European Glacial Retreat Rates Highest In At Least 10,000 Years - BBC

[hatrack]

Rising temperatures are shrinking all but two of the main glaciers that give Europeans clean water, scientists say. A report by the European Environment Agency says the current rate of glacier retreat is now reaching levels higher than those of the last 10,000 years.

It says climate change is affecting the whole environment, from the plight of glaciers to plants' growing seasons. The EEA is developing a continent-wide internet information system to help people to prepare for extreme weather.

From 1850 to 1970, it says in EEA Signals 2004, glaciers in the European Alps lost about a third of their area and half their mass, with 20-30% of the remaining ice lost since 1980. It says about 75% of the glaciers in the Swiss Alps are likely to disappear by 2050.

EDIT

Speaking at a conference in Hungary of European environment and health ministers organised by the World Health Organisation, Professor McGlade said the EEA had placed on its website satellite images of the distribution of fires in Italy and Portugal in recent summers. She said: "We noticed a significant increase in web traffic and were informed after the event that the public had been unable to obtain local information of where fires were spreading and were therefore using the EEA site instead."

EDIT

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3839833.stm

[Mnemosyne]

1. Hi Hatrack! Sad so few will notice or care until it's too late.

Do you think HAARP will hasten this effect? I've just started to do some research on it and before that had just been saying I wanted to brush up on Tesla.

Suddenly, I'm reading about HAARP and thinking of him and there he is in the article.

There are no coincidences, at least that's what I know.

Thanks for the info, hope to see you round the du.

[NNadir]

2. Objectively I can't understand why the EU doesn't call for economic

sanctions against the US over this issue and our "Go fuck yourself" attitude.

It's not like they need to extend even more credit to us than they already have. If nations were like people, the United States would be like a big, fat, violent drunk on a last bender before they take away his badly over-extended credit card.

[Dogmudgeon]

6. As soon as OPEC dumps the Dollar for the Euro

That's when the European Economic Community will start to stiffen its spine. Right now is a dicey time for the EEC. In a couple years, that could change radically, especially if the Saudi royal family is overthrown in a coup d'êtat.

The better deal would be for a reformulation of the Kyoto accord -- with the USA as the first signer. Perhaps President Kerry could personally do the honors.

--bkl

[NNadir]

8. A nice thought.

I don't think President Kerry will be able to undo all of the disaster of the last 4 years overnight, though. As we all know, it is much easier to destroy something than it is to rebuild it.

I think future Presidents (assuming the Presidency is restored and continue to exist for much time) will have their hands forced on this issue.

I also think it is inevitable that what you suggest will come to pass: Saudi Arabia is hardly politically stable. I also believe that Saudi Arabia will have less and less ability to produce oil in the next decade or so.

There are so many good reasons to replace oil that it is incredible that we are not moving to build the infrastruce to do so.

[Soloflecks]

3. What a coinky-dink!

The last ice age was about 10,000 years ago. Hmmmmm.

[meow mix]

4. greenhouse gas much higher now (than 10,000 years ago)

or even 430,000 years ago. (eeps)

ive never understood how the "ice-age is coming" people reconcile with that.

er,
not meaning anyone in particular.. just whoever =)

[Dogmudgeon]

5. Reconciliation isn't required

Greenhouse gas -- mainly methane and CO2 -- spike before the onset of a cool-down event. It is thought that in the past, large releases of oceanic methane were the primary triggers of this effect. Such large deposits of methane exist off the east coast of North America and in a large swath of the Northern Pacific ocean.

Once the atmosphere heats up, icemelt water dilutes and changes the thermohaline circulation, leading to an abrupt global cooling event known as a Heinrich Event. A global heating event is known as a Dansgaard-Oeschger Event. Searches on either set of terms will yield a large number of studies that have been posted online.

These "events" appear as spikes in proxy records (tree rings, ice-core stratigraphy) but may last as long as a decade or two. The Younger-Dryas Period you may have read about is thought to have been triggered by an unusually intense Dansgaard-Oeschger Event.

The global climate is a dynamic system, and this dynamism has been used to pooh-pooh warings about climate change. But the overall picture is becoming very clear, that we have both been entering a period of natural climate change, AND we've been drastically pushing the changes ourselves. When atmospheric CO2 reaches 400 ppm (as it is likely to do within 20 years), it will be the highest it has been not in 10,000 years, but in 250 million years. (The overall CO2 level is currently around 390 ppm).

If such warming triggers a release of oceanic methane (as has been hypothesized), global warming will increase dramatically ... for about a decade. Then it will end with a severe cool-down.

It's a tough topic for a lot of people to really understand because "systems thinking" is still fairly new. But I assure you, the signs are there in multitude, and we've only recently "woken up" to it.

--bkl

[Dogmudgeon]

7. BTW

Does anyone know how to tag subscripts and superscripts in the version of HTML that is used here? Can it even be done?

"CO2" looks so ugly!

--bkl

[On the Road]

9. Here's How:

CO₂ substituting square brackets:

CO₂

For superscripts, use <sup> in square. I've discovered a number of tricks by googling for "HTML tags" plus the name of the function I'm looking for.