Global Warming's Terrifying New Math

Kinda hard to see because of the cloud cover, but the difference in greenery is appalling.

That's snow!

What?

/californian

Some of that in 2013 is clouds, it doesn't snow in the San Juaquin Valley. I also think that picture exagerates the problem in that the earlier one was probably taken after a major system went through and dusted the ground with a lot of snow that later surely melted away. All the snow in the Nevada flatlands doesn't persist, I don't think.

(/climate change denier)

So far, precipitation since October in the Northern Sierras and Southern Sierras is on track with the 1923-24 and 1976-77, the two driest years on record. Reservoir storage is only 65% of average.

So the snow blanketing the Great Basin in the 2013 shot is a bit misleading, but the parched Central Valley doesn't lie.

In other news, Paolo Bacigalupi, my favorite science fiction author engaging climate change issues, has a new novel The Water Knife to be released February 14th (in the UK, at least). Its set in the same world of Colorado basin water woes as his short story "The Tamarisk Hunter" (full text).

I'm not really a denier, just thought the two pictures were a little misleading.

LA Times article on the drought

enviro biggies bail on "all of the above"

http://www.salon.com/2014/01/17/you_cant_have_it_both_ways_green_groups_break_with_obama_over_hypocritical_climate_policy/

they should've put the pressure on back in 2011, after the climate bill failed, and before the 2012 election. obama has always treated environmentalists as just another political constituency to pay lip service to (i know, big surprise), he doesn't actually give a shit about the environment (another big surprise). so they should have exerted more pressure on him back he might have actually paid attention. what does he care now what they say?

this way they still get to sell tote bags and t shirts to 'mainstream' Dems

Earth had another top-ten hottest year on record in 2013, which ranked as the 4th warmest year since records began in 1880, NOAA's National Climatic Data Center said today. NASA rated 2013 as the 7th warmest on record. The disagreement between the two data sets is minor, since the 2013 numbers were within 3% of each other. Including 2013, nine out of ten of the warmest years in the 134-year period of record have occurred during the 21st century (2001–2013). Only one year during the 20th century--1998--was warmer than 2013. Global land temperatures were the 4th warmest on record during 2013, and ocean temperatures were the 8th warmest. Global satellite-measured temperatures in the lower atmosphere were the 4th or 9th warmest in the 35-year record, according to UAH and RSS, respectively. Following the two wettest years on record (2010 and 2011), 2013 joined 2012 as having near-average precipitation on balance across the globe.

http://icons.wxug.com/hurricane/2014/2013temps.gif

http://icons.wxug.com/hurricane/2014/noaa-nasa-2013.jpg

http://icons.wxug.com/hurricane/2014/global-temps-1880-2013.png

it's ok, we can always shoot millions of tons of sulfur dioxide into the stratosphere to save us at the last minute, right. exxon for mvp

Jesus, we're all going to die.

yes. yes we are.

oh sorry you were talking to jesus.

Of course we're all going to die.

http://i.imgur.com/JFnOa2K.gif

50 is ok by me, all downhill from there anyway.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/24/science/earth/threat-to-bottom-line-spurs-action-on-climate.html?hpw&rref=us&_r=0

lol coca-cola's profits are flagging because it is too hard to get WATER

so they're gettin -srs-

it was a pleasure knowing you, gents.

Nice to see that a small fraction of megacorps are paying attention now that the effects of GHG emissions up to 1984 are becoming apparent. The problem is that the GHG emissions of today won't become fully apparent until 2044 (~30 year lag)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GaSjwAu3yrI

it was a pleasure knowing you, gents.

Greetings from the barren drought-ridden wasteland of Southern California. Thirsty ILX travelers welcome, just tip me some Dogecoin on your way through.

I'm RICH!
http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2011/121/4/d/nuka_cola_bottle_caps_by_chanced1-d3fcj9g.jpg

50 is ok by me, all downhill from there anyway.

Welcome to my life.

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/jan/30/flooding-experts-uk-adapt-climate-change

"It is the only sensible policy – it makes no sense to defend the indefensible."

is this guy an ilxor?

iirc ilxors love defending the indefensible

Managed retreat has been accepted as inevitable by most geographers for a decade, I think. The coastline wouldn't really be defensible even if sea levels weren't rising, it would be daft to think they could be defensible now. When you have flooding or serious erosion it's not politically astute to say 'sorry, nothing we can do' though.

Amid drought, California says it won't allot water to local agencies

Encouraging, at least.

eople working on the regulation say that White House officials regularly remind them of its urgency. One person even described White House “nagging” — a notable reversal for an administration that slowed down controversial environmental regulations during the 2012 presidential campaign.

Writing the new rule is legally complicated. Although the environmental agency has the authority to issue the regulation, Mr. Goffman and his lawyers will have to employ a rarely used portion of the Clean Air Act that was not specifically written to address climate change.

They could devise a legally cautious rule that has little environmental impact, or they could write an aggressive regulation that would slash emissions but be legally vulnerable.

“The legal interpretation is challenging,” said an E.P.A. official who spoke on the condition of anonymity. “This effectively hasn’t been done.”

