1476 on: August 23, 2019, 07:12:59 PM »
The scientific method is the same regardless the phenomena. However it might be too late to define baseline and departure from baseline for a lot of ecosystems as they are changing rapidly.

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1477 on: August 25, 2019, 05:45:37 PM »
The attached image of MODIS/NASA fire radiative forcing in the Amazon thru August 23, 2019, makes it clear that so far this year is exhibiting atypically high number of wildfires in the Amazon.
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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1478 on: August 25, 2019, 06:14:12 PM »
Thank you for that graph ASLR :).
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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1479 on: August 26, 2019, 05:06:16 PM »
The linked Axios article cites several reasons as to why it has been so difficult to make progress reducing global fossil fuel consumption.  To the examples cited in the article I note that the fossil fuel industry would like to get Trump reelected in 2020, and thus has its US refineries working at historical levels of output; which has helped drive average gasoline prices down by 25 cents in America as compared to the same time last year.

Title: "Why climate change is so hard to tackle: Our stubborn energy system"

https://www.axios.com/why-climate-change-is-so-hard-to-tackle-our-stubborn-energy-system-6c8fc596-3c47-477a-82aa-cd00f063c9a0.html

Extract: "The big picture: In 1987, 81% of our world’s energy consumption came from oil, natural gas and coal. Thirty years later, it is still 81% — despite the incredible increase in wind and solar energy, according to the International Energy Agency.

Global fossil-fuel companies have built powerful political operations to lobby governments to maintain subsidies and oppose big climate policy."
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vox_mundi

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1480 on: August 26, 2019, 05:08:17 PM »
First mega-city casualty to sea-level rise ...

Indonesia Builds New Capital City in Borneo as Jakarta Sinks Into the Java Sea
https://phys.org/news/2019-08-indonesia-borneo-island-capital.html



Indonesia will move its capital to the eastern edge of jungle-clad Borneo island, President Joko Widodo said Monday, as the country shifts its political heart away from congested and sinking megalopolis Jakarta.

The proposed location—near the regional cities of Balikpapan and Samarinda—is an area at "minimal" risk of natural disasters, where the government already owns some 180,000 hectares (445,000 acres) of land, he added.

Quote
"Jakarta will continue to be a megacity—as a centre for finance and commerce—for a few more decades, but ultimately it is at severe risk to climate change"

... Building is set to begin next year with the move of some 1.5 million civil servants slated to begin by 2024, at a cost of 466 trillion rupiah ($33 billion), officials said.

... The new site known as Kalimantan, Indonesia's section of Borneo—the island it shares with Malaysia and Brunei—is home to major mining activities as well as rainforests, and is one of the few places on Earth with orangutans in their natural habitat.

This region has also been blanketed in choking haze from annual forest fires that ravage vast swathes of land.

« Last Edit: August 26, 2019, 06:38:50 PM by vox_mundi »
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AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1481 on: August 26, 2019, 05:28:09 PM »
GOP lobbyists are not only pushing for continued/increased use of fossil fuel, they are also pushing to convert the world's largest rainforest into agribusiness and mining:

Title: "GOP Lobbyists Help Brazil Recruit U.S. Companies to Exploit the Amazon"

https://theintercept.com/2019/08/23/gop-lobbyists-help-brazil-recruit-u-s-companies-to-exploit-the-amazon/

Extract: "This summer, fires are being used to clear wide swaths of the Amazon at an unprecedented rate. One-fifth of the Amazon has already been destroyed in the past 50 years; further industrialization of the rainforest risks destroying another fifth, a loss that would be catastrophic for the global ecosystem.

