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Charlie Riedel / AP, file
A flock of geese fly past a smokestack at the Jeffery Energy Center coal power plant near Emmitt, Kansas, in this Jan. 10, 2009 photo.
Greenhouse gases reached a new record level in 2011, the World Meteorological Organization said Tuesday.
The body, an agency of the United Nations, said in a statement that there had been a 30 percent increase in the warming effect on the climate between 1990 and 2011.
It said the level of carbon dioxide – which accounts for about 80 percent of the warming effect – and other so-called greenhouse gases such as methane and nitrous oxide had reached the carbon dioxide-equivalent of 473 parts per million in 2011.
The three gases are closely linked to human activities such as fossil fuel use, deforestation and intensive agriculture.
Further warming
WMO Secretary-General Michel Jarraud said in the statement that billions of tons of carbon dioxide emitted since the start of the industrial age in 1750 would “remain there for centuries, causing our planet to warm further and impacting on all aspects of life on earth.”
“Future emissions will only compound the situation,” he said.
Jarraud said about half of the carbon dioxide emitted as a result of human activity had been absorbed by carbon sinks such as forests and oceans.
“But this will not necessarily continue in the future,” he said. “We have already seen that the oceans are becoming more acidic as a result of the carbon dioxide uptake, with potential repercussions for the underwater food chain and coral reefs.”
“There are many additional interactions between greenhouse gases, Earth’s biosphere and oceans, and we need to boost our monitoring capability and scientific knowledge in order to better understand these,” he added.
Ed Jones / AFP - Getty Images, file
Heavy traffic passes Tiananmen Square outside the opening session of the Chinese Communist Party's five-yearly Congress at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on Nov. 8.
A warmer, more acidic ocean poses a threat to coral and shellfish.
In July, researchers found that coral reefs had collapsed along Panama's Pacific Coast for 2,500 years due to natural climate cycles.
Coral in Caribbean, Florida in sharp decline, 'no signs of slowing,' report finds
Study co-author Richard Aronson, a biology professor at Florida Institute of Technology, said the discovery showed that reducing greenhouse gas emissions should prevent this from happening again or enable the coral to recover if there was a widespread collapse.
Reuters contributed to this report.
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Leave a Comment:
Most of this is environmental wacko BS propaganda. If there is a green house gas problem we need to look to the east and no further!
Republicans could put a stop to any and all discussions on Climate Change in the US....simply come out strongly in favor of some of the most ridiculous claims and approaches made on addressing Climate Change by the loonies, and I guarantee you, the loonies would move to a different "sky is falling" diatribe. Maybe they would even consider promoting the concept that the Climate is actually COOLING. Face it.....when a bunch of "scientific" nuts go on a binge their vision is very narrow and they tend to pound the subject to death. SHOW US a 10 year PATTERN of their "warming" claims and we can understand their arguments FOR Global warming. But their arguments are always based on individual incidents as PROOF, YET they debunk their oppositions arguments using INDIVIDUAL INCIDENTS AS NON-proof. Be consistent.
I love your indignation! Does smoke come out of your ears when you write this crap?
It might be more effective if you try jumping up and down while you type.
He makes a lot of sense -god...and you don't
Well then, how about this:
Anyone who can deny climate change at this point is either retarded or stupid. You have the entire internet at your disposal if you want to really learn what's going on, but some of you (yes, I mean you and trythis) would rather sit here and mindlessly b!tch about politics.
Doesn't matter... you guys are lucky, really... you're too stupid to realize how stupid you are.
And if you're going to jump on me for name-calling, just keep in mind that there are only so many words that can accurately describe a denier. Stupid, retarded, idiot, those are a few. They may not be polite or PC but they're necessary for accuracy.
