The monthly global temperature records just keep falling…
Despite no El Nino declared, an extraordinarily hot global ocean surface keeps dumping heat back into the atmosphere. This transfer resulted in the hottest March-through-May period in the global record and has pushed numerous record spikes in the global measures this summer. By August, according to NASA, the global average had again climbed to never-before-seen levels.
As of yesterday’s report, NASA showed that the Global Land-Ocean Surface Temperature Index had climbed to 0.70 degrees Celsius above the mid 20th Century average and about 0.95 degrees Celsius above the 1880s average. The previous record high for the period was set in 2011 at 0.69 degrees C above the global 1951 to 1980 average.
(Global surface temperature departures according to NASA GISS. Image source: NASA.)
Throughout the world, global ocean surface temperatures showed extraordinary departures above average for the month. Greater variance was experienced over continental land masses and over the polar regions.
Zonal anomalies showed far greater heat amplification near the southern polar region, especially in the region near 80 south latitude. In the Northern Hemisphere the tundra region near 60 north latitude focusing in Northeast Siberia near the methane emitting zone of the East Siberian Arctic Shelf, the region north of the Caspian Sea, and Baffin Bay and Northeast Canada showed the greatest high temperature anomalies. Only the high Arctic and regions in or near the southern ocean showed widespread and significant cooler than average zonal readings.
You can see these zonal anomalies in the graph provided by NASA below:
(Temperature departures by latitudinal zone. Image source: NASA.)
A Catastrophic Pace of Warming
To understand these record high global temperatures, it is useful to consider the broader paleo-climate context. In this context, the global temperature difference between 1880 and the last ice age was about 5 degrees Celsius. So the current temperature departure, driven by human greenhouse gas emissions, is equal to about 1/5 the difference between the 19th century and an ice age, but on the side of hot.
As it took about 12,000 years for the post ice-age warming to occur, the recorded pace of warming since 1880 is about 20 times faster than that period of extreme Earth system change. With the predicted pace of warming expected to increase even further and with ice sheets still covering the surface of the Earth (which greatly help to mitigate the pace of warming spikes), this current velocity of change is both likely unprecedented and catastrophic.
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robertscribbler 
kevin jones
/ September 16, 2014Superb reporting, yet agaim
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kevin jones
/ September 16, 2014again my neighbor just offered me reading glass
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beckjeremy
/ September 16, 2014NTHE – Seems like Guy McPherson may be right after all :-((
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Apneaman
/ September 16, 2014Forget about McPherson and NTHE. Even if it could be proven there is still the matter of suffering and having some choice as to how to live. Walking away and letting the psychopaths have the floor is guaranteed suffering and slavery for most people. The deniers and their masters are criminals. You can argue if the true believers are only guilty of negligence or are murders like their owners, but either way they are a threat to you and your family. They simply do not care if people die. Power, money & status for the owners and a reassured worldview for the true believers/useful idiots. It is not about physical science. You will never convince the true believer. Ever. They are literally fighting for their sanity, because if climate change is real then everything they believe is wrong and that is a form of death. It is no coincidence that they are almost exclusively white, male, and conservatives. As for the majority of people who have done nothing to change their lifestyles they will fall in line through economic contraction and the reality of climate disasters. Many are going to die no matter what.
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pintada
/ September 16, 2014Apneaman, I agree with what you said, but do not get why that makes McPherson wrong. Or were you not saying that NTHE won’t happen. Actually, you seemed to give an excellent reason why it will happen. If you have an opportunity to clarify …
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Paul from NSW
/ September 22, 2014First let’s define NTHE as actual homo sapiens extinction and not the extinction of civilization. With that in mind then I think one compelling reason that I struggle with NTHE is the Azolla event. Unless the Azolla growing in the Arctic “lake” at the time of the Oecene could handle significantly hotter temperatures than all varieties seen today then the average temperatures of the Arctic circle at that time were survivable by humans.
Bearing in mind that the Azolla event was estimated to sequester 2850 ppm CO2 from the atmosphere so the CO2 levels were significantly higher than anything that will be experienced even under BAU for a long time. The other factor is that the Azolla event means that the subsea permafrost is NOT abiotic, it is laid down under a slab model. That is, there will not be a sudden outgassing that will exterminate us, but rather a ramping up release with pockets explosively venting.
We need desperate measures to mitigate what is happening. Under the worst possible conditions odds are still there for a remnant of humanity to survive.
What I do not like about the NTHE meme, it will eventually create chaos. As demonstrated by the Black Death, but on steroids, fatalism will run riot, and people will not have prepared at all as they see no point.
There are natural processes that we can invoke to get this under control;
http://thecarbonchallenge.blogspot.com/2014/08/fixing-permafrost-problem.html
Fatalism steals peoples resolve, and more often than not, fatalism is actually espoused by people nearing the end of their own timeline. It is hardly a motivator for change.
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Mark from New England
/ September 16, 2014Welcome back Robert and good article. Interesting that eastern North America and eastern China are among the few cooler than average locations. Might China be cooler because of regional dimming from all their air pollution?
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wili
/ September 18, 2014Yeah, the two power centers we need most desperately to get on board and become leaders are literally feeling the least heat!
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Loni
/ September 16, 2014Thank you Robert, I can only imagine your ‘sighs’ as this information comes across your desk.
My question to you, if time allows, do the models show that heat build up in the Pacific, along the coast of Alaska down to California as a continuing condition? In other words, do the winds or currents, dynamics that, I assume, are going to changing very little, continue to push heat into that zone for the next foreseeable future?
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dtlange
/ September 16, 20140916 Today’s Air Temp. Anomaly from Climate Reanalyzer: http://cci-reanalyzer.org/DailySummary/output/T2_anom_satellite1.jpg
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earthfriendrick
/ September 16, 2014Yep, another great post! Thank you fro all that you do! If SST stay anomalously high, we many not need an El Nino to push global record high temperatures…
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Ed-M
/ September 16, 2014Welcome back, Robert.
In the thread to your last article, the temperature anomaly and jet stream maps showing the NW quadrisphere indicates that the dip in the jet stream over eastern North America is still in place. Being in New Orleans, I am not looking forward to this winter… more episodes of the Polar Vortex being rendered homeless which makes for multiple subfreezing cold spells. We may even see a blizzard!
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dtlange
/ September 16, 2014Texas proposes rewriting school text books to deny man made climate change
Analysis of proposed 6th grade texts show they falsely claim scientific disagreement about global warming
Texas has proposed re-writing school text books to incorporate passages denying the existence of climate change and promoting the discredited views of an ultra-conservative think tank.
The proposed text books – which come up for public hearing at the Texas state board of education on Tuesday – were already attracting criticism when it emerged that the science section had been altered to reflect the doctrine of the Heartland Institute, which has been funded by the Koch oil billionaires.
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/sep/16/texas-proposes-rewriting-school-text-books-to-deny-manmade-climate-change
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Mark from New England
/ September 16, 2014‘God’ help us all! How much longer will this bulls&^t go on?
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lesliegraham1
/ September 18, 2014They will never ever give up. In fact this is really just the start of the Talibanisation of science education by the Tea Party extremists with fossil-fuel backing.. They have obviously realised that they have ‘lost’ the 14 to 18 demographic so are following the Jesuit doctrine of ‘get them while they are young’.
Needless to say; 5 to 10 year olds are far more psychologicaly maleable and impressionable than older children and attitudes ingrained at this age are very difficult to remove later.
They know exactly what they are doing.
This ain’t no disco. There are trillions of dollars in short term prfits involved and that means they will stop at nothing.
