By David G. Eselius
The least-cost option to lower the global warming risk is to start now and steadily transform the global energy system over the coming decades to low or zero greenhouse gas-emitting technologies. The only large capacity clean energy that is suitable for reducing human greenhouse gases is nuclear energy.
No national leader has attempted to establish a viable national response plan to counter global warming temperature increase. Worse still, many world leaders are covertly opposing the transition from national carbon economies to carbon neutral economies. Without now reducing global warming greenhouse gas emissions and the “clathrate gun methane event,” the human races terminate 2050-2099.
BERKELEY LAB FLAWED ARCTIC “COMPUTER MODELING STUDY”
New computer modeling study, led by a Berkeley Lab scientist, could help revise understanding of permafrost’s role in global warming, AUGUST 22, 2011, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory news release.
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory study does not mention Arctic Ocean methane. The study was published in last week’s online early edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences: "Permafrost carbon-climate feed backs accelerate global warming," published ahead of print August 18, 2011, Early Edition Last updated August 23, 2011
Importantly, as part of President Obama’s liberal U.S. Department of Energy, liberal Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory computer molding chose a mild carbon/methane forcing scenario (that of SRES A2), "could shift from being a sink to a source of CO2 by the end of the 21st century when forced by a Special Report on Emissions Scenarios (SRES) A2 climate change scenario.”
On the fringes of the Arctic and within the Arctic Ocean it is now changing from a carbon/methane sink to a carbon/methane source. There is no need to wait to the end of the century—carbon sink to source is happening now.
The Earth changing from a carbon/methane sink to a carbon/methane source is a very important geologic event. This event is the result of exceeding 350 ppm CO2eq (CO2 equivalent). Global warming temperature is now +0.8C above preindustrial. When Earth’s temperature reaches +2C, the global environment is very unattractive and will have larger global populations.
As identified by IPCC, actual natural and human greenhouse gas projected global warming temperature increase is grossly inadequately stated. Expected are temperature commitments exceeding +2C at 2030-2040. Actual temperature increase at end of century will most likely exceed the life terminating temperature +6.4C.
UNDERSTATING GLOBAL WARMING
To maximize the understating of global warming (aka “climate change”), the carbon economy’s political-technical leadership divided the 1990s “business as usual” (or “no carbon policy scenario”) global warming greenhouse gas emissions into IPCC SRES scenarios of four scenario families (A1, A2, B1, and B2). Only the worst case portion of IPCC SRES scenario A1Fl comes close to the current “business as usual” (or “no carbon policy scenario”) global warming greenhouse gas emissions scenario.
IPCC SRES scenario families are a political ruse intended to mislead IPCC technical direction for more than a decade. Resulting from the political ruse—there has been no decade of CO2 emission reductions for more than 70 years. It is this 70 year increase of CO2 emissions that must be altered to save the human races. Reference: CO2.now
Resulting from political interference, IPCC documents and conclusions are no longer dependable or reliable. Much global warming internet documentation has been unfavourable tampered with. U.S. schools and universities’ teaching and research on global warming are based upon false and unreliable IPCC information. Much global warming research funding is dependent upon federal/state politics, and how the politicians feel about global warming.
Politicians manipulate global warming information, studies, commissions, IPCC work groups, and technologies—world leaders who want to remain on carbon economies are enabled to do so by participating in covert global warming “cover up” politics.
WORLD LEADERS’ “BUSINESS AS USUAL SCENARIO” OR “NO CARBON POLICY SCENARIO”
When all natural greenhouse gases are included within global warming studies, the most likely global warming scenario is worse than IPCC’s 1990s “business as usual scenario.” The global warming projections of the 1990s IPCC “business as usual” carbon release is also called the “no carbon policy scenario.” To downplay global warming reporting, in the 1990s world carbon-economy leaders covertly had the UN technical groups adopt unrealistic Special Report on Emissions Scenarios (SRES) to replace real “business as usual” global warming projections. Now, more than ten years later, the integrity of all IPCC documents are in question. Governments, universities, and private groups whose technical documents and base their conclusion on IPCC information are also in question.
In the latter part of the 1990s, as a response to the adoption on 11 December 1997 Kyoto Protocol agreement, global leaders took steps to down play and confuse global warming temperature increase development. To keep their nations dependent upon carbon economy economies, leaders established national control of technical reporting and the global warming mitigation process. The carbon using and carbon supplying national leadership still retain control of major IPCC technical working groups and meetings.
President Obama’s direction for U.S. government departments and government grant/funding for dependent education-facilities is undermining the significance of greenhouse gas increases, minimizes public understanding of global warming temperature increase, and continues UN “climate change” “business as usual scenario.”
President Obama is avoiding exposure of his extensive participation in undermining global warming mitigation, and exposure of his dismantling of the U.S. nuclear energy sector. After Obama’s term as U.S. President, the world will never be the same.
COVERT GLOBAL WARMING POLITICS
To prevent the U.S. from shifting from a carbon economy to a carbon neutral economy President Obama’s oversight of global warming functions of U.S. government departments continue to under represent global warming temperature increase. As an example, DOE Secretary Chu arranged to have Berkeley National Lab understate the consequences of Arctic warming by having Berkeley’s use SRES A2 climate change scenario.
“Business as usual” (or “no carbon policy scenario”) unrestricted carbon release scenario is now established for the foreseeable future. Certainly, “business as usual” carbon releases are to extend beyond the point of no return for global warming temperature increase.
World leadership’s plan is not to reduce global warming greenhouse gases and to retain carbon dependent economies.
In the December 2009 Copenhagen (COP15) meeting Obama had world leaders agree to implement UN funding of wealth transfers to poor nations rather than reduce global warming greenhouse gases. Prior to his acceptance of the Nobel Peace Prize of USD 1.935 million and the signing of the Copenhagen (COP15) agreement, Obama and left-Democrats shut down the U.S. sector of clean nuclear energy by stopping completion of Yucca Mountain geologic nuclear repository. Obama also controls U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) members’ decisions.
Because Obama is the U.S. President, German Green Party and the U.S. will not deploy clean nuclear energy. Therefore, there is little hope that the human races will be saved from global warming destruction 2050-2099.
METHANE CLATHRATE
Methane clathrate, also called methane hydrate, hydro methane, methane ice, "fire ice" and natural gas hydrate, is a solid clathrate compound (more specifically, a clathrate hydrate) in which a large amount of methane is trapped within a crystal structure of water, forming a solid similar to ice. When hydrocarbons are present, temperatures are low and are under pressures, clathrate water ice can form. Significant deposits of methane clathrate are common and have been found under sediments on the ocean floors of Earth.