Or maybe I'm being too harsh.... maybe you don't know that a search engine will return millions of results for "climate change" and all you have to do is read them.
god, and everything on the Internet has to be true or it wouldn't be allowed on the Internet right!
god just closed everybody's ears with his first sentence. This is exactly why even people who dont know science are skeptical when they hear some liberal using GW as their latest excuse to tell you how to live.
polluting of the planet natuaral resources is what humans need to focus on. that i can agree is man-made and needs to be curbed. there is nowhere near the money to be made focusing on that though thats why global warming is being touted so much.in fact that costs money.again ...follow the money then try and make dumb comments like some sheeple above do who will believe in anything that is fed them, especially by the u.n. and a group of liberal scientists backed up by the liberal media.bahhhhhhhh.
Sorry, I was interested in your post for a while, but then you used the word "sheeple" and I could no longer take you seriously.
Another perfect example of why people who dont even understand the science words instinctively disbelieve ranting socialists.
They can babble on and on. They state one thing and have no specific numbers. The oceans are more acidic? Do you have any valid data? Inform us, where and when are these numbers being taken. The planet is getting warmer, yet the world temperatures are cooler.
Maybe the UN just wants to control every aspect of human life? How can anyone believe these blowhards?
Release some actual VALID data on the little information that you have.
Al Gore should take a role as the joker. How much money has motivated him to say the bologna he is feeding the stupid?
Of course, Ever controlling organization has to have some strategy to keep control over their population. Just a few examples from history:
1. or we'll kill you.
2. we control the crops so if you want to eat.
3. our army beat your army
4. the king has your interests in mind.
5. or you'll burn in hell
6. to help the poor
7. cuz the rich create the jobs.
8. to avoid the coming ice age.
9 to avoid the coming scorched earth
10. to avoid the coming floods
etc etc etc.
LMAO. Humans are so egocentric. Greenhouse gases have been many times higher than now. They would have to work for a thousand years to get them to any where near record.
THE SKY IS FALLING THE SKY IS FALLING.
Nevermind, it's just the political agenda scientists shatting on us.
No, I'm sh!tting on you, too, along with everyone else who has an I.Q. above 20.
Stand still! SPLORT!!! Ah, that feels better!
You were saying?
Scientists know where the grant money comes from. They respond to incentives just like everybody else.
gooberdude,
They also know that publishing obvious BS can destroy a hard-earned career. There is what is called peer review.
Depends on which peers you let review. Science magazines also need articles to sell magazines. Big Pharma has mastered the Selective Peer Review scam.
Well something must be happening. Most states in the south are wondering where winter temps are these days. Its Thanksgiving week some say and the temps are up close to the 80's. In the 60's and 70's we used to have cold fronts at the end of August. Now, no more so temps are ever warmer with a cold front finally getting to the southern states during the first weeks in December. Spring also comes earlier now in the south and record summer temperatures are unbearable. Not much we can do here in the U.S. except get out and plant trees, regulate emissions, drive much less, and stop burning coal and hope the nations like Mexico, China, Brazil, India, etc....put pollution controls in place. We all need to get away from fossil fuels before the heaven's roll up like a scroll and disappear with a bang. Earth becoming like Mars may not be that far away.
Google CFC's and you'll see it's the same exact crowd that was saying they were a hoax back in the 80's-90's who are saying man made climate change is a hoax but then that pesky little hole the size of Texas opened up in our O-Zone layer. The same people around here (Wyoming) that buy a $60,000 4x4 diesel truck that may produce less carbon UNTIL they jerk off the factory exhaust and throw on one that expels HUGE plumes of black soot every time they "gun" it then add a 6 inch lift so they feel awesome and big. Trust me little boys, you're still 5'7" but thanks to people like you we are going to see 100 year floods and storms every year until we reverse this trend of obnoxious gluttony of fossil fuels.
I'd like to see a page on facebook or somewhere you could sign and date saying, "I, <YOUR NAME> completely reject the science behind man-caused climate change therefore I refuse to engage in any behavior that would reduce carbon emissions because the science is tainted." Put your name to it, then at least your children could see if you were a denier. If Fox is against it, it MUST be true.
