How Bad Is Global Warming?

[DrEvil]

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/ ... -report-un

IPCC climate change report: averting catastrophe is eminently affordable

Landmark UN analysis concludes global roll-out of clean energy would shave only a tiny fraction off economic growth


Catastrophic climate change can be averted without sacrificing living standards according to a UN report, which concludes that the transformation required to a world of clean energy is eminently affordable.
“It doesn’t cost the world to save the planet,” said economist Professor Ottmar Edenhofer, who led the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) team.

The cheapest and least risky route to dealing with global warming is to abandon all dirty fossil fuels in coming decades, the report found. Gas – including that from the global fracking boom – could be important during the transition, Edenhofer said, but only if it replaced coal burning.

The authoritative report, produced by 1,250 international experts and approved by 194 governments, dismisses fears that slashing carbon emissions would wreck the world economy. It is the final part of a trilogy that has already shown that climate change is “unequivocally” caused by humans and that, unchecked, it poses a grave threat to people and could lead to wars and mass migration.

Diverting hundred of billions of dollars from fossil fuels into renewable energy and cutting energy waste would shave just 0.06% off expected annual economic growth rates of 1.3%-3%, the IPCC report concluded.
“The report is clear: the more you wait, the more it will cost [and] the more difficult it will become,” said EU commissioner Connie Hedegaard. The US secretary of state, John Kerry, said: “This report is a wake-up call about global economic opportunity we can seize today as we lead on climate change.”

The UK’s energy and climate secretary, Ed Davey, said: “The [report shows] the tools we need to tackle climate change are available, but international efforts need to significantly increase.”

The IPCC economic analysis did not include the benefits of cutting greenhouse gas emissions, which could outweigh the costs. The benefits include reducing air pollution, which plagues China and recently hit the UK, and improved energy security, which is currently at risk in eastern Europe due to the actions of Russia – a large producer of gas – in Ukraine.

The new IPCC report warns that carbon emissions have soared in the last decade and are now growing at almost double the previous rate. But its comprehensive ­analysis found rapid action can still limit global warming to 2C, the internationally agreed safe limit, if low-carbon energy triples or quadruples by 2050.

“It is actually affordable to do it and people are not going to have to sacrifice their aspirations about improved standards of living,” said Professor Jim Skea, an energy expert at Imperial College London and co-chair of the IPCC report team. “It is not a hair shirt change of lifestyle at all that is being envisaged and there is space for poorer countries to develop too,” Skea told the Guardian.

Nonetheless, to avoid the worst impacts of climate change at the lowest cost, the report envisages an energy revolution ending centuries of dominance by fossil fuels – which will require significant political and commercial change. On Thursday, Archbishop Desmond Tutu called for an anti-apartheid style campaign against ­fossil fuel companies, which he blames for the “injustice” of climate change.

Friends of the Earth’s executive director, Andy Atkins, said: “Rich nations must take the lead by rapidly weaning themselves off coal, gas and oil and funding low-carbon growth in poorer countries.”

Along with measures that cut energy waste, renewable energy – such as wind, hydropower and solar – is viewed most favourably by the report as a result of its falling costs and large-scale deployment in recent years.

The report includes nuclear power as a mature low-carbon option, but cautions that it has declined globally since 1993 and faces safety, financial and waste-management concerns. Carbon capture and storage (CCS) – trapping the CO2 from coal or gas burning and then burying it – is also included, but the report notes it is an untested technology on a large scale and may be expensive.

Biofuels, used in cars or power stations, could play a “critical role” in cutting emissions, the IPCC found, but it said the negative effects of some biofuels on food prices and wildlife remained unresolved.

The report found that current emission-cutting pledges by the world’s nations make it more likely than not that the 2C limit will be broken and it warns that delaying action any further will increase the costs.

Delay could also force extreme measures to be taken including sucking CO2 out of the air.

This might be done by generating energy by burning plants and trees, which had absorbed carbon from the atmosphere, and then using CCS to bury the emissions. But the IPCC warned such warned such carbon removal technologies may never be developed and could bring new risks.

“This is a very responsible report,” said Professor Andrew Watson, an atmospheric scientist at the University of Exeter who was not part of the IPCC team. He said there were economic and social risks in transforming the energy system to cut carbon. “However, there are even bigger risks if we do nothing and rely exclusively on being able to ride out climate change and adapt to it.”