The disaster is widely blamed on interests seeking to clear the world’s largest rainforest for cattle ranching, mining, and export-focused agribusiness. Documents reveal that those interests are being pushed in the U.S. by Republican lobbyists, friendly with President Donald Trump’s administration, who entered into talks with the Brazilian government to promote corporate investment in the Amazon."
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AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1482 on: August 26, 2019, 05:45:26 PM »
To me the attached Sentinel image (from August 26, 2019) of the Pine Island Ice Shelf calving face indicates that the glacial ice to the northeast and to the southwest of the crevasse indicated by the red arrow are progressively rotating (clockwise to the northeast and counterclockwise to the southwest); which as some point in the not too distant future will result in a major calving event.
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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1483 on: August 26, 2019, 11:33:25 PM »
The linked reference, and associated article, indicate that ocean acidification is shrinking the size of phytoplankton; which, will act as a positive feedback to further accelerate climate change:

Katherina Petrou et al. (2019), "Acidification diminishes diatom silica production in the Southern Ocean", Nature Climate Change, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-019-0557-y

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-019-0557-y

Abstract: "Diatoms, large bloom-forming marine microorganisms, build frustules out of silicate, which ballasts the cells and aids their export to the deep ocean. This unique physiology forges an important link between the marine silicon and carbon cycles. However, the effect of ocean acidification on the silicification of diatoms is unclear. Here we show that diatom silicification strongly diminishes with increased acidity in a natural Antarctic community. Analyses of single cells from within the community reveal that the effect of reduced pH on silicification differs among taxa, with several species having significantly reduced silica incorporation at CO2 levels equivalent to those projected for 2100. These findings suggest that, before the end of this century, ocean acidification may influence the carbon and silicon cycle by both altering the composition of the diatom assemblages and reducing cell ballasting, which will probably alter vertical flux of these elements to the deep ocean."

See also:

Title: "Acid oceans are shrinking plankton, fueling faster climate change"

https://theconversation.com/acid-oceans-are-shrinking-plankton-fuelling-faster-climate-change-121443

Extract: "In our study we discovered increased seawater acidity reduced Antarctic phytoplanktons’ ability to build strong cell walls, making them smaller and less effective at storing carbon. At current rates of seawater acidification, we could see this effect before the end of the century."
“It is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive but those who can best manage change.”
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AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1484 on: August 27, 2019, 04:50:54 PM »
The linked reference confirms that chronically drained peatlands have reduced capacity and stability to function as a carbon sink.  Thus, wildfires are just one of several ways to accelerate carbon contributions from peatlands toward climate change:

C.A. Stricker et al. (22 August 2019), "Carbon chemistry of intact versus chronically drained peatlands in the southeastern USA", JGR Biogeosciences, https://doi.org/10.1029/2019JG005079

https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1029/2019JG005079?af=R

Abstract: "The Great Dismal Swamp (GDS) is a large temperate swamp in Virginia/North Carolina with peat soils historically resistant to microbial decomposition. However, this peatland has been subject to ~200 years of disturbance during which extensive drainage, fire suppression, and wide‐spread logging have increased decomposition and dramatically decreased the distribution of Atlantic white cedar (AWC). The purpose of this study was to determine the impact of long‐term drainage and AWC loss on the carbon chemistry of GDS peats. Peat cores were collected from three drained GDS vegetation communities (pocosin, AWC, and red maple‐black gum) and compared to cores collected from an intact, undrained AWC peatland at the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge (AR) in North Carolina, USA. The AR peats had higher lignin content in the deeper peat intervals, and lignin content and % organic carbon were largely invariant with depth compared to the GDS peats. The concentrations of syringyl group phenols were greater in the surface layers of GDS peats, likely reflecting the selective removal of AWC and transition from gymnosperms to angiosperms. Acid to aldehyde ratios for vanillyl and syringyl group phenols indicated that the GDS peats were more decomposed, particularly at depth, and that this occurred under aerobic conditions. Moreover, solid state 13C NMR confirmed a coincident loss of carbohydrates and increase in recalcitrant byproducts of carbohydrate degradation with depth. These data indicate that long‐term drainage has accelerated the decomposition of peat at the GDS, reducing the capacity and stability of the carbon sink."
“It is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive but those who can best manage change.”
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AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1485 on: August 27, 2019, 05:26:59 PM »
The linked article sheds some light as to why so many consensus climate scientists err on the side of least drama (ESLD) w.r.t. climate change projections; in that society rewards them for focusing on each one of their specialist silos, while pressuring them to leave systemic evaluations to the 'decision makers'; which results in a tyranny of small decisions.  Consensus climate scientists gain authority by succumbing to the reductionist tendency to deal with the complexities of Earth Systems by focusing on the use of deductive reasoning at the expense of logic systems that acknowledge uncertainty such as inductive and abductive (which is popular for machine learning) reasoning.  Many authoritarian decision makers prefer/reward such reductionist tendencies in consensus climate science because it allows them to convey a sense of closure to the populace, while avoiding the effort required to evaluate the risks associated with 'known unknowns' and 'unknown unknowns' that are hallmarks of progressive/inclusive decision making.  Obviously, to counter the 'tyranny of small decisions' of consensus climate scientists, extra effort/work is required to gain a more global perspective with regards to: a) systemic risk assessments; b) more frequent use of both inductive and abductive reasoning; and c) looking at risks from multiple perspectives:


Title: "Tyranny of small decisions"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyranny_of_small_decisions

Extract: "The tyranny of small decisions is a phenomenon explored in an essay of the same name, published in 1966 by the American economist Alfred E. Kahn. The article describes a situation in which a number of decisions, individually small and insignificant in size and time perspective, cumulatively result in a larger and significant outcome which is neither optimal nor desired.

In 1982, the estuarine ecologist, William Odum, published a paper where he extended the notion of the tyranny of small decisions to environmental issues. According to Odum, "much of the current confusion and distress surrounding environmental issues can be traced to decisions that were never consciously made, but simply resulted from a series of small decisions."

'Considering all of the pressures and short-term rewards that guide society toward simple solutions, it seems safe to assume that the "tyranny of small decisions" will be an integral part of environmental policy for a long time to come.' – William Odum

An obvious counter to the tyranny of small decisions is to develop and protect appropriate upper levels of decision making. Depending on the issue, decision-making may be appropriate at a local, state, country or global level. However, organisations at these levels can entangle themselves in their own bureaucracy and politics, assigning decisions by default back to the lower levels. Political and scientific systems can encourage small decisions by rewarding specific problems and solutions. It is usually easier and more politic to make decisions on individual tracts of land or single issues rather than implementing large-scale policies. The same pattern applies with academic science. Most scientists are more comfortable working on specific problems rather than systems. This reductionist tendency towards the small problems is reinforced in the way grant monies and academic tenure are assigned.

Odum advocates that at least some scientists should study systems so the negative consequences that result when many small decisions are made from a limited perspective can be avoided. There is a similar need for politicians and planners to understand large-scale perspectives. Environmental science teachers should include large-scale processes in their courses, with examples of the problems that decision making at inappropriate levels can introduce."

« Last Edit: August 27, 2019, 05:36:12 PM by AbruptSLR »
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AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1486 on: August 27, 2019, 05:45:22 PM »
The linked article indicates that the IEA (International Energy Agency) believes that it will be harder to shutdown new coal plants than current consensus planners are anticipating, as these new coal plants provide a 'lifeline' to many people in developing countries.

Title: "IEA: New coal plants are a "blind spot" in climate change debate"

https://www.axios.com/international-energy-agency-coal-plants-702c6073-f07a-4b99-9af3-72bc96b87ee7.html

Extract: "The International Energy Agency (IEA) will analyze the climate change and economic costs of the world’s coal plants in its 2019 world energy outlook, set for release in November, the agency's top official told Axios in a recent interview.

Why it matters: "There is an important problem here," said IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol. "The existing infrastructure provides a lifeline to people in developing countries, but at the same time, it’s the single most important driver of global carbon dioxide emissions."

Those plants in particular are what Birol calls a “blind spot” in our climate and energy debate, given they are likely to be emitting for decades longer."
« Last Edit: August 28, 2019, 06:10:50 PM by AbruptSLR »
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AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1487 on: August 28, 2019, 08:24:23 PM »
The linked op/ed. piece makes it clear that it is not only fossil fuel companies that are implicated in slowing progress in the fight against climate change, but also Big Ag companies:

Title: "Big Ag Is Sabotaging Progress on Climate Change"

https://www.wired.com/story/big-ag-is-sabotaging-progress-on-climate-change/

Extract: "The IPCC identifies a range of impacts on land, water, and other natural resources, and offers a set of welcome if unsurprising recommendations to both reduce the contributions of our food systems to climate change and adapt to feed a global population expected to grow to nearly 10 billion by 2050. They include: Stop draining wetlands to grow biofuels; reduce demand for beef and strengthen regulations to prevent deforestation in critical areas like the Amazon; cut food waste, which now squanders one-third of consumable food; reduce excessive fertilizer use; and improve cropping systems to turn croplands from heavy greenhouse-gas emitters to carbon sinks.

