World could warm by massive 10C if all fossil fuels are burned

[Eugene]

Source: The Guardian

World could warm by massive 10C if all fossil fuels are burned

Arctic would warm by as much as 20C by 2300 with disastrous impacts
if action is not taken on climate change, warns new study

Damian Carrington
Monday 23 May 2016 16.00 BST

The planet would warm by searing 10C if all fossil fuels are burned, according to a new study, leaving some regions uninhabitable and wreaking profound damage on human health, food supplies and the global economy.

The Arctic, already warming fast today, would heat up even more – 20C by 2300 – the new research into the extreme scenario found.

“I think it is really important to know what would happen if we don’t take any action to mitigate climate change,” said Katarzyna Tokarska, at the University of Victoria in Canada and who led the new research. “Even though we have the Paris climate change agreement, so far there hasn’t been any action. [This research] is a warning message.”

The carbon already emitted by burning fossil fuels has driven significant global warming, with 2016 near certain to succeed 2015 as the hottest year ever recorded, which itself beat a record year in 2014. Other recent studies have shown that extreme heatwaves could push the climate beyond human endurance in parts of the world such as the Gulf, making them uninhabitable.

[font size=1]-snip-[/font]

The new work, published in Nature Climate Change, considers the impact of emitting 5tn tonnes of carbon emissions. This is the lower-end estimate of burning all fossil fuels currently known about, though not including future finds or those made available by new extraction technologies.

[font size=1]-snip-[/font]

Read more: http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/may/23/world-could-warm-by-massive-10c-if-all-fossil-fuels-are-burned

Related: The climate response to five trillion tonnes of carbon (Nature)

[mackdaddy]

1. What about the Methane Hydrates / Clathrates in the Arctic?

I did not see any mention of these in this or the source document on line. I keep seeing a video of a couple of Russian scientist who say that up to a 50 giga tone (sp) burst of Methane from hydrates in the Arctic is possible with the increased temperatures there. This would be a release of carbon in the form of methane that would be over 10 times larger that this human burnt carbon discussed in this article.

I have read article about "pingos" massive craters formed from methane release in Arctic Russia, permafrost melting than is not so perma any more, and multi square mile areas of the Arctic ocean have had occurrence of looking like ginger-ale from all of the methane bubbling up. Large methane concentrations around the north pole are also displayed on satellite maps of the area.

So my question is: how real is this potential Methane monster release? The large amounts of frozen Methane as hydrates seems to be real, Is it? Will these extreme arctic temperatures really release it? Assuming this is real, Why do so many of these "scientific" papers make no mention of it?

I really am having a hard time figuring out who to believe on this area.