A complete accounting of the global amount of methane clathrate is not available. However, the worldwide amounts of methane bound in gas hydrates is conservatively estimated to total twice the amount of coal, oil, natural gas carbon to be found in all known fossil fuels on Earth. Reducing the release of methane clathrate global warming temperature increase gas is hugely significant to continuing the existence of the human races.
Methane is a powerful greenhouse gas. Despite its short atmospheric half-life of 7 years, methane has a global warming potential of 62 over 20 years and 21 over 100 years (IPCC, 1996). [NOTE: Today the IPCC does not recognize natural Arctic methane/carbon releases.]
Contrary to popular belief, climate models are not the principal basis for assessing human-made climate effects. Our most precise knowledge comes from Earth's paleoclimate, its ancient climate, and how it responded to past changes of climate forcings, including atmospheric composition. Our second essential source of information is provided by global observations today, especially satellite observations, which reveal how the climate system is responding to rapid human-made changes of atmospheric composition, especially atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2). Reference: "Earth's Climate History: Implications for Tomorrow"
The sudden release of large amounts of natural gas from methane clathrate deposits is a cause of past and future geologic global warming climate changes. Events possibly linked in this way are the Permian-Triassic extinction event (251.4 Ma (million years ago)) and the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (55 Ma).
Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM) also called Initial Eocene Thermal Maximum (IETM), a short interval of maximum temperature lasting approximately 100,000 years during the late Paleocene and early Eocene epochs. The interval was characterized by the highest global temperatures of the Cenozoic Era (65 Ma to the present). Triggers for the Era event appear to be the rise in methane (CH4) and carbon dioxide (CO2) related to a massive volcanic eruption.
Instead of PETM volcanic eruptions, the Modern Global Warming Era is faced with massive global population increases and massive natural and human global warming greenhouse gas releases.
Climate scientists hypothesize that methane clathrates in the permafrost and ocean regions will be released as a result of global warming; unleashing powerful feedback forces which may cause runaway climate change that cannot be controlled (i.e., “clathrate gun hypothesis”).
The only control for reducing “clathrate gun methane release” is to stop global warming temperature increases.
The 1996 IPCC Methane Guidelines - The IPCC Guidelines were first accepted in 1994 and published in 1995. UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) COP3 held in 1997 in Kyoto reaffirmed that the Revised 1996 IPCC Guidelines for National Greenhouse Gas Inventories should be used as "methodologies for estimating anthropogenic emissions by sources and removals by sinks of greenhouse gases" in calculation of legally-binding targets during the first commitment period.
NOTE: Although there are decades of Arctic literature on Arctic greenhouse gases, the IPCC does not consider Arctic greenhouse gas-releases within any of its IPCC AR4 studies and reports. IPCC documents are revised on a political needs basis. Reference: Climate Change 2007: Working Group III: Mitigation of Climate Change, IPCC AR4 1.3.1, Review of the last three decades.
World leaders have ignored valid greenhouse gas guidelines and have used their own methods to remain on carbon economies.
Clathrate Gun Methane Event - Thawing by global warming of sub sea layer of the Arctic Ocean seafloor permafrost will release stores of underlying, seabed methane (the “clathrate gun hypothesis”). Recent research carried out in 2008 in the Siberian Arctic has shown millions of tonnes of methane being released with concentrations in some regions reaching up to 100 times above normal. Such regional methane releases feed back an produce increased regional temperature increases.
A section of the Arctic Ocean seafloor that holds vast stores of frozen methane is showing signs of instability and widespread venting of the powerful greenhouse gas, according to the findings of an international research team led by University of Alaska Fairbanks scientists. A geologic “clathrate gun methane event” appears to be now occurring:
The East Siberian Arctic Shelf is part of the Arctic Ocean coast line. The total Arctic Ocean area is 14.056 million sq km (5.4 million sq miles), includes Baffin Bay, Barents Sea, Beaufort Sea, East Siberian Sea, Hudson Bay, Hudson Strait, Kara Sea, Laptev Sea, Northwest Passage, and other tributary water bodies, which includes the Greenland Sea and Chukchi Sea. The Arctic Ocean coastline is 45,389 km (28,203 miles) and is slightly less than 1.5 times the size of the U.S.
All of the Arctic Ocean is subject to large methane clathrate deposits that destabilize global warming.
Reducing further global warming greenhouse gas emissions is the most cost effective method for stopping Arctic global warming methane releases. Not reducing greenhouse gases results in expanding the “clathrate gun methane event.”
GLOBAL WARMING TEMPERATURE INCREASE +6.4C PRIOR TO 2099
Earth’s temperature at 2090-2099 is a very important topic for Earth’s population. The combination of increased natural and human (anthropomorphic) greenhouse gases and the “clathrate gun methane event” results in a global temperature increase exceeding +6.4C prior to 2099. Human races terminate 2050-2099.
In 2011, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) estimated that global methane clathrate contains more organic carbon than the combined world's coal, oil, and non-methane clathrate natural gas. By 2099, with a global temperature of +6.4C temperature increase above preindustrial times, the magnitude of the warmed oceans’ global release of methane clathrate storehouses of methane (CH4) is truly staggering: methane fireballs tear across the sky, causing further global warming. Reference: Blogger “Global Warming 2050-2099” “Population, growth, and global warming temperature increase”
Methane clathrate release from the Arctic’s not-so-permafrost is the most dangerous amplifying feedback in the entire carbon cycle. Research has found methane bubbling out of the ocean and melting permafrost (frozen soil and waters) and in Arctic/Tundra wetlands and lakes. Permafrost lining the deep and shallow cold Arctic seas is holding in untold amounts of trapped methane within methane clathrate. Under pressure and low temperature, methane (which normally boils at –161 degrees Celsius (434 Kelvin)) forms a thermodynamically stable association with water. These solids are called methane clathrate (or hydrates). As the seas and lands warm, massive amounts of global warming greenhouse gas methane and carbon is released.
In the 1960's it was recognized that considerable quantities of gas hydrate, namely methane hydrate, occur naturally in sediments of the sub sea continental slopes, and in the subsurface of Arctic permafrost regions. Reference: "Where is Gas Hydrates Found?"
If even a fraction of the methane stored in the Eastern Siberia Arctic Ocean shelf is released it could trigger abrupt climate warming. The Siberian Arctic Shelf is a 20-30 year frontier in methane studies. There are additional areas of methane interest near the Arctic Ocean coast. The Arctic Ocean shelf is shallow, 50 meters (164 feet) or less in depth, which means the Arctic Shelf, has been collecting methane alternately submerged or terrestrial, depending on sea levels and temperatures throughout Earth’s history. It is described as a methane ticking time bomb. Ignoring global warming gas increases has been describe as a political “suicide pact.”