Uh...the muffler has no effect on what comes out the pipe. Today's diesels run much cleaner. But what about the BNSF or UP engines that sit idling in the yard when not on the road, and are only turned off at maintenance time.
What's Obama's answer to this? Let's build more roads for more cars. Should be building more buses and trains and restrict cars if all this political agenda science is actually true.
Oh, but if you build fewer cars and roads there are fewer jobs for Obama's union buddys. Can't have that can we? So, on with the hypocrisy. He's the clown.
I'm pretty sure Obama isn't in charge of America's infrastructure projects. That's a bit small beans for the freaking president.
SF, So you wouldn't hold a CEO responsible for what happens in his company?
Apparently we dont. :)
It depends. Would I hold him responsible for an offensive display in one of his company's stores? Of course not. Would I hold him responsible for the store's location? Yes.
Your question is poorly worded, but if you're asking if I immediately assign blame for everything that goes wrong in an organization to the top tier of management, the answer is no. I put some thought into how much say that person really has and what his/her responsibilities actually are. It usually isn't "everything".
"The three gases are closely linked to human activities such as fossil fuel use, deforestation and intensive agriculture."
So what's the immediate solution here? For every man, woman, and child to lock and load and at the count of three by the UN everyone on earth blows their brains out? Or how about another Jim Jones escapade on a world wide basis, overseen by the UN, of course. TO HELL WITH THE UN!!!!! GET AMERICA OUT OF THE UN NOW!!!!!!!!!!
The party of stupid continues it's assault on science. Mock the scientist and listen to the preacher. Let's see how this works out for us. Or just look to the east coast and see what a hoax climate change is turning out to be.
Scientists are no different than preachers. They understand a certain mindset and speech in ways that are internally consistent with that mindset. You accept that mindset and its results or you don't.
Good. The frozen tundra will become productive farm land.
Didn't Gore's famous chart show CO2 rising after the temperature increased?
Russia had better thank us!
Actually the Russians have teams of scientists extremely concerned over the melting tundras and the possibility of catastrophic methane releases. If all those gigatonnes of methane break loose we'll forget all about CO2. To put some humor into this, just youtube the videos of methane fart-firing through the tundra ice.
bet that looked cool. ;)
youtube one of them. There are lots of videos on this. Yep, a real gas. Good for some laughs. But then you'll also find some from the Russian scientists who have those serious frowns on their face because they know the implications of gigatonnes of methane being released. And they ain't never heard of Al Gore.
Recently just read a report on the growing concerns about all the methane locked in off our east coast beginning to come loose due to warming gulf stream. I find it hard to imagine how people can not take some of this seriously.
Yes I guess it's about time the U.N. put sanctions on China, for their over use of coal, but of course it's all the fault of the U.S. in their eyes. While I believe there is global warming, folks like Al Gore have overstated things for personal gain.
We should have access to the information, and not in lawyer fine prints.
I second putting sanctions on China. HKDakota NASA is stating we have to do something quick. Forget AL Gore.
The UN and Al Gore are a joke
A new extinction will solve the problem! By God!
Even with all the panic over global ecological collapse, I still believe that old mother earth will quickly recover once the virus that is mankind is eliminated or greatly reduced.
Yet, my friends are naive enough to sometimes vehemently deny that we are subject to natures violent temperament, usually directly after denying that humans have ANY role in global climate change.
And how is that going to happen? There's nothing short of a complete, life-ending, global catastrophe that could unseat humanity. And even then, we'd probably hang on for a few decades; it's not like all the critters or plants have climate-controlled bunkers, nuclear reactors, or micro-agriculture.
Show a picture of steam and claim it is a smokestack. It is water vapor. You clothes iron on steam doesn't produce smoke, it produces steam.
