Global Warming News

March, 2008

Western Antarctic Ice Chunk Collapses 3/25/2008 AP: "A chunk of Antarctic ice nine times the size of Manhattan has suddenly collapsed, putting an even larger glacial area at risk. Satellite images show the runaway disintegration of a 220-square-mile chunk in western Antarctica. British scientist David Vaughan says it's the result of global warming."

January, 2008

Escalating Ice Loss Found in Antarctica 1/14/2008 WaPo: "Climatic changes appear to be destabilizing vast ice sheets of western Antarctica that had previously seemed relatively protected from global warming, researchers reported yesterday, raising the prospect of faster sea-level rise than current estimates… Rignot said the tonnage of yearly ice loss in Antarctica is approaching that of Greenland, where ice sheets are known to be melting rapidly in some parts and where ancient glaciers have been in retreat. He said the change in Antarctica could become considerably more dramatic because the continent's western shelf, an expanse of ice and snow roughly the size of Texas, is largely below sea level and has broad and flat expanses of ice that could move quickly. Much of Greenland's ice flows through relatively narrow valleys in mountainous terrain, which slows its motion. The new finding comes days after the head of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said the group's next report should look at the "frightening" possibility that ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica could melt rapidly at the same time. "Both Greenland and the West Antarctic ice sheet are huge bodies of ice and snow, which are sitting on land," said Rajendra Pachauri, chief of the IPCC, the United Nations' scientific advisory group. "If, through a process of melting, they collapse and are submerged in the sea, then we really are talking about sea-level rises of several meters." (A meter is about a yard.) Last year, the IPCC tentatively estimated that sea levels would rise by eight inches to two feet by the end of the century, assuming no melting in West Antarctica."

December, 2007

Ominous Arctic melt worries experts 12/11/2007 AP: "Just last year, two top scientists surprised their colleagues by projecting that the Arctic sea ice was melting so rapidly that it could disappear entirely by the summer of 2040. This week, after reviewing his own new data, NASA climate scientist Jay Zwally said: "At this rate, the Arctic Ocean could be nearly ice-free at the end of summer by 2012, much faster than previous predictions." So scientists in recent days have been asking themselves these questions: Was the record melt seen all over the Arctic in 2007 a blip amid relentless and steady warming? Or has everything sped up to a new climate cycle that goes beyond the worst case scenarios presented by computer models?"

The Hidden Truth About Genetically Modified Foods 12/5/2007 Common Dreqams: "Consider Dr Arpad Pusztai, the world’s leading scientist in his field, who inadvertently discovered in 1998 that unpredictable changes in GM crops caused massive damage in rats. He went public with his concerns and was a hero at his prestigious institute for all of two days. The director of the institute received two phone calls, allegedly from the UK prime minister’s office, and Dr Pusztai was fired after 35 years and silenced with threats of a lawsuit."

November, 2007

Cancer Terrorists Unmasked 11/21/2007 Counterpunch: "The Secret History of the War on Cancer is a multi-layered treasure trove of a shadow history leading from Hypocrates to Ramazinni to Nazi Germany, which ironically was the first country to ban smoking in public places. The Nazis were simply implementing the work of a spectacular 1936 conference in Brussels on the environmental causes of cancer. Yes, it turns out that a great deal was known environmental and workplace causes of cancer but ignored by most of the industrial world. In her investigations Davis was shocked to learn about this International Congress of Scientific and Social Campaign against Cancer, where 200 of the world's top scientists convened. She calls it a "a veritable Manhattan Project on cancer." "Many of your late relatives and mine might still be with us if the things these eminent women and men of science knew about the causes of cancer in 1936 had entered mainstream medical practice," writes Davis."

How Dry We Are - A Question No One Wants to Raise About Drought 11/16/2007 Common Dreams: "And then what exactly can we expect? If the southeastern drought is already off the charts in Georgia, then, whether it’s 80 days or 800 days, isn’t there a possibility that Atlanta may one day in the not-so-distant future be without water? And what then?"

October, 2007

Ice cap melt seen "very, very alarming" 10/2/2007 Reuters

August, 2007

Antarctic ice thawing faster than predicted 8/22/2007 Reuters: "A thaw of Antarctic ice is outpacing predictions by the U.N. climate panel and could in the worst case drive up world sea levels by 2 meters (6 ft) by 2100, a leading expert said on Wednesday. Millions of people, from Bangladesh to Florida and some Pacific island states, live less than a meter above sea level. Most of the world's major cities, from Shanghai to Buenos Aires, are by the sea. Chris Rapley, the outgoing head of the British Antarctic Survey, said there were worrying signs of accelerating flows of ice towards the ocean from both Antarctica and Greenland with little sign of more snow falling inland to compensate. "The ice is moving faster both in Greenland and in the Antarctic than the glaciologists had believed would happen," Rapley told Reuters during a climate seminar in Ny Alesund on a Norwegian Arctic island 1,200 km from the North Pole. "I think the realistic view is that we will be nearer a meter than the 40 cm" in sea level rise by 2100, Raply said. The U.N. climate panel in February gave a likely range of 18 to 59 cm this century, for an average around 40 cm."