I wish I was a paranoid conspiracy freak but I’m not – this is really happening and won’t stop unless we make it stop.
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Andy in San Diego
/ September 16, 2014Ocean temperature is 6+ F above normal here today. Air temp is 95F on the water, 100+ inland. Today marks 100 days in a row above average temperature here. It is hot as Hades and the humidity is unbelievable (no rain, no thunderstorms). As the hurricane that smacked Cabo rolls towards Az, the next one is forming below the Baja peninsula making it 4 hurricanes in 4 weeks.
Up north in the state, the fires are raging with this year setting a statewide record for fire suppression costs.
On the priorities front… my daughters school chose not to put any cooling in the portables and used that money for a new electric sign for the football field.
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Mark from New England
/ September 16, 2014That is HOT. What is the relative humidity? I thought it was supposed to mainly be a ‘dry heat there in San Diego? Of course, ‘supposed to’ is a thing of the past now in many places.
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Mark from New England
/ September 16, 2014Luckily, your 7 day forecast has it falling into the mid-70’s next week after two more days in the 80s. At least that’s what the WC says 😉
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Ed-M
/ September 17, 2014So that’s where our Atlantic hurricanes all disappeared to! And not just 4 ‘canes in 4 weeks, but 15 Eastern Pacific named storms for the season. Looks like you guys have our Hurricane Alley, and our Gulf Coast weather, minus the pop-up thunderstorms (which we still have).
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earthfriendrick
/ September 16, 2014Andy in Sandie, it does not sound good at all… Y’all do not usually have that much humidity… Makes it all the more painful to have drought, heat, and humidity…
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dtlange
/ September 16, 2014Portland, OR USA, 1400 hrs PDT
Ground observation:
The sky overhead has about a dozen fairly static, and straight jet trails from airliners flying the north-south polar route (unless they are all going to Vancouver, BC or Anchorage, AK). Many have been up there for a long time, barely dissipating, and as straight as when they were first created. Most of the thin high altitude cloud cover is from the late morning and early afternoon aviation traffic. Very little movement in the upper air. Jet steam AWOL.
I’ve seen quite a lot of this. Seems quite abnormal for the usually energetic air over the Pacific Northwest.
Oh well… that is all.
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Griffin
/ September 16, 2014We have missed you Robert!
More bad news from Jason Box popped up today. Looks like Greenland is hurting more and faster than was expected (again). http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2014/09/16/jason_box_s_research_into_greenland_s_dark_snow_raises_more_concerns_about.html
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Jacob
/ September 16, 2014In my opinion it’s very refreshing when a scientist like Jason Box is brutally honest/blunt. Conversely, it’s disturbing when their employer restricts them from expressing an honest opinion when that opinion is based on their scientific observation.
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Griffin
/ September 16, 2014I couldn’t agree more Jacob!
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bassman
/ September 16, 2014Great article Griffen, I always wondered how much of the “dirt” remains on the ice to influence albedo reduction in subsequent years and how much fresh snow can cover it up. Either way it appears we are entering an era of positive feedbacks in the Arctic that could really be enhanced by another El Niño pumping warm equatorial waters into the Arctic in 2015 and 2016.
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Griffin
/ September 17, 2014I think back to Robert explaining how this year saw extremely high melt rates despite conditions that remained relatively benign compared to previous years. As he pointed out, if we see favorable melt conditions in a summer soon, it is going to melt in a way that we have never seen before.
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james cole
/ September 17, 2014Those Greenland Ice pictures are the most shocking thing I have seen related to climate in a long time! Just mind blowing. We all know the heat absorbed by dark surfaces compared to white is huge. All you can say is that melting under these conditions will go off the charts!
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james cole
/ September 17, 2014I should add, that all the evidence form the arctic is looking to confirm the belief that I have that the High Arctic and Greenland have already made a phase shift, and we are seeing the Tip of the shift only, but a couple years down the road, the main body of a climate shift will arrive. Dark Snow and Ice in Greenland, Siberian sink holes, Siberian permafrost melt and methane release from the arctic seas. Temperature rising fast and feed backs getting into full gear. I think, but can’t prove, that the arctic climate has already entered a new phase and a new climate normal. The biggest fear is that it will suddenly lurch to an even hotter normal, and run away feed backs blow all predictions away.
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Griffin
/ September 17, 2014James, as scary as it is, it looks like your theory is well on its way. So many changes so rapidly, its freaky.
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Ed-M
/ September 17, 2014James, I am on the same page as Griffin. It really does look like it’s getting freaky or even freaky-deaky! And Jim Hansen, who estimated it would take 5000 Gt of Carbon from burnt Fossil Fuels, may be off by a factor of ten. On the conservative side. Second Permian, here we come!
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Ed-M
/ September 17, 2014I should add the pictures show the sort of snow which should not be anywhere except on the margins of the streets of a Northern city after a weeklong warm spell following a heavy snow accumulation (blizzard, heavy snowstorm, several normal snowstorms).
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Phil
/ September 17, 2014Those pictures are alarming. Another factor in play. Any indication that the sea ice looks similar?
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Griffin
/ September 17, 2014That is a very good question Phil, I have wondered about the sea ice albedo too.
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dtlange
/ September 17, 2014Spooky and ominous. Jason is doing a hell of a job with his reporting — in the trenches/crevasses where the action is. Photo journalism at it’s finest.
The close-ups of the crevasses amidst the blackness really bring the message home.
As a Ps, and not to distract from Jason and Greenland but to see an urban setting (2012 Santa Barbara, CA) coated in black see my blog post. I informed, with similar photos, civil government and agencies in the spring of 2010. Things got worse in 2011 & 2012 — much worse — too much to go into detail here. I feel a certain kinship with what Jason is doing.
Raise hell Jason. The truth’s you reveal today will only us hurt for a short while — the reality will hurt forever.
– DT
http://windspiritkeeper.blogspot.com/p/blog-page_6851.html
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Griffin
/ September 17, 2014Wow, DT your pictures bear a striking similarity to the ice. That is simply an incredible amount of toxic soot. I can’t imagine what that stuff will do to the surf when it finally rains there. So much concentrated pollution will go right into the water.
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Andy in San Diego
/ September 17, 2014Torrential downpour now here in SD, never seen anything like this here.
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Andy in San Diego
/ September 17, 2014…and 20 minutes later it’s gone. At least it pounded the heat down a bit.
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Ed-M
/ September 17, 2014Y’all’s got our pop-up thunderstorms now! Crazy weather, isn’t it?
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Andy in San Diego
/ September 17, 2014Flying Rivers in Brazil drying up causing drought (ie: what we’ve seen in Sao Paolo). Flying rivers are the moisture caused by the forest which is carried by the wind. Deforestation, climate change are eliminating them. Once gone it’s gone?
http://www.rtcc.org/2014/09/15/amazons-flying-rivers-dry-up-as-drought-takes-hold/
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james cole
/ September 17, 2014Brazil has always been a point of interest for me. Ever since the late 1980’s exposed the rapidly deforested Amazon. Relative humidity is falling in many areas across the Amazon, this allows fires to gain a foothold and burn through the cool damp nights, whereas before, night time was a death sentence for many smaller fires. Now they burn on without the humidity to damp them down. Fire Fighters in the Amazon always point to this factor as one of the big problems for increased fore spreading. Not enough relative humidity!
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Robert A. Vella
/ September 17, 2014Reblogged this on The Secular Jurist.