The agency’s task is further complicated by Mr. Obama’s tight timeline, intended to complete as much of the regulatory process as possible by the end of his term in early 2017. After the release of the draft in June, the president wants a final version by June 2015. By June 2016, states must submit plans for carrying it out — a challenge for state environmental agencies, which typically have two to three years to write major new regulations.

“It will be a heavy lift,” said Scott Nally, who last month stepped down as Ohio’s top environmental official. In December, Mr. Nally met with environmental agency officials in Washington for a five-and-a-half-hour session aimed at hashing out details of the rule — particularly how states could meet the schedule.

“We rolled up our sleeves,” Mr. Nally said. “We started with coffee and finished with coffee.”

The timeline is also delicate politically. The draft regulation will come out just months before the 2014 midterm elections, when Republican campaigns plan to reignite charges that Democrats are waging a “war on coal.”

http://libcom.org/blog/whos-afraid-ruins-18022014

I enjoyed that! But we've already established I'm a sucker for worst case scenarios. I'm not sure the optimistic stuff about rebuilding makes sense though. Disaster communism lasts exactly as long as it takes for someone to find the right levers to put themselves in charge.

wow, i used to think that maybe one possible redeeming quality of john mccain was that he slightly cared about climate change (he co-sponsored one of the most promising bills on it several years ago), but then i remember that he says things like this:

When John Kerry said earlier this week that climate change is one of the world's most pressing problems, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) was left wondering if he and the secretary of state are on the same planet.

McCain said Tuesday that in light of recent diplomatic efforts by the United States, Kerry shouldn't be focused on the environment.

“Why should he talk about climate change when we’ve got a 130,000 people in Syria killed, and, as I predicted on this show many times, the whole Geneva thing was a fiasco, when the Iran-U.S. talks are obviously a joke, and the Palestinian-Israeli negotiations haven’t even begun,” McCain told host Mike Broomhead on Phoenix radio station KFYI.

"You know John Kerry and the President, they could be hitting the trifecta here."

McCain expressed disbelief that Kerry used a recent visit to Indonesia to address climate change.

"Hello? On what planet does he reside?" McCain said.

Kerry said Sunday that climate change is the world's "most fearsome" weapon. He also compared climate changer-deniers to members of the Flat Earth Society.

Those remarks prompted former House Speaker Newt Gingrich to call for Kerry's resignation.

O_o -_- >_<

yes why would people in indonesia possibly be interested in remarks on climate change, HELLOOOOO earth to KERRRYYYYY

It's just mindboggling

You'll never go broke betting on McCain disappointing you.

Handy rubric, as you can replace "McCain" with "humans."

"Hello? On what planet does he reside?" McCain said. A question perhaps best asked of yourself, Senator. If you can't think of any security or diplomatic ramifications to climate change, why don't you just ask your pals in the Pentagon. What a maroon!

How dare you politicize Our Boys, Michael!

The personnel is the political, Lee

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2014/02/11/there-have-been-five-mass-extinctions-in-earths-history-now-were-facing-a-sixth/

The fossil record from our epoch will probably look like a more rapid loss of species/dramatic climate change than the Permian event. I don't think there is any doubt about that, might not be any geologists about to examine it though. Btw hello Scott!

Al Gore reviewed that E Kolbert book in the NYTBR, and his lede suggests he still has that ol' tin ear:

those who have enjoyed her previous works like “Field Notes From a Catastrophe” will not be disappointed...

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/16/books/review/the-sixth-extinction-by-elizabeth-kolbert.html?_r=0

McCain's comments follow a series of tweets by former GOP House Speaker Newt Gingrich, who on Monday called on Kerry to resign over his climate speech in Jakarta, Indonesia.

"A delusional secretary of State is dangerous to our safety," Gingrich said on Twitter and asked, does Kerry "really believe global warming more dangerous than North Korean and Iranian nukes? More than Russian and Chinese nukes? Really?"

Kolbert on Stewart.

It only works in the US, worth seeking out?

are more people coming around to near term extinction? should I quit my job and spend our final days with my family?

Nah.

Even the full runaway greenhouse scenario; with burning rainforests, burping permafrost, belching seabed methane hydrate releases, Greenland and West Antarctica on the rocks; will take thousands of years to play out. For our lifetimes, the major effects are mostly just persistent droughts in grain belts, and possibly tropical storms, and the political unrest and diasporas of the perenially hungry. We're pretty durable, and I'm fairly confident that in 5000 years there will still be hundreds of thousands of our descendants living around current cliffsides of the Arctic and Southern Ocean, and as the seas abate over the following 100,000 years, we might get another go at the whole industrial enterprise, only with scarce fossil fuels. Its perhaps just a normal rough patch faced by every sentient species in universe.

good, staying put then.

http://libcom.org/blog/whos-afraid-ruins-18022014

― j., Wednesday, February 19, 2014 3:48 AM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

can i just say it warms my cockles to see a libcom link on ilx

Sanpaku, I'm actually disappointed I won't be around for the collapse of civilization.