2006 : Hottest Year Ever

[Martin]

The official data is in. Hottest year ever for the U.S. so far -

http://www.breitbart.com/news/2007/01/09/D8MHUMVO0.html

Warm December Pushes 2006 to Record Year

Jan 09 2:21 PM US/Eastern

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Last year was the warmest on record for the United States, with readings pushed over higher than normal by the unusual and unseasonably warm weather during the last half of December.

Preliminary data from the National Climatic Data Center listed the average temperature for the 48 contiguous states last year as 55 degrees Fahrenheit. That's 2.2 degrees warmer than average and 0.07 degree warmer than 1998, the previous warmest year on record.

Worldwide, the agency said, it was the sixth warmest year on record.

In December the Center had predicted that 2006 would be the United States' third warmest year, but unusual readings later that month pushed the year into first place.

The Center said it is not clear how much of the warming is a result of greenhouse-gas induced climate change and how much resulted from the current El Nino warming of the tropical Pacific Ocean.

El Nino conditions occur every few years in the Pacific and can affect climate around the world, including producing warmer conditions in the United States.

The average U.S. and global temperature are both about 1 degree warmer than at the start of the 20th century, a change many scientists attribute to gases released into the atmosphere by industrial processes.

The temperature data was collected from a network of more than 1,200 stations across the country.

The climate center said the unusual warmth in early winter reduced residential energy needs by 13.5 percent compared to average conditions for the season.

While December started cold, spring-like conditions reigned in the eastern states during the last half of the month, making it the nation's fourth warmest December. Five states had their warmest December on record _ Minnesota, New York, Connecticut, Vermont and New Hampshire. No state was colder than average in December.

[Big Red 11]

It was over 60 degrees up here in jersey yesterday. Not cool.

We skiiers are pretty pissed off.

[RadioactiveMan]

If you don't like the heat, come to Canada. We're having an unusually cold winter (at least in this part of Canada).

[Swiss Miss]

Originally Posted by RadioactiveMan

If you don't like the heat, come to Canada. We're having an unusually cold winter (at least in this part of Canada).

Well now I know where NOT to go. It's so beautiful here. I was dredding the winter season but overall it's been nice 80 degree weather most of the time. (Right now it's kinda chilly though)

If Al Gore was in a grave, he'd be rolling in it. But since he's not, he's probably just super pissed off! He might as well go ahead and tattoo "I told you so!" on his forehead now.

Gettin warmer all over...

Winter warmest on record worldwide
Thu Mar 15, 2007 - This winter was the warmest on record worldwide, the government said Thursday in the latest worrisome report focusing on changing climate.

The report comes just over a month after the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said global warming is very likely caused by human actions and is so severe it will continue for centuries. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said the combined land and ocean temperatures for December through February were 1.3 degrees Fahrenheit above average for the period since record keeping began in 1880.

The report said that during the past century, global temperatures have increased at about 0.11 degrees per decade. But that increase has been three times larger since 1976, NOAA's National Climatic Data Center reported. Most scientists attribute the rising temperatures to so-called greenhouse gases which are produced by industrial activities, automobiles and other processes. These gases build up in the atmosphere and trap heat from the sun somewhat like a greenhouse.

Also contributing to this winter's record warmth was an El Nino, a periodic warming of the tropical Pacific Ocean. It was particularly strong in January — the warmest January ever — but the ocean surface has since begun to cool. The report noted that in the Northern Hemisphere the combined land and water temperature was the warmest ever at 1.64 degrees above average. In the Southern Hemisphere, where it was summer, the temperature was 0.88 degree above average and the fourth warmest.

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Study: Warming cut $5bn in crops over 20 years
Estimate covers 1981-2002; future likely 'to be a drag,' researcher says
March 16, 2007

Global warming has cut about $5 billion worth of the world's most commonly grown grains over 20 years, according to a new study. Warming temperatures from 1981 to 2002 cut the combined production of wheat, corn, barley and other crops by 40 million tons per year, according to the peer-reviewed study published in Environmental Research Letters on Friday.

"Most people tend to think of climate change as something that will impact the future," Christopher Field, a co-author on the study and ecology expert at the Carnegie Institution in Stanford, Calif., said in an e-mail response to questions. "This study shows that warming over the past two decades has already had effects on global food supply," he added.