As with most UN climate proposals, these seem like common sense, yet little seems to change. The reason is clear: the corporate interests threatened by such reforms are large and dominant, and they use their undue influence over governments to prevent progress.

In this case, it’s not fossil fuel companies that are most strongly implicated, it’s agribusinesses. As I repeatedly found in five years of research for my recent book, they are a powerful obstacle to change, they are only getting more powerful, and they have hijacked government policies all over the world to advance their interests."
“It is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive but those who can best manage change.”
― Leon C. Megginson

AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1488 on: August 28, 2019, 08:42:59 PM »
Currently, the phytoplankton in the Southern Ocean acts as a major carbon sink; however, I wonder whether the potential abrupt freshening of the Southern Ocean surface seawater, might turn this major sink into a carbon source if the WAIS were to significantly collapse in the coming decades:

Stacy L. Deppeler & Andrew T. Davidson (16 February 2017), "Southern Ocean Phytoplankton in a Changing Climate", Front. Mar. Sci., https://doi.org/10.3389/fmars.2017.00040

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmars.2017.00040/full

Extract: "Phytoplankton are the base of the Antarctic food web, sustain the wealth and diversity of life for which Antarctica is renowned, and play a critical role in biogeochemical cycles that mediate global climate. Over the vast expanse of the Southern Ocean (SO), the climate is variously predicted to experience increased warming, strengthening wind, acidification, shallowing mixed layer depths, increased light (and UV), changes in upwelling and nutrient replenishment, declining sea ice, reduced salinity, and the southward migration of ocean fronts. These changes are expected to alter the structure and function of phytoplankton communities in the SO. The diverse environments contained within the vast expanse of the SO will be impacted differently by climate change; causing the identity and the magnitude of environmental factors driving biotic change to vary within and among bioregions. Predicting the net effect of multiple climate-induced stressors over a range of environments is complex. Yet understanding the response of SO phytoplankton to climate change is vital if we are to predict the future state/s of the ecosystem, estimate the impacts on fisheries and endangered species, and accurately predict the effects of physical and biotic change in the SO on global climate. This review looks at the major environmental factors that define the structure and function of phytoplankton communities in the SO, examines the forecast changes in the SO environment, predicts the likely effect of these changes on phytoplankton, and considers the ramifications for trophodynamics and feedbacks to global climate change. Predictions strongly suggest that all regions of the SO will experience changes in phytoplankton productivity and community composition with climate change. The nature, and even the sign, of these changes varies within and among regions and will depend upon the magnitude and sequence in which these environmental changes are imposed. It is likely that predicted changes to phytoplankton communities will affect SO biogeochemistry, carbon export, and nutrition for higher trophic levels."
“It is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive but those who can best manage change.”
― Leon C. Megginson

AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1489 on: August 28, 2019, 11:47:14 PM »
A Minsky moment is a sudden, major collapse of asset values which generates a business cycle; and the linked article(s) indicate that climate-relate risks (CRRs); could cause a Minsky moment in the coming decades; as our current financial institutions have previously not considered CRRs in their planned:

Title: "Research on climate-related risks and financial stability: An "epistemological break"?"; based on remarks by Mr Luiz Awazu Pereira da Silva, Deputy General Manager of the BIS, at the Conference of the Central Banks and Supervisors Network for Greening the Financial System (NGFS), Paris, 17 April 2019.

https://www.bis.org/speeches/sp190523.htm

Extract: "A growing body of research and studies by academics, central banks, the NGFS and institutions such as the BIS focus on climate-related risks (CRRs). This work is helping to trace the links between the effects of climate change (CC), or global warming, and the stability of our financial sectors. The potential financial consequences of CRRs amount to a new form of systemic risk with implications for financial stability. Since financial stability has been explicitly or implicitly incorporated into the post-crisis mandate of many central banks, they have become more concerned with CRRs.

