Greenhouse Gases Hit Record Levels; Concentrations Exceed Scientists' Worst-Case Scenarios

GENEVA -- Global warming gases have hit record levels in the world's atmosphere, with concentrations of carbon dioxide up 39 percent since the start of the industrial era in 1750, the U.N. weather agency said Monday.

The new figures for 2010 from the World Meteorological Organization show that CO2 levels are now at 389 parts per million, up from about 280 parts per million a quarter-millenium ago. The levels are significant because the gases trap heat in the atmosphere.

WMO Deputy Secretary-General Jeremiah Lengoasa said CO2 emissions are to blame for about four-fifths of the rise. But he noted the lag between what gets pumped into the atmosphere and its effect on climate.

"With this picture in mind, even if emissions were stopped overnight globally, the atmospheric concentrations would continue for decades because of the long lifetime of these greenhouse gases in the atmosphere," he said.

Negotiators from virtually all the world's nations will gather later this month in South Africa to try to agree on steps to head off the worst of the climate disruptions that researchers say will result if concentrations hit around 450 parts per million.

That could happen within several decades at the current rate, though some climate activists and vulnerable nations say the world has already passed the danger point of 350 parts per million and must somehow undo it.

The WMO said the increase of 2.3 parts per million in CO2 in the atmosphere between 2009 and 2010 shows an acceleration from the average 1.5 parts per million increase during the 1990s.

But there are seasonal fluctuations, too. During the summer growing season, plants absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. In winter, the concentration of C02 rises as vegetation and other biomass decompose.

Since 1750, WMO says, atmospheric concentrations of CO2 have risen 39 percent, those of nitrous oxide have gone up 20 percent and concentrations of methane jumped 158 percent.

Its report Monday cites fossil fuel-burning, loss of forests that absorb CO2 and use of fertilizer as the main culprits.

Comments

[lambdin1]

10:32 AM on 11/25/2011

Not surprising. Got Clean Coal, yet? For that matter have you got any clean energy yet? What about the Keystone XL pipeline. Think it will be clean? Cut down another tree and support the logging industry. As long as you use paper products, trees will disappear. And as long as you use oil and drive cars and use plastic products, the big oil companies will continue to drill and as long as you continue to use natural gas, fracking will continue. Not a nice picture is it?!?

[fumes]

11:46 PM on 11/24/2011

CO2 may not warm the planet as much as thought

19:00 24 November 2011 by Michael Marshall

The climate may be less sensitive to carbon dioxide than we thought – and temperature rises this century could be smaller than expected. That's the surprise result of a new analysis of the last ice age.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn21212-co2-may-not-warm-the-planet-as-much-as-thought.html?full=true&print=true

[ILoveFiction]

02:09 AM on 11/25/2011

The climate may be less sensitive to carbon dioxide than we thought

The climate may be more sensitive to carbon dioxide than we thought

That's why it's called an estimate.

[fumes]

08:56 AM on 11/25/2011

zackly

[keme]

03:08 AM on 11/25/2011

You conveniently left out the last sentence from your quoted paragraph.

"The climate may be less sensitive to carbon dioxide than we thought – and temperature rises this century could be smaller than expected. That's the surprise result of a new analysis of the last ice age. However, the finding comes from considering just one climate model, and unless it can be replicated using other models, researchers are dubious that it is genuine."

http://www­.newscient­ist.com/ar­ticle/dn21­212-co2-ma­y-not-warm­-the-plane­t-as-much-­as-thought­.html?full­=true&prin­t=true

[fumes]

08:57 AM on 11/25/2011

(it was on purpose)..

just like the study

[fumes]

09:52 PM on 11/24/2011

no mo winter!

golf year round at the poles!

we're doomed i tell you.. DOOMED!!!

[Cayce58]

01:17 PM on 11/24/2011

It has happened before. One extinction has been pinned down to a methane release from the oceans, Methyl hydrate...methane hydrate...same thing. It is kept at the bottom of the ocean by cold and pressure. The current changed, the ocean warmed, it released catastrophicly. Europe suffered tidal waves and the climate warmed 6 degrees. A satellite saw a 100 square mile bubble of methane release in the arctic ocean last year.