GREENHOUSE GASES ARE COMBINED NATURAL AND HUMAN GASES
Aside from purely human-produced synthetic halocarbons, most greenhouse gases have both natural and human-caused sources. Prior to the industrial era, greenhouse gas concentrations were roughly constant. Due to human activity, global warming atmospheric greenhouse gas ratios are no longer constant and are in a state of change.
Post Industrial Era use of human carbon energy (coal, oil, natural gas) has added huge amounts of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, mainly through the burning of fossil fuels and deforestation. Energy consumption is driven by population size and gross domestic product size. Increased energy used increases global warming CO2 emissions that are life threatening to the human race. Reference: Blogger Global Warming 2050-2099 “GDP and Population Size Drive Energy Consumption"
Human and natural activities result in emissions of principal greenhouse gases (GHGs): carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O) and human only halocarbons.
Methane has gone from being a gas of no importance to the most important greenhouse gas, both for understanding climate change and as a cost-effective target for future emission reductions.
The Arctic methane feedback increases global warming temperature increase. Therefore, Arctic methane feedback must be included within greenhouse gas scenarios and global warming models.
Gas methane clathrates (hydrates) in the Arctic were being reported upon by the US DOE since at least 1978 JANUARY 01. Methane trapped in marine sediments as a clathrate (hydrate) represents such an immense carbon reservoir that it must be considered as an emerging dominant factor in estimating global warming temperature increase.
In 1995, Rice University suggested that the only conceivable perturbation to the global carbon cycle was the result of methane releases.
Global temperature is rising as fast in the past decade as in the prior two decades, despite year-to-year fluctuations associated with the El Niño-La Niña cycle of tropical ocean temperature. Reference: figure "Global Surface Temperature"
There is NO SAFE greenhouse gases concentration stabilization level above 350 ppm CO2eq, much less above 450 ppm CO2eq (CO2 equivalent). Required is spending as much money as necessary to reduce NATURAL and HUMAN (anthropomorphic) greenhouse gases (GHGs) to stabilize Earth’s temperature increase to a “safe” level.
The world leaders drive global warming temperature increase mitigations to remain dependent upon national carbon economies. That is, world leaders’ covertly manipulate global warming responses to retain “business as usual scenario” or “no carbon policy scenario” policies. Current world leaders will destroy, or have destroyed, human races.
Global warming temperature increase does not respond to covert political tactics. Unless there are huge human energy changes over the next few years, there will be no human race 2050-2099. Anyone under the age of 30 will die of global warming temperature increase.
The least-cost option to lower the global warming risk is to start now and steadily transform the global energy system over the coming decades to low or zero greenhouse gas-emitting technologies. The only large capacity clean energy that is suitable for reducing human greenhouse gases is nuclear energy.
No national leader has attempted to establish a viable national response plan to counter global warming temperature increase. Worse still, many world leaders are covertly opposing the transition from national carbon economies to carbon neutral economies. Without now reducing global warming greenhouse gas emissions and the “clathrate gun methane event,” the human races terminate 2050-2099.
BERKELEY LAB FLAWED ARCTIC “COMPUTER MODELING STUDY”
New computer modeling study, led by a Berkeley Lab scientist, could help revise understanding of permafrost’s role in global warming, AUGUST 22, 2011, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory news release.
"Billions of tons of carbon trapped in high-latitude permafrost may be released into the atmosphere by the end of this century as the Earth’s climate changes, further accelerating global warming, a new computer modeling study indicates. The study also found that soil in high-latitude regions could shift from being a sink to a source of carbon dioxide by the end of the 21st century as the soil warms in response to climate change."
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory study does not mention Arctic Ocean methane. The study was published in last week’s online early edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences: "Permafrost carbon-climate feed backs accelerate global warming," published ahead of print August 18, 2011, Early Edition Last updated August 23, 2011
Abstract
[Arctic] Permafrost soils contain enormous amounts of organic carbon, which could act as a positive feedback to global climate change due to enhanced respiration rates with warming. We have used a terrestrial ecosystem model that includes permafrost carbon dynamics, inhibition of respiration in frozen soil layers, vertical mixing of soil carbon from surface to permafrost layers, and methane (CH4) emissions from flooded areas, and which better matches new circumpolar inventories of soil carbon stocks, to explore the potential for carbon-climate feed backs at high latitudes. Contrary to model results for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Fourth Assessment Report (IPCC AR4), when permafrost processes are included, terrestrial ecosystems north of 60°N could shift from being a sink to a source of CO2 by the end of the 21st century when forced by a Special Report on Emissions Scenarios (SRES) A2 climate change scenario. Between 1860 and 2100, the model response to combined CO2 fertilization and climate change changes from a sink of 68 Pg to a 27 + -7 Pg sink to 4 + -18 Pg source, depending on the processes and parameter values used. The integrated change in carbon due to climate change shifts from near zero, which is within the range of previous model estimates, to a climate-induced loss of carbon by ecosystems in the range of 25 + -3 to 85 + -16 Pg C, depending on processes included in the model, with a best estimate of a 62 + -7 Pg C loss. Methane emissions from high-latitude regions increase from 34 Tg CH4/y to 41–70 Tg CH4/y, with increases due to CO2 fertilization, permafrost thaw, and warming-induced increased CH4 flux densities partially offset by a reduction in wetland extent.
Importantly, as part of President Obama’s liberal U.S. Department of Energy, liberal Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory computer molding chose a mild carbon/methane forcing scenario (that of SRES A2), "could shift from being a sink to a source of CO2 by the end of the 21st century when forced by a Special Report on Emissions Scenarios (SRES) A2 climate change scenario.”
On the fringes of the Arctic and within the Arctic Ocean it is now changing from a carbon/methane sink to a carbon/methane source. There is no need to wait to the end of the century—carbon sink to source is happening now.
The Earth changing from a carbon/methane sink to a carbon/methane source is a very important geologic event. This event is the result of exceeding 350 ppm CO2eq (CO2 equivalent). Global warming temperature is now +0.8C above preindustrial. When Earth’s temperature reaches +2C, the global environment is very unattractive and will have larger global populations.
As identified by IPCC, actual natural and human greenhouse gas projected global warming temperature increase is grossly inadequately stated. Expected are temperature commitments exceeding +2C at 2030-2040. Actual temperature increase at end of century will most likely exceed the life terminating temperature +6.4C.
