Global Warming! We Are Doomed!

The climate change issue is heating up. 2006 was announced as the hottest year in the past 100 years until the IPCC scientists re-evaluated and determined that it was only the fifth warmest year in the past 100 years. Seasoned meteorologists are questioning the accuracy of the weather stations recording the temperatures used to calculate global warming. Astrophysicists are trying to make it public that the earth's orbit and orientation changes over time contributing to climate change. They also mention that the sun's energy changes in predictable cycles that also affect climate change. James Hansen, of the Goddard Institute of Space Science, recently noted that soot or black carbon has nearly the same impact on ice melt as carbon dioxide.

The political/scientific debate is becoming quite interesting, at least for me. I find it interesting that after the fact peer review in the media is becoming the norm. James Hansen, is one of the most vocal of the climate change scientists. After reading a few comments by his co-workers on blogs, I have an idea he is one of the most political of the climate change scientists.

Hansen is an enigma. While there is great validity to his work, he dismisses other work as a religious leader might dismiss an infidel. Lloyd D. Keigwin, of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, in a paper dated December 1996, noted that proxy data from a Sargasso Sea survey seemed to verify that sea surface temperatures were considerable warmer during the period commonly called the Medieval Warming Period (MWP). Hansen, dismisses this MWP as folklore having no scientific basis. Many glacial ice core samples indicate that there may well have been a global MWP.

Based on the ice core samples, we are in what is called an interglacial period or a warm period that lasts about 20,000 years. We are about 10,000 years in this current interglacial. If the MWP were not dismissed, we would be in a cooling trend during this particular interglacial period.

If you ask the solar astrophysicists, we are in a period of reduced solar activity. Just coming out of a period of high solar activity, by the way. That means we are in a cooling period of roughly ten years. We are also in a period of increased tropical cyclone activity that will last roughly ten to fifteen more years. The last time we were in an increased tropical cyclone period the average global temperature dropped about 0.25 degrees centigrade. There is also evidence that the North Atlantic Heat Pump (NAHP) is reducing the delivery of warm equatorial water that warms Europe is decreasing. Another indication of Northern Hemispherical cooling.

Admittedly, the global atmospheric carbon dioxide levels are higher that historic levels. This is a cause for concern that needs to be dealt with in a responsible manner. How urgently is a subject of debate? Based on the last 400,000 years of ice core proxy data, that higher carbon dioxide level may not be a bad thing. It could increase the average temperature of the next glacial period by one to two degrees.

Changes in the Earth's orbit and axial orientation parrot historical climate changes. Still, those changes are not enough to justify the temperature changes determined by ice core and sea sediment proxy data. Other influences like multi-millennial comet orbits, undetermined solar cycles or astronomical impacts may prove to be the actual cause.

So to sum every thing up, climate changes. It is just a touch complicated. We, people, may be a part of the cause of the recent climate change. Pragmatic options to reduce our impact on the environment are prudent. Just is case, let's hedge our bet a little if you know what I mean. Freaking out and doing something stupid, well that's the American way!

Didn't Carnegie say, "If your bellhop gives you stock advise, get out of the market?" Something like that I recall. If George Bush "believes" in global warming? Hell, that alone should be enough to chill Al Gore out some. Don't be the Heidi Fleiss, er.. Heidi Cullen of the weather world and give up natural skepticism. Use your brain and think for yourself. Make smart decisions to save energy, but do not blow off any option you may have. The jury is still out.