[Cayce58]

01:11 PM on 11/24/2011

Siberia had a heat wave. The permafrost subsided, leaving a landscape of shallow lakes all bubbling methane. It is the end of a culture, a way of life. There are 9 billion tons of carbon in the worlds permafrost. We won't stop it from melting. We can't because the arctic warmed 2 degrees as the world warmed one. While denialists point their bony Wizard of Oz fingers at the cold in their back yards, 1% per year turned into CO2 equals the human contribution.

[ILoveFiction]

07:17 AM on 11/24/2011

"158 percent jump in methane"

Whew!

Wasn't me!

[jimspy]

11:02 PM on 11/27/2011

Sorry. My bad.

[Badgersouth]

01:59 PM on 11/23/2011

Suggested reading:

“Young and Thin Instead of Old and Bulky: Researchers Report On Changes in Arctic Sea Ice After Return of Research Vessel Polarstern” ScienceDaily, Oct 6, 2011

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/10/111006102617.htm

[jimboy71]

02:29 PM on 11/23/2011

It's really amazing that this is pretty obvious stuff if you just sit down and think about it.

The issue is that most people denying science here don't understand that salt water can supercool, and that it can freeze fresh meltwater on top of it, nor that the poles are dark for half a year. Not to mention that floating ice packs from terrestrial sources aren't solid sea ice.

[Badgersouth]

03:26 PM on 11/23/2011

Prooving once again that most climate denier drones belong to "I've made up my mind, don't confuse me with the facts." school of thinking.

[Max Headroom]

01:59 PM on 11/23/2011

For those non-deniers here who would try and educate the deniers I would offer these words...

For deniers there is nothing you can say or do to changer their minds. Denial is literally part of their religion. They have bought into the corporate sponsored meme that the Christian God sees all, controls all, and wants humans to conquer and control all of the world including the atmosphere and natural "resources". So to make arguments based on logic and science to a denier is like telling a Christian believer to give up that belief based on facts. It will never happen. That's why they call it Faith.

Deniers will continue to have "Faith" that their "superiors" are telling them the truth even when their houses are blown away or underwater (and not in the monetary way). Someday this will change but it will be as slow of a process as say giving women the right to vote or letting the "colored" people ride in the front of the bus.

In the meantime, I do enjoy reading these threads and imagine it would have been much the same during the suffrage movement or civil rights movement had there been an internet.

[Badgersouth]

01:52 PM on 11/23/2011

The skeptic argument “it’s Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO)” suggests that maybe the true cause of recent warming is the PDO. The PDO is a climate phenomenon that occurs primarily in the North Pacific Ocean. The “oscillation” happens between warm phases (positive values) and cool phases (negative values) that last anywhere from 10 to 40 years. The phases are associated with changes in sea surface temperatures (SST). While the causes of the PDO are still unknown, the primary effects seem to be changes in northeast Pacific marine ecosystems and a changing jet stream path.

Source: “The Pacific Decadal Oscillation and global warming” Skeptical Science, Sep 15, 2011

http://www.skepticalscience.com/The-Pacific-Decadal-Oscillation-and-global-warming.html

[Joe Goforth]

01:48 PM on 11/23/2011

Argue about CO2 but it might very well be the methane that dooms us;

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/10/071025174618.htm

[Max Headroom]

02:02 PM on 11/23/2011

Very true. Methane is a much more effective heat trapping gas than CO2. And as the oceans and tundras warm there could be massive, rapid releases of methane.

[Joe Goforth]

02:22 PM on 11/23/2011

I think something liked that happened on earth befoews.

[jimboy71]

02:31 PM on 11/23/2011

CO2 is the train that gets us to Methane Station.

[BlackbirdHighway]

09:49 AM on 11/23/2011

According to the deniers the Arctic ice "Have seen the fastest spike in sea ice expanse growth in 10 yrs."

So it is now Autumn when temperatures fall and ice grows, so this is entirely normal. The rate of ice growth is completely meaningless on its own.

Let's review the meaning of "rate of growth". A man has a penny in his pocket and finds another one on the sidewalk. The rate of growth of his wealth is 100%. Another man has a million dollars and receives another $10,000. His rate of growth is only 1%.

The deniers would have you believe that the man with two pennies is more wealthy because his rate of growth is higher.

[jimboy71]

02:33 PM on 11/23/2011

Widow's might.

It's a Bible lesson.