In a nutshell, what is happening with the repricing of climate-related risk in the financial sector is perhaps an illustration, as applied to financial risk management, of Bachelard's "epistemological break".  Our financial risk models used to neglect the CC dimension of investments, assuming that the impact of CRR on profitability, returns and financial health would be negligible. Such views probably need to be revised in line with new evidence.

The epistemological break or paradigm shift is happening because CRR is changing the perception of the financial consequences of CC. Agents are increasingly aware that the CRR consequences they thought lay in the distant future are now much closer. CC poses, including for the financial sector, a clear and present danger. The ongoing repricing is changing the terms of the "tragedy of the horizon". The horizon has been brought forward. This is good news, but it also raises the possibility of a CC-related "Minsky moment" of financial fragility."

See also:

https://www.unepfi.org/climate-change/climate-change/

Extract: "Climate change is referred to by leading economists as the greatest market failure in human history, with potentially disruptive implications on the social well-being, economic development, and financial stability of current and future generations: conservative estimates see unabated climate change leading to global costs equivalent to losing in-between 5 to 20% of global gross domestic product (GDP) each year, now and forever."
“It is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive but those who can best manage change.”
― Leon C. Megginson

Human Habitat Index

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1490 on: August 29, 2019, 01:59:51 AM »
A Minsky moment is a sudden, major collapse of asset values which generates a business cycle; and the linked article(s) indicate that climate-relate risks (CRRs); could cause a Minsky moment in the coming decades; as our current financial institutions have previously not considered CRRs in their planned:

Title: "Research on climate-related risks and financial stability: An "epistemological break"?"; based on remarks by Mr Luiz Awazu Pereira da Silva, Deputy General Manager of the BIS, at the Conference of the Central Banks and Supervisors Network for Greening the Financial System (NGFS), Paris, 17 April 2019.

https://www.bis.org/speeches/sp190523.htm

Extract: "A growing body of research and studies by academics, central banks, the NGFS and institutions such as the BIS focus on climate-related risks (CRRs). This work is helping to trace the links between the effects of climate change (CC), or global warming, and the stability of our financial sectors. The potential financial consequences of CRRs amount to a new form of systemic risk with implications for financial stability. Since financial stability has been explicitly or implicitly incorporated into the post-crisis mandate of many central banks, they have become more concerned with CRRs.

In a nutshell, what is happening with the repricing of climate-related risk in the financial sector is perhaps an illustration, as applied to financial risk management, of Bachelard's "epistemological break".  Our financial risk models used to neglect the CC dimension of investments, assuming that the impact of CRR on profitability, returns and financial health would be negligible. Such views probably need to be revised in line with new evidence.

The epistemological break or paradigm shift is happening because CRR is changing the perception of the financial consequences of CC. Agents are increasingly aware that the CRR consequences they thought lay in the distant future are now much closer. CC poses, including for the financial sector, a clear and present danger. The ongoing repricing is changing the terms of the "tragedy of the horizon". The horizon has been brought forward. This is good news, but it also raises the possibility of a CC-related "Minsky moment" of financial fragility."

See also:

https://www.unepfi.org/climate-change/climate-change/

Extract: "Climate change is referred to by leading economists as the greatest market failure in human history, with potentially disruptive implications on the social well-being, economic development, and financial stability of current and future generations: conservative estimates see unabated climate change leading to global costs equivalent to losing in-between 5 to 20% of global gross domestic product (GDP) each year, now and forever."

The economy is a subset of the ecology period.

Ecology - Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Ecology
Ecology (from Greek: οἶκος, "house", or "environment"; -λογία, "study of") is a branch of biology that studies the interactions among organisms and their biophysical environment, which includes both biotic and abiotic components.

Economy - Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Economy
An economy (from Greek οίκος – "household" and νέμoμαι – "manage") is an area of the production, distribution, or trade, and consumption of goods and services by different agents.

2020 30 year bonds expire in 2050.

According to the IPCC we will have zero emissions and technology to take co2 out of the atmosphere by then. Bulldust !

Who is going to buy these bonds ?

This effect is already showing up with perverse negative interest rates and inverted yields where short term bonds pay more interest tham long term bonds.

Economic collapse is imminent.

Then we have a sudden spike in temperatures due to loss of aerosol masking effect (from a dramatic contraction in economic activity) setting off a gaggle of tipping points.