Arctic sea ice 'lowest in recorded history': scientists 8/12/2007 Physorg: "Sea ice in the northern hemisphere has plunged to the lowest levels ever measured, US polar specialists said, adding they expect the record low to be "annihilated" by summer's end."

May, 2007

Earth’s Natural Defenses against Climate Change ‘Beginning to Fail’ 5/18/2007 Independent

Rapid rise in global warming is forecast 5/18/2007 London Times: "The reduced ability to absorb carbon is thought to be a result of high winds acting on ocean currents bringing deeper waters that already contain high levels of carbon to the surface. The higher winds are themselves believed to have been caused by climate change due to a combination of changes in the ozone layer and carbon emissions. The scientists from countries including Britain, France and Germany, said their findings marked the first time that one of the world’s natural “carbon sinks” had been shown to be weakened by Man’s own actions. Ian Totterdell, a climate modeller at the Met Office Hadley Centre, described the research as “an important piece of work”. He said: “This is the first time we have been able to get convincing evidence that a change in the uptake of CO2 by the oceans is linked to climate change. “It’s one of many feedbacks we didn’t expect to kick in until some way into the 21st century.” "

April, 2007

Mysterious disappearance of US bees creating a buzz 4/6/2007 AFP: "The phenomenon now being witnessed across the United States has been dubbed "colony collapse disorder," or CCD, by scientists as they seek to explain what is causing the bees to literally disappear in droves. The usual suspects to which bees are known to be vulnerable such as the varroa mite, an external parasite which attacks honey bees and which can wipe out a hive, appear not to be the main cause. "CCD is associated with unique symptoms, not seen in normal collapses associated with varroa mites and honey bee viruses or in colony deaths due to winter kill," entomologist Diana Cox-Foster told the Congress committee. In cases of colony collapse disorder, flourishing hives are suddenly depopulated leaving few, if any, surviving bees behind. The queen bee, which is the only one in the hive allowed to reproduce, is found with just a handful of young worker bees and a reserve of food. Curiously though no dead bees are found either inside or outside the hive. The fact that other bees or parasites seem to shun the emptied hives raises suspicions that some kind of toxin or chemical is keeping the insects away, Cox-Foster said."

February, 2007

GOP, Global Warming & Dinosaur Farts  2/22/2007 Consortium News

Global Warming: South Pacific More Vulnerable Than Thought  2/22/2007 Common Dreams

Climate Science from Climate Scientists  2/21/2007 Real Climate

Step It Up, Climate Change Action  2/21/2007 Step it Up: This April 14th, tens of thousands of Americans will gather all across the country at meaningful, iconic places to call for action on climate change. We will hike, bike, climb, walk, swim, kayak, canoe, or simply sit or stand with banners of our call to action: Step it Up, Congress, Cut Carbon by 80% in 2050.

McKibben, The Real News about Global Warming  2/21/2007 New York Review of Books

One Great Big Plastic Hassle  2/19/2007 Alternet

Cheap solar power poised to undercut oil and gas by half  2/18/2007 Telegraph

Oceans and climate  2/4/2007 Energy Bulletin: published 7/06

Methane Burps: Ticking Time Bomb  2/4/2007 Energy Bulletin: published 12/04

January, 2007

Origin of pingo-like features on the Beaufort Sea shelf and their possible relationship to decomposing methane gas hydrates 1/5/2007 American Geophysical Union: discusses methane hydrate release in the ocean.

December, 2006

Review of the Year: Global Warming  12/29/2006 Independent: "During the past year, scientific findings emerged that made even the most doom-laden predictions about climate change seem a little on the optimistic side. And at the heart of the issue is the idea of climate feedbacks - when the effects of global warming begin to feed into the causes of global warming. Feedbacks can either make things better, or they can make things worse. The trouble is, everywhere scientists looked in 2006, they encountered feedbacks that will make things worse - a lot worse."

Flood Maps  12/25/2006 Firetree: Set flood level from 1m to 14m in upper left.

