Friday, November 4, 2011

Here We Go

Now at last NBC is reporting that climate change is for real.  Maybe that should be rephrased to global warming is for real, because one of the researchers has determined that during the past year there were three times as many record warm days as record cold days ... up from the recent norm of 2 to 1.  So everything is in the ballpark that  I had expected.  Part of that is the reality that I had anticipated that people would really begin to "get" it when the situation had already gotten to be very serious.  If cattle are dying in Texas and there are major wildfires in TX, October snowstorm in New England, that would seem to me to be very serious.

Here is the link to the NBC program:  http://switchboard.nrdc.org/blogs/jschmidt/must_watch_nbc_tv_on_climate_c.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+switchboard_all+%28Switchboard%3A+Blogs+from+NRDC%27s+Environmental+Experts%29&utm_content=Google+Reader

I hear the refrain from some that government must not regulate and interfere in the affairs of people and businesses.  Well here is a locus where we citizens to do something to avoid that.  We can take significant voluntary action to reduce our carbon footprints. Consider what happens if we do not do this.  As the situation gets worse, there will come a time when we are really threatened by this situation. At that point there will be the need for regulations and enforcement.  We will end up with police and other officials having to enforce rules for low carbon footprint.  Sort of like many of us now will be penalized if we burn open fires of brush in suburban or urban areas.  Thus, Libertarians and Conservatives along with everyone else to the more Liberal side, if we are worth our salt, should be pushing for voluntary action to reduce carbon footprints.

Monday, October 31, 2011

Denier Confirms Global Warming

Not a lot needs to be said by me about the Richard Muller at Berkeley study results .

Watch here for more humorous and/or verbose treatments:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPg6ImD9C34

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8BQpciw8suk&feature=results_main&playnext=1&list=PL8256C4D14B1F3D0C

Thursday, March 10, 2011

Climate Change Begins Maybe to Come Home

Last evening my wife and I were in the grocery store.  I checked the price of iceberg lettuce.  Fortunately, I had purchased a head a couple days earlier at BJ's for $1.49, which is higher than we usually pay since we tend to wait for specials.  So now I was in Stop and Shop, and the price was $2.49 per head.  Highest price I had ever seen for lettuce, although the heads were pretty good sized and firm.  Then I noticed a sign about ten feet to the right alerting customers to a shortage of certain items due to weather damage, and therefore higher prices.  Not lettuce, but cucumbers, squash, and a few other things.  As I went past the iceberg lettuce, I chatted briefly with another customer, who agreed that the lettuce had gotten rather pricey.  I pointed out the sign to him.  He commented that things were crazy.  I commented that it was going to get crazier.  I was thinking not just about Climate Change but also about warfare and revolution, as well as world demand for oil beginning to pass world supply.

Now today there is an article in the New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/10/science/earth/10coffee.html?hp. I thought it was daring of the author and the New York Times to put this on the front page with the following commentary:  "Changes linked to global warming have contributed to a shortage of the beans used in specialty coffees."  Daring because we who understand Climate Change a little bit are being very careful about ascribing many of these changes to Climate Change.  There are a bunch of unethical people who are manipulating data (meaning "making it up") and arguing that Climate Change does not exist.  So the up side to that is that we avoid controversy and criticism.  The down side is that there are a lot of people who are ignoring the issue of Climate Change, and they need to get with it.

In whatever time I can manage on the side of a busy schedule, I am writing a paper on weather change and Climate Change.  Maybe I will save time by simply publishing the results on my blog.  Based on my initial data analysis, it would appear that the weather impacts have been building a lot longer than many of us had been thinking.  Winter weather in Boston seems to confirm the effect that George Woodwell explained to me one day some years ago:  More carbon in the air means that more solar energy is absorbed in the atmosphere.  More energy in the air means that that energy must go somewhere.  That means more turbulence and storminess.  This would well describe the Boston area weather pattern during the past 4-6 months.  Lots of fronts moving through with a lot more than the usual action associated with each front.  Therefore a lot of precipitation, windiness, and winter thunderstorms. 

This is showing up during warmer weather as well.  Minneapolis used to be outside the tornado belt, but the belt has been expanding since 1950 (!!).  My cousin's child lives north of Minneapolis and refers to that area as "tornado alley."  It used to be that the Minneapolis area got an occasional, or should I say rare, tornado.  I grew up there until I was 18 and went off to college.  There was one tornado in all those years.  Clearly the situation has changed.

Winter thunderstorms are a real anomaly that continued this winter and really concern me.  I do not know anyone who had experienced a winter thunderstorm until recently when I blogged about it.  If there is anyone who experienced a winter thunderstorm out there prior to two years ago, please share about it.  If you have experienced a winter thunderstorm more recently, I also want to hear about that.