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Gemini1766 -> RE: Global temps have not risen since 1998 (4/4/2008 4:46:50 PM)
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ORIGINAL: Loveisallyouneed
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ORIGINAL: cyberdude611
No one is debating the fact that pollution is a problem. The problem I have is using science to scare the public in order to support your own agenda. That's wrong.
Out of curosity, what will you be saying when (not if) the tundra melts, flooding the atmosphere with a good deal more CO and CO2 than now exists?
"oops"?
Not even when, it's already starting. National Geographic has done articles and shows on this subject.
Global Climate Change
Global Warming Effects Information, Global Warming Facts, Climate Change Effects Nat. Geo.
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And the effects of rising temperatures aren’t waiting for some far-flung future. They’re happening right now. Signs are appearing all over, and some of them are surprising. The heat is not only melting glaciers and sea ice, it’s also shifting precipitation patterns and setting animals on the move. Some impacts from increasing temperatures are already happening. Ice is melting worldwide, especially at the Earth’s poles. This includes mountain glaciers, ice sheets covering West Antarctica and Greenland, and Arctic sea ice.Researcher Bill Fraser has tracked the decline of the Adélie penguins on Antarctica, where their numbers have fallen from 32,000 breeding pairs to 11,000 in 30 years.Sea level rise became faster over the last century.Some butterflies, foxes, and alpine plants have moved farther north or to higher, cooler areas.Precipitation (rain and snowfall) has increased across the globe, on average.Spruce bark beetles have boomed in Alaska thanks to 20 years of warm summers. The insects have chewed up 4 million acres of spruce trees. Other effects could happen later this century, if warming continues. Source for climate information: IPCC, 2007 Sea levels are expected to rise between 7 and 23 inches (18 and 59 centimeters) by the end of the century, and continued melting at the poles could add between 4 and 8 inches (10 to 20 centimeters).Hurricanes and other storms are likely to become stronger.Species that depend on one another may become out of sync. For example, plants could bloom earlier than their pollinating insects become active.Floods and droughts will become more common. Rainfall in Ethiopia, where droughts are already common, could decline by 10 percent over the next 50 years.Less fresh water will be available. If the Quelccaya ice cap in Peru continues to melt at its current rate, it will be gone by 2100, leaving thousands of people who rely on it for drinking water and electricity without a source of either.Some diseases will spread, such as malaria carried by mosquitoes.Ecosystems will change—some species will move farther north or become more successful; others won’t be able to move and could become extinct. Wildlife research scientist Martyn Obbard has found that since the mid-1980s, with less ice on which to live and fish for food, polar bears have gotten considerably skinnier. Polar bear biologist Ian Stirling has found a similar pattern in Hudson Bay. He fears that if sea ice disappears, the polar bears will as well.
Scientist Measures an Overlooked Greenhouse Gas
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All Things Considered, September 10, 2007 · Alaska scientist Katey Walter studies an aspect of climate change that has been largely overlooked: methane emissions. Methane is a greenhouse gas that is 23 times more powerful than carbon dioxide, which means it is much more efficient at trapping heat. As a result, methane feeds into a loop of global warming.Thawing Yields More Methane As global temperatures rise, permafrost thaws. Ponds and lakes form in the depressions left behind by melting chunks of ice in the ground. In the bottoms of ponds and lakes, bacteria feed on the carbon that previously had been frozen underground and burp it out as methane.And because methane emissions from lakes haven't been carefully studied, scientists worry that projections for global warming could be far worse than currently estimated.Walter, who teaches at the University of Alaska in Fairbanks, says that methane is being released from lakes in the far north — Alaska, Siberia, elsewhere — at a far greater rate than anyone has estimated.
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