Game over.

My educational background is in economics and law, after following environmental politics since the early 80s I reached this opinion in 2011 because after Copenhagen I realized that the IPCC was just smoke and mirrors that had not even taken into account methane calthrates and other tipping points.

Events since then have vindicated my decision to drop out of economic society, as indeed changes have occurred faster than the IPCC projected and are occurring faster and faster.
There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance. That principle is contempt prior to investigation. - Herbert Spencer

nanning

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1491 on: August 29, 2019, 05:59:22 AM »
Thanks for the new posts ASLR. Sobering.

Quote
conservative estimates see unabated climate change leading to global costs equivalent to losing in-between 5 to 20% of global gross domestic product (GDP) each year, now and forever."

:o
That's not a good prospect. I wonder how rich world governments will still be able to grow their economies (off-topic).

Makes you think.
"It is preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else, that prevents us from living freely and nobly" - Bertrand Russell
"It is preoccupation with what other people from your groups think of you, that prevents you from living freely and nobly" - Nanning
Why do you keep accumulating stuff?

Tony Mcleod

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1492 on: August 29, 2019, 08:53:44 AM »
Thanks for your tireless compiling and analysis AbruptSLR.

gerontocrat

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1493 on: August 29, 2019, 02:37:43 PM »
Thanks for the new posts ASLR. Sobering.

Quote
conservative estimates see unabated climate change leading to global costs equivalent to losing in-between 5 to 20% of global gross domestic product (GDP) each year, now and forever."

:o
That's not a good prospect. I wonder how rich world governments will still be able to grow their economies (off-topic).

Makes you think.
The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) is also known as "The Central Bankers' Bank". They don't speak publicly very often, and when they do, one should take note.

As early as 2004 they were warning about reckless lending putting undue strain on the world's financial systems. By golly, they were right. And if you think that things have been fixed since 2008-2009 you may wish to consider if negative interest rates for savers is a sign of health.

It is not off-topic, as like it or not, a functioning world financial system is required to assemble the very large amounts of capital required for the projects needed to avoid runaway Global Heating, and climate costs, direct and indirect, are already damaging various financial markets already.

The BIS has just told us that the light at the end of the tunnel is the searchlight on the express train thundering towards us. But when will we see an "epistemological break"? Things have a habit of staggering along sort of OK like a Detroit Clunker- until suddenly they don't.
"Para a Causa do Povo a Luta Continua!"
"And that's all I'm going to say about that". Forrest Gump
"Damn, I wanted to see what happened next" (Epitaph)

AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1494 on: August 29, 2019, 04:05:09 PM »
In numerous previous posts, I have recommended that climate scientists take a more holistic/systemic review of climate change risks in the coming decades; and I imagine that consensus climate scientists, for example, feel very comfortable about the comprehensive nature of their SSP radiative forcing scenarios.  However, all of the SSP scenarios assume some sort of rational behavior on the part of decision makers; while the three linked article illustrate that this assumption likely errs on the side of least drama (ESLD):

Title: "EPA poised to roll back Obama-era methane regulations"

https://www.axios.com/methane-regulation-rollbacks-climate-change-epa-0c0aeb58-f666-4cad-bead-9b78408f9ace.html

Extract: "The Environmental Protection Agency is expected to unveil proposed rules Thursday that are designed to ease Obama-era rules on methane emissions from oil-and-gas business."

&

Title: "How Russia and China are preparing to exploit a warming planet"

https://www.politico.com/story/2019/08/29/russia-china-climate-change-1691698

Extract: "As Arctic ice melts, Russia stands to gain access to oil and gas fields historically locked beneath northern ice — and is building up capability to launch cruise missiles from newly navigable waters to threaten America's coastlines.

As polar seaways open up, China is eyeing a new “Polar Silk Road” — shorter shipping routes that could cut weeks off of shipping times from Asia to Europe.

And as drought drives more farmers and herders off their lands, extremist groups in Africa and the Middle East are finding fresh recruits."

&

Title: "Alaska's cloudy crude oil future"

https://www.axios.com/alaska-crude-oil-bp-sale-hilcorp-a5f78a54-fe3b-4f82-810c-eed431637801.html

Extract: "BP's decision to offload its Alaska holdings highlights the uncertainty around whether the state — once at the heart of U.S. production — will ever regain its crude mojo.