Maps  12/25/2006 End to Global Warming: "East coast - the east coast of North America, with 1, 3, 10, 30, and 100 meter rises in sea-level; 100-meter-rise - maps of the entire world and of Europe, with a 100 meter sea-level rise "

Massive Ice Shelf 'May Collapse without Warning'  12/3/2006 New Zealand Herald: "A New Zealand-led ice drilling team has recovered three million years of climate history from samples which gives clues as to what may happen in the future. Initial analysis of sea-floor cores near Scott Base suggest the Ross Ice Shelf had collapsed in the past and had probably done so suddenly. The team's co-chief scientist, Tim Naish, told The Press newspaper the sediment record was important because it provided crucial evidence about how the Ross Ice Shelf would react to climate change, with potential to dramatically increase sea levels."

November, 2006

Up in Smoke: The African Apocalypse  11/24/2006 Independent: "The continent burning into a desert Nowhere is the effect of global warming more dangerous than in Somalia, where the worst drought in 40 years is affecting the lives of 1.8 million people."

A Step Shy of Book-Burning  11/23/2006 Truth Out: "In August, under the guise of fiscal responsibility, the Bush Environmental Protection Agency began closing most of its research libraries, both to the public and to its own staff. The EPA's professional staff objected strongly, insisting that closing the libraries would hamstring them in their jobs. In a letter to Congress protesting the closures, public employees said, "We believe that this budget cut is just one of many Bush administration initiatives to reduce the effectiveness of the US Environmental Protection Agency, and to continue to demoralize its employees.""

Study: 90% of the ocean's edible species may be gone by 2048  11/3/2006 USA Today: "Oversight of commercial fishing must be strengthened or there may eventually be no more seafood. That's the conclusion of a report in today's Science journal that predicts 90% of the fish and shellfish species that are hauled from the ocean to feed people worldwide may be gone by 2048. Even now, 29% of those species have "collapsed," meaning a 90% decline in the amount being fished from the sea, said Boris Worm, lead author and a professor of marine conservation biology at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Canada. "It is a very clear trend, and it is accelerating," Worm said. The paper represents four years of work by an international team of researchers at various universities who analyzed ocean species diversity over the past 1,000 years. The team concludes that this trend can be reversed. "We need to implement sustainable fishing methods, create marine sanctuaries where species can replenish themselves and limit pollution from coastal areas," said Heike Lotze, a marine ecologist at Dalhousie University. "If the habitat is gone or the water's destroyed," the fish populations can't bounce back, she said."

October, 2006

Global warming to cost trillions 10/30/2006 News 24: "Global warming will cost the world up to seven trillion dollars in the next decade unless governments take drastic action soon, according to a major British report. Former World Bank chief economist Sir Nicholas Stern was commissioned last year by finance minister Gordon Brown to lead a review into the economics of climate change. The Observer newspaper on Sunday published excerpts from the 700-page report, which adds that unchecked global warming could make 200 million people refugees from drought or flood. Publication of the report is likely to fuel debate in Britain over whether the government should introduce a tougher regime of "green taxes" to cut carbon emissions. According to the Observer, the Stern report says unchecked climate change would cost up to 3.68 trillion pounds (6.98 trillion dollars) - more than World Wars I and II and the Great Depression of the 1930s."

Climate Extremes Are Coming, Study Says 10/20/2006 AP: "The world _ especially the Western United States, the Mediterranean region and Brazil _ will likely suffer more extended droughts, heavy rainfalls and longer heat waves over the next century because of global warming, a new study forecasts. But the prediction of a future of nasty extreme weather also includes fewer freezes and a longer growing season. In a preview of a major international multiyear report on climate change that comes out next year, a study out of the National Center for Atmospheric Research details what nine of the world's top computer models predict for the lurching of climate at its most extreme."

September, 2006

Scientists shocked as Arctic polar route emerges 9/20/2006 AFP: "European scientists voiced shock as they showed pictures which showed Arctic ice cover had disappeared so much last month that a ship could sail unhindered from Europe's most northerly outpost to the North Pole itself. "

August, 2006

Global warming behind China typhoon disaster 8/17/2006 Times of India: ''BEIJING: Global warming is contributing to an unusually harsh typhoon season in China that started around a month early and has left thousands dead or missing, government officials and experts said. "The natural disasters caused by typhoons in our country have been many this year," the head of the China Meteorological Administration, Qin Dahe, said. "Against the backdrop of global warming, more and more strong and unusual climatic and atmospheric events are taking place."''

May, 2006

West's Failure over Climate Change 'Will Kill 182m Africans' 5/15/2006 Independent: ''The poorest people in the world will be the chief victims of the West's failure to tackle global warning, with millions of Africans forecast to die by the end of the century, Christian Aid says in a report out today. The potential ravages of climate change are so severe that they could nullify the efforts to end the legacy of poverty and disease across developing countries, the charity says. The report highlights the fact that, despite hand-wringing in the West about the threat to its coastlines from rising temperatures, it is the poorest who are likely to suffer most. It estimates that a "staggering" 182 million people in sub-Saharan Africa could die of disease directly attributable to climate change by 2100. Many millions more face death and devastation from climate-induced floods, famine, drought and conflict.''

