
2015 Set a Frenzy of Climate Records - philipalexander
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/2015-set-a-frenzy-of-climate-records/
======
SwellJoe
The scary thing about this (well, one scary thing) is that we, as a worldwide
community, needed to be making hard decisions about the climate two or three
decades ago, to stave off the worst of the impact of climate change. We're
several years too late to stop it, and we still have half of our government
(in the US) utterly denying the problem even exists. The decisions that need
to be made _now_ to stave off complete disaster are too extreme for even the
non-insane elements in our government to support, because there's a whole
segment of the population that still believes in fairy tales spun by the oil
and gas industry.

The human mind is just terrible at grasping problems on the scale and timeline
of global climate change, and it's plausible that it'll be the end of life as
we know it in another few decades. All the assholes who denied it was
happening will be dead, already, of course...so they won't care. I just don't
see any significant movement on solving these problems; despite cool stuff
like electric cars and renewable power becoming cheaper than coal, emissions
are still increasing worldwide, not decreasing (and, again, it needed to begin
decreasing decades ago).

I'm an optimist in the general case, but when it comes to climate and the
environment, I see little reason to be optimistic.

~~~
strommen
There's definitely reason to be optimistic. Emissions have started decreasing
majorly in Europe [1], slightly in the USA [2], and are even leveling off in
China [3]. Those three entities account for half the world's emissions.

Solar power has become cheap enough now that it's reasonable for developing
countries (especially India) to rely on it heavily as they become fully
electrified.

[1] [http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-
explained/index.php/...](http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-
explained/index.php/Greenhouse_gas_emission_statistics)

[2]
[https://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/docs/National...](https://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/docs/National_Security_Implications_of_Changing_Climate_Final_051915.pdf)

[3]
[https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/mar/07/chinas-c...](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/mar/07/chinas-
carbon-emissions-may-have-peaked-already-says-lord-stern)

~~~
danieltillett
The problem is the real, unbiased, can't be faked data shows that the CO2
level is rising the most it has in recorded history. It has jumped 4 ppm in
the last year alone [1].

1\.
[http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/](http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/)

~~~
strommen
3.75ppm, but yes - to be clear, worldwide emissions are continuing to
increase, so the CO2 level should be rising by more and more every year.

If we can level off our greenhouse emissions (and we're very close), the CO2
level should continue to rise each year, but at a roughly-constant rate.

And if the world can get approach net-zero greenhouse emissions (a reasonable
goal for 2050), the CO2 level should stop growing.

And then, we would need a few centuries of _negative_ greenhouse emissions to
get back to pre-industrial temperatures. I suspect we'll never bother to do
this.

~~~
danieltillett
According to the NOAA link I provided the CO2 concentration at Mauna Loa rose
from 402.80 ppm in June 2015 to 406.81 ppm in June 2016 (most recent data)
which is 4.01 ppm in a year :(

I think you mean the growth rate of CO2 emission is starting to level
(actually looking at the data not even this is true), not growth of CO2. We
are still headed for disaster if the CO2 goes up by 4ppm every year. I see no
sign that emissions of CO2 are slowing, or that we are doing anything serious
to stop emitting GHG. Just look at the growth of CH4 which is continuing to
increase [1].

1\.
[http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends_ch4/](http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends_ch4/)

------
castratikron
Global warming is the greatest existential threat to civilization. And when
today's Republican nominee says that global warming is a "hoax", it makes me
almost certain that that's what's going to end up doing us in.

~~~
jeremyt
Could you lay out the play-by-play on how global warming is a threat to
civilization? It seems to me, at worst, a slow-motion problem that will take
almost a century to unfold and perhaps force large chunks of people to
relocate to other places.

I would appreciate it very much if you wouldn't read any kind of tone into my
question. Straight up honest question.

~~~
SwellJoe
Already climate change is causing disease and death on an alarming (and
growing) scale. Rich people, as always, have a buffer. We in the developed
world will be the last to be hit by it and the least impacted.

But, Africans are already feeling it. The Zika virus, which was identified in
the 40s, was never been considered a serious health crisis, until climate
change enabled it to spread farther and faster. Anything that enables
mosquitoes to live longer and breed faster is a death sentence for people in
many parts of the world.

Drought-prone regions are also feeling it already. It isn't a matter of "just
move to another place" when your wages are measured in single-digit dollars
per week or month. So, as climate change progresses, more people go hungry.

And, I think what's most alarming about it is that it is progressing faster
than even the most extreme (mainstream) projections predicted. Where small
changes were expected over a long period of time, we seem to be seeing a
domino effect, where slight rises in temperature trigger other events that
cause faster change. So, we probably don't have a century to adjust,
particularly in areas that already have challenging weather events; Florida
and Louisiana because of hurricanes and flooding, Texas and California because
of drought. Many of our food producing states will be forced to evolve
rapidly...I doubt it will be a smooth transition. There's already constant
political battles over water in some parts of California.

~~~
mod
Like the guy you replied to, I don't want any tone inferred into my question.

Those points you made, while worrisome, are not "civilization-ending" or
catastrophic. Is there worse, or is that what you expect to continue?

~~~
SwellJoe
That's what I expect this decade. My concern is that it is all happening
faster than even many of the most pessimistic scientists in the field
expected, and it seems to be accelerating.

What I see when I try to extrapolate from what is happening today: Less food
and clean water for more people, sometimes dramatically so in places that are
already stressed for food and clean water (again, this will strike the poor
far sooner than it will hit the developed world...but, that doesn't make it
less horrifying, to me, and it is merely a leading indicator of what we will
all experience). More forced migration, more refugee crises, more war over
resources (including resources we don't yet generally currently consider worth
going to war over, like water and arable land), more disease epidemics (and
with no effective antibiotics to treat them), more mosquitoes, etc.

All of these things are already happening. We can see and measure them. And,
they are trending in the wrong direction, and accelerating.

I just don't see how to interpret what we see happening as anything other than
a slow moving disaster. There's only so much "relocation" can solve, when
speaking of a world with billions of people. If you consider literally
millions (or even billions) of people dying off to be a non-catastrophic
event, I guess it's not catastrophic. But, it looks like a catastrophe, to me.
And, when that many people are put at risk of starvation and disease, the
likelihood of war, even world war, seems likely to increase remarkably.

Edit: A useful current article on the subject, with references:
[https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/aug/03/climat...](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/aug/03/climate-
crisis-media-relegates-greatest-challenge-hurtle-us-collapse-planet)

~~~
tonmoy
That seems like the current conclusion. But as people start dying, the
population should decrease and that will limit global warming. Life as humans
knew it has already ended, and civilization as we know it might end, but
shouldn't mankind and civilization still survive pretty well? (Legitimate
question)

~~~
SwellJoe
I'm not sure what to make of that question. I think part of what makes
civilization "civil" is that we don't accept huge swaths of the human
population dying horrible deaths so that a lucky and rich portion of the human
population can survive.

