I can assure Dave Hawkins judgement on this particular subject is probably
true. Since 2005 I have been suggesting that the Arctic Ocean's sea ice cover
might destabilise by the end of this decade due to multiple impacts starting to
hit at ice increasingly as its thickeness and area gets ever smaller increasing
the ice mobility, wind speeds and wave sizes, albedo effect and warmer
weathers, increased Siberian runoff, overturning, wave penetration under the
ice, much easier and spatially larger compression of thin seasonalised ice into
pack ice, etc. e
In 5th May 2006 I gave a presentation on the above idea that the Arctic Ocean
would be so shortly ice free and received an invitation to publish my
hypothesis in The Weather journal of the Royal Meteorological Society. So at
least one paper has surely bucked the trend. I can also remember the whole
front page article on the First News (newspaper) by Peter Wadhams that the
Arctic could be ice free by 2012.
I tend to inkline towards opinion of Dave Hawkins the scientific community is
not particularly afraid to publish controversial papers and new ideas. Even
more so, there are different papers such as New Scientist, which takes up more
controversial papers and promotes hypothetical ideas at earlier stages of
development. I just read a review that New Scientist is judged as world's most
successful science paper.
However, the sad truth is that it is entirely a different matter to give a
verbal commendation or backing to an eccentric or new paradigm, to get it
published in a paper from getting a pilot project funded. Verbal and printed
support to a cause does not take us very far unless the fund is forthcoming.
Real science and engineering can only be taken forward by research getting
funded, the architecht can draw a house with a pen and paper but if there are
no funds to get it built, is it then good architecture, or architecture at all.
Same with geoengineering.
We had yesterday the 17th anniversary of the World Indigenous Nations Summit's
investigation request to the United Nations General Assembly. Here we have a
whole new paradigm presented to the United Nations General Assembly by a major
body of world nations which never has had their view point investigated and the
whole matter has always stayed outside the perimeter of peer reviewed science.
I intend to keep it that way, and I will fund the experiments required whether
the First Nations case history will re-occur in Greenland, especially in the
post-sea ice conditions. If so, the ice sheet starts to float on its own melt
water so much so that it looses suddenly its footing on the elevated terrain
and the resulting ice sheet thrust of the sliding forces a major "2012"-style
land slip to let the ice out. This is followed by "A Day After Tomorrow"-style
event called the Last Dryas as hundreds of millions ice bergs suddenly occupy
the Atlantic.
Science is beautiful because it is a pure common sense. Whatever the perceived
or real opposition of prophets of the established Western conventions, the
perceived point of this warned cascade of Greenland's icy contents will happen
at its weakest point: Melville Bay. So be it. Therefore, we fly in by
helicopter to install GPS monitoring equipment that measures the coastal
barrier to accuracy of 0.01 metres.
Ice won't climb over Greenland's coastal rocks. If there is any true
recollection behind the First Nations claim that the Hudson Bay Ice Dome
detached suddenly and rapidly cascaded into sea we will see it in GPS. Whether
there are 10, 200 or 5,000 prophets of all conventions, GPS will show who is
right and who is wrong and we can keep this matter in the realms of politics
and outside the remit of scientific debate.
One day I should preach our findings at TED conference what are the grievances
of the First Nations about the case history of ice age.
What are the worries of the 2012 hysteria at its more quality-end rather than
Roland Emmerlich's hoo-haa (instead of neutrinos, it was the solar radiation,
the prolonged and sustained global warming at the end of ice age destabilising
the ice sheets that started to afloat on their meltwaters, pushing tracts of
land into sea, isostatic rebounds from the ice sheet slides causing earthquakes
and huge volcanoes to blow up, sea throwing the huge waves and sea level rise
leading to sudden coastal Floods and subsequent intenste cooling of A Day After
Tomorrow.)
May be this is a cruel proposition. But I think it would be a fitting tribute
to the process that started as a political process to remain political. I
wonder if geoengineering could be made a functional realm of commercial remit
or political remit to get it done.
This only recalls in my mind the local governance in Russia who are paying for
Far Eastern Shipping Company (FESCO) to sail along coastal margin when winds
blow towards the warm sea areas and carry the loosened ice to areas of sea
where it melts away in a process they call "ice chipping". No one ever came to
ask them question to remove sea ice cover artificially this way, they just do
it as it delivers benefits.
Sometimes it might be possible to find a philantrophist or a corporate sponsor
that might do the project and ask not too many questions and opinions. Since
the CFC scare people are concerned of all athmospheric or sea water
modifications that might become irreversible, but as I have seen most
geoengineering are entirely reversible and can be turned off, or that the pilot
projects can be made small enough that any damage is not in any way substantial.