Global Warming Cited in Wind Shift 5/3/2006 AP: "It's not clear what climate changes might arise in the area or possibly beyond, but the long-term effect might resemble some aspects of an El Nino event, a study author said. El Ninos boost rainfall in the southern United States and western South America and bring dry weather or even drought to Indonesia, Malaysia and elsewhere in the western Pacific. As for the Pacific food chain near the equator, the slowdown might reduce populations of tiny plants and animals up through the fish that eat them, because of reduced nutrition welling up from the deep, said the author, Gabriel Vecchi… The slowdown was detected in shipboard and land-based data going back to the mid-1800s. It matches an effect predicted by computer climate simulations that trace global warming to a build-up of heat-trapping greenhouse gases, the researchers report. But simulations that consider only natural influences fail to produce the observed slowdown, Vecchi said. So, it appears the slowdown is largely due to the man-made buildup of greenhouse gases, the researchers concluded. And the result lends more credibility to computer models that trace global warming to greenhouse gases, at least for their ability to forecast what will happen in the tropics, Vecchi said."

April, 2006

Global Warming Debate Suppressed 4/8/2006 Mother Jones

Climate Researchers Feeling Heat From White House 4/6/2006 Washington Post

March, 2006

Divine Destruction: Dominion Theology and American Environmental Policy  3/28/2006 Buzzflash: "But, as "Divine Destruction" explains, a key underpinning of the Bush anti-environmental policy is based on extremist religious thinking. This includes the "Dominionists" who claim Biblical justification for the outlook that God gave the earth to men and women to use for their comfort and wealth. In fact, many "Dominionists" regard conservationists as unholy "pantheists" who make the mistake of seeing God in nature. As an adjunct to the "Dominionist" movement (and we are simplifying this complex fanatical religious overview here for the sake of brevity), many hardcore right wing fundamentalist supporters of Bush believe in the "End Time" theory that Jesus will return to earth and lead the true Christian believers to heaven. The despoiling of the earth (and a world torn apart by war) isn't really anything to be concerned about because the world is nearing "Rapture" (the return of Christ) anyway."

New City-sized Iceberg Created Near Antarctica  3/27/2006 Live Science: "The iceberg is about 8 miles wide and 15 miles long. It broke free of the Fimbul Ice Shelf, a large glacial ice sheet along the northwestern section of Queen Maud Land, in the eastern Weddell Sea near Antarctica."

Ice caps melting faster than forecast  3/25/2006 Toronto Star: "Global warming of only a couple of degrees Celsius projected by the end of this century is enough to trigger widespread melting of the massive Greenland ice cap and the partial collapse of Antarctica's ice sheets, prominent climate researchers warn in two studies published yesterday. The findings are a stunning about-face from previous expert forecasts that such massive melting would take millennia to kick in, even with rising global atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. This new research, based on a comprehensive look at global warming in the distant past, says melting the two icy domains could eventually raise sea level worldwide by as much as five metres, enough to flood low-lying regions like the Netherlands and most Pacific atolls, as well push half a billion people inland."

Glacial earthquakes rock Greenland ice sheet  3/24/2006 New Scientist: "He discovered the glacial quakes three years ago, when looking for unusual earthquakes, and traced them to slips within the ice. And the quakes can be substantial: a 10-metre slip of an ice slab roughly the size of Manhattan Island, and as tall as the Empire State building, causes a magnitude-5 quake on the Richter scale. When the team analysed glacial seismic records back to 1993, they found a striking increase in the number of quakes recorded in recent years. All 136 of the best-documented slips were traced to glaciated valleys draining the main Greenland ice sheet. A handful of others occurred in Alaskan glaciers or on Antarctica."

Special Online Collection: Climate Change -- Breaking the Ice  3/24/2006 Science

Scientists find Antarctic ice shrank significantly  3/3/2006 Reuters: "The Antarctic ice sheet shrank significantly during the past three years, according to the findings of a NASA study released on Thursday. Using data from the NASA/German Aerospace Center Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE), scientists concluded that Antarctica's ice sheet decreased by about 152 cubic kilometers annually from April 2002 to August 2005. The estimated loss was enough to raise global sea level about 1.2 millimeters (0.04724 inch) during the study period or about 13 percent of the overall observed sea level rise for the same period, according to the study conducted by researchers at the University of Colorado, Boulder. That is about how much water the United States consumes in three months and represents a change of about 0.4 millimeter (0.01575 inch) per year to global sea level rise, the study concluded."