Environmental campaign groups, which have previously criticised the IPCC for being too conservative, welcomed the new report. WWF’s Samantha Smith said: “The IPCC report makes clear that acting on emissions now is affordable, but delaying further increases the costs. It is a super strong signal to [fossil fuel] investors: they can no longer say they did not know the risks.”

Kaisa Kosonen, at Greenpeace International, said: “Renewable energy is unstoppable. It’s becoming bigger, better and cheaper every day. Dirty energy industries are sure to put up a fight but it’s only a question of time before public pressure and economics dictate that they either change or go out of business.”

[Laodicean]

Dedicated to BenD, who I henceforth dub the "Caribbean Queen". You can feel the hot exhaled CO2 air in the air from his every breath of denial. The oceans currents adrift with hot hellish surprises on the horizon for humanity.

Laodicean, you are henceforth judged as being neither hot or cold, but lukewarm.....until you heed this rebuke and repent...

Humanity should in deed repent fot its wrongdoing, BenD. I agree. But your rebuke fails in the face of the dragon, who is you. Go ahead and toss your bible in the fire along with your denial of Nature itself, for which Humanity is a part - not apart. For once you realize the Truth, you'll also know we're already too late. Smoke'em if ya got'em!

[Laodicean]

Repent the Rebuke!

[Ben D]

.....denial of Nature itself, for which Humanity is a part.

It's the AGW team that started the anthropogenic blame game and discriminated against mankind's CO2 emissions, while all other CO2 emissions appear to be considered ok.

All natures CO2 emission comprise 0.03 of a percent of the total atmosphere...of this 0.03%, only 4%* of it (0.0012% of the atmosphere) is emitted by humans, the rest (96%) by the rest of nature..

And btw, far from my denying the unity of nature, I consider it essential for all aspirants to understand the awesome underlying unity of nature...to be at one with this oneness is what I'm about..He who would try to save his life will ultimately lose it, but the one who surrenders their sense of separateness for the sake of the underlying unity of reality, will realize eternal being.

* I had understood the figure was 1%, this reference quotes it at 4% so I'll go with that for now...

[brainpanhandler]

It has also locked most people into yet another "divide-and-conquer" bullshit debate about whether or not you should "believe" in global warming.

Like that matters one way or another.

Right. Like why should it matter whether we can increase the probability that we correctly understand the effects of deforestation? And does it really matter one way or the other whether we "believe" in anything, like gravity and stuff? What is gravity anyway? Can anyone tell me? No. Even if a piano should fall on my head I still wouldn't know what gravity "is" and it wouldn't really matter then, would it? Point made.

[Nordic]

It has also locked most people into yet another "divide-and-conquer" bullshit debate about whether or not you should "believe" in global warming.

Like that matters one way or another.

Right. Like why should it matter whether we can increase the probability that we correctly understand the effects of deforestation? And does it really matter one way or the other whether we "believe" in anything, like gravity and stuff? What is gravity anyway? Can anyone tell me? No. Even if a piano should fall on my head I still wouldn't know what gravity "is" and it wouldn't really matter then, would it? Point made.

My point is that the "discussion" is then about whether or not we should even believe it exists, instead of the actual problem at hand.

Then the people who believe can scream at the people who don't, and call them names, and vice versa.

Meanwhile the earth burns up and nobody does anything.

It's a tactic the PTB uses all the time.

[brainpanhandler]

It has also locked most people into yet another "divide-and-conquer" bullshit debate about whether or not you should "believe" in global warming.

Like that matters one way or another.

Right. Like why should it matter whether we can increase the probability that we correctly understand the effects of deforestation? And does it really matter one way or the other whether we "believe" in anything, like gravity and stuff? What is gravity anyway? Can anyone tell me? No. Even if a piano should fall on my head I still wouldn't know what gravity "is" and it wouldn't really matter then, would it? Point made.

My point is that the "discussion" is then about whether or not we should even believe it exists, instead of the actual problem at hand.

Then the people who believe can scream at the people who don't, and call them names, and vice versa.

Meanwhile the earth burns up and nobody does anything.

It's a tactic the PTB uses all the time.