The issue with geoengineering is to tap into right philantrophists, corporate
sponsors, or political establishment who do not get bogged into infinite rounds
of reviews which planning process will sap all the energy before any actual
work in the field trials or facility running are in place.
There ought to be instances where research or operation may attract the funding
for execution your plans. Perhaps we geoengineers should discuss more at this
particular option and draw plans to try to get ahead also on this way to get
our dreams materialised.
Human mind is complex one and the patrons of climate change denialists know
that. Hacking of CRU computers create confusion and disorder, this destabilises
public confidence to the scientists and politicians and the commerce can do
selling polluting things and way of life as before. Professor Ian Plimer and
Daily Express who I have taken to the Press Complaint Commission claimed that
the athmosphere has had 1,000 times more carbon dioxide in the past
300,000-400,000 parts per million. Half a dozen Conservative break away
politicians immediately supported it. However, in my calculus the athomosphere
has O2 in concentrations of only 210,000 parts per million, so how come CO2 at
400,000 p.p.m.? The facts do not always matter, the sentiments do, if someone
tells us a lie we want, we tend to believe it even if it is total nonsense.
I wish, the First Nations old recollections would also be nonsense. My
sentiments and look at their details tells me the opposite. Time shows.
With kind regards,
Veli Albert Kallio, FRGS
Hawkins, Dave wrote: "Come on folks. There is no reason to dismiss the entire
scientific community as afraid to publish a paper due to concerns about
political correctness or impact on careers. I don't buy this slur on an entire
profession."
Gorman, John wrote: "This is a case where the correct answer is that "there
isnt any peer reviewed reference because it wouldnt be politically correct to
say it and to do so would be to risk ones career" However the back of an
envelope calculation is simple; The area of sea ice has halved in little
more than a decade. Whatever scenario one takes it will be gone in 30, 40, 50
years. Even with no further emissions from today the CO2 will stay at 380 and
the temperature in the Arctic will stay at 3 or 4 deg C above 50 years ago. The
sea ice will continue to melt. With any conceivable emissions limitation
scenario it will be gone much sooner."
Date: Fri, 11 Dec 2009 12:08:23 -0500
Subject: Re: [geo] Population control, emission cuts, but geoengineering?
From: wf...@utk.edu
To: j...@cloudworld.co.uk; dhawk...@nrdc.org
CC: gorm...@waitrose.com; geoengineering@googlegroups.com;
oliver.tick...@kyoto2.org
Dear John Nissen:
How important is it to avoid loosing summer sea ice in the Arctic? The bads
from it include: positive feedback on warming due to albedo lowering and
increased input of GHG emissions from permafrost melting and hydrate
decomposition causing some acceleration of the impact of warming on the
Greenland ice sheet, damage to ecosystems (including iconic species) and
social systems, possible harmful impact on northern latitude weather patterns,
and perhaps others that I don’t know about. There are some goods to like the
Northwest passage I suppose. To your knowledge has anyone or any group tried
to quantify these bads or do a rough cost/benefit analysis. One important part
of your arguments, with which I am in agreement, is that the bads are pretty
bad, and, therefore, there is an urgency to do something. If that can be shown
unequivocally, then it argues for finding out if some form of SRM can reduce
the bads; i.e. Initiating an urgent, focused and comprehensive RD&D program.
Perhaps the first step in the program is to do the cost/benefit as best it can
be done.
With best regards,
Bill
Bill Fulkerson, Senior Fellow
Institute for a Secure and Sustainable Environment
University of Tennessee
311 Conference Center Bldg.
Knoxville, TN 37996-4138
wf...@utk.edu
865-974-9221, -1838 FAX
Home
865-988-8084; 865-680-0937 CELL
2781 Wheat Road, Lenoir City, TN 37771-
On 12/11/09 11:18 AM, "John Nissen" <j...@cloudworld.co.uk> wrote:
Hi Dave,
I'll deal first with John's case from the "back of the envelope" calculation,
and then with the scientific reticence.
The case is even stronger than John Gorman has put it. Even if emissions were
stopped overnight, the mean annual temperature in the Arctic would continue to
rise, and with an acceleration, due to the positive feedback of the sea ice -
as ice (with high albedo) melts it gives way to open water (with low albedo)
which absorbs most of the sunlight. This albedo effect is thought to be part
of the basic mechanism of polar amplification.
Now for the scientific reticence.
It's not quite the entire scientific community who are reticent. There are
some good folks on this list who have stood out for geoengineering, David Keith
for one. He gave an excellent presentation on geoengineering, at the Royal
Geographical Society, here in London. He pointed out the ginormous quantity of
CO2 mankind had dumped in the atmosphere, and he pointed out that some of this
CO2 would last thousands of years - worse than nuclear waste! It was quite
clear that the associated global warming would last a time longer than the
Arctic sea ice.