February, 2006

Is America facing yet another dust bowl? 2/27/2006 Morris Daily Herald: "The low-level jet stream — a fast-moving current of winds close to the Earth's surface — travels from east to west across the Atlantic, then typically curves northward as it crosses the Gulf of Mexico, bringing moisture to the Great Plains. Abnormal sea-surface temperatures have caused this low-level jet stream to continue westward and to weaken, which is preventing much-needed moisture from reaching the agriculturally critical region. The shift in the jet stream is also allowing a southerly flow from Mexico to bring much drier air northward into the Plains. Besides dramatically reducing precipitation for the region, the changes brought about by the abnormal sea-surface temperatures will also result in higher surface temperatures in the Plains. "When surfaces are wet, energy from solar radiation both evaporates moisture and heats the ground," said AccuWeather.com Chief Meteorologist Elliot Abrams. "When no moisture is present, all that energy is channeled toward heating the ground, and the warm-er ground heats the lower atmosphere. “The combination of low moisture and higher temperatures would be a crippling one-two punch for the Great Plains should these conditions persist, much like what occurred during the Dust Bowl drought.""

New Study in Science Warns of Greenland’s Accelerating Glaciers 2/16/2006 AAAS: "The behavior of the glaciers that dump ice into the sea is the most important aspect of understanding how an ice sheet will evolve in a changing climate," said Science author Eric Rignot from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, Calif. "It takes a long time to build and melt an ice sheet, but glaciers can react quickly to temperature changes." Rignot expressed concern that the models now used to predict Greenland's ice loss and contribution to sea level rise are inadequate because they do not account for changes in the speed of outlet glaciers that flow into the sea. Taking higher glacier speeds into account, the authors calculate that Greenland contributes about 0.5 millimeters per year to global sea level rise which currently stands at 3 millimeters per year. Recent increases in glacier speed on Greenland are responsible for more than two-thirds of Greenland's contribution to sea level rise, the authors say."

January, 2006

Climate Expert Says NASA Tried to Silence Him 1/29/2006 NYT: "Mr. Acosta said other reasons for requiring press officers to review interview requests were to have an orderly flow of information out of a sprawling agency and to avoid surprises. "This is not about any individual or any issue like global warming," he said. "It's about coordination." Dr. Hansen strongly disagreed with this characterization, saying such procedures had already prevented the public from fully grasping recent findings about climate change that point to risks ahead. "Communicating with the public seems to be essential," he said, "because public concern is probably the only thing capable of overcoming the special interests that have obfuscated the topic.""

Rapidly Shrinking Arctic Ice Could Spell Trouble for the Rest of the World 1/11/2006 Common Dreams

December, 2005

Gulf Stream 'engine' weakening, say scientists  12/11/2005 Independent, UK: "Climate models suggest that if the conveyor ground to a halt - as more extreme forecasts predict could happen - average temperatures could drop by up to 10C in Britain and north-west Europe." [= 18 Farenheit]

The Psychology of Global Warming: Alarm-ist Versus Alarm-ing  12/8/2005 Truth Out

Alarm over dramatic weakening of Gulf Stream  12/1/2005 Guardian: "Researchers on a scientific expedition in the Atlantic Ocean measured the strength of the current between Africa and the east coast of America and found that the circulation has slowed by 30% since a previous expedition 12 years ago."

November, 2005

The Gathering Winds - A Rise in Deadly Storms Since '95 Has Researchers Worried About the Future  11/27/2005 Washington Post: "There are at least two fundamental problems with the studies, according to Gray and others. The first is that Atlantic hurricane activity has long been known to undergo fluctuations over long periods. The flip-flops between active and inactive hurricane periods in the Atlantic are attributed to long-term trends in currents and salinity. The 1950s and 1960s saw lots of hurricane activity, for example, whereas the '70s, '80s and early '90s did not. The uptick in hurricanes that began in 1995 had long been anticipated, though researchers hadn't been sure when exactly the change would come. Critics said the rise in Atlantic hurricanes that the papers detected was probably the cause of this natural "oscillation," not global warming. The second flaw in the papers, according to critics, is that both papers are based on hurricane records over decades, and those vary in quality, largely because the means of measuring hurricane intensity have changed over time. In the northwest Pacific, for example, which sees a large share of hurricane-force storms, records of storm intensity have at times been based on flight observations and sometimes on satellite images. "In a nutshell, the data sets they're using aren't reliable enough to answer those important questions," said NOAA hurricane researcher Christopher W. Landsea. "The data sets don't take into account the different ships, the different planes, the different satellite imagery. The data is affected by the different ways of measuring." For all the skepticism from some quarters, the arguments have been persuasive elsewhere. Willoughby said he has been leaning toward the global warming explanation and that the two new papers helped. Still, he said, it is too early to tell."