Climate disruption is not like your house being on fire. The evidence for that is smoke and fire. It's obvious and visceral. Fire! Climate disruption has not yet disrupted enough people's lives in a noticeable enough way to demand everyone's attention. So people have to be persuaded with the evidence. You are of course right in that this gives unscrupulous elements an opening to create a false debate about it, which in turn prevents and delays the drastic measures that should have taken place 30 years ago. but you create the impression that there is some sort of equivalency between the two sides. There isn't. There's no equivalency at all. The trolls making $.02 a word posting bullshit on the internet are a part of a grand scheme of creating doubt and delaying action because it threatens the bottom line of powerful forces . The politicians preying on people's weaknesses and portraying the evidence for the existence of climate disruption as "junk science" should be shot. They're pre-enlightenment troglodytes. There is no equivalency.

This is one of the greatest challenges of science in the history of man. To convince the masses, based on the scientific evidence, that anthropogenic climate disruption is real, that it has the potential to destabilize the biosphere to such an extent that it threatens massive extinctions, including maybe us, and that despite the relative seeming normalcy of people's consumptive lives drastic measures must be taken immediately that will mean changes in the way people live in order to hopefully stave off the worst consequences for future generations. It's a lot easier to appeal to and take advantage of people's optimism, laziness, and ignorance and tell them everything will be alright, pay no attention to the godless scientists in cahoots with the green revolution and the corrupt politicians who want to funnel your hard earned tax dollars to those parasites. Doesn't require a single shred of evidence to make that argument. No equivalency. None.

[NeonLX]

Which reminds me...WHY is the mainstream media so suddenly interested in providing the drooling public a barrage of climate change "facts"? I've noticed for a week or two now, the network "news" at 5 p.m. has been reporting on the effects from climate change, and also presenting opinions from "experts" on how bad it really is--not to the level of Guy McPherson, but still quite drastic for what's normal for corporate-sponsored news.

Of course, hangin' with y'all has made me suspicious of the PTB's sudden interest in the subject. Anyone else noticed this lately?

[brainpanhandler]

Which reminds me...WHY is the mainstream media so suddenly interested in providing the drooling public a barrage of climate change "facts"? I've noticed for a week or two now, the network "news" at 5 p.m. has been reporting on the effects from climate change, and also presenting opinions from "experts" on how bad it really is--not to the level of Guy McPherson, but still quite drastic for what's normal for corporate-sponsored news.

Of course, hangin' with y'all has made me suspicious of the PTB's sudden interest in the subject. Anyone else noticed this lately?

Normally I am content to use and to let people use ptb liberally without having to name names, but in this case it would be helpful if you named some names. Like for instance, are you talking about the people that own the corporations that control the media? http://www.commoncause.org/site/pp.asp? ... &b=4923173

Assuming the ptb understand and have understood and known for quite some time that anthropogenic climate disruption is real and that they are not suicidal or suicidally short sighted, then their behavior becomes more understandable. For instance, the fact that Exxon has been raking in record profits seems to me to be evidence that they understand that 1) peak oil is real and 2) anthropogenic climate disruption is real and 3) their business model has a short shelf life left. That understanding translates into the following strategy -

1) Do whatever is necessary to prevent any measures to curtail mining, selling and burning every last bit of fossil fuel energy for as long as possible.

2) Dig and pump as fast as possible.

3) Jack prices up as much as possible without collapsing the economies of their largest customers

I also wonder if the the great recession is not part of a plan by the .001% to slow climate disruption enough to protect longer term profits.

[Iamwhomiam]

Ben, I do hope you realize that the tiny addition by humans has thrown nature out of balance, as you point out for others to note.

Slimmouse, Carbon DIoxide is merely one of many gases that contribute to warming our atmosphere, but one simple to understand and one chosen as a measuring stick, a gauge other warming gases could be easily compared to. Please read this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPCC_list_of_greenhouse_gases

Here's a breakdown of the IPCC draft report:

http://ipcc-wg2.gov/AR5/report/final-drafts/

Climate Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability

WGII AR5 Final Drafts (accepted)

The Final Draft Report, dated 28 October 2013, of the Working Group II contribution to the IPCC Fifth Assessment Report Climate Change 2014:Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability was accepted but not approved in detail by the 10th Session of Working Group II and the 38th Session of the IPCC on 29 March 2014 in Yokohama, Japan. It consists of the full scientific and technical assessment undertaken by Working Group II.