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Robert A. Vella
/ September 17, 2014The respected accounting firm Pricewaterhouse Cooper just released its “Low Carbon Economy Index” which states that we’re a mere 20 years away from a climate catastrophe. See: http://www.pwc.co.uk/assets/pdf/low-carbon-economy-index-2014.pdf
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Phil
/ September 17, 2014Can expect Australia’s recent reductions in emissions to tick up. With the withdrawal of the carbon price and increase in gas prices, generation by coal plant has increased the last couple of months and so have emissions.
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Spike
/ September 17, 2014Thank you for that – I have sent it to my likely future member of Parliament – she might take note of it as it’s written by an accountancy firm!
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Apneaman
/ September 17, 2014Pin
I’m not saying McPherson is wrong or right. I’m saying that because many of us will still live for decades we must create the best conditions possibly for our families and communities. If there is only 20-50 years left is it not worth every effort to make those years as normal as possible for your kids? To not fight the psychopaths is to embolden them even more. Others lives, men-women-children, mean nothing to them. They will sacrifice their true believer/useful idiots too when the time comes. Don’t care, no feeling. That what it means to be a psychopath.
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pintada
/ September 17, 2014Thanks
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Andy in San Diego
/ September 17, 201451 million folks in the west in drought regions. California looking mighty dark red now. If we don’t get snow pack this winter things may get quite difficult for the farmers.
http://droughtmonitor.unl.edu/Home/RegionalDroughtMonitor.aspx?west
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Spike
/ September 17, 2014I note further flooding due to continuing heavy rains in the Balkans – quite astonishing footage of the violence of a flash flood here:
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Bernard
/ September 17, 2014Google maps doesn’t know Tekji. In case anyone wants to check maps, Tekija is a village in the municipality of Kladovo in eastern Serbia.
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Ed-M
/ September 17, 2014This is the sort of flooding we used to see on footage from Haiti! 😯 Which is badly deforested.
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Griffin
/ September 17, 2014That’s terrifying. Absolutely frickin terrifying.That is one of the most violent flood videos I have ever seen. I can’t imagine the mental strain of actually experiencing that kind of power and destruction.
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Colorado Bob
/ September 17, 2014KAMPALA, Uganda—Floods sweeping across eastern Uganda have destroyed thousands of hectares of crops, aid officials said Tuesday, warning that tens of thousands of people in the East African nation could face a severe food shortage in the coming months.
http://online.wsj.com/articles/uganda-floods-destroy-crops-1410860907
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Apocalypse4Real
/ September 17, 2014Hi Robert,
Good to see your observations again. One thing to note is that the .70 degrees LOTI index only seems to appear in the GISS TEMP table. The graphic in the article has only a .68 anomaly from the 1951-1980 norm.
Additionally, if one views the table, we have experienced higher anomalies previously than August 2014. For example, it was .86 C in 1998.13, .89 C in 2002.21, and 2007.04 resulted in a .93C anomaly.
The .70 C anomaly has this month tied for 26th-30th highest in the GISS Temp LOTI data.
What is significant is that 2014 has the most months at or above a .70 C anomaly. Five of the last 8 months are at or above that line, with 2014.38 being the highest at .79 C above the norm.
The tabular data link is here: http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs_v3/Fig.C.txt
Best wishes,
A4R
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Colorado Bob
/ September 17, 2014Jason Box is going have to change the name of his project , to “Black Snow” , “Dark” just isn’t the right word any more.
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Andy in San Diego
/ September 17, 2014Those were scarey pics. I had no idea how bad that was.
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Mark from New England
/ September 17, 2014Dark Snow crashes, pouring its light into ashes…
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wharf rat
/ September 18, 2014Thanks. Bro
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dtlange
/ September 17, 2014And, in America, out west, we have this despicable heritage to overcome. This has been going on for a long time. The off-road recreational (wreck-creation) crap is pure vandalism and a crime against nature. It has stuck in my craw for a long time.
Rocky Mountain Dust-up: Runoff’s Dirty Secret
The dust on high peaks, blown in from Southwestern pastures, farms, mining roads and off-road vehicle parks, is hastening snowmelt and reducing the runoff into the Colorado River, scientists say.
Every time the winds blow east from the deserts of the Southwest, it means less water for 27 million people who depend on the Colorado River.
Layers of dust form every year on snowfields in the Rocky Mountains, blown in from pastures, farms, dirt roads and off-road vehicle parks. For decades, according to a study released this week by the National Academy of Sciences, this dust on snow both accelerates the annual runoff by weeks and reduces what reaches the Colorado River by 5 percent…
http://www.psmag.com/environment/rocky-mountain-dust-up-runoffs-dirty-secret-23223/
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messtime
/ September 17, 2014Yes, and someone mentioned that those large dust storms which cover the Phoenix, Arizona area periodically are at least partly due to off-road dirt bikes, 3 & 4 wheeled ATV’s ripping up the desert in the surrounding areas.
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Colorado Bob
/ September 17, 2014Here, here .
It’s called “Red Snow” in Durango .
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dtlange
/ September 17, 2014On the music scene of black, first up is the classic (the great Stanley Kubrick used it to close “Full Metal Jacket”)… I see a red door, and I want to paint it black…
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dtlange
/ September 17, 2014And, at the other end of the spectrum is the classic, Rahsaan Roland Kirk “Blacknuss”.
Without music I would… never mind. Don’t go there. Ha.
That is all.
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Mark from New England
/ September 17, 2014Great stuff DT. Likewise about music…
though to stay on topic, I wonder how far in to the deep interior of Greenland the darkest of the dark snow extends at the end of a bad year like this one. Were these recent pictures taken fairly close to the coast, or inland a ways? Just wondering about the spatial distribution of dark snow on ice sheets. Is there satellite data or proxy data that would tell us?
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Colorado Bob
/ September 17, 2014Mark from New England –
Dark Snow
http://darksnow.org/
They are inland from the discharge fiord of the Jakobshavn Glacier. Not sure how far , 100 miles ? Not sure
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Apneaman
/ September 17, 2014No rain for decades: Stand by for the ‘megadroughts’, scientists warn
“Megadroughts are also likely to be hotter and last longer than in the past, he claimed. His peer-reviewed research – to be published in the American Meterological Society’s Journal of Climate – is the first to scientifically establish that climate change exacerbates the threat. ”
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/no-rain-for-decades-stand-by-for-the-megadroughts-scientists-warn-9732483.html
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Colorado Bob
/ September 17, 2014Mark from New England –
The Jakobshavn Glacier is the world’s fastest . And has been for years, I wrote about it 7 years ago :
Jakobshavn Glacier the World’s Fastest, Picking-up Speed
I’ve always been a fan of Nova, and Robert Kurlwich, so I was watching 2 years ago when this Nova Science Now program first aired on the Jakobshavn Glacier. Kurlwich introduces the story by doing a little glacier 101 speed report. The clip is here and it’s 7 min. long .
World’s Fastest Glacier
In the story , they report that around the year 2000 the Jakobshavn started to pick-up speed. It went from the “normal” speed of around less than 1 foot a day to 113 feet a day in 5 years. This was widely reported then, so it’s a pretty good benchmark. The program aired in July of 2005, so this morning I went looking to see what the Jakobshavn was doing 2 years later.
http://coloradobob1.newsvine.com/_news/2007/07/10/828271-jakobshavn-glacier-the-worlds-fastest-picking-up-speed
It makes perfect sense that Jason Box is working on the ice that feeds Jakobshavn Glacier , and to see it all black scares the shit of of me. This is pulling the cork out of the ice field in southwest Greenland .
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Mark from New England
/ September 18, 2014Bob, Thanks for the context and link.
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Colorado Bob
/ September 17, 2014Mark from New England –
All that black ice is feeding melt water into the world’s fastest glacier for the last 14 years.
That sucker could be discharging icebergs in January given the melt water entering the system.