Pacific Atlantis: first climate change refugees  11/25/2005 Guardian: "The Carterets will join many other Pacific islands that are on the point of being swallowed by the sea. Much of Kiribati, the Marshalls and other low-lying island groups might only be visible through a glass-bottomed boat in decades to come. Two uninhabited Kiribati islands, Tebua Tarawa and Abanuea, disappeared underwater in 1999, according to the South Pacific regional environment programme. In 2003 the government of Tuvalu said it would start evacuating its citizens in the face of climate change and rising sea levels, but plans have been tied up in red tape. According to the Red Cross, the number of people in the Oceania region affected by weather-related disasters has soared by 65 times during the past 30 years. Increased numbers of cyclones, droughts and floods, all predicted by climate change scientists, are said to be making life unviable on many islands. Rising sea levels entirely swamping the islands is the last act of a long, perhaps unstoppable process."

The Big Thaw: Global Disaster Will Follow If the Ice Cap on Greenland Melts Now scientists say it is vanishing far faster than even they expected.  11/20/2005 Inedpendent

Sea level rise doubles in 150 years  11/15/2005 Guardian: "Today's warning comes from US researchers at Rutgers University in New Jersey who analysed cores drilled from different sites along the eastern seaboard. By drilling down 500 metres through layers of different sediments and using chemical dating techniques, the scientists were able to work out where beaches and dry land were over the past 100m years. The analysis showed that during the past 5,000 years, sea levels rose at a rate of around 1mm each year, caused largely by the residual melting of icesheets from the previous ice age. But in the past 150 years, data from tide gauges and satellites show sea levels are rising at 2mm a year."

October, 2005

Climate Change and Geoengineering ‘intentional large scale manipulation of the global environment’  10/20/2005 Global Research: "In the case of at least one geoengineering measure, by no means the most ‘outlandish’, namely: ‘Enhancing Clouds to Reflect Sunlight’, a mass of eyewitness evidence for all over the world suggests that, despite official denials, a programme serving some such purpose is not merely a proposal but a reality and has been under implementation on an immensely large scale for at least a decade."

How Earth-Scale Engineering Can Save the Planet  10/20/2005 Popular Science: published 6/05

Climate warning as Siberia melts  10/18/2005 New Scientist: "His colleague Karen Frey says if the bogs dry out as they warm, the methane will oxidise and escape into the air as carbon dioxide. But if the bogs remain wet, as is the case in western Siberia today, then the methane will be released straight into the atmosphere. Methane is 20 times as potent a greenhouse gas as carbon dioxide. In May this year, Katey Walter of the University of Alaska Fairbanks told a meeting in Washington of the Arctic Research Consortium of the US that she had found methane hotspots in eastern Siberia, where the gas was bubbling from thawing permafrost so fast it was preventing the surface from freezing, even in the midst of winter."

Global warming, in capsule form  10/18/2005 Gristmill: "a handy one-paragraph-long roundup of evidence on global warming"

METHANE CLATHRATE OUTGASSING AND ANOXIC EXPANSION IN SOUTHEAST ASIAN DEEPS DUE TO GLOBAL WARMING  10/18/2005 Environmental Monitoring and Assessment: published 1997 - "Numerous marine areas in SouthEast Asia are cold and deep enough to develop stable gas hydrates of greenhouse gases methane and carbon dioxide and of reducing agents such as hydrogen sulfide. In addition many of these deeps have low oxygen values below sill depths. Warming of such waters could: (1) destabilize existing gas hydrates (clathrates) flashing them into gas and (2) reduce the oxygen capacity of waters below the sill depth. Outgassing could increase the buoyancy, producing upwelling of potentially noxious deep waters into the photic zone and even to the surface where the greeenhouse gases would be added to the atmosphere."

Britain faces big chill as ocean current slows  10/18/2005 Times, London: published 5/05 - "CLIMATE change researchers have detected the first signs of a slowdown in the Gulf Stream — the mighty ocean current that keeps Britain and Europe from freezing. They have found that one of the “engines” driving the Gulf Stream — the sinking of supercooled water in the Greenland Sea — has weakened to less than a quarter of its former strength."

SEPTEMBER WARMER AND DRIER THAN AVERAGE ACROSS U.S., WARMEST SEPTEMBER GLOBALLY SINCE BEGINNING OF RELIABLE INSTRUMENTS  10/16/2005 NOAA: "The average global temperature anomaly for combined land and ocean surfaces for September (based on preliminary data) was 1.13 degrees F (0.63 degrees C) above the 1880-2004 long-term mean. This was the warmest September since 1880, the beginning of reliable instrumental records. The second warmest September was in 2003 with an anomaly of 1.02 degrees F (0.57 degrees C) above the mean. Land surface temperatures were highest on record for September with temperatures more than 5 degrees F (2.8 degrees C) above normal across large parts of Asia and North America. Ocean temperatures were third highest on record."