The Final Draft Report has to be read in conjunction with the document entitled “Climate Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability. Working Group II Contribution to the IPCC 5th Assessment Report — Changes to the Underlying Scientific/Technical Assessment” to ensure consistency with the approved Summary for Policymakers (IPCC-XXXVIII/DOC.4) presented to the Panel at its 38th Session. This document lists the changes necessary to ensure consistency between the full Report and the Summary for Policymakers, which was approved line-by-line by Working Group II and accepted by the Panel at the above-mentioned Sessions. A listing of substantive edits additionally indicates corrections of errors for the Final Draft Report.


Edits to the Final Draft Report
Changes to the Underlying Scientific/Technical Assessment (IPCC-XXXVIII/DOC.4) 0.17 MB
List of Substantive Edits 0.12 MB


SUMMARY PRODUCTS
Technical Summary 18.6MB
WGII AR5 Volume-wide Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) 0.15 MB

VOLUME I: GLOBAL AND SECTORAL ASPECTS
Context for the AR5
Ch 1 — Point of departure 0.95 MB
Ch 2 — Foundations for decisionmaking 1.31 MB
Natural and Managed Resources and Systems, and Their Uses
Ch 3 — Freshwater resources 2.50 MB
Ch 4 — Terrestrial and inland water systems 2.80 MB
Ch 5 — Coastal systems and low-lying areas 1.42 MB
Ch 6 — Ocean systems 9.07 MB
Ch 7 — Food security and food production systems 1.64 MB
Human Settlements, Industry, and Infrastructure
Ch 8 — Urban Areas 3.76 MB
Ch 9 — Rural Areas 0.83 MB
Ch 10 — Key economic sectors and services 0.82 MB
Human Health, Well-Being, and Security
Ch 11 — Human health: impacts, adaptation, and co-benefits 1.13 MB
Ch 12 — Human security 0.88 MB
Ch 13 — Livelihoods and poverty 2.13 MB
Adaptation
Ch 14 — Adaptation needs and options 0.44 MB
Ch 15 — Adaptation planning and implementation 0.46 MB
Ch 16 — Adaptation opportunities, constraints, and limits 1.56 MB
Ch 17 — Economics of adaptation 0.64 MB
Multi-Sector Impacts, Risks, Vulnerabilities, and Opportunities
Ch 18 — Detection and attribution of observed impacts 1.33 MB
Ch 19 — Emergent risks and key vulnerabilities 1.23 MB
Ch 20 — Climate-resilient pathways: adaptation, mitigation, and sustainable development 0.36 MB

[b]VOLUME II: REGIONAL ASPECTS[/b]
Ch 21 — Regional context 0.51 MB
Regional Chapters
Ch 22 — Africa 4.01 MB
Ch 23 — Europe 2.98 MB
Ch 24 — Asia 1.95 MB
Ch 25 — Australasia 2.52 MB
Ch 26 — North America 2.84 MB
Ch 27 — Central and South America 1.78 MB
Ch 28 — Polar Regions 2.35 MB
Ch 29 — Small Islands 1.01 MB
Ch 30 — The Ocean 4.43 MB

CROSS-CHAPTER RESOURCES
Glossary 0.22 MB
WGII AR5 Chapter-specific FAQs 0.24 MB
Cross-chapter box compendium 2.70 MB


The designations employed and the presentation of material on maps do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concerning the legal status of any country, territory, city or area or of its authorities, or concerning the delimitation of its frontiers or boundaries.

http://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar5/wg2/

[Iamwhomiam]

Neon, it's being reported on lately because the IPCC WG II released the group's final draft for the AR5 on March 31, 2014.

Oh, and they must have felt it important to remind us we're still idly standing by watching the end of the world.

I mean, Noah?

[NeonLX]

Thanks, IAWIA and BPH.

My rigour has been lacking even more than usual.

Hard times ahead.

[DrEvil]

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 59741.html

Fires could turn Amazon rainforest into a desert as human activity and climate change threaten ‘lungs of the world’, says study

The Amazon rainforest is becoming increasingly vulnerable to catastrophic forest fires due to a combination of droughts, climate change and human activities such as deforestation, farming and habitat fragmentation, a major study has concluded.

One of the last great wildernesses on earth – known as the lungs of the world – is balancing dangerously close to a “tipping point” where forest fires will become so commonplace and extensive that they will change much of the landscape forever, scientists said.

Although fires have always occurred in Amazonia, they have been largely controlled by the natural humidity of the region. Now, however, the drying out of the rainforest threatens to ignite the tree-filled habitat – with its rich biodiversity – and convert it almost overnight into barren desert, they warned.