Not every scientist agrees that agriculture is suffering from warmer temperatures. A draft U.N. report obtained by Reuters on Thursday said warming is expected to turn the planet a bit greener by spurring plant growth, but crops and forests may wilt beyond mid-century if temperatures keep rising. That report, by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, will be released on April 6.

More http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17645528/from/RS.1/

Birds goin' where its warmer...

Bird species showing up farther north
18 Mar. 2007 - Townsend's warbler, a species that normally spends the winter in Mexico, was spotted in Massachusetts this winter.

More bird species in the USA are ranging farther north and even staying there for the winter in a possible sign of adaptation to global warming, ornithologists and conservation groups say. Some indicators come from the recent Great Backyard Bird Count, which found more swallows, orioles and other common birds in uncommon locations.

"We've got Baltimore orioles in 14 states, orchard orioles in five different reports and Scott's oriole in Pennsylvania. They shouldn't be here. They should be way south," says Paul Green of the National Audubon Society, co-sponsor of the count with the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. Scientists cannot say yet whether the birds' movements are climate-related or a short-term reaction to storms, hot or cold spells, disruption of habitat or food availability.

However, the results of the four-day tally performed in February are "a tempting indicator of change, which may turn out to be the early stages of the effects of changing climate on bird distribution," Green says. "We won't know for certain until we have another 20 years of data." Birds may have nature's best advantage against temperature rise: They can fly away. That can make them bellwethers of climate change, says Cornell ornithologist David Winkler. Birds "really are the canary in the coal mine — a very sensitive indicator of what's going on in the environment," he says. "We will see changes in their distribution long before we see big drops in their abundance."

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Al Gore stumpin' for global warming change...

Al Gore tells Congress of 'irrefutable evidence' of climate change
Wednesday 21st March, 2007 Former Vice President Al Gore has testified before Congress on the dangers posed by global warming.

The environmentalist and former presidential candidate urged lawmakers to take steps to move the United States toward greater energy efficiency and de-facto compliance with the Kyoto Treaty. Al Gore's Oscar-winning documentary, An Inconvenient Truth, tracked his efforts around the world to raise international awareness about global warming.

=snip=

'What in God's name were they doing? Didn't they realize that four times in 15 years the entire scientific community in this world issued unanimous reports calling on them to act? What was wrong with them? Were they too blinded and numbed by the business of political life, or daily life, to take a deep breath and look at the reality of what we are facing?,' said Gore. 'Did they think it was perfectly all right to keep dumping 70 million tons every single time of global warming pollution into this atmosphere? Did they think all the scientists were wrong?,' he continued.

Gore cited recent studies saying that global warming may be worse than previously thought, and that the Arctic ice cap is melting more rapidly than previously predicted, and could disappear in as little as 34 years. 'This problem is burning a hole at the top of the world in the ice cover that is one of the principal ways that our planet cools itself. If it goes, it will not come back in any time scale relevant to the human species,' said former vice president.

FULL http://feeds.bignewsnetwork.com/?sid=235988

Wonder if this will offset the downside to global warming?

Riches await as Earth's icy north melts
25 Mar. 2007 — Barren and uninhabited, Hans Island is very hard to find on a map. Yet these days the Frisbee-shaped rock in the Arctic is much in demand — so much so that Canada and Denmark have both staked their claim to it with flags and warships. The reason: an international race for oil, fish, diamonds and shipping routes, accelerated by the impact of global warming on Earth's frozen north.

The latest report by the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says the ice cap is warming faster than the rest of the planet and ice is receding, partly due to greenhouse gases. It's a catastrophic scenario for the Arctic ecosystem, for polar bears and other wildlife, and for Inuit populations whose ancient cultures depend on frozen waters. But some see a lucrative silver lining of riches waiting to be snatched from the deep, and the prospect of timesaving sea lanes that could transform the shipping industry the way the Suez Canal did in the 19th century.

The U.S. Geological Survey estimates the Arctic has as much as 25% of the world's undiscovered oil and gas. Moscow reportedly sees the potential of minerals in its slice of the Arctic sector approaching $2 trillion. All this has pushed governments and businesses into a scramble for sovereignty over these suddenly priceless seas. Regardless of climate change, oil and gas exploration in the Arctic is moving full speed ahead. State-controlled Norwegian oil company Statoil ASA plans to start tapping gas from its offshore Snoehvit field in December, the first in the Barents Sea. It uses advanced equipment on the ocean floor, remote-controlled from the Norwegian oil boom town of Hammerfest through a 90-mile undersea cable.