UNDERSTATING GLOBAL WARMING
To maximize the understating of global warming (aka “climate change”), the carbon economy’s political-technical leadership divided the 1990s “business as usual” (or “no carbon policy scenario”) global warming greenhouse gas emissions into IPCC SRES scenarios of four scenario families (A1, A2, B1, and B2). Only the worst case portion of IPCC SRES scenario A1Fl comes close to the current “business as usual” (or “no carbon policy scenario”) global warming greenhouse gas emissions scenario.
IPCC SRES scenario families are a political ruse intended to mislead IPCC technical direction for more than a decade. Resulting from the political ruse—there has been no decade of CO2 emission reductions for more than 70 years. It is this 70 year increase of CO2 emissions that must be altered to save the human races. Reference: CO2.now
Resulting from political interference, IPCC documents and conclusions are no longer dependable or reliable. Much global warming internet documentation has been unfavourable tampered with. U.S. schools and universities’ teaching and research on global warming are based upon false and unreliable IPCC information. Much global warming research funding is dependent upon federal/state politics, and how the politicians feel about global warming.
Politicians manipulate global warming information, studies, commissions, IPCC work groups, and technologies—world leaders who want to remain on carbon economies are enabled to do so by participating in covert global warming “cover up” politics.
WORLD LEADERS’ “BUSINESS AS USUAL SCENARIO” OR “NO CARBON POLICY SCENARIO”
When all natural greenhouse gases are included within global warming studies, the most likely global warming scenario is worse than IPCC’s 1990s “business as usual scenario.” The global warming projections of the 1990s IPCC “business as usual” carbon release is also called the “no carbon policy scenario.” To downplay global warming reporting, in the 1990s world carbon-economy leaders covertly had the UN technical groups adopt unrealistic Special Report on Emissions Scenarios (SRES) to replace real “business as usual” global warming projections. Now, more than ten years later, the integrity of all IPCC documents are in question. Governments, universities, and private groups whose technical documents and base their conclusion on IPCC information are also in question.
In the latter part of the 1990s, as a response to the adoption on 11 December 1997 Kyoto Protocol agreement, global leaders took steps to down play and confuse global warming temperature increase development. To keep their nations dependent upon carbon economy economies, leaders established national control of technical reporting and the global warming mitigation process. The carbon using and carbon supplying national leadership still retain control of major IPCC technical working groups and meetings.
President Obama’s direction for U.S. government departments and government grant/funding for dependent education-facilities is undermining the significance of greenhouse gas increases, minimizes public understanding of global warming temperature increase, and continues UN “climate change” “business as usual scenario.”
President Obama is avoiding exposure of his extensive participation in undermining global warming mitigation, and exposure of his dismantling of the U.S. nuclear energy sector. After Obama’s term as U.S. President, the world will never be the same.
COVERT GLOBAL WARMING POLITICS
To prevent the U.S. from shifting from a carbon economy to a carbon neutral economy President Obama’s oversight of global warming functions of U.S. government departments continue to under represent global warming temperature increase. As an example, DOE Secretary Chu arranged to have Berkeley National Lab understate the consequences of Arctic warming by having Berkeley’s use SRES A2 climate change scenario.
“Business as usual” (or “no carbon policy scenario”) unrestricted carbon release scenario is now established for the foreseeable future. Certainly, “business as usual” carbon releases are to extend beyond the point of no return for global warming temperature increase.
World leadership’s plan is not to reduce global warming greenhouse gases and to retain carbon dependent economies.
In the December 2009 Copenhagen (COP15) meeting Obama had world leaders agree to implement UN funding of wealth transfers to poor nations rather than reduce global warming greenhouse gases. Prior to his acceptance of the Nobel Peace Prize of USD 1.935 million and the signing of the Copenhagen (COP15) agreement, Obama and left-Democrats shut down the U.S. sector of clean nuclear energy by stopping completion of Yucca Mountain geologic nuclear repository. Obama also controls U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) members’ decisions.
Because Obama is the U.S. President, German Green Party and the U.S. will not deploy clean nuclear energy. Therefore, there is little hope that the human races will be saved from global warming destruction 2050-2099.
METHANE CLATHRATE
Methane clathrate, also called methane hydrate, hydro methane, methane ice, "fire ice" and natural gas hydrate, is a solid clathrate compound (more specifically, a clathrate hydrate) in which a large amount of methane is trapped within a crystal structure of water, forming a solid similar to ice. When hydrocarbons are present, temperatures are low and are under pressures, clathrate water ice can form. Significant deposits of methane clathrate are common and have been found under sediments on the ocean floors of Earth.
A complete accounting of the global amount of methane clathrate is not available. However, the worldwide amounts of methane bound in gas hydrates is conservatively estimated to total twice the amount of coal, oil, natural gas carbon to be found in all known fossil fuels on Earth. Reducing the release of methane clathrate global warming temperature increase gas is hugely significant to continuing the existence of the human races.
Methane is a powerful greenhouse gas. Despite its short atmospheric half-life of 7 years, methane has a global warming potential of 62 over 20 years and 21 over 100 years (IPCC, 1996). [NOTE: Today the IPCC does not recognize natural Arctic methane/carbon releases.]
Contrary to popular belief, climate models are not the principal basis for assessing human-made climate effects. Our most precise knowledge comes from Earth's paleoclimate, its ancient climate, and how it responded to past changes of climate forcings, including atmospheric composition. Our second essential source of information is provided by global observations today, especially satellite observations, which reveal how the climate system is responding to rapid human-made changes of atmospheric composition, especially atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2). Reference: "Earth's Climate History: Implications for Tomorrow"
The sudden release of large amounts of natural gas from methane clathrate deposits is a cause of past and future geologic global warming climate changes. Events possibly linked in this way are the Permian-Triassic extinction event (251.4 Ma (million years ago)) and the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (55 Ma).
Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM) also called Initial Eocene Thermal Maximum (IETM), a short interval of maximum temperature lasting approximately 100,000 years during the late Paleocene and early Eocene epochs. The interval was characterized by the highest global temperatures of the Cenozoic Era (65 Ma to the present). Triggers for the Era event appear to be the rise in methane (CH4) and carbon dioxide (CO2) related to a massive volcanic eruption.
Instead of PETM volcanic eruptions, the Modern Global Warming Era is faced with massive global population increases and massive natural and human global warming greenhouse gas releases.
Climate scientists hypothesize that methane clathrates in the permafrost and ocean regions will be released as a result of global warming; unleashing powerful feedback forces which may cause runaway climate change that cannot be controlled (i.e., “clathrate gun hypothesis”).
The only control for reducing “clathrate gun methane release” is to stop global warming temperature increases.
