Day 5: Climate Webquest

-Evidence:

*global warming...
-http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/kids/cc.html : Over the past 100 years, the earth has warmed by 1' F.

-http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/science/recentcc.html : During the 20th Century, global average surface temperatures have increased by .7' and 1.5' F. During the last century, the sea level has risin by 6-8 inches. 1-3 of those inches caused by the expansion of water due to increased ocean temperatures, and the rest due to melting glaciers. Along the U.S. and Gulf coasts, the sea level has risin .08 to .12 in the last year. In some places, the rate of sea level rise is up to .36 inches a year, such as the Louisiana coast. The sea level rose 1-3 inches more in the 20th century than the 19th (more human activity). According to NASA's Earth Observatory, the sea level has been rising at a rate of 9 to 13 inches a century.

-NOAA and NASA's 2005 Surface Temperature Analysis:
http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/science/recentcc.html : the average surface temperature has risin by about 1.2' to 1.4' F. since 1900. the average surface temperature has risin by about 1' since 1970. The earth's surface temperature is rising at a rate of 3.2' F./ Century.

-Antarctica: In 150 years, the average Antarctic ice core temperatures have risen .2' C.

+why does this matter?-National Geographic- Global warming is causing ocean currents to slow, in turn not supplying the North Atlantic with warm water. Since the 1950's, the current towards NW Europe has declined by 30%. In the amount of deep cold water going to the tropics from the North Atlantic, there has been a 50% drop. Also, warm waters are staying in the tropics, 50% more.

*ice sheet recession...
-"LA Times": Greenland's glaciers are melting two times as fast as they were five years ago. On some days, the temperature on the ice cap were up to 20' above normal. Each year, Greenland is loosing up to 52 cubic miles of ice sheets. Since 1991, the average winter temperature has risin by about 10'. Since 1996, the ice stream has tripled its speed to about 3 feet per day.

-Antarctica 2: Antarctica is shrinking due to global warming. Between 1992 and 1999, the inland glacier of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet lost a total of 31 cubic kilometers of ice. This glacier alone is decreasing in size by about 4 gigatons per year, in turn raising the sea level by about .01 millimeters. If this entire ice sheet melted, the world wide sea level would increase by about 5 meter, flooding many costal cities.

-Global Warming?: Greenland's ice sheet, the largest, is increasingly shrinking.

*global damage...
-"Hurricanes": Judith Curry, professor of atmospheric sciences at the Georgia Institute of Technology, says that "Global warming [is] to blame for the past two horrific hurricane seasons...". She believes this because worldwide the sea surface temperatures have increased by about 1', making about a 50% increase in tropical storm activity, particularly in the past decade. She also says, "...some external force is raising sea surface temperatures in tropical regions."

-Newsweek 1: There are many signs on Earth all pointing to a not-so-distant drastic weather change, resulting in a severe decrease in food production, in as little as 10 years from now. Main regions of impact include Canada, the USSR in the North, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indochina, and Indonesia; some of which growing season's depend on annual monsoons. There is abundant evidence supporting this prediciton. Since 1950, England's farmers have seen a decline in their growing season by about two weeks, resulting in an overall grain loss of about 100,000 tons annually estimated. Likewise, around the equator, the average temperature has risin by a fraction of a degree. But in many instances this results in drought.

-Global Warming?: Even moderate amounts of global warming will cause devestation. Coastal cities will be flooded, water supplies will become contaminated with salt, heat wave, droughts, and floods would increase in both frequency and intencity if global warming continued. There has been a build up of CO2 (an increase of about 25%), that traps heat and warms the earth. Volcanic eruptions also contribute to this epic.

-Contributing Factors:
-http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/science/recentcc.html : since about 1750 (the industrial revolution), the greenhouse effect has increased, caused by the burning of fossil fuels and biomass (living material: vegetation), cutting down forests, and the use of aerosols that trap and release heat and reflect sun light. These all change the compostition of the atmosphere, which in turn effects the weather. There have also been changes in the Earth's surface compostion (deforestation, reforestation, and desertification). It can change how much sun the land reflects and absorbs.

-"Newsweek 2": There has been an increase in the amount of dust and aerosols (droplets of liquid in the air, composed mostly of sulfuric acid.) in the atmosphere since 1970, comming from increased agriculture and the burning of coal in power plants.

-"Washington Files": Thomas Karl, director of the National Climatic Data Center of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, said that, "Some greenhouse gases are increasing in the atmosphere because of human activities and increasingly trapping more heat."

-McClatchy Article: On September 11, 2006, 19 American and European scientists stated, "Humans are largely to blame for the recent trend toward more powerful hurricans." They developed a chain that linked the burning of fossil fuels by means of cars and factories, the overall warming of the Earth, and more powerful hurricanse (category 4 + 5, higher intensity and duration). There main findings being that the wind speed of hurricanes goes up and down with the rise and fall of sea surface temeratures.

-Newsweek 1: The climates natural changes, in part, contribute to global warming.

-Time Magazine 1: The climates natural changes contribute to global warming (again), along with human activities such as the burning of coal and oil then being released into the air. Since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has doubled.

-NASA 2: According to satillites, models, and ground observations, scientists say urban areas are contributing to the global warming by means of asphalt, buildings, and aerosols. The increased amount of aerosols most likely collect water, and preventing the water to collect into droplets. Asphalt changes water run-offs, and wind behaviors. Also, air pollution delays when percipitation falls, resulting in heavier storms over the unnatural areas.

-Stanford University: Historically, the Earth has gone through phases of warming and cooling. We are currently in a warming phase.

-Global Warming?: People are causing global warming by the burning of fossil fuels (coal, oil, and natural gas) and cutting down forests.

-Solution:
I propose a nation-wide decrease in the amount of fossil fuels burned. Develope more economically efficient cars, etc... things like that.