Too bad that temperatures have been stable for 16 years, in other words, NO WARMING. Even with CO2 levels continuing to rise.
If you go back and look at the raw temperature data, (before it has been adjusted and manipulated) you can see that temps have been slowly rising ever since the last ice age. But you will also see a cycle of warming and COOLING within that slow temperature rise. There were two periods of warming and cooling in the 20th century. Cooling, and then warming for 30 years and then cooling for 30 years and then warming again. And guess what? We are starting to cool again. And all of that cooling and warming and cooling again happened while CO2 was steadily rising.
People (scum of the Earth really) have been trying to profit and scam people over this natural 60 year cooling/warming cycle. During the 60s and 70s it was global cooling and the next ice age. Then it was global warming. The scammers tried to over their butts when the warming stopped by changing the name to climate change but it is still natural and man has nothing to do with it.
Except for adjusting and manipulating the data. NOAA has a new system of weather stations. This new system is properly sited unlike the current system that has been corrupted by being too close to man made things like roads, buildings, parking lots, etc. All things that absorb more heat than the natural dirt, grass, etc. While the current corrupted system was used to proclaim the hottest July ever the new properly sited system averaged 2 degrees cooler. Which was 1.9 degrees cooler than the record July temp from the 1930s.
The 1950s, 60s and 70s were the cooling half of the natural cycle. The 1950s were known for hot summers, drought, cold winters and east coast hurricanes. Sound familiar?
Anyone that tells you that tropical storm Irene in 2011 and post tropical cyclone Sandy in 2012 were because of man made global warming be sure to ask them this. What caused the three Cat 3 hurricanes that hit the east coast in 1954? Back when CO2 was below the "safe" level of 350 ppm.
Ask them why the United States is currently setting a new record for the longest time since a major hurricane (Cat 3 or higher) has hit the US. Ask them why it has been over 7 years since Florida has been hit by ANY hurricane. Ask them why July of 2012 set a new record for the FEWEST tornadoes. As them why violent tornadoes have trended down since the mid 70s when the worry was global cooling.
An overall warm atmosphere is a stable atmosphere and has fewer strong and severe storms. It is the interaction between cold dry air aloft and warm moist air below that fuels storms.
The National Weather Service offers Skywarn classes which are free. You will learn that it is cold that is needed to produce storms. That's why when there are natural heat waves (stable stationary air) you don't have rain or storms. The cold air is blocked.
It isn't the warming half of the natural 60 year cycle we need to worry about. It is the cooling half that we are entering that will provide man and our society with challenges.
The warming advocates know little if any science and even less about the elements of weather and climate.
They believe anything that agrees with their preformed opinions-- just like everybody else. Very few minds are open to a complete change of philosophy.
NASA I'm sure knows a lot more than you.
The warming advocates are scientist from all over the world independantly coming up with the same conclusions. Scientists gain as much recognition for disproving a hypothesis as they do from proving one. None of the points made by economykiller are new. The scientists are not looking at his post saying "wow, what insight. I never thought about that". Climate deniers only exist in the political world not the scientific. The party of dumb and their followers.
Too bad scientists cant explain their points to anybody except other scientists. It just lets the power grabbers distort it for their own ends.
NASA has a ton of information on Global Warming and it is not hard to read. They also have research data they have collected.
Arguing over whether or not global warming is caused or added to by our activity, is pointless. The facts are, the atmosphere is warming, the oceans are warming, sea levels are rising. The effects those facts will have on humanity are unavoidable, larger storms damaging infrastructure, people will migrate from costal areas causing stresses in areas which have problems supporting their current populations, and if the ice loss in Greenland and Antarctica continue to accelerate, these changes could occur within 50 years. So when we argue over whose fault it is, we fail to realistically plan how we'll cope with the changes which are already taking place all around us.
Temps are rising.