The 1996 IPCC Methane Guidelines - The IPCC Guidelines were first accepted in 1994 and published in 1995. UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) COP3 held in 1997 in Kyoto reaffirmed that the Revised 1996 IPCC Guidelines for National Greenhouse Gas Inventories should be used as "methodologies for estimating anthropogenic emissions by sources and removals by sinks of greenhouse gases" in calculation of legally-binding targets during the first commitment period.
NOTE: Although there are decades of Arctic literature on Arctic greenhouse gases, the IPCC does not consider Arctic greenhouse gas-releases within any of its IPCC AR4 studies and reports. IPCC documents are revised on a political needs basis. Reference: Climate Change 2007: Working Group III: Mitigation of Climate Change, IPCC AR4 1.3.1, Review of the last three decades.
World leaders have ignored valid greenhouse gas guidelines and have used their own methods to remain on carbon economies.
Clathrate Gun Methane Event - Thawing by global warming of sub sea layer of the Arctic Ocean seafloor permafrost will release stores of underlying, seabed methane (the “clathrate gun hypothesis”). Recent research carried out in 2008 in the Siberian Arctic has shown millions of tonnes of methane being released with concentrations in some regions reaching up to 100 times above normal. Such regional methane releases feed back an produce increased regional temperature increases.
A section of the Arctic Ocean seafloor that holds vast stores of frozen methane is showing signs of instability and widespread venting of the powerful greenhouse gas, according to the findings of an international research team led by University of Alaska Fairbanks scientists. A geologic “clathrate gun methane event” appears to be now occurring:
The East Siberian Arctic Shelf is a methane-rich area that encompasses more than 2 million square kilometers of seafloor in the Arctic Ocean. It is more than three times as large as the nearby Siberian wetlands, which have been considered the primary Northern Hemisphere source of atmospheric methane. Research results show that the East Siberian Arctic Shelf is already a significant methane source, releasing as much as is emitted from the rest of the ocean.
"Our concern is that the sub sea permafrost has been showing signs of destabilization already," she said. "If it further destabilizes, the methane emissions may not be teragrams, it would be significantly larger." Reference: “Methane Releases From Arctic Shelf May Be Much Faster Than Anticipated” MARCH 4, 2010, NSF Press Release 10-036 LINK
The East Siberian Arctic Shelf is part of the Arctic Ocean coast line. The total Arctic Ocean area is 14.056 million sq km (5.4 million sq miles), includes Baffin Bay, Barents Sea, Beaufort Sea, East Siberian Sea, Hudson Bay, Hudson Strait, Kara Sea, Laptev Sea, Northwest Passage, and other tributary water bodies, which includes the Greenland Sea and Chukchi Sea. The Arctic Ocean coastline is 45,389 km (28,203 miles) and is slightly less than 1.5 times the size of the U.S.
All of the Arctic Ocean is subject to large methane clathrate deposits that destabilize global warming.
Reducing further global warming greenhouse gas emissions is the most cost effective method for stopping Arctic global warming methane releases. Not reducing greenhouse gases results in expanding the “clathrate gun methane event.”
GLOBAL WARMING TEMPERATURE INCREASE +6.4C PRIOR TO 2099
Earth’s temperature at 2090-2099 is a very important topic for Earth’s population. The combination of increased natural and human (anthropomorphic) greenhouse gases and the “clathrate gun methane event” results in a global temperature increase exceeding +6.4C prior to 2099. Human races terminate 2050-2099.
In 2011, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) estimated that global methane clathrate contains more organic carbon than the combined world's coal, oil, and non-methane clathrate natural gas. By 2099, with a global temperature of +6.4C temperature increase above preindustrial times, the magnitude of the warmed oceans’ global release of methane clathrate storehouses of methane (CH4) is truly staggering: methane fireballs tear across the sky, causing further global warming. Reference: Blogger “Global Warming 2050-2099” “Population, growth, and global warming temperature increase”
Methane clathrate release from the Arctic’s not-so-permafrost is the most dangerous amplifying feedback in the entire carbon cycle. Research has found methane bubbling out of the ocean and melting permafrost (frozen soil and waters) and in Arctic/Tundra wetlands and lakes. Permafrost lining the deep and shallow cold Arctic seas is holding in untold amounts of trapped methane within methane clathrate. Under pressure and low temperature, methane (which normally boils at –161 degrees Celsius (434 Kelvin)) forms a thermodynamically stable association with water. These solids are called methane clathrate (or hydrates). As the seas and lands warm, massive amounts of global warming greenhouse gas methane and carbon is released.
In the 1960's it was recognized that considerable quantities of gas hydrate, namely methane hydrate, occur naturally in sediments of the sub sea continental slopes, and in the subsurface of Arctic permafrost regions. Reference: "Where is Gas Hydrates Found?"
If even a fraction of the methane stored in the Eastern Siberia Arctic Ocean shelf is released it could trigger abrupt climate warming. The Siberian Arctic Shelf is a 20-30 year frontier in methane studies. There are additional areas of methane interest near the Arctic Ocean coast. The Arctic Ocean shelf is shallow, 50 meters (164 feet) or less in depth, which means the Arctic Shelf, has been collecting methane alternately submerged or terrestrial, depending on sea levels and temperatures throughout Earth’s history. It is described as a methane ticking time bomb. Ignoring global warming gas increases has been describe as a political “suicide pact.”
GREENHOUSE GASES ARE COMBINED NATURAL AND HUMAN GASES
Aside from purely human-produced synthetic halocarbons, most greenhouse gases have both natural and human-caused sources. Prior to the industrial era, greenhouse gas concentrations were roughly constant. Due to human activity, global warming atmospheric greenhouse gas ratios are no longer constant and are in a state of change.
Post Industrial Era use of human carbon energy (coal, oil, natural gas) has added huge amounts of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, mainly through the burning of fossil fuels and deforestation. Energy consumption is driven by population size and gross domestic product size. Increased energy used increases global warming CO2 emissions that are life threatening to the human race. Reference: Blogger Global Warming 2050-2099 “GDP and Population Size Drive Energy Consumption"
Human and natural activities result in emissions of principal greenhouse gases (GHGs): carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O) and human only halocarbons.
Methane has gone from being a gas of no importance to the most important greenhouse gas, both for understanding climate change and as a cost-effective target for future emission reductions.
The Arctic methane feedback increases global warming temperature increase. Therefore, Arctic methane feedback must be included within greenhouse gas scenarios and global warming models.
Gas methane clathrates (hydrates) in the Arctic were being reported upon by the US DOE since at least 1978 JANUARY 01. Methane trapped in marine sediments as a clathrate (hydrate) represents such an immense carbon reservoir that it must be considered as an emerging dominant factor in estimating global warming temperature increase.