The fear that academics have of their own peers is quite understandable. Paul
Crutzen had enormous difficulty in publishing his seminal paper on
geoengineering with stratospheric sulphate - and then received a lot of flack
from colleagues after it was published - so much flack that he seems to have
retired from the scene.
The other fear, which is more forgiveable, is that academics, and scientific
advisers generally, didn't want to disrupt the Copenhagen process. They have
strained every ounce of intellect to persuade the politicians to get the best
possible deal at Copenhagen. This has meant that government advisers (like
ex-IPCC Bob Watson in the UK) who perfectly understand the dangers of Arctic
sea ice, have been telling the government that cutting emissions is the top
priority. What the advisers have not acknowledged is the speed of retreat of
the sea ice - that is until their "Copenhagen Diagnosis" report [1]. The sea
ice summer extent has been 40% below the IPCC models predictions for three
years in a row! So the summer sea ice is now expected disappear by 2040 - and
there is the possibility of it disappearing end summer within a few years,
especially because of the natural variability of Arctic weather. The sea ice
is indeed the "elephant in the room".
However now that the politicians seem committed to obtaining good Copenhagen
results, we could see everything change, and scientists will point out that,
not only do we have to reduce emissions, but we have to do other things to save
the planet. It is already accepted by some leading climate scientists, such as
Jim Hansen, that geoengineering will be required to suck CO2 out of the
atmosphere. It must also be accepted that SRM geoengineering is needed to save
the Arctic sea ice - since nobody can dispute the argument.
Cheers from Chiswick,
John
[1] http://www.copenhagendiagnosis.org/
---
Hawkins, Dave wrote:
Come on folks. There is no reason to dismiss the entire scientific
community as afraid to publish a paper due to concerns about political
correctness or impact on careers. I don't buy this slur on an entire
profession.
-----Original Message-----
From: John Gorman [mailto:gorm...@waitrose.com]
Sent: Friday, December 11, 2009 3:33 AM
To: Hawkins, Dave; j...@cloudworld.co.uk; geoengineering@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [geo] Population control, emission cuts, but
geoengineering?
this is a case where the correct answer is that "there isnt any peer
reviewed reference because it wouldnt be politically correct to say it
and to do so would be to risk ones career"
However the back of an envelope calculation is simple; The area of sea
ice has halved in little more than a decade. Whatever scenario one
takes it will be gone in 30,40,50 years. Even with no further emissions
from today the CO2 will stay at 380 and the temperature in the arctic
will stay at 3 or 4 deg C above 50 years ago. The sea ice will continue
to melt. With any conceivable emissions limitation scenario it will be
gone much sooner.
This is partly why I included that quote from Schumaker in my submission
to the parliamentary committee. All this talk of tree rings, computers,
models etc is just stopping us from recognising the obvious.
Vick Pope would say " can you prove that this will happen?" no of course
i cant. Its in the future.
john Gorman
----- Original Message -----
From: "Hawkins, Dave" <dhawk...@nrdc.org> <mailto:dhawk...@nrdc.org>
To: <j...@cloudworld.co.uk> <mailto:j...@cloudworld.co.uk> ;
<geoengineering@googlegroups.com> <mailto:geoengineering@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Thursday, December 10, 2009 10:06 PM
Subject: Re: [geo] Population control, emission cuts, but
geoengineering?
Hi John,
In your note you say, "The undisputed fact that emissions reduction
cannot save the Arctic sea ice, at its current rate of retreat..."
Can you provide a reference or two that reaches this conclusion?
(I'm not asking to dispute what you say but would like to see what you
have in mind as support for the proposition.)
Thanks
David
----- Original Message -----
From: geoengineering@googlegroups.com
<geoengineering@googlegroups.com> <mailto:geoengineering@googlegroups.com>
To: Geoengineering <geoengineering@googlegroups.com>
<mailto:geoengineering@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Thu Dec 10 16:46:31 2009
Subject: [geo] Population control, emission cuts, but geoengineering?
Hi all,
Two excellent programmes on the environment and mankind's impact:
David Attenborough:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00pdjmk/Horizon_20092010_How_Many_
People_Can_Live_on_Planet_Earth/
Iain Stewart:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00jf6md/Hot_Planet/
Unfortunately, although Iain had sympathetic mention of Klaus
Lackner's
artificial trees, solar radiation management was represented by
sulphur
being fired into the stratosphere by guns - mention of ozone
disruption
- and the programme ended with punch line "geoengineering is too
expensive and too dangerous". This was an unwarranted dismissal of
the
technology with probably the best chance of saving the Arctic sea ice.
The undisputed fact that emissions reduction cannot save the Arctic
sea
ice, at its current rate of retreat, was not mentioned.
Cheers,
John
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