Why it matters: Hints of the answer will come when the Interior Department sells leases in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge as soon as this year, after a 2017 GOP tax bill opened the region following decades of political battles. It could hold over 10 billion barrels of oil in a state where the oil industry is a large part of its economic well-being.

The state has lots of oil in other areas of the North Slope, including the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A), which is one of the places where the state's biggest producer ConocoPhillips has acreage."
“It is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive but those who can best manage change.”
― Leon C. Megginson

AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1495 on: August 29, 2019, 04:44:23 PM »
...
It is not off-topic, as like it or not, a functioning world financial system is required to assemble the very large amounts of capital required for the projects needed to avoid runaway Global Heating, and climate costs, direct and indirect, are already damaging various financial markets already.

The BIS has just told us that the light at the end of the tunnel is the searchlight on the express train thundering towards us. But when will we see an "epistemological break"? Things have a habit of staggering along sort of OK like a Detroit Clunker- until suddenly they don't.

When Steve Bannon was still in office he retained Nicholas Taleb (the author of the book: "Antifragility: Things that Gain from Disorder"), to develop ideas that could be (were) used to justify defunding climate science in America, in order to reduce the systemic fragility associated with over managing both the climate and over managing socio-economic systems in order to reduce GHG emissions.

To me this is but one example of how the alt-right plans/proposes to adapt to climate change by pushing the burden of climate risks on to 'others', whether: scientific institutions, poor people, or third world countries (see the following linked article). 

Title: "The Intersection of Global Fragility and Climate Risks"

https://www.climatelinks.org/resources/intersection-global-fragility-and-climate-risks

Extract: "States with high exposure to climate hazards face multi-faceted challenges, including physical and livelihood risks for the population that may force states to redirect scarce resources to adaptation or humanitarian response efforts and strain the capacity of states …"

In this regard, the alt-right seems to believe that a black swan ("epistemological break") event for the turkey is not a black swan event for the butcher; as in a last resort they seem to believe that the first world can always just implement geoengineering if/when they see third world countries buckling under a combination of global and climate stresses in the coming ten to twenty years.

Unfortunately, as you point out, the first world likely will not have sufficient money (nor knowledge) to successfully implement such technological silver bullets as geoengineering.  Furthermore, it is my opinion that by circa 2035, the first world countries will be subject to the same type of "epistemological break" that I suspect will hit many third world countries in the next ten years, due to such factors as the aging of the first world population (see the attached images for aging trends of the US population).
« Last Edit: August 29, 2019, 04:58:33 PM by AbruptSLR »
“It is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive but those who can best manage change.”
― Leon C. Megginson

FishOutofWater

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1496 on: August 29, 2019, 05:05:45 PM »
Negative interest rates mean that there is money available right now to invest in solutions that will reduce or mitigate climate change, but not the incentives or the will to do so.

The problem is that we in the west are thinking like old people or we think we are exempt from the laws of nature because of our technology and wealth. The Bannon ideas are an obnoxious combination of both.

Russia is a very cold nation which will see some major benefits (longer growing seasons) from a warming climate as well as some major problems (fires and permafrost collapse). Because Russia's main source of foreign exchange is oil and gas, Putin is doing whatever it takes to keep drilling and exploiting oil and gas, climate be damned.

China is trying to adapt to climate change but will have major water problems because of it. China will benefit from developing green energy and they are working hard on improved green tech.

The U.S. is dysfunctional because old right wing assholes are running the show. We can do better. Climate destabilization is hurting U.S. farmers badly and stronger storms are savaging our coastlines. We are acting like old fools in the U.S.A.

AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1497 on: August 29, 2019, 05:18:08 PM »

The U.S. is dysfunctional because old right wing assholes are running the show.
...