Remember, the water that is melted from this “Black Snow” is carrying far more BTU’s than we had planned on. , and it’s going right to the base of the ice sheet . AND it carrying all the carbon into the base of the Arctic waters .
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Colorado Bob
/ September 17, 2014Greenland’s fastest glacier reaches record speeds
Date:
February 3, 2014
Source:
European Geosciences Union (EGU)
Summary:
Jakobshavn Isbræ (Jakobshavn Glacier) is moving ice from the Greenland ice sheet into the ocean at a speed that appears to be the fastest ever recorded. Researchers measured the dramatic speeds of the fast-flowing glacier in 2012 and 2013.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/02/140203101016.htm
Jason Box has come back with pictures of the ice that feeds this beast, and they are all black , and broken-up into weird shapes, that cold ice does not form.
These are worst climate change pictures you have ever seen to date.
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Griffin
/ September 18, 2014The black ice broken into shapes that bear an eerie resemblance to land cracked by drought.
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Colorado Bob
/ September 18, 2014Griffin
The black ice broken into shapes that bear an eerie resemblance to land cracked by drought.
Yes they do,
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bassman
/ September 18, 2014Even if we seriously reduce emissions, the Arctic feedbacks will haunt us beyond 2100. We aren’t going to have cloudy April/May periods forever. The next 2007/2012 like melt season (whenever it occurs) will really enhance these feedbacks.
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Colorado Bob
/ September 18, 2014We have screwed pooch. And we have been at it for centuries.
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james cole
/ September 18, 2014I picked up a 60 second breaking news story on CNN. They mentioned California fires. One of which burned down 150 homes in 1 day! 6,000 firefighters fighting blazes. But the entire news coverage war 60 seconds! Then off to Pro Football wife and child beaters and America’s new war on ISIS. A couple decades ago, a story of these California fires would have been all over the news, with updates and major investigations into the status of fires. Yet, in 2014, the huge California drought and now insane level of fires, enough to destroy 150 homes in a few hours, these fires get only seconds mention before fast slipping back into infotainment. The corporate media is deeply influenced by energy corporation, Oil, Coal, Natural Gas and Fracking Industry. They only report climate stories when they are so huge they can’t be ignored, so they give the story 1 minute and move on. I believe this is intentional suppression of news unfavorable to fossil fuel industry which fund media via advertizing.
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Apneaman
/ September 18, 2014How many wealthy people do you think own significant amounts of stock in big energy, big media and advertizing? How many pension funds do? How many people who are a part of big pension funds know what they own? How many want to? There are tens of millions who THINK they will lose out if things change. Much of it is already gone…soon as the next bubble pops….soon
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Bernard
/ September 18, 2014I was wondering if there’s someone from Calif. here who can fill me in on the area depicted in red here:
http://imgur.com/HB0z3M5
The screenshot is from yesterday. The area in red is from last year’s August burn. From the image I get the impression that one year later the area hasn’t started recovering.
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Jacob
/ September 19, 2014Bernard,
The Rim Fire, burned a substantial portion of the Stanislaus National Forest near Yosemite. I don’t get out that way as much as I would like, but conditions here are bone dry so I would guess that will play into how quickly, or even if, the forest recovers.
http://www.kpbs.org/news/2014/aug/18/one-year-after-calif-rim-fire-debate-simmers-over/
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Bernard
/ September 22, 2014Thanks Jacob.
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todaysguestis
/ September 18, 2014Hurricanes to heatwaves: South-west US hit by extreme weather
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-29247767
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Colorado Bob
/ September 18, 2014LikeLike
dtlange
/ September 18, 2014Spooky — and it all makes sense. “As easy as falling off a…”
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Griffin
/ September 18, 2014So the process is defined for how the ice sheet can disintegrate rapidly. Due to the positive feedback of the melting on the surface. That alone causes Dr. Box to tell us that the sea level rise figures are too low. On top of that, the ice albedo has grown much darker than expected this year. That increases melt rate, which then increases the feedback. On top of that, the contributor to the albedo-diminishing soot is the massive fires that also spewed huge amounts of carbon into the atmosphere, which will only aggrevate the air temp anomalies which will of course increase surface melt rate and thus the positive feedback. We are really kicking ass now, anything we missed? Basal melt of the calving front due to warm water interaction! Of course! Helped along by stratification of the ocean temp layers, extremely warm waters are helping to remove the buttress that holds back the glaciers, which of course only adds to our positive feedback mentioned above. Not to be outdone, the loss of ice has also shown to be at least partly responsible for altering and weakening the jet stream which has resulted in more frequent intrusions of very warm air into the Arctic and we have ourselves yet another push for the ice loss feedback. Man, at this point we should really hope that the whole methane thing is a non-factor cause that ice sheet seems plenty well screwed as it is!
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Griffin
/ September 18, 2014Oh, I also forgot to add in Gerald’s points from below. The topography will also do its part to make sure the whole process goes much faster than previously expected!!!
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Gerald Spezio
/ September 18, 2014I read premier glaciologist Eric Rignot’s 2005 paper about Greenland’s accelerating melting, especially Jacobshavn Glacier, when it was published.
It was THE most inescapable & powerful empirical evidence to date for facing the coming climate change horrors.
I knew in my bones when I absorbed Rignot’s OBSERVATIONS that the game was up.
So when Colo Bob opines; “These are worst climate change pictures you have ever seen to date,” I agree completely & it puts me in abject despair.
Tying Colo Bob’s statement about the increasing BTUs in Greenland’s meltwater with methane release from the shallower depths around Greenland should prompt some to
consider revising their timelines for facing Guy McPherson’s NTE.
Correlating methane release from the sea areas adjacent to Jacobshavn Glacier is a no brainer.
We might re-label Jason Box’s dark ice – death ice?
Here is an updated synopsis in full to remind us that the “tipping points” are here now.
The time left for humankind is getting very short.
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
18-May-2014
University of California – Irvine
Greenland will be far greater contributor to sea rise than expected
Major UCI-NASA work reveals long, deep valleys connecting ice cap to the ocean
Irvine, Calif. – Greenland’s icy reaches are far more vulnerable to warm ocean waters from climate change than had been thought, according to new research by UC Irvine and NASA glaciologists. The work, published today in Nature Geoscience, shows previously uncharted deep valleys stretching for dozens of miles under the Greenland Ice Sheet.
The bedrock canyons sit well below sea level, meaning that as subtropical Atlantic waters hit the fronts of hundreds of glaciers, those edges will erode much further than had been assumed and release far greater amounts of water.
Ice melt from the subcontinent has already accelerated as warmer marine currents have migrated north, but older models predicted that once higher ground was reached in a few years, the ocean-induced melting would halt. Greenland’s frozen mass would stop shrinking, and its effect on higher sea waters would be curtailed.
“That turns out to be incorrect. The glaciers of Greenland are likely to retreat faster and farther inland than anticipated – and for much longer – according to this very different topography we’ve discovered beneath the ice,” said lead author Mathieu Morlighem, a UCI associate project scientist. “This has major implications, because the glacier melt will contribute much more to rising seas around the globe.”
To obtain the results, Morlighem developed a breakthrough method that for the first time offers a comprehensive view of Greenland’s entire periphery. It’s nearly impossible to accurately survey at ground level the subcontinent’s rugged, rocky subsurface, which descends as much as 3 miles beneath the thick ice cap.
Since the 1970s, limited ice thickness data has been collected via radar pinging of the boundary between the ice and the bedrock. Along the coastline, though, rough surface ice and pockets of water cluttered the radar sounding, so large swaths of the bed remained invisible.
