Global warming reaching point of no return: report

Global warming is reaching the point of no return, with widespread drought, crop failure and water shortages the likely result, according to a new international report highlighted in the British press.

The countdown to climate-change catastrophe is spelt out by a task force of senior politicians, business leaders and academics. In 10 years or less, they predict, the catastrophic point-of-no-return may be reached, The Independent daily reported.

The new study, Meeting The Climate Challenge, has been timed to coincide with British Prime Minister Tony Blair's promised efforts to advance climate change policy this year as head of both the G8 group of richest nations and the European Union.

The report was assembled by the Institute for Public Policy Research in Britain, the Centre for American Progress in the United States and The Australia Institute.

It says the danger point will be signalled when temperatures rise by two degrees celsius above the average world temperature prevailing in 1750, before the industrial revolution.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/Science/Global-warming-reaching-point-of-no-return-report/2005/01/24/1106415510153.html

why does the committee recommend solutions that won't kick in before it's too late?

"The report urges all G8 countries to agree to generate a quarter of their electricity from renewable sources by 2025, and to double their research spending on low-carbon energy technologies by 2010."

We have an unknown time anywhere between tomorrow and 10 years from today

God help us all.

He thinks he is fulfilling Biblical prophesy.

When he said, "Mission Accomplished," he meant it.

"Apocalypse Accomplished"

literally! :evilgrin:

Sorry, just whistlin' past the graveyard.

It's never to late to be a pessimist.

and it sounds like we need to cut our carbon emissions by a full 70% in order to stabilize our climate.

I've got it -- Maybe the end timers are right -- what if God is playing a cosmic joke on us by 'sending' George Bush to us at this time to morally test us -- whether we are so sinfully greedy and wanton that we would destroy his creation in order to fatten the bottom line and not inconvenience ourselves in our decadent lifestyles. Bush represents satanic temptation telling us that we can use up the earth and not pay any price for it. Maybe this could be our line with the fundamentalists -- that they are in fact falling for temptation and wantonly and greedily destroying God's own creation and all its creatures. They are going to have to pay BIG TIME on the Day of Judgment.

Back to reality -- Gelbspan paints a really grim picture of what is to come if we don't get our collective act together real soon. In addition to his wonderful book is site is very informative too -- http://www.heatisonline.org/main.cfm

funding:
Congress Cuts Funds for Climate Research Stations


ATMOSPHERIC SCIENCES:


NOAA Loses Funding to Gather Long-Term Climate Data
Science Magazine, Jan. 14, 2005


Congress has eliminated funding for a fledgling network of 110 observation stations intended to provide a definitive, long-term climate record for the United States.


The surprise assault on the Climate Reference Network (CRN) was buried in the 3000-page omnibus spending package for 2005 signed last month by President George W. Bush (Science, 3 December 2004, p. 1662). Legislators also took a bite out of a long-established atmospheric monitoring network that includes the historic time sequence of increasing carbon dioxide levels measured at Hawaii's Mauna Loa.

http://www.heatisonline.org/contentserver/objecthandlers/index.cfm?id=5060&method=full

Republicans are a danger to the earth!

The concern is that its not just scientists, but any old fool can observe
that winters have less or no snow, that storms are stronger. A chap
near by where i live had 6mm glass window broken in by the wind last
week... not even the "big" storm that hit the news... a window that had
lasted 30 years of previous storms without effect.

Massive flooding has raged in areas that have not had flooding problems..
and clearly something is afoot and getting worse in one sense. I must
build and protect any structure around the house for 150mph winds or
i'm not being pragmatic... and it seems, i must prepare for a time that
will come in my lifetime, when we'll have siberian temperatures after
the gulf stream ends.

Ask any person who lives in an area where there is a traditional snow
fall over the winters.... and though individual storms might seem worse,
the snowcover is less.... who needs an atmosphere student to observe
the blatantly obvious. Something's definitely afoot.

The last few years I've been watching quite a bit of Premier League football from England and it has stuck me how mild the winters are. You watch games in Dec and January and the players are in shortsleeves and no breath is visible.

:eyes:

and they can't defend themselves.

It looked into global dimming, and how this phenomenon has made scientists underestimate the effects of global warming. It said in short, that unless we slash emissions soon, by 2040 we reach the point where frozen methane hydrates on the ocean floor start melting and we're all screwed within something like 50 years. Here's a link. http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/tvradio/programmes/horizon/dimming_prog_summary.shtml

I don't know who to blame more for this. The people creating the report or the press who don't understand sqat. This reads like meaningless junk. File it away with the 200 foot sea level rise, etc.

Yeah, that's the ticket. Double the missions, hell, triple 'em! Gotta stave off that incoming sunlight so the oil companies can continue to make a profit, dontcha know!

Mother is angry.

:freak:
dbt