[NatureNS] Global Warming

From: Christopher Majka <c.majka@ns.sympatico.ca>
To: naturens@chebucto.ns.ca
Date: Tue, 10 Jun 2008 21:01:39 -0300
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Hi Dave,

On 10-Jun-08, at 8:02 PM, David & Alison Webster wrote:

>   Figure 1a shows without doubt that temperature, CO2 & CH4 are  
> related but--- temperature starts to increase BEFORE  CO2 & CH4  
> start to increase. There may subsequently be positive feedback, but  
> at least initially, higher temperatures are driving CO2 & CH4  
> increase not the converse.
>
>   I suppose one could call this 'tceffe esuohneerg a' but it would  
> be awfully difficult to pronounce.


You must have preternaturally acute vision to be able resolve this  
from Figure 1a. :-> I'm looking at it at the moment and, as you point  
out, does show a clear historical relationship of temperature, CO2,  
and CH4 but the graph, which represents 800,000 years, is only 3.75"  
wide on my screen. At that level of resolution, these graphs, set one  
over the other, look absolutely co-incident to me. I tried printing  
this out and running a vertical rule over it, but I don't see how one  
could possibly discern whether temperature, carbon dioxide, or methane  
are increasing before or after one another at this resolution. :->

There is a lot of very interesting information in this Nature article  
by Ed Brook on paleoclimatic history. It's astonishing that we now  
have an 800,000 year old climatic record, and even more amazing that  
the IPICS (International Partners in Ice Core Sciences), has set  
itself the target of establishing a continuous 1.5-million-year record  
which they believe they can do from drilling at other sites in the  
eastern Antarctic. Most germane to the present discussion on climate  
change is Brook's statement that, "The fundamental conclusion that  
today's concentrations of these greenhouse gases have no past analogue  
in the ice-core record remains firm."

Methane concentrations over the past 800,000 years have fluctuated  
between 400 and 700 p.p.b. whereas presently they are spiking at 1,800  
p.p.m. (about triple the historical average), and all of this increase  
appears to have taken place in the last century. Similarly, carbon  
dixoide, which has fluctuated between 180 and 300 p.p.m. over the past  
800,000 years, is now in the range of 380 p.p.m., and again all of  
this historically unprecedented increase appears to have taken place  
in the last century.

This is another important scientific finding that underscores the  
dramatic scale of contemporary anthropogenic climate change. It is  
science such as this that bears out the reality of climate change, and  
not petitions one way or the other. These are sobering findings that  
we cannot afford to ignore.

All the best!

Chris

Christopher Majka - Atlantic Canada Coleoptera
http://www.chebucto.ns.ca/Environment/NHR/atlantic_coleoptera.html
c.majka@ns.sympatico.ca


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