Measurements of Greenland’s topography have tripled since 2009, thanks to NASA Operation IceBridge flights. But Morlighem quickly realized that while that data provided a fuller picture than had the earlier radar readings, there were still major gaps between the flight lines.
To reveal the full subterranean landscape, he designed a novel “mass conservation algorithm” that combined the previous ice thickness measurements with information on the velocity and direction of its movement and estimates of snowfall and surface melt.
The difference was spectacular. What appeared to be shallow glaciers at the very edges of Greenland are actually long, deep fingers stretching more than 100 kilometers (almost 65 miles) inland.
“We anticipate that these results will have a profound and transforming impact on computer models of ice sheet evolution in Greenland in a warming climate,” the researchers conclude.
“Operation IceBridge vastly improved our knowledge of bed topography beneath the Greenland Ice Sheet,” said co-author Eric Rignot of UC Irvine and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. “This new study takes a quantum leap at filling the remaining, critical data gaps on the map.”
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Kevin Jones
/ September 18, 2014Just visiting Cryosphere Today. Looking at the 1979 to present undulating graph of Antarctic Sea Ice Area. Thinking of humongous volume of ice cold(light) fresh water pouring out from on top and underneath the shelves. Finding this terrifically ominous if counter-intuitive to the unschooled.
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Kevin Jones
/ September 18, 2014Record Sea Ice around Antarctica due to Global Warming New Scientist
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Gerald Spezio
/ September 18, 2014Colo Bob; Arctic News for Sept. 18 has a sea surface temp map showing a hot spot adjacent to the Jacobshavn Glacier.
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Andy in San Diego
/ September 19, 2014An interesting bit on the Foreign Policy site regarding pending water wars.
This is not a surprise to any of us who travel through here on Roberts site. For the bulk of humanity they are engrossed in the task of surviving another day. Most do not consider this an issue (ie: my sister in law is ambivalent and doesn’t believe it).
References to National Intelligence Strategy, DoD Quadrennial Defense Review it has some decent info we already know. It is simply refreshing to see others not in the fog who can read the tea leaves for what is coming.
People don’t stop and realize that the Dark Ages (medieval cold period) spawned massive conflict for it’s time. This will be similar in scope, however will amaze us in scale. We have a tremendously higher population armed to the teeth with exquisite killing machines. They will eye on anthers water and basic survival assets as things they require, at all costs.
Understanding what Robert has mentioned of his DoD past and likely many of you as well (mine as well), you should feel a bit of comfort that the NIA, CIA, DoD etc… are ignoring the politicians and making plans.
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2014/09/18/water_wars_climate_change_intelligence_strategy
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Apneaman
/ September 19, 2014These people destabilize countries for a living. Torture is such a regular part of their job description that they train for it. For Christ sakes Andy, grow up.
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Andy in San Diego
/ September 19, 2014My point is simply that someone in govt can see whats coming, nothing more, nothing less. The source does not matter.
Condoning or not condoning any behavior of the site was not the intent of the post. If it came across that way then my apologies, then I have fail
I peruse sites that cover many points of view. I want to see what other nations perceive, other political parties, climate denialists etc…. I want to understand the breadth of opinions, views, calls to action (whatever they are), calls to inaction, national moves by allies and others.
I read Heartland’s site. Why? Because I want to understand their position, their weapons of misinformation. I want to gauge the stretch they have to make and noise in order to generate confusion in order to understand their confidence/desperation and to estimate when their noise wall will stop being effective.
“To know you enemy is to understand him. ”
Apneaman, I am quite grown up
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Griffin
/ September 19, 2014A wise man watches all sides of the discussion Andy. Thanks for bringing this up. I agree with you that behind all the noise in the media, they are quietly assessing the threat to stability that climate change poses. Last year, the commander of Pacific Forces, Admiral Locklear, spoke on the subject in Boston. He called climate change the single biggest threat to regional security in the pacific. A group of retired officers issued strong words in a statement in May of this year about the threat posed to security by our changing world.
So yes, despite the lack of attention paid to the urgency of the situation by the fossil fuel controlled media, the ones who will inevitably find themselves embroiled in conflict are very well aware of the facts regarding the threat.
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vardarac
/ September 22, 2014I can only hope that these precautions are taken in the case that developing technologies will not be able to mitigate or deliver us from resource shortages – and not that these technologies have been noticed, analyzed, and summarily dismissed as being unable to do so.
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Apneaman
/ September 19, 2014‘Forced labor’ rife in Malaysian electronics factories: report
“Nearly a third of some 350,000 workers in Malaysia’s electronics industry – a crucial link in the international consumer supply chain – suffer from conditions of modern-day slavery such as debt bondage,”
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/17/us-malaysia-labour-report-idUSKBN0HC08E20140917?feedType=RSS&feedName=topNews
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Andy in San Diego
/ September 19, 2014This seems endemic. And if ones connects the dots it leads back to poverty and marginal existence, which others can take advantage of. How that ends in each case is anyone’s guess whether it is foreign workers in Dubai, Vietnamese, Malay or others.
The source of the issue will now compound (see my above post on water wars and food scarcity [oh wait, you did], then connect dots). How it compounds in regions and nations and is either resolved, stamped down or otherwise is within the fog. To see within the fog and estimate, we’ll need to consume data from many sources (those we agree with and otherwise. We need to understand intent and capability).
If we don’t gather data from many sources, then it is just fog and we get blind sided.
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Apneaman
/ September 19, 2014It read like you were suggesting we trust the security agencies who no longer represent average folks (if they ever did). Maybe I was too quick to comment. Did not mean to offend. I apologize.
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Andy in San Diego
/ September 19, 2014All good, as long as we understand one another. I did not intend on implying that I am inline with the publisher. But I will gather info from all camps on the subject matter. When I see a site that should lean towards denial, lean the other way a bit to me is news.
When I see a war monger site take this seriously, then to me it is news for the following reasons (I connect dots).
They steer a number of conservatives in leadership. They steer a number of conservative leaning people. They nudge those people towards the side of science, and either defense/offense. I perceive this as a degree of domestic progress on one hand. On the other I see the position that may evolve (win at all costs, very human). This may be good or bad. Then I look towards where this combat / occupation will / must occur. It is Canada. When you can not feed a part of 300+ million (US Population), where do they go? One destination, sorry folks just pointing out the obvious. Now look at the recent integration between the USA & Canada. IRS & Revenue Canada are integrated (yes, 100%), DoD & CDN Mil can operate on one anthers soil legally(as of 2007/2008). Banks are now integrated 100%. This is all in addition to the oil, gas, food, security and all other integrations. All disparate national laws are being nudged towards one another all over, just look. This tells me the leadership that counts has already merged the nations (do politicians count?). Our side of the game is set (5 eyes). Keep in mind, I am CDN who has spent yrs in the US DoD as a subject matter expert. I have seen the integration yrs ago, I have worked with Us DoD folks and respect them greatly. They have given the same respect, US DoD folks are exemplary folks. I have watched it evolve. It is one of the things that makes me feel a degree of safety. The US has population & combat capabilities, Canada has resources including food production & water. If you are American & you do not agree with me, then you are an idiot who wants to die.
The various sides are lining up. Combat is coming like it or not. We have a great team ( I know the #’s and we are good. We are 3x). It doesn’t mean I like it, but I want my kid to live, eat, have a future. And when someone whats to take it from her, I want the USA/CDN/UK/AUS/NZ plus Nato on her side.
Now look on the other side and work through the players (friendly, neutral, enemy). You will see similar movements. I wont do the homework for others.