Some of it is human caused
we dont really know how much
any solution will only affect that unknown, human part.
peanutgallerytheater get educated by reading NASA site. There are already scientists saying Florida Keys is in trouble because of sea levels rising. The argument is over. The world is not waiting for us. Europe has already protected coastal cities with barriers. I'm thinking NY wished they had. Now they have a 31 billion dollar recovery cost.
The simple truth is that it pointless for Americans to even argue about this any more. We have done a lot to limit our greenhouse emissions, but countries like China and India do not because they argue that it is expensive for factories to limit their emissions and the United States and Western world made their fortunes by polluting the environment.
What they fail to understand is that we created things like the EPA back in 60's and 70's when we had rivers that were catching fire because of all the chemicals we were dumping into them.
China is starting to come around to a more environmental approach but very slowly and mostly because they are starting to see the adverse health effects the air pollution is having on people in places like Beijing which has serious smog issues. But I believe I once heard a report that said that 60% of all the air pollution that we have in the U.S. now comes from the far east and mostly China.
We effectively removed lead from our paint and acid from our rain by recognizing that there was a problem and implementing an appropriate course of action. If we don't recognize that human activity is driving climate change we will not come up with an effective solution.
Whoaw Nelly. Where is it 473 PPM of CO2?
Average in the air is 125 ppm around here. 350 is what they recommend for greenhouse lettuce growing, and up to a 1000 ppm, after which plants can't use it. If it was 473 I'd know it.
Anyhow, they need to explain those numbers a little, and where they got them at. Can we please have acess to these research documents? I do believe the levels have risen and I am a believer of the destruction it can create on this world, but I am not going to just suck up the number.
Maybe they (we) should let the Brazilian and Indonesian forests regrow as wood cellulose is a storage of CO2, but that would imply those countries agreeing to it.( we need the space for cultivation, blah blah blah..). it comes down to stop population growth, again. Or going solar, green etc..
this is a UN issue and the governments have to agree to solutions, but we can't even agree to a budget in this country so I suppose Mother Nature will "take care" of us all.
save, Great post!
That was EQUIVALENT CO2; taking into account the 20:1 (ish) factor for methane and whatever it is for NOX. CO2 is at about 391 last I read.
Thanks Poolman, yes we try.
Peanut, still 391 is way high so where is that at? You don't know, I don't know, nobody knows but we are supposed to take the number?!
I am all for making sure we're not $hitting the bed of the only home we have in the 'Verse, we are stewards of this planet and need to tend to its well being for all species.
That said, water vapor - not CO2 - accounts for the majority of the green house effect. The article is a little misleading in its wording.
Again that said, we need to tend to our only home in the 'Verse. We need to stop powering the world via the chemical release of energy! Why are we still powering a 21st century world on 19th Century (and older) technologies? I mean beyond the fact that some very rich people want to stay VERY RICH?
Post # 2... no one else wants to say this so I will, we have TOO MANY people on this planet. Really. If our #s were 1/3rd what they are now we'd be having a different conversation. Once we get 7,000,000,000 of anything not one of that # is special.
Derek,
I propose that we go ahead and start eating each other before we actually have to. Just think, there would be more tvs and cars, etc. to go around, and that would take a load off our manufacturing and mining, etc. Just have a "young buck" season and maybe a limit of 12 per year. Those are the ones out there who are making babies even though they haven't learned how to even take care of themselves. Catch'em, put them in the freezer, mmmm barbeques all year long.
And for the specialty markets, allow for govt. inspected, grade A, of course, CEO steaks to be sold.
Probably bring the population down in a hurry.
Not to worry. Nature will clean out the populations whose political system cant deliver the goods.
gooberdude,
You're probably right on that one.
Yesterday I mention how the current corrupted weather station system was two degrees warmer than a new properly sited system.
Today a new paper released that shows urban heat islands can account for up to two degrees of warming.
http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00704-012-0790-z/fulltext.html
http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com/2012/11/new-paper-finds-urban-heat-islands-can.html