In 1995, Rice University suggested that the only conceivable perturbation to the global carbon cycle was the result of methane releases.
“Methane A Scientific Journey from Obscurity to Climate Super Stardom,”
NASA Methane: A Scientific Journey from Obscurity to Climate Super-Stardom
By Gavin Schmidt, SEPTEMBER 2004 Reference: Article
The first survey in 1971 on the possibility of inadvertent human modification of climate stated that "Methane [CH4] has no direct effects on the climate or the biosphere [and] it is considered to be of no importance". The gas did not even appear in the index of the major climatology book of the time (Lamb's Climate Past, Present and Future). Yet in the 2001 IPCC report, large parts of multiple chapters are dedicated to examining the sources, sinks, chemistry, history and potential future of this humble molecule. New papers are published every month relating paleo-climate changes to methane variability and discussing the possibility of significantly reducing future anthropogenic climate change by aggressively managing methane emissions. New hypotheses such as the "clathrate gun hypothesis" (more below) place methane variability at the centre of the debate on rapid climate change.
What has fueled the rapid rise of methane from an obscure trace gas to a major factor in past, present and future climate change? As is usual in science, it is the conflation of multiple lines of evidence, that only when taken together do the connections and possible feed backs seem obvious.
Methane as a Greenhouse Gas
First some basics: methane (CH4) is a very simple molecule (one carbon surrounded by four hydrogen atoms) and is created predominantly by bacteria that feed on organic material. In dry conditions, there is plenty of atmospheric oxygen, and so aerobic bacteria which produce carbon dioxide (CO2) are preferred. But in wet areas such as swamps, wetlands and in the ocean, there is not enough oxygen, and so complex hydrocarbons get broken down to methane by anaerobic bacteria. Some of this methane can get trapped (as a gas, as a solid, dissolved or eaten) and some makes its way to the atmosphere where it is gradually broken down to CO2 and water (H2O) vapor in a series of chemical reactions.
Although methane was detected in the atmosphere in 1948, its importance to climate was only recently revealed by three key discoveries.
● The first, at NASA GISS in 1976, was that methane in the atmosphere was actually a significant greenhouse gas — it absorbs some frequencies of infrared radiation (emitted from the Earth's surface) that would otherwise go straight out to space. In combination with other greenhouse gases (water vapor, CO2 and N2O), this leads to a surface temperature that is about 30°C warmer than if there were no atmosphere.
● The second key result was due to the recovery and analyses of Greenland and Antarctic ice cores. These multi-kilometer cores, drilled through the ice sheets by both European and American research teams, have shown in unprecedented detail climate changes over centuries, millennium, and hundreds of thousands of years. Indeed, annual layers can be discerned for much of the length of the cores, which allowed researchers to construct an extremely accurate timescale for the climate-related changes they found.
Along with isotopic analyses of the ice itself (which is mainly related to temperature), the researchers were able to isolate the gases trapped inside tiny bubbles in the ice. The greenhouses gases, CO2 and CH4, within those bubbles showed that since the industrial period began (around the mid-1800s) concentrations of both CO2 and CH4 have been increasing rapidly. In fact, CH4 concentrations have more than doubled over the last 150 years, and the contribution to the enhanced greenhouse effect is almost half of that due to CO2 increases over the same period.
The changes over the last century seem to be mostly related to increased emissions due to human activity: leaks from mining and natural gas pipelines, landfills, increased irrigation (particularly rice paddies, which are essentially artificial wetlands) and increased livestock producing more intestinal CH4 (!) among other factors. However, over the last ice age, and particularly in the turbulent world just prior to the modern Holocene period (roughly the last 11,500 years), methane was observed to oscillate almost hand-in-hand in response to rapid climate.
Methane Sources Schematic - Natural sources of methane include wetlands, termites, decomposing organic materials in ocean and fresh water, and methane hydrate. Anthropogenic influenced sources include livestock flatulence, rice paddies, biomass burning, landfills, coal mining, and gas production, with rice paddies and livestock flatulence being the major sources of methane. Reference: pdf "Methane hydrate in the global organic carbon cycle"
Methane Sources – Resulting from global warming temperature increase, methane (clathrate, hydrate, and other) portion of the methane pie chart is expanding. At some point, when atmospheric radiative forcing (RF) factors and CO2eq exceed 450 ppm, or the +2C temperature increase is exceed; methane forcing overwhelms Earth’s temperature increase. Reference: pdf "Methane and Nitrous Oxide Emissions From Natural Sources"
Methane Ice Core Records – Historical ice core records of methane (CH4) concentrations through time as deduced from the concentration in trapped air inside the ice. Over the long term seen in the Antarctica record, CH4 observed to oscillate consistently with temperature (from 400 to 700 ppb in cold and warm periods respectively). Reference: Ice core, Antarctica
Methane Stable Preindustrial Value Of 700 ppb to 1750 ppb - In the modern period seen in the higher accumulation core at Law Dome (Antarctica), the relatively stable preindustrial value of 700 ppb is shown to have increased to 1750 ppb today. Arctic Methane Samples 1800-2000
Methane Sensitivity to Climate
● The third key piece of evidence was an exceptional investigation at Scripps Institution of Oceanography and Washington State University. The Universities convincingly showed (using some novel geochemistry involving the isotopes of nitrogen that react to rapid changes in surface temperatures) that methane rapidly increases in a warming climate with a small lag behind temperature. Therefore, not only does methane affect climate through greenhouse effects, but it in turn can evidently be affected by climate itself.
With these observations — that methane is a greenhouse gas that changes to emissions can affect the atmospheric concentration, and that climate can cause methane emissions to vary — there is a potential for some very interesting positive feed backs. The question then turns to what controls this variability and how large these effects can be. Researchers have only started to delve into the details necessary to understand the links more thoroughly.
I have already discussed the principle methane sources, but the other side of the coin is the sink of methane. Once emitted into the atmosphere, what happens to it? The answer is intimately bound up in atmospheric chemistry.
In the lower part of the atmosphere, below about 10-12 km (the troposphere), the key cycles are mediated above all by the presence of what are called OH radicals — colloquially known as the atmospheric detergent. All hydrocarbon chemical species that are emitted can be eventually broken down (or oxidized) by these radicals to CO2 and H2O, and methane is no exception. An average molecule of CH4 lasts around eight to nine years before it gets oxidized. This is a long time compared to most atmospheric chemicals but is fast enough so that there can be significant year-to-year variability. Around 10% of the CH4 makes it into the upper atmosphere (the stratosphere, between 15 and 50 km above sea level)) where it also gets oxidized, though through a slightly different set of reactions. A key point is that in the very dry stratosphere, the water produced from methane oxidation is a big part of the water budget and stratospheric water vapor is a greenhouse gas in its own right! This indirect process enhances the climate impact of methane changes by about 15%.