But to discern this you have to visit many sites, many places on the net. Some may not be in line with ones views ( read – grain of salt – read more – more salt ). I read sites that make me grind my teeth. But if I don’t then I don’t know who is after my lunch and what they are thinking / planning.
It is all triangulation.
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bassman
/ September 19, 2014I posted this on Neven’s Blog: This was in reference to NOAA’s record August surface anomaly value of .75
Some calculations to consider:
NOAA now has a year to data temp anomaly of .68 beating .66 for 2010 and .65 for 2005.
JMA now has a year to date temp anomaly of .24 beating .22 of 1998 and .20 of 2013! (I averaged the monthly data myself for 2014)
I would say there is a 70-90% chance that both data sets set a record for 2014 even without an El Nino.
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Greyson Smythe
/ September 19, 2014Slate: Global Oceans Break All-Time Heat Record; World on Pace for Warmest Year Ever
http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2014/09/18/global_oceans_break_all_time_heat_record_world_on_pace_for_warmest_year.html
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Andy in San Diego
/ September 19, 2014But it was a wee bit chilly in Little Rock Ak last Wednesday for 1.5 hrs at 3 am. Shouldn’t that invalidate the situation for the entire summer for the entire planet?
Yes, the sarcasm was intentional. Sorry I had to.
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Colorado Bob
/ September 19, 2014The melt did result in one notable statistic according to Stroeve, though. In the Laptev Sea off the northern coast of Siberia, open water came within five degrees latitude of the North Pole. This area has always had at least some ice cover since satellite recordkeeping began in 1979, even in some of the most dramatic melt seasons.
Very warm sea surface temperatures that were up to 9°F above normal in the Laptev Sea combined with persistent southerly winds from central Siberia, a very warm spot on the globe this summer, to clear the region of ice.
http://www.weather.com/news/science/environment/arctic-sea-ice-shrinks-6th-lowest-extent-record-20140917
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dtlange
/ September 19, 2014I still worry about the loss of arctic ice, and the floundering jet stream which has become chronically segmented.
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bassman
/ September 19, 2014Me too, that hot region in the northern pacific makes me think the Arctic dipole will be fierce in central and eastern U.S. this winter. It is influencing the jet stream for sure and maybe the El Niño development in some way?
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Apneaman
/ September 19, 2014Of Course your under threat in America, but not in the way your “friends” have convinced you. 30 million killed for empire since the end of WWII makes for one hell of a blow back. Add to that the upcoming blow back from the tens of millions of former middle class Americans. Your suffering from American PR and glad handing Andy and that DOD group think. I have said I’m Canadian dozens of times and I lived in the US for 7 years. Were just another resource base to them. You have been propagandized boy. They are going to use Canada like a cheap whore. I have known this for years and so have others here. Fighting the cold war together was one thing, but I will not sell my soul for the very limited possibility of a few more soft years under Yankee boot. Look how they treat their own people. They are not about defense they are conquers from day one. It’s all about power games and more money for the elite. None of them gives a fuck about you or your family. They are conquers and all conquers assume everyone else in the world thinks like them and that’s why they are permanently paranoid. No sacrifice of other peoples lives is too small to defend against the latest boggy man. What exactly do you think is going to happen? Think there is going to be a 20th century conventional war and after it is over your going to suburb it up on the GI bill? If there is a major war it will be nukes and or cyber. The MIC just want to keep having proxy wars and keep the Iraq’s going to keep milking the tax payer. If the Russians or Chinese put boots on the ground in North America, I’ll dust off the deer rifle and take the field. As for the rest of it, there is nothing I can do about them coming here when there are parts of America that are no longer liveable due to drought. I’m sure they will make all kinds of promises (on paper) about an orderly and peaceful migration and some will abide, but it will be just like everywhere else they have gone; intimidation, theft, murder and rape. The only thing that will stop them is civil war or blowing up the world. I’ll see you and Ted Cruz when you bring the chosen ones back home to their new promised land.
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Andy in San Diego
/ September 19, 2014“Were just another resource base to them. ”
Agreed 100%. I’m just glad that when they come for those resources it may not be at the end of an A-1. They will take them (or someone else), they have to. Either in a friendly manner or otherwise. If otherwise, your deer rifle will not achieve a whole lot and your family will suffer. I prefer that your family and others don’t become the new “Indians” for the new settlers. It never works out well for under powered indigenous folks.
You, I and everyone share the same base instincts.
“You have been propagandized boy.” <== quite possible. I view the USA as a necessary companion the same as a weak kid appreciates a tough big brother.
As Putin is now practice running Tu-95's into their launch boxes over Canadian airspace, and their other incursions I feel a bit more secure that the USA is our friend. Canada does not have the population or equipment to preserve territory alone. If this makes me a bad guy, so be it.
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dtlange
/ September 19, 2014Here’s some other historical aspects of our current dilemma. It is in regard to: “Think there is going to be a 20th century conventional war and after it is over your going to suburb it up on the GI bill?” I’ve considered this for a long time.
– A slew of GIs mustered out with a pack of cigarettes (corporate cancer etc) in their pockets. Same for war workers.
– Urban sprawl tied together with miles of highways.
– Jobs were distant from worker homes.
– Detroit (corporate) built millions of overly large (gas burning and polluting) cars that the workers bought and used. This continued for decades, Many (all gross polluters) are still on the road.
– Somewhere in there the UAW got health insurance, the only public sector to have insurance until very recently. Then federal bail-outs for corporates.
– The fossil fuel industry got more powerful.
– The American public got more gullible and reckless — driving, consuming etc.
– What else… until 2014?
– Much of the rest of the world has followed our insane path.
– This is some of what confronts us today.
In seven or so decades CO2 (picture an inverted Keeling Curve as a guillotine descending towards our collective necks) , air pollution, fossil fuel extraction and consumption has skyrocketed to where we are on, or past. the brink of environmental catastrophe. A human caused calamity surely to be worse by many magnitudes than any combination of war, natural disaster, and economic collapse.
DT Lange, USA: 1948 to …
OVER AND OUT.
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Kevin Jones
/ September 19, 2014Re: Black ‘Green’land photos by Jason Box. Took some time and courage for me to view them and read the article. Truly speechless, Griffin, others.
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Kevin Jones
/ September 19, 2014Gives new meaning to the old legal expression ‘beyond the pale’
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Kevin Jones
/ September 19, 2014beyond the pale “Describing behavior that is considered to be outside the bounds of morality, good behavior or judgement in civilized company.” Wiktionary
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Kevin Jones
/ September 19, 2014“It is as fatal as it is cowardly to blink facts because they are not to our taste.” John Tyndall 1820-1893
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Griffin
/ September 19, 2014That quote is right on!!!
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Andy in San Diego
/ September 19, 2014I’ve touched a bit of a nerve on what nations and peoples will do as resources get thinner, and populations continue to be high, simply by referencing a website. This was not my intent and is completely unexpected. My apologies to all.
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Apneaman
/ September 19, 2014We need to use another trillion dollars of resources to prepare for the last resource war so WE (not the Russian’s or Chinese) get to burn those last resources and thus seal our (all) children’s fate. Empire’s logic.
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Andy (at work)
/ September 19, 2014Sadly, I think you have just seen the future.
I would prefer the madness stop, we leave the carbon in the ground and make the shift to sustainable behavior. However, people become monsters in a crowd, and as a species we’ll devour the last remnants no different than locusts, and with similar foresight.
I think the war bounty you are mentioning is not more oil, it is water and livable space.