Apocalypse Now - How Mankind Is Sleepwalking to the End of the Earth  10/16/2005 Dissident Voice: published 9/05, excellent summary of global warming issues.

The Heat Death of American Dreams  10/12/2005 Alternet: "Overshadowed by last month's hurricanes was the news that global warming is likely to accelerate much faster than feared, and it's already begun."

An Abrupt Climate Change Scenario and Its Implications for United States National Security  10/3/2005 Pentagon: examines aspects of the end of the Gulf Stream ("thermohaline conveyor")

August, 2005

Katrina's real name 8/30/2005 Boston Globe: "THE HURRICANE that struck Louisiana yesterday was nicknamed Katrina by the National Weather Service. Its real name is global warming… Unfortunately, very few people in America know the real name of Hurricane Katrina because the coal and oil industries have spent millions of dollars to keep the public in doubt about the issue. The reason is simple: To allow the climate to stabilize requires humanity to cut its use of coal and oil by 70 percent. That, of course, threatens the survival of one of the largest commercial enterprises in history. In 1995, public utility hearings in Minnesota found that the coal industry had paid more than $1 million to four scientists who were public dissenters on global warming. And ExxonMobil has spent more than $13 million since 1998 on an anti-global warming public relations and lobbying campaign. In 2000, big oil and big coal scored their biggest electoral victory yet when President George W. Bush was elected president -- and subsequently took suggestions from the industry for his climate and energy policies. As the pace of climate change accelerates, many researchers fear we have already entered a period of irreversible runaway climate change."

June, 2005

New US move to spoil climate accord 6/18/2005 Observer, UK: "Extraordinary efforts by the White House to scupper Britain's attempts to tackle global warming have been revealed in leaked US government documents obtained by The Observer. These papers - part of the Bush administration's submission to the G8 action plan for Gleneagles next month - show how the United States, over the past two months, has been secretly undermining Tony Blair's proposals to tackle climate change. The documents obtained by The Observer represent an attempt by the Bush administration to undermine completely the science of climate change and show that the US position has hardened during the G8 negotiations. They also reveal that the White House has withdrawn from a crucial United Nations commitment to stabilise greenhouse gas emissions."

April, 2005

A Planetary Problem 4/18/2005 New Yorker: "There is a very broad consensus in the scientific community that global warming is under way. To the extent that there are conflicting views, they are usually over how exactly the process will play out. This is understandable. The climate affects just about every natural system on earth, and these systems in turn affect the climate. So making predictions is very complicated. Meanwhile, we have only one planet, so it’s impossible to run a controlled experiment. To focus on the degree of disagreement, rather than on the degree of consensus, is, I think, fundamentally misguided. If ten people told you your house was on fire, you would call the fire department. You wouldn’t really care whether some of them thought that the place would be incinerated in an hour and some of them thought it would take a whole day."

January, 2005

Global Warming Approaching Point of No Return, Warns Leading Climate Expert 1/23/2005 Common Dreams: "He also cited alarming measurements, first reported in The Independent on Sunday, showing that levels of carbon dioxide (the main cause of global warming) have leapt abruptly over the past two years, suggesting that climate change may be accelerating out of control. He added that, because of inertia built into the Earth's natural systems, the world was now only experiencing the result of pollution emitted in the 1960s, and much greater effects would occur as the increased pollution of later decades worked its way through. He concluded: "We are risking the ability of the human race to survive." "

January, 2004

"Eco-imperialism" in New York 1/21/2004 GM Watch: "A conference that its organisers say will make "eco-imperialism" a household word is taking place at the Sheraton Hotel & Towers, New York, Tuesday. According to the title of the event "eco-imperialism" is, "The global green movement's war on the developing world's poor". Opposition to GM crops, it is claimed, is part of that "war". The conference is being organised by the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE). CORE styles itself "one of America's premier civil rights organizations". Its national spokesperson Niger Innis says, "We intend to stop this callous eco-manslaughter". "

January, 2003

Triggering Abrupt Climate Change 1/19/2003 Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute: "When the Gulf Stream’s waters reach the Labrador, Greenland and other northern seas, and lose their heat to the atmosphere, they become colder—and hence denser. The waters are also relatively salty. Salty water is denser than fresher water, so the whole salty mass begins to sink to great depths. When this sinking mass of cold water reaches the abyss, it then flows at deep levels of the ocean, from the North Atlantic southward into the South Atlantic. The plunge of this great volume of cold, salty water propels the Great Ocean Conveyor. And on the back end, it creates a void that actively pulls the Gulf Stream northward to replace the waters that are sinking… If you simply add too much fresh water to the North Atlantic, the waters there will become less salty and less dense. They will stop sinking. Then the Gulf Stream slows down or is deflected southward. Winters in the North Atlantic region get significantly colder."