Climate Impacts on Methane
There are many possible climate influences on the methane sink. For instance, as the climate warms or cools, the amount of water in the air changes, this in turn affects levels of OH. As it gets warmer, the sink becomes more efficient and CH4 levels would fall in the absence of other changes. Changing emissions of other chemicals (e.g. carbon monoxide in biomass burning, complex hydrocarbons from vegetation) can compete for OH and again cause CH4 to change proportionately. In fact, the CH4 level itself has a positive feedback on its own lifetime: i.e., the more methane there is, the more OH is "used up" and the longer the methane can stick around.
What about variations in emissions that might be climatically controlled? I mentioned above that natural methane emissions depend on the extent of organic decomposition in very wet conditions. It turns out that for an individual wetland, an increase in the water table (for instance as rain increases) and/or an increase in temperature will lead to greater emissions on a very short time scale. Over longer periods, wetlands and river deltas come and go as a function of sea level or changes in large-scale rainfall patterns. In the high latitudes, the freezing and thawing of permafrost regions can significantly change the extent of peat bogs and hence emissions. A recent study in Sweden demonstrated that emissions increased by between 20 and 60% over a 30-year period due to permafrost thawing.
Over recent decades the growth rate of methane has oscillated significantly and, indeed, has been basically zero (i.e., no increases) for the last three years. The combination of changes in wetland emissions and climate-related cooling during the Mt. Pinatubo eruption (1991-1993) combined with changes in economic activity, particularly in the former Soviet Union, seem to explain most of this variability although there are still large error bars in these estimates. There is, however, one additional reservoir of methane about which very little is known: the methane clathrate reservoir in the oceans — the 600-pound gorilla of methane variability!
Ice core records of CH4 concentrations through time as deduced from the concentration in trapped air inside the ice. Over the long term seen in the Vostok (Antarctica) record, CH4 is observed to oscillate consistently with temperature (from 400 to 700 ppb in cold and warm periods respectively).
In the modern period seen in the higher accumulation core at Law Dome (Antarctica), the relatively stable pre-industrial value of 700 ppb is shown to have increased to 1750 ppb today.
Methane Clathrates and Climate
Clathrates are a class of compound that consists of a cage of molecules that can trap gases, such as methane, in a solid form. For methane, the most important "cage" is one that is made of water molecules, and so is described sometimes as a hydrate. Some key facts about clathrates make them particularly interesting to climatologists. First, they may make up a significant portion of total fossil carbon reserves, including coal and oil. Current best guesses suggest that maybe 500 to 2000 gigatonnes of carbon may be stored as methane clathrates (5-20% of total estimated reserves). Some estimates are as high as 10,000 gigatonnes. They occur mainly on the continental shelf where the water is relatively cold; there is sufficient pressure and enough organic material to keep the methane-producing bacteria happy. Most importantly, clathrates can be explosively unstable if the temperature increases or the pressure decreases — which can happen as a function of climate change, tectonic uplift or undersea landslides.
The importance of these clathrates in climate change has only recently started to be appreciated. The first clue was some puzzling data from a period 55 million years ago. In the early 1990's, Scripps Institute of Oceanography noticed that during an extremely short amount of time (geologically speaking) at the transition between the Paleocene and Eocene epochs, carbon isotope ratios everywhere (the deep sea, on land, at the poles and in the tropics) suddenly changed to favor the lighter 12C isotope of carbon at the expense of 13C. The rapidity and size of this change was unprecedented in the period since the demise of the dinosaurs, and this excursion was simultaneous with a short period of extreme global warming (around 3 to 4 degrees globally, more in the high latitudes).
In 1995, Rice University suggested that the only conceivable perturbation to the global carbon cycle to fit these data was a massive input of light carbon that had been stored as methane clathrates, which are observed to be particularly high in 12C. Nothing else could be as fast-acting or have enough of the lighter isotope to have had the observed effects. Given that both CH4 and its oxidization product CO2 are greenhouse gases, this might explain the global warming as well.
Subsequent work, including atmospheric chemistry studies by NASA GISS, has confirmed that this hypothesis is still the most likely candidate, although the initial triggering mechanism is unknown. Similar ideas explain short-term events in the Jurassic, at the Permian-Triassic boundary, although the evidence for a unique role of methane in these cases is much weaker than at the Paleocene/Eocene boundary.
With a plausible role for methane clathrates in the Paleocene, it is only natural to examine whether they played a similar role in more recent climate changes, such as rapid climate variability during the last ice age. There are some tantalizing clues. In ocean sediments offshore of California, Woods Hole recently found geochemical traces of clathrate releases coincident with warming in the Greenland ice core records. In some records, there are coincident spikes in the carbon isotope record, reminiscent of the Paleocene/Eocene spike but of lower amplitude. This has lead to the so-called "clathrate gun hypothesis", that methane builds up in clathrates during geologic cold periods, and as a warming starts it is explosively released, leading to enhanced further rapid climate warming. This idea is not yet widely accepted, mainly because the records of methane in the ice cores seems to lag the temperature changes, and the magnitudes involved do not appear large enough to significantly perturb the radiative balance of the planet. The more conventional explanation is that as the climate warms there is increased rain in the tropics and thus increased emissions from tropical wetlands which need to have been large enough to counteract a probable increase in the methane sink. There is, however, much that we don't understand about the methane cycle during the ice ages, and maybe hydrates will eventually be considered part of the rapid climate change story.
Methane hydrate consists of a cage of water molecules trapping a methane molecule within. This can form large crystals of hydrate in cold and heavily pressurized situations (mainly on the continental slope in the oceans).
When brought to the surface, methane gas will escape into the atmosphere from the hydrate or it can be burnt off.
Methane and the Future
This example does lead to the wider question: What role does methane (including methane clathrates) play in the global carbon cycle? It has been suggested that all carbon cycling models need to take the clearly significant methane reservoir into account. However, much is still to be learned about the clathrates. How extensive are they? How long is required for the reservoir to fill? What happens when clathrates are exposed to the ocean? What is the role of methane-eating bacteria in the sediment? Until recently these questions were considered extremely esoteric, but such subjects now have moved to the mainstream in carbon-cycle research.