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mikkel
/ September 20, 2014Andy, you are looking at the wrong paradigm and having false security. When empires break down, nationalism isn’t what comes into play; class and identity does. If you seek security in the mentality you talk about above then it is not “siding” with the US against some outside force, it is participating in increasing enslavement of your fellow citizens. The Fall of Rome is a good template (since there is so much history, but several empires have seen the same fate) where it went from a highly connected state held together by trade and law, to a smattering of wealthy warlords who traded favors and war alliances. The rich Romans bought out huge estates that became the basis for feudalism and threw their peasants into the grinder when battling each other. If resources were running out, they just upped the battles.
The outer “barbarians” that “conquered” merely picked off the weakest warlords and took their place.
I highly recommend you read The Archdruid Report, if you haven’t, and see how his comparative history argumentation holds up with your current perception. I believe that the last refuge of nation states is to hold them together long enough for the elite to try (with both success and failure) to take resources needed for them and them alone to last. When push comes to shove, it will disappear overnight.
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Colorado Bob
/ September 19, 2014Climate Change Is an Opportunity to Dramatically Reinvent the Economy
An interview with author and activist Naomi Klein
Naomi Klein:
I’ve spent a fair bit of time hanging out with some of the hardcore climate deniers. And I think they’re very open about the fact that what brought them to this issue is not that they discovered a problem with climate science. It’s that they look at what the science is saying and they realize that if the science is true, it would upend their ideological project—because their ideological project calls for deregulation, austerity cuts, privatization of the public sphere, deregulated free trade. And if you just glance at the kinds of policies we would need in order to take the science seriously, it would mean strong regulations of the corporate sector; it would mean big investments in the public sphere to prepare ourselves for heavy weather and to lower our emissions rapidly. It would also mean transfers of wealth, which they’re not very big fans of.
Link
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Colorado Bob
/ September 19, 2014Unusual species in Alaska waters indicate parts of Pacific warming dramatically
A giant hotspot in the North Pacific Ocean may help explain why a massive ocean sunfish was spotted in Prince William Sound this month and a skipjack tuna was caught in a gillnet weeks earlier near the mouth of the Copper River, scientists say.
http://www.adn.com/article/20140914/unusual-species-alaska-waters-indicate-parts-pacific-warming-dramatically
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dtlange
/ September 19, 2014Not a good sign, CB
And to amplify the situation:
..’NOAA Fisheries, Sept. 2014: Scientists across NOAA Fisheries are watching a persistent expanse of exceptionally warm water spanning the Gulf of Alaska that could send reverberations through the marine food web. The warm expanse appeared about a year ago and the longer it lingers, the greater potential it has to affect ocean life… “Right now it’s super warm all the way across the Pacific to Japan,” said Bill Peterson, an oceanographer with NOAA… “it’s a very interesting time because when you see something like this that’s totally new you have opportunities to learn things you were never expecting.” Not since records began has the region of the North Pacific Ocean been so warm for so long… The situation does not match recognized patterns in ocean conditions such as El Niño Southern Oscillation or Pacific Decadal Oscillation… “It’s a strange and mixed bag out there,” Mantua said… warm temperatures are higher and cover more of the northern Pacific than the PDO typically affects… cold near-shore conditions in the Pacific Northwest also don’t match the typical PDO pattern.
http://enenews.com/govt-scientists-very-unusual-occurring-northeast-pacific-unprecedented-historical-record-extends-all-across-pacific-japan-dramatically-reduced-productivity-17000-square-kilometers-could-se?mc_cid=cf846b99e1&mc_eid=a94ff1829d
-And then there is the weak and segmented jet stream. The Gulf of Alaska should be a cauldron of energetic water and weather.
Oh well…
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dtlange
/ September 19, 2014Here’s an AP photo of Orca whales in the waters of the Pacific Northwest. Mt. Baker, with mostly bare peaks, is in the background. The air is filthy.
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Andy in San Diego
/ September 20, 2014Land is being lost to the gulf of Mexico in Louisiana at a rate of a football field sized chunk every 48 minutes.
I found this study of the delta, what people have done to it and where that may lead.
http://projects.propublica.org/louisiana/#
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dtlange
/ September 20, 2014Incredible loss rate mostly to gas and oil extraction. Great graphics and info by propublica. Thanks Andy.
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Colorado Bob
/ September 20, 2014The doppler estimate out of Midland, – Northwest of Pecos, Texas shows 10 to 12 inches over a large area :
Link
The jack rabbits here carry canteens.
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Colorado Bob
/ September 20, 2014http://waterdata.usgs.gov/nwisweb/graph?agency_cd=USGS&site_no=08406000&parm_cd=00065&period=7
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Colorado Bob
/ September 20, 2014Various normally dry washes have gone up 10-15′ (and back down), with the Black River near Malaga rising an astounding 30′ this morning!
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dtlange
/ September 20, 2014Good gawd!
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Colorado Bob
/ September 20, 2014Incredible Rainstorm in Southern France
Torrential rainfall Tuesday through Thursday morning (September 16-18) in the Languedoc Region of southern France has resulted in flooding that has killed at least four people with two others still missing. The rainfall rates during the storm were phenomenal………………………………………………. Over the course of the entire 36-hour long storm period from Monday evening 8 p.m. to Thursday morning 8 a.m., a total of 468 mm (18.43”) of rainfall accumulated at Saint-Gervais-sur-Mare, the equivalent of 40% of their average annual precipitation amount. Some other totals for this same 36-hour period include:
Link
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Andy in San Diego
/ September 20, 2014More algae bloom issues, but this one is not on the great lakes. Now a river in Oregon.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/20/us-usa-algae-oregon-idUSKBN0HF01520140920
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dtlange
/ September 20, 2014Right, Andy. It’s the Willamette River close to downtown Portland. Besides river water warming due to ‘climate change’, Portland has a big problem with nitrogen pollution, especially from aerosols. That’s another story though. Urban foliage is taking a horrible hit from it.
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Colorado Bob
/ September 20, 2014Global warming aids spread of invasive fish in Mediterranean Sea
FRISCO — The spread of invasive tropical fish into previously temperate waters is also affecting the Mediterranean Sea, according to Australian scientist monitoring the spread of rabbitfish which have already devastated algal forests in the eastern Mediterranean Sea.
Global warming may help the fish spread into the entire Mediterranean Basin, researcher warned in a new paper published in the Journal of Ecology (Authors: Dr. Adriana Vergés, of the University of New South Wales, Australia, and Dr. Fiona Tomas of the Mediterranean Institute for Advanced Studies in Spain).
Members of the team surveyed more than 1,000 kilometres of coastline in Turkey and Greece, where two species of rabbitfish have become dominant since they moved into the region via the Suez Canal.
Link
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Jay M
/ September 21, 2014NOX has been turned into an invisible gas while carbon burning is suspect mainly through the vigilant survey of aerial pollution via industry and consumption. Ozone is knocked down in high carbon burn areas only to accumulate where the carbon burn scavenger molecules are not very common. Internal combustion engines become just as messy as horses once the society becomes motorized.
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dtlange
/ September 21, 201450 Canadian climate researchers speak out in support of the People’s Climate March
Canada is failing to meet its carbon pollution reduction targets, and its climate researchers are calling for a change
The Canadian government is hell-bent on exploiting the Alberta tar sands to the fullest extent possible, even at the expense of the global climate. Canada simply cannot meet its carbon pollution reduction pledges if it continues to expand tar sands operations.
While the American government has finally begun to take the threat of climate change seriously and do something about it, the Canadian government has merely played lip service to the problem. 50 Canadian climate researchers have reached the point where they feel the need to speak out, using the People’s Climate March on September 21st as a catalyst to call for action. To that end, they penned the following letter.