Alan Murray, an analyst with the consulting firm Wood Mackenzie, said most petroleum companies are now focusing research and exploration on the far north. Russia is developing the vast Shkotman natural gas field off its Arctic coast, and Norwegians hope their advanced technology will find a place there. "Oil will bring a big geopolitical focus. It is a driving force in the Arctic," said Arvid Jensen, a consultant in Hammerfest who advises companies that hope to hitch their economic wagons to the northern rush. It could open the North Pole region to easy navigation for five months a year, according to the latest Arctic Climate Impact Assessment, an intergovernmental group. That could cut sailing time from Germany to Alaska by 60%, going through Russia's Arctic instead of the Panama Canal.

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possum worried he gonna go extinct, Granny told him not to worry - possum's r' tough!...

Climate change will increase extinction risk, study finds
Monday, March 26, 2007 | Unique climates and the species that inhabit them may disappear from the Earth entirely due to global warming, computer models suggest.

Changes in regions such as the Peruvian Andes, portions of the Himalayas and southern Australia could have a profound impact on indigenous plants and animals, said John W. Williams, assistant professor of geography at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. The findings are being published in this week's online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The UN-led Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, representing the world's leading climate scientists, reported in February that global warming was an "unequivocal" fact, and that man-made greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide were "very likely" behind the rise in temperatures. The IPCC report also found 11 of the highest average recorded global temperatures have come in the past 12 years, and estimated temperatures will rise between 1.8 C and 4 C in the next century.

Williams and his research partners used computer models to estimate how various parts of the world would be affected by regional changes consistent with the IPCC's climate models. "By the end of the 21st century, large portions of the Earth’s surface may experience climates not found at present, and some 20th-century climates may disappear," the authors wrote.

'Geologically unprecedented'

Drought, heat kill Arizona 'sky islands'
March 27, 2007 -- Arizona's "sky islands," mountainside oases that provide a cool lush retreat from the desert, are falling victim to higher temperatures and a long drought.

Debbie Fagan told The New York Times that she settled in Summerhaven near Tucson 25 years ago after a country-wide search for the perfect place. "Nature is confused," Fagan said. "We used to have four seasons. Now we have two. I love this place dearly, and this is very hard for me to watch."

In 2003 and 2004, wildfires devastated thousands of acres. The trees were first weakened by high temperatures, and then hit by insects with fire finishing the job. Scientists say that the devastation of the "sky islands" suggests that the combination of record warmth and drought is not just a normal climate swing.

"A lot of people think climate change and the ecological repercussions are 50 years away," said Thomas Swetnam, head of the Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research at the University of Arizona in Tucson. "But it's happening now in the West. The data is telling us that we are in the middle of one of the first big indicators of climate change impacts in the continental United States."

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One in 10 at risk from rising seas - report
March 28, 2007 - ONE in 10 people in the world, mostly in Asia, live in coastal areas at risk from rising seas and more powerful storms that may be caused by global warming, an international study shows.

The researchers urged governments to make billion-dollar policy shifts to encourage more settlements inland rather than in coastal regions from China to Florida that may suffer ever more storm surges and erosion. A zone less than 10 metres above sea level "contains some 2 per cent of the world's land and 10 per cent of its population," according to the study to be published in the April edition of the journal Environment and Urbanisation.

"Settlements in coastal lowlands are especially vulnerable to risks resulting from climate change, yet these lowlands are densely settled and growing rapidly," the researchers in the United States and Britain said in the article released today. Based on new computer population models and NASA satellite data, it estimated that 634 million people lived in the coastal zone in 2000, including 360 million in towns and cities.

More than 75 per cent were in Asia. Globalisation is promoting a shift towards coasts in countries including China and India by fostering a world trade largely dependent on shipping. UN climate experts projected last month that sea levels could gain by 18 to 59cm by 2100, and keep rising for centuries. They also forecast shifts including more powerful storms, droughts and heatwaves because of emissions of greenhouse gases, mainly from burning fossil fuels.

More http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599...-23109,00.html