For the first time, scientists have shown in experiments on the ground how extreme, dry weather combined with the effects of human activities can create a tinderbox environment where intensely damaging forest fires can spread easily, killing trees that have taken hundreds of years to grow.

The study, carried out on three large experimental plots of rainforest monitored by satellite, showed that droughts abruptly increased the risk of intense forest fires compared to non-drought years, and this effect can be exacerbated significantly in areas influenced by human activities.

“These results provide, to our knowledge, the first experimental evidence of the link among extreme weather events, widespread and high-intensity fires and associated abrupt changes in forest structure, dynamics and composition,” said the scientists from the US and Brazil.

“This mechanism of rapid forest degradation could operate over a larger geographical area, such as the ‘arc of deforestation’, where droughts, forest fragmentation and forest fires are already common,” they said in a study published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The researchers monitored the three 50-hectare plots of Amazon rainforest over an eight-year period. During this time they subjected two of the plots to controlled fires, either on an annual or a three-year basis, and left the third plot untouched as a control for comparison.

They found that while the rainforest did not burn very much in years with normal rainfall, it burned intensively and extensively in drought years, which are expected to increase in both frequency and severity due to climate change causing shorter, more intense rainy seasons and longer dry seasons.

Trees in the tropical rainforests, unlike more temperate woodlands, are not naturally immune to forest fires and are easily killed by flames. The study found that this vulnerability caused a collapse of the overhead canopy cover and an invasion of the forest by more flammable vegetation from the inhabited forest edges, causing a cascade of events that increased the chances of an irreversible “tipping point” triggered by fire.

“Agricultural development has created smaller forest fragments, which exposes forest edges to the hotter dryer conditions in the surrounding landscape and makes them vulnerable to escaped fires,” said Marcia Macedo of the Woods Hole Research Centre in Falmouth, Massachusetts.

“These fragmented forests are more likely to be invaded by flammable grasses, which further increase the likelihood and intensity of future fires,” Dr Macedo said.

The researchers emphasised that most computer models of how the Amazon will respond to climate change do not take into account the true scale of the threat posed by forest fires, which is a serious flaw in the assessment of what could happen over the coming decades of warmer global temperatures.

“This study shows that fires are already degrading large areas of forests in southern Amazonia and highlights the need to include interactions between extreme weather events and fire when attempting to predict the future of Amazonian forests under a changing climate,” said Paulo Brando of the Instituto de Pesquisa Ambiental da Amazonia in Belem, Brazil, and lead author of the study.

Over the past 10 years, the Amazon has experienced several unusual droughts. In 2005, a drought occurred over a wide area that was calculated to be a one-in-100-year event, however, an even more extensive drought occurred in 2010.

On both occasions, scientists believe the Amazon went from being a net absorber of carbon dioxide to a net producer. In 2005, for instance, researchers calculated that it turned from being a net absorber of about 2 billion tonnes of CO2 to a net producer of as much as 5bn tonnes of CO2 – almost as high as the 5.4bn tonnes emitted annually by the US.

However, in the drought of 2010 was far larger, causing the massive Rio Negro river – the biggest tributary of the Amazon – to fall to its lowest level since record began more than a century ago. On this occasion, the forest expelled some 8 billion tonnes net of CO2, scientists said.

A more regional drought in 2007, which mainly affected southeast Amazonia, caused a significant increase in forest fires in the area, which burned about 10 times more forest than in typical years – an area equivalent to a million soccer fields.

The scientists believe that the findings show that the response of the Amazon to rising global temperatures and the increased risk of severe drought years can be unpredictable and “non-linear” because of a sudden breach of an irreversible tipping point.

“None of the models used to evaluate future Amazon forest health include fire, so most predictions grossly underestimate the amount of tree death and overestimate overall forest health,” said Michael Coe, another Woods Hole researcher and member of the joint US-Brazil team.

[coffin_dodger]

We're fubared. Enjoy what's left.

[Iamwhomiam]

You're welcome, Neon.

Dr. Evil,
Not really mentioned was the atmospheric carbon input from burning and the forest's reversal as a carbon sink before desertification. WE mus also recognize that forests, especially rain forests, contributes to rain falling elsewhere. This loss of moisture assures rapid dessication.

Same ol' beat, just a bit up-tempo.

By the way, I'll have to catch this later, but you can enjoy it now. Well, maybe not enjoy it, but you know what I mean, watch it.



http://ipcc-wg2.gov/AR5/