Another lesson in why using the skydaddybook is a bad idea when it comes to science...or in this case, basic mathematics.

[Jame Gumb]

08:49 AM on 11/23/2011

Hey there ! Anthropomorphic climate change "true believers". Eat this!

Sir Karl Raimund Popper: Popper is known for his attempt to repudiate the classical observationalist / inductivist form of scientific method in favour of empirical falsification. Logically, no number of positive outcomes at the level of experimental testing can confirm a scientific theory, but a single counterexample is logically decisive: it shows the theory, from which the implication is derived, to be false.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl_Popper

[ILoveFiction]

08:56 AM on 11/23/2011

You mean it snowed in Vermont?

[Jame Gumb]

04:49 AM on 11/27/2011

no. I mean if there is no way to prove a proposition is false, then it is not a falsifiable proposition. If it is not a falsifiable proposition it is not a valid theory.

[gallon]

08:59 AM on 11/23/2011

So, science has been searching since 1896 for a different explanation than CO2 to explain AGW. One by one all other possibilites have been eliminated. Tens of thousands of scientific papers have been researched and written. Only one theory survives, the original theory of Nobel winner Arrhenius.

[Jame Gumb]

12:40 AM on 11/27/2011

black swan problem: all possibilities have not been eliminated. Thousands of scientific papers is not proof of anything just as consensus is not proof of anything.

And the guy who though up Luminiferous aether got the same prize.

[Papa Swamp]

08:21 AM on 11/23/2011

These are not record levels. These are record levels since we have been measuring them. CO2 levels are massively lower than previous times. Has human activity (burning fossil fuels, habitat loss (thus loss of CO2 sequestration), etc.) caused a rise in CO2 levels? Absolutely! But CO2, which comprises 1%) as well as loss of biomass (thus loss of CO2 sequestration) UHI, etc.. are much larger issues. Of course the ultimate cause, if one wanted to point fingers, would be simply there are too many humans.

[alteredstory]

08:36 AM on 11/23/2011

They are record levels in the history of human existence.

Humans have never encountered a world in which CO2 levels are this high.

Yes, there are too many of us, but if we weren't burning fossil fuels, this wouldn't be a problem. We do have the capability to stop, and I'd rather not roll the dice on whether we can survive something we've never encountered before.

[Papa Swamp]

09:25 PM on 11/23/2011

I didn't realize we had CO2 measuring devices throughout human existance….

[Papa Swamp]

09:36 PM on 11/23/2011

If it's global warming ask this question….'why is Antarctic sea ice extent been expanding for the last 20 yrs?' Notice people ONLY talk about the arctic. There is something else going on.

[Jame Gumb]

08:44 AM on 11/23/2011

we live in an expanding and contracting universe. To claim that CO2 levels are increasing or decreasing due to human activity one must first out all other possible causes. "True believers" rely on naive falsification for their conclusion that climate change is Man made.

There are 2 ways to explain the cause of a liquid that overflows from the container. First you can say that more liquid is being added (mass) or you can say tht the volume is decreasing (volume). To say that the cause can only be the increase in mass and deny the possibility of change in volume is irrational and unreasonable. Yet true believers do it everyday.

This is why it is called Naive Falsification. True believers is climate change have no way to falsify their claim that AGW is man made. The logic simply says, since it is not naturally occurring, it must be that Man is the cause.

[jimboy71]

08:50 AM on 11/23/2011

What?

If you add stuff into a finite system, that system fills up.

The earth isn't infinite.

It is very large, relatively speaking, which means there are many mechanisms whereby something like CO2 can be absorbed and sequestered. But removing millions of years of sequestered carbon and burning it can ONLY have one result in a finite system. An increase in atmospheric carbon.

There is no other possibility.

[gallon]

09:05 AM on 11/23/2011

Gumby, you are fixated on a simplistic definition there. Science is rather more subtle than you are giving credit for.

Science has in fact ruled out all other causes. Show us an alternate cause and we'll easily disprove it.

Everything else you have said about this is just blather.

[ILoveFiction]

01:16 AM on 11/23/2011

It's called "Storms of My Grandmother" because she'll get to see it happen.

Don't worry Granny. We'll figure something out.

[lulex]

12:44 AM on 11/23/2011

First step: Get Harper out of office.