Moderated Global Warming Discussion

[lenny]

but are they?

Part of the problem is that most GCMs use a grid (5 deg x 5 deg) that does not support factors related to precipitation. These are better dealt with using regional models.

agreed.

but when there are known physical processes which are important for regional climate, and may well trigger local feedbacks on regional scales, when such processes are not realistically simulated in global models, does this not put a limit on how far into the future the global models can be informative even on the larger scales?

 

[Mikemcc]

agreed.

but when there are known physical processes which are important for regional climate, and may well trigger local feedbacks on regional scales, when such processes are not realistically simulated in global models, does this not put a limit on how far into the future the global models can be informative even on the larger scales?

The outputs of GCMs can be used as inputs to regional models, but there are limitations. There are error bars on each of these measures, some may be unacceptable and require further investigation. This is where previous discussion of decadal modelling comes in, these are regional models. It may be that these are able to give relevant results (persoanally I'm yet to be convinced with regards to the timescale). I'm likely to be wrong, but it's too early to tell.

It's still not an excuse to act now.

 

[Mikemcc]

agreed.

but when there are known physical processes which are important for regional climate, and may well trigger local feedbacks on regional scales, when such processes are not realistically simulated in global models, does this not put a limit on how far into the future the global models can be informative even on the larger scales?

No, global models are just that, global, not regional. They average out causes and effects that may be discernable in a finer scale.

The models used are looking at different things. There is no such thing as a scaleable model over such different viewpoints. It would be ideal if we had a GCM, that you could then pick a region and timescale to model, but such a thing is 20-30 years away at least, and probably 50+ years away before we have sufficent data to prove good results

 

[macdoc]

http://www.wmo.int/pages/prog/arep/wwrp/new/tropical_meteorology.html

Chinese are working steadily on monsoon models.

snip

The article "Climate Bridging Weather and Climate in the Research and Forecasts of the Global Monsoon System" has been published in the March 2011 issue of the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society. The article by CP Chang, NC Lau, Richard H. Johnson and Meiyan Jiano is a summary of discussions, recommendations and scientific papers presented at the Fourth International Workshop on Monsoons (IWM-IV) held in Beijing. China from 20 to 25 October 2008.

 

[macdoc]

Degrees of devastation: major report warns of drastically hotter planet

Date
November 19, 2012 - 12:33PM

Climate change is coming to a planet near you.

The World Bank has warned the planet is on track to warm by four degrees Celsius this century - causing increasingly extreme heat waves, lower crop yields and rising sea levels - unless significant action is taken to cut greenhouse gas emissions.

In a major report released ahead of the year-end United Nations climate summit in Qatar, the bank says changes associated with four degrees of warming would have dramatic and devastating effects on all parts of the world, including Australia, but that the poor would be most vulnerable.

Scientists say global warming must be kept within two degrees of pre-industrial temperatures to give the world the best chance of avoiding the worst impacts of climate change.

The report – a snapshot of the most recent climate science prepared for the bank by the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and Climate Analytics – says global mean warming is now about 0.8 degrees above pre-industrial levels.

It says that if current promises by nations to curb emissions are met then it is most likely there will be more than three degrees warming. However, under that scenario it warns there is also a 20 per cent likelihood that four degrees of warming will occur by 2100.

If current promises are not met, then the world is "plausibly" on a path to warm by four degrees this century, possibly as early as 2060, the bank says.

The report, titled Turn Down the Heat, says if the world experiences four degrees of warming it would:

* See a 150 per cent increase in ocean acidity, leading to the extinction of some sensitive coral reef ecosystems.

* Result in sea-level rise of 0.5 to 1 metres by 2100, with more in following centuries, affecting low-lying islands and coastal communities.

* Lead to more extreme heatwaves, reduced run-off into major rivers and a significant decline in biodiversity, all risking the support systems of humans.

The report says the full impact on human development of a four-degree-hotter world is unknown, making it is unclear whether humanity would be able to adapt.

"A 4°C world is likely to be one in which communities, cities and countries would experience severe disruptions, damage, and dislocation, with many of these risks spread unequally," the report says.

"It is likely that the poor will suffer most and the global community could become more fractured, and unequal than today."

World Bank Group president Jim Yong Kim said: "A four-degree-warmer world can, and must be avoided – we need to hold warming below two degrees."
.....
continues

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/environmen...tter-planet-20121119-29l3c.html#ixzz2Cd2JqAsM

my sense is four degrees is inevitable.

 

[lomiller]

start 100 slightly different model runs from 1 Jan 2000, they will have el nino events in different years, but if they are to model the impacts realistically, they must simulate el nino, and changes in its evolution in a warmer climate, realistically. no?

This presumes there will be be a change in ENSO characteristics resulting from global warming. It may happen but that doesn't mean it will.