In order to answer these questions, researchers are currently working on improvements in the understanding of many aspects of the methane cycle. They are refining techniques for measuring the carbon isotopes in the ice-core methane to possibly distinguish between different sources. Models of the climate and atmospheric chemistry are being revised and improved in order to simulate the variations in methane seen in the ice core records. Deep in the ocean, researchers are paying close attention to the chemistry and biology that is going around the clathrate deposits. In the high latitudes, scientists are better quantifying the fluxes of methane from peat bogs and thawing permafrost regions. Slowly but surely some of the uncertainties are being reduced.
And so what of the future? Over the last few years atmospheric methane concentrations have hardly changed. This is clearly good news for those worried about continued greenhouse warming, but until scientists understand why, there is no assurance that increased emissions won't resume. This stands as a clear reminder that we still do not know everything we need to about methane. Many of the anthropogenic sources of methane such as irrigation, mining, farm practices, etc. are however relatively cheap and straightforward to control. For example, New Zealand's primary contribution to greenhouse gas emissions is from sheep digestive processes, and scientists there are experimenting with changes to feed that have the potential to reduce methane production enormously. Similarly, improved capture of methane released in mining and oil operations is providing a cleaner fuel source and increasing profits for the companies concerned.
The responses of wetlands and clathrate deposits to climate change are hard to foresee, and one wild card is the extent to which the potential exploitation of the clathrate reservoir for energy production might lead to increased releases to the atmosphere. However, the technologies involved in this have yet to be fully developed and so forecasts are extremely uncertain. Research is now being conducted on reducing methane emissions from almost all the sources and that may possibly allow for relatively short term (<50 years) decreases in methane concentrations, and a consequent reduction in the forces driving global warming.
Over the last 30 years, methane has gone from being a gas of no importance, to — in some researchers’ eyes, at least — possibly the most important greenhouse gas both for understanding climate change and as a cost-effective target for future emission reductions. Whether some of these new ideas stand up to the scrutiny of the wider climate research community remains to be seen, but one thing is certain, the scientific journey of methane is not yet complete.
References and Further Reading
● Alley, R.B. 2000. The Two-Mile Time Machine: Ice Cores, Abrupt Climate Change, and Our Future. Princeton University Press.
● Christensen, T.R., T. Johansson, H.J. Åkerman, M. Mastepanov, N. Malmer, T. Friborg, P. Crill, and B.H. Svenson 2004. Thawing sub-arctic permafrost: Effects on vegetation and methane emissions. Geophys. Res. Lett. 31, L04501, doi:10.1029/2003GL018680.
● EPICA Community Members 2004. Eight glacial cycles from an Antarctic ice core. Nature 429, 623-628, doi:10.1038/nature02599.
● Hinrichs, K.-U., L.R. Hmelo, and S.P. Sylva 2003. Molecular fossil record of elevated methane levels in late Pleistocene coastal waters. Science 299, 1214-1217, doi:10.1126/science.1079601.
● Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change 2001. Climate Change 2001: The Scientific Basis. Cambridge University Press.
● Kennett, J.P., K.G. Cannariato, I.L. Hendy, and R.J. Beh 2003. Methane Hydrates in Quaternary Climate Change: The Clathrate Gun Hypothesis. American Geophysical Union.
● Lamb, H.H. 1972. Climate Past, Present and Future, vol. 1. Methuen.
● Ruddiman, W. 2003. The anthropogenic greenhouse era began thousands of years ago. Climatic Change 61, 261-293, doi:10.1023/B:CLIM.0000004577.17928.fa.
● Schmidt, G.A., and D.T. Shindell 2003. Atmospheric composition, radiative forcing and climate change as a consequence of a massive methane release from gas hydrates. Paleoceanography 18, doi:10.1029/2002PA000757.
● Severinghaus, J.P., and E.J. Brook 1999. Abrupt climate change at the end of the last glacial period inferred from trapped air in polar ice. Science 286, 930-934, doi:10.1126/science.286.5441.930.
● Wang, W.-C., Y.L. Yung, A.A. Lacis, T. Mo, and J.E. Hansen 1976. Greenhouse effects due to man-made perturbation of trace gases. Science 194, 685-690.
About the Author
Gavin Schmidt is a research scientist at the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and Center for Climate Systems Research, Columbia University in New York. He works on models of the climate system and their application to problems of past, present and future climate change. This article was commissioned for the September 2004 issue of La Recherche, Paris, and this English-language translation appears here with their permission.
When did humans start influencing climate?
University of Virginia recently proposed that human influences on atmospheric methane may have started a long time before the current industrial period.
Suggested is that the start of widespread agriculture, and particularly rice cultivation, 8000 years ago, was a trigger for increasing emissions, and may indeed have prevented a new ice age cycle from occurring by now. Conclusions mainly rest on comparing this current warm period with methane changes seen in the Vostok ice core that correlate with changes in the Earth's orbit (going back 400,000 years). This idea is certainly intriguing.
However, calculations of the changes in the Earth's orbit that are thought to trigger ice ages by the University of Louvain-le-Neuve in Belgium demonstrate that the current warm period is actually quite anomalous compared to the recent past, and thus the previous correlations might not be applicable to the present. Indeed, recent results from the extremely long EPICA core show values in Stage 11 (the best analog to the present) very similar to those seen in the pre-industrial. There is a small increase in methane concentrations from about 5000 years ago, and the conventional wisdom attributes this to the development of boreal wetlands and the major river deltas (at the mouths of the Nile, Mississippi, Niger and Amazon rivers, for instance) once sea level had basically stabilized after the de-glaciations.
In addition, it is extremely uncertain that the low population and area of land cultivated prior to the industrial revolution would lead to sufficient emissions to make a substantial difference. Better quantification of these factors will be needed before this idea can be fully accepted.
Fin
Global temperature is rising as fast in the past decade as in the prior two decades, despite year-to-year fluctuations associated with the El Niño-La Niña cycle of tropical ocean temperature. Reference: figure "Global Surface Temperature"
There is NO SAFE greenhouse gases concentration stabilization level above 350 ppm CO2eq, much less above 450 ppm CO2eq (CO2 equivalent). Required is spending as much money as necessary to reduce NATURAL and HUMAN (anthropomorphic) greenhouse gases (GHGs) to stabilize Earth’s temperature increase to a “safe” level.
The world leaders drive global warming temperature increase mitigations to remain dependent upon national carbon economies. That is, world leaders’ covertly manipulate global warming responses to retain “business as usual scenario” or “no carbon policy scenario” policies. Current world leaders will destroy, or have destroyed, human races.
Global warming temperature increase does not respond to covert political tactics. Unless there are huge human energy changes over the next few years, there will be no human race 2050-2099. Anyone under the age of 30 will die of global warming temperature increase.