On September 21st more than a thousand events are planned around the world to demand stronger action on climate change, echoing New York’s People Climate March. As Canadian researchers who study Climate Change and Sustainability, we strongly support this global mobilization.
Canada is running a sustainability deficit. Unlike budgetary deficits, it does not seem to preoccupy our politicians. Canada has repeatedly missed its own climate change emission reduction targets. Last January, Environment Canada acknowledged that Canada won’t meet its least ambitious target to date, proposed in 2009 as part of international climate negotiations coined the Copenhagen Accord…
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2014/sep/20/50-canadian-climate-researchers-in-support-of-climate-march
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humortra
/ September 21, 2014“On the eve of the UN Climate Summit, Desmond Tutu argues that tactics used against firms who did business with South Africa must now be applied to fossil fuels to prevent human suffering.”
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/sep/21/desmond-tutu-climate-change-is-the-global-enemy
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dtlange
/ September 21, 2014FAUSTIAN SUPPLY AND DEMAND IN 2014 SAN DIEGO:
… Demands on the electric grid for San Diego and southern Orange county broke all previous records on Monday afternoon, and then again on Tuesday, as millions of people retreated to air-conditioned spaces to escape hot, muggy weather. Temperatures rose above 90 on the San Diego coast and 107 farther inland during the four-day heat wave that started a week ago.
On Tuesday, the thirst for power climbed to 4,890 megawatts in areas served by San Diego Gas & Electric. The previous all-time peak load of 4,687 megawatts occurred on Sept. 27, 2010.
Twin reactors at San Onofre used to fulfill 20 percent of San Diego’s year-round power needs, up until the plant’s breakdown in January 2012. Without the plant, some state and federal energy officials questioned if San Diego would be able to maintain reliable electrical service during an energy crisis…
http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2014/sep/21/resilient-post-nuclear-grid/
– Andy, hope you are well in SD.
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dtlange
/ September 21, 2014AND WHAT CHANCE THE JET STREAM?
THE Arctic ice cap is in a “death spiral” a leading academic claimed after returning from a research voyage.
Peter Wadhams, professor of ocean physics at Cambridge University, said that the ice cap has now melted so much that open water is now just 350 miles form the North Pole.
This is the shortest distance ever recorded.
He added: “The Arctic ice cap is in a death spiral.”
Professor Wadhams measured the thickness of the Arctic sea ice by sending a remote-control mini-submarine under the floes.
He said: “On average it was about 0.8 metres thick, compared with five metres when I first went in 1976…
http://www.express.co.uk/news/nature/513544/Arctic-ice-cap-death-spiral
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Griffin
/ September 21, 2014Ice area and extent measurements and graphs get a lot of attention, but the thickness is absolutely crucial to longevity of the cap. As Robert has mentioned here before, it will only take one season of favorable melt conditions to produce catastrophic results. Thanks for sharing this DT.
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dtlange
/ September 21, 2014BUT WAIT AND PONDER THE YIN AND YAN AS WE SEE FROM DOWN SOUTH:
Antarctic ice at record-high growth, Arctic continues to lose
Antarctica gained 7.6 million square miles of sea ice this southern winter, according to The National Snow and Ice Data Center, while sea ice in its northern counterpart continues to shrink.
The Southern Hemisphere’s unrelenting winds and frigid air froze ocean water into 7.6 million square miles (19.7 million square kilometers) of Antarctic sea ice this southern winter, the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) said yesterday (Sept. 16).
With several more weeks of growth to go, Antarctica’s sea-ice extent could soar well above the records set in 2012 and 2013. For now, only 88,800 square miles (230,000 square km) separate the 2013 and 2014 high marks.
Sea-ice extent is the total ocean area in which the ice concentration is at least 15 percent, as measured by satellite.
http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2014/0919/Antarctic-ice-at-record-high-growth-Arctic-continues-to-lose
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dtlange
/ September 21, 201409212014 CLIMATEREANALYZER SEA SURFACE TEMPERATURE DEPARTURE FROM THE AVERAGE:
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dtlange
/ September 21, 2014And north and south of Mt. Shasta is alive with wildfires.
UPDATE: Flash Flood Watch After Glacier Breaks Off Mt. Shasta
MT. SHASTA (KRON) — Officials are monitoring a mudflow that has closed roads in Siskiyou County after a glacier broke off Mt. Shasta.
A large mudflow and debris began cascading down the mountain at about 3 p.m. Saturday on the southeastern side of Mt. Shasta, according to the National Weather Service.
The weather service initially issued a flash flood warning Saturday night but downgraded it to a flash flood watch.
The warning is in effect through 5 p.m. Sunday.
Forest Service spokesperson Andrea Capps said that while the exact cause hasn’t been determined yet, it is believed that drought conditions “have left Mt Shasta’s glaciers exposed to the sun’s heat.”
http://news.kron4.com/news/officials-issues-flash-flood-warning-after-glacier-breaks-off-mt-shasta/
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Colorado Bob
/ September 21, 2014dtlange
You’re doing yomen work here today , many thanks I’m wondering if Peter Wadhams, professor of ocean physics at Cambridge University was sailing on the Oden . Sure sounds like it .
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Jay M
/ September 22, 2014lahars is a nice name for the debris and mud flows from glaciers and volcanoes
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Andy in San Diego
/ September 22, 2014Big climate change marches today. I chose not to drive my car to one of those, I planted 2 trees in the back yard instead. Dear world, I apologize for not participating in the march, I chose my own quiet thing by planting trees (perhaps if everyone did that instead….).
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Wade
/ September 22, 2014a bit of hope?
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Kevin Jones
/ September 22, 2014Well, Andy in San Diego, I was on the road for 600 miles today. (make that yesterday EST as of 44 minutes ago) 80% of it in a chartered bus, but still it hurt(s). Who the hell knows which decision was of more value, it that’s the word….? but it was rich in NYC. Rich to hear how you responded as well.
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Andy in San Diego
/ September 22, 2014I’m glad they stood up and showed numbers. I am relieved they put a face and number on the subject such that it is not perceived as a fringe thing. I just wish somehow there was an opportunity for folks to do one small thing to move things in the right direction as well. If each person planted one small tree or plant on one day each year….
Pretty tough in NYC, not many places to plop a small tree or shrub there…..
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Paul from NSW
/ September 22, 2014Well the first, and current challenge, is to buy something made of hemp…
https://www.facebook.com/groups/thecarbonchallenge/
Hemp can sequester up to 10T/ha per year, so supporting the industry makes a lot of sense. There is a lot of products that can be made from hemp, so it is easy to substitute for another product you already use.
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Andy (at work)
/ September 22, 2014Paul,
Agreed 100%. One of the most efficient bio sources there is. You can make everything from fiber based products to super capacitors.
http://ecopreneurist.com/2014/08/25/supercapacitors-from-hemp-fiber-could-be-half-the-cost/
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Bill H.
/ September 22, 2014Terrible damage, yet again, to the Philppines, from Typhoon Fung-Wong. A large part of Manila flooded. That’s a city of 12 million people – a tad larger than N. Orleans
http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/comment.html?entrynum=2804
Little MSM interest, AFAIK
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dtlange
/ September 22, 2014All that moisture in the atmosphere dumped in a short time over one place.
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dtlange
/ September 22, 201419222014 CLIMATEREANALYZER PERCIPITABLE WATER:
(The Philippines are at about 5 o’clock.)
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writersdream9
/ September 24, 2014I used to believe that the earth would simply right herself but I must admit that I am moving away from that belief as the data is very daunting to say the least! People like you, who write well and give the data are performing such a great service as I can no longer trust the mainstream media! Thank you and I am following you now!
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