Decision makers would do well to recognized that the growing North American trend to produce shale oil & gas by fracking will result in an ever-increasing number of abandoned oil and gas wells, that will particularly leak methane for decades/centuries to come.  Also, I note that the US Federal government has just eliminated federal regulations requiring industry to plug such leaks; so, unless states fill this regulatory gap, we can expect methane emissions to continue from leaks for the foreseeable future:

Title: "As abandoned oil wells climb, regulators consider ways to stop problem from worsening"

https://bismarcktribune.com/bakken/as-abandoned-oil-wells-climb-regulators-consider-ways-to-stop/article_58c39a16-73a1-5592-ba5f-fc7c9c50cbcd.html#tracking-source=home-top-story-1

Extract: "The number of abandoned oil and gas wells in North Dakota has grown 10% over the past two years to more than 700 amid low oil prices, and state regulators are considering new rules to try to keep the problem from getting worse."
« Last Edit: August 29, 2019, 11:03:21 PM by AbruptSLR »
“It is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive but those who can best manage change.”
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gerontocrat

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1498 on: August 29, 2019, 05:44:31 PM »
If a storm surge from Hurricane Dorian does combine with a load of rain and a king tide, some very expensive beachfront property owned by some very rich people is going to look a bit damaged. It will also be Florida's third major hurricane in 3 years.

Or is denial so deep that thought processes are completely anaesthetized to all climate events? Mind you, insurance rates will rise again - many more of the homes of the less well-off will become uninsured. To quote AbruptSLR
Quote
.....how the alt-right plans/proposes to adapt to climate change by pushing the burden of climate risks on to 'others', whether: scientific institutions, poor people, or third world countries 
"Para a Causa do Povo a Luta Continua!"
"And that's all I'm going to say about that". Forrest Gump
"Damn, I wanted to see what happened next" (Epitaph)

AbruptSLR

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Re: Ice Apocalypse - MULTIPLE METERS SEA LEVEL RISE (narrated video)
« Reply #1499 on: August 29, 2019, 07:18:54 PM »
The linked reference (& associated article) make it clear the consensus climate scientists have underestimated methane emissions for US cities by at least a factor of two:

Genevieve Plant et al. (15 July 2019), "Large Fugitive Methane Emissions From Urban Centers Along the U.S. East Coast", Geophysical Research Letters, https://doi.org/10.1029/2019GL082635

https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2019GL082635

Abstract
Urban emissions remain an underexamined part of the methane budget. Here we present and interpret aircraft observations of six old and leak‐prone major cities along the East Coast of the United States. We use direct observations of methane (CH4), carbon dioxide (CO2), carbon monoxide (CO), ethane (C2H6), and their correlations to quantify CH4 emissions and attribute to natural gas. We find the five largest cities emit 0.85 (0.63, 1.12) Tg CH4/year, of which 0.75 (0.49, 1.10) Tg CH4/year is attributed to natural gas. Our estimates, which include all thermogenic methane sources including end use, are more than twice that reported in the most recent gridded EPA inventory, which does not include end‐use emissions. These results highlight that current urban inventory estimates of natural gas emissions are substantially low, either due to underestimates of leakage, lack of inclusion of end‐use emissions, or some combination thereof.

Plain Language Summary
Recent efforts to quantify fugitive methane associated with the oil and gas sector, with a particular focus on production, have resulted in significant revisions upward of emission estimates. In comparison, however, there has been limited focus on urban methane emissions. Given the volume of gas distributed and used in cities, urban losses can impact national‐level emissions. In this study we use aircraft observations of methane, carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, and ethane to determine characteristic correlation slopes, enabling quantification of urban methane emissions and attribution to natural gas. We sample nearly 12% of the U.S. population and 4 of the 10 most populous cities, focusing on older, leak‐prone urban centers. Emission estimates are more than twice the total in the U.S. EPA inventory for these regions and are predominantly attributed to fugitive natural gas losses. Current estimates for methane emissions from the natural gas supply chain appear to require revision upward, in part possibly by including end‐use emissions, to account for these urban losses.

See also:

Title: "Airborne research shows East Coast cities emitting twice as much methane as estimated"

https://news.agu.org/press-release/airborne-research-shows-east-coast-cities-emitting-twice-as-much-methane-as-estimated/

Extract: "Now, a new study in the AGU journal Geophysical Research Letters using an instrumented airplane has found unexpectedly large emissions over five major cities along the East Coast – twice the total amount of methane and almost 10 times the amount estimated from natural gas."
“It is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive but those who can best manage change.”
― Leon C. Megginson