Thaw in Greenland threatens new ice age 1/11/2003 Guardian, UK: "The snowfalls of the past week may be just a taster of what is to come, if the latest predictions from scientists are correct. The amount of ice melting from the surface of the Greenland ice sheet broke all known records last year, threatening a rapid rise in sea levels and a return of very cold winters to Britain because of a slowing down in the Gulf Stream."

June, 2002

Smog-Forming and Toxic Gases 'Consistently' Undercounted, Major Study Finds  6/9/2002 Public I: "In a discovery with national implications, a group of government, academic and private researchers involved in a $20 million study of Houston's air quality have found that operators of petrochemical plants in the city's vast industrial complex have been significantly underestimating emissions of key air pollutants in required reports to regulators. Smog-forming and toxic gases were "consistently" measured at levels three to 10 times greater -- and in some cases, "100 or more [times] greater" -- than local oil refineries and chemical plants reported releasing, according to a recent analysis of the Houston findings by federal, state and academic experts."

The Sky is Indeed Falling Bush Says, Get Used to It  6/7/2002 Alternet: "It concluded that the "respiratory hazard index" exceeded 1.0 for "nearly the entire US population," noting that a hazard index "greater than 1.0 can be best described as indicating that a potential may exist for adverse effects." For 20 million Americans, the hazard index surpassed 10.0."

Global warming blamed for melting Everest glacier  6/7/2002 Planet Ark: "A glacier from which Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay set out to conquer Mount Everest nearly 50 years ago has retreated five km (three miles) up the mountain due to global warming, a U.N. body says. "

Bush dismisses EPA report on climate change  6/4/2002 CNN

Climate Changing, U.S. Says in Report  6/3/2002 NYT: "In a stark shift for the Bush administration, the United States has sent a climate report to the United Nations detailing specific and far-reaching effects that it says global warming will inflict on the American environment. In the report, the administration for the first time mostly blames human actions for recent global warming. It says the main culprit is the burning of fossil fuels that send heat-trapping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. But while the report says the United States will be substantially changed in the next few decades — "very likely" seeing the disruption of snow-fed water supplies, more stifling heat waves and the permanent disappearance of Rocky Mountain meadows and coastal marshes, for example — it does not propose any major shift in the administration's policy on greenhouse gases."

May, 2002

Planet at 'crucial crossroads' as global warming looms, says report 5/23/2002 Irish Times

Monster iceberg breaks off Antarctic ice shelf 5/9/2002 CNN: "The new iceberg measures roughly 47 miles by 4.6 miles (76 km by 7 km), or almost ten times the area of Manhattan." Thank you Enron, Texaco, Shell, GM, Ford, Exxon, and crew. This is no doubt due to the fact that there is no global warning, as the Wall Street Journal would have it.

April, 2002

SCIENTIST WHO WARNED OF GLOBAL WARMING REMOVED FROM PANEL BY US, OIL GIANTS  4/20/2002 Radio Havana

U.S. scientist voted off international climate panel  4/19/2002 AP: there is no global warming: "A U.S. scientist was voted off an international climate panel Friday following what campaigners claimed was pressure from the oil industry and Washington."

Melting glaciers in Himalayas threaten catastrophic floods  4/17/2002 Independent, UK: "there is no global warming" - Wall Street Journal

March, 2002

Iceberg Slim  3/20/2002 Guerrilla New: "Here is what the academy had to say: it is possible that the global warming trend projected over the course of the next 100 years could, all of a sudden and without warning, dramatically accelerate in just a handful of years - forcing a qualitative new climatic regime which could undermine ecosystems and human settlements throughout the world, leaving little or no time for plants, animals and humans to adjust."

Antarctic Ice Shelf Collapses - Antarctic Ice Shelf Collapses With Surprising Speed Because of Warming Trend  3/19/2002 AP: "An enormous floating ice shelf in Antarctica that has existed since the last Ice Age 12,000 years ago collapsed this month with staggering speed during one of the warmest summers on record there, scientists say."

As ice melts, climate-study funds dry up  3/14/2002 Christian Science Monitor

February, 2002

Last Three Months Warmest on U.S. Record Books-NOAA 2/21/2002 Reuters: but the Wall Street Journal says there is no global warming.

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