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Global warming to step up after 2009
Posted on Sunday, August 12, 2007 (CDT) by Thoth
 Global warming is forecast to set in with a vengeance after 2009, with at least half of the five following years expected to be hotter than 1998, the warmest year on record, scientists report.
Climate experts have long predicted a general warming trend over the 21st century. But this new study is more specific about what is likely to happen in the decade that started in 2005.
"There is ... particular interest in the coming decade, which represents a key planning horizon for infrastructure upgrades, insurance, energy policy and business development," the authors note.
To make this
kind of prediction, researchers at the UK's Met Office made a computer
model that takes into account such natural phenomena as the El Niño
pattern in the Pacific Ocean and other fluctuations in ocean
circulation and heat content.
A forecast of the next
decade is particularly useful, because climate could be dominated over
this period by these natural changes, rather than human-caused global
warming, says study author Dr Douglas Smith.
In research published in
the journal Science, Smith and his colleagues predict that the next
three or four years will show little warming despite an overall
forecast that saw warming over the decade.
The scientists say that
natural forces will offset the expected warming caused by human
activities, such as burning fossil fuels.
And they say the real heat won't start until after 2009.
Back to the future
To check their models, the
scientists used a series of 'hindcasts', forecasts that look back in
time, going back to 1982. They then compared what their models
predicted with what actually occurred.
Factoring in the natural
variability of ocean currents and temperature fluctuations yielded an
accurate picture, the researchers found. This differed from other
models which mainly considered human-caused climate change.
"Over the 100-year
timescale, the main change is going to come from greenhouse gases that
will dominate natural variability, but in the coming 10 years the
natural internal variability is comparable," Smith says.
Soot from industry and fires
In another climate change
article published online today in Science, US researchers report that
soot from industry and forest fires has had a dramatic impact on the
Arctic climate, starting around the time of the Industrial Revolution.
Industrial pollution
brought a seven-fold increase in soot, also known as black carbon, in
Arctic snow during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, say
scientists at the Desert Research Institute.
Soot, mostly from burning
coal, reduces the reflectivity of snow and ice, letting Earth's surface
absorb more solar energy and possibly resulting in earlier snow melts
and exposure of much darker underlying soil, rock and sea ice. This in
turn led to warming across much of the Arctic region.
At its height from 1906 to
1910, estimated warming from soot on Arctic snow was eight times that
of the pre-industrial era, the researchers say.
Copyright: ABC
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No Comments Allowed for Anonymous, please register |
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Re: Global warming to step up after 2009
by Kerux on Sunday, August 12, 2007 (CDT)
(User Info | Send a Message) | This infromation is incorrect. It has been detirmined that data used to determind what the hottest years have been came from data supppied by NASA. Apparently the 2000 Y2K did effect something it effected all the climate data at NASA. NASA has quitely just released a correction. It now appears that the hottest year was in the 1920's and in fact of the top ten hottest years five of them were before WWII.
Kerux |
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Re: Global warming to step up after 2009
by Kerux on Sunday, August 12, 2007 (CDT)
(User Info | Send a Message) | This infromation is incorrect. It has been detirmined that data used to determind what the hottest years have been came from data supppied by NASA. Apparently the 2000 Y2K did effect something it effected all the climate data at NASA. NASA has quitely just released a correction. It now appears that the hottest year was in the 1920's and in fact of the top ten hottest years five of them were before WWII.
Kerux |
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