A change in ENSO characteristics would probably some sort of tipping point was reached, which is indeed something climate model have some difficult with. I think, though, that you are mistaken if you are assuming that improving the skill of short term ENSO predictions will help in predicting these tipping points. It may or may not, but figuring out how ENSO may change is an active area of research.

 

[CapelDodger]

but when there are known physical processes which are important for regional climate, and may well trigger local feedbacks on regional scales, when such processes are not realistically simulated in global models, does this not put a limit on how far into the future the global models can be informative even on the larger scales?

Not really. Global models will define the general circumstances of a region at some global equilibrium, such as where the rain-belts will lie. Regional models will then have to find the local details, but there aren't going to be any surprises leaping up and overturning the whole general model. The Hadley-type circulation cells and the jet-streams will mostly define conditions.

The only surprises possible are where albedo matters, which is in the main where the ice and snow is. Apart from Greenland and Antarctica there won't be enough of that around in a couple of decades to really feature any more.

 

[aleCcowaN]

my sense is four degrees is inevitable.

The source is a better read, just to avoid the denialist howls in the comment section of that press article.

"Turn Down the HEAT - Why a 4° Warmer World Must be Avoided"
Report (pdf - 108 pages)
Executive Summary (pdf - 24 pages)
World Bank's website on global warming

About inevitabilities, I'd rather say that an imaginary impact of a 30 km diameter asteroid expected 200 years in the future is not inevitable in spite of claiming today "how the heck are we going to do?", so what are we going to do about something we have the first move, and what is going to be the result in a century is far from being inevitable.

I prefer to think about the whole think as if it is an inveterate smoker that finally quits with a lot of permanent damages. How is going to live that person with COPD, that might include a "4° warmer world", but we're not sure, as we can't predict exactly how each patient evolves -in fact, we have a sole patient experience- and how treatment would evolve during the long course of the illness.

Speaking of 70 or 100 years I have no idea on how the public may behave and how the values would evolve. I know that I'm not to expect Germany today passing a law requiring all the Jews at hand to be captured and sent to extermination camps. And it took much less than 70 years such evolution because the core of it was always there (someone would say that such actions characterizes Germans, but they are a few and guess what kind of cultural background they have and what are the opinions regarding global warming that are coming from that cultural background. Isn't it a surprise?). The same way, the core values of the future are here today.

And speaking of 70 or 100 years I have no idea on what technology will be available and at what cost. So, inevitable, it isn't. That doesn't mean that AGW is not a problem of the present times.

Besides, there are a lot of uncertainties. Ignoring the very nature of what is unknown and focusing in methane bursts and every positive feedback imaginable is exactly the same kind of hedonistic epistemology the denialists live on.

 

[macdoc]

You cannot use outlier likelihoods to craft insurance. I did qualify it and say "pretty much" inevitable.
The dark side of that message of course is that there is every possibility that it will be significantly higher...

The take away for policy is to make a reasonable assumption that it WILL be 3-4 degrees C warmer globally and assess what course of action for an individual area.

Netherlands will have a differ envelope of consequences than Nepal.
The US will pretty much get all of them along with Australia and China.
Some Nordic nations including Canada and Russia may well find benefits which in the Arctic have to start being dealt with now.....infrastructure in the Arctic, sovereignty issues ( fishing quotas in a newly opened Arctic Ocean ).

The reality of AGW has been firm in science since the 90s There WERE some hopeful initiatives that would parallel the ozone depletion treaty.
That failed in part due to the disinformation campaign and sheer inertia plus the unwillingness of some governments to put in place the carbon taxes needed to reduce C02 emissions.
In the latter case, Europe fumbled the cap and trade which was always dodgy.

Planning for a 3-4 degree rise is only good management practice even if it does not unfold within the century.

China is taking a long view, Japan and Germany are being stupid about nuclear and caving to public angst about a chimera. Sweden, Norway and Denmark are taking a long view and no matter what the actual rate of change is - eventually industrial society will have to move to a low carbon output so why not start the process in a managed way rather than after say a series of events as afflicted the US in the last couple of years?

I don't see being mealy mouthed about the severity is in any way productive.

The Economist has noted that....

Many scientists and journalists are cautious in listing climate change as a causal factor behind a storm like Sandy. Understandably so: weather emerges as part of a complex system, and it would be impossible to say whether a storm would or would not have materialised without global warming. But scientists are becoming ever less shy in drawing a line between a higher frequency of "extreme" weather events and a warming climate. Climate shifts the probability distribution of such events, and so global warming may not have "caused" Sandy, but it makes Sandy-like storms more probable. As the ever-less-funny joke goes, 500-year weather events seem to pop up every one or two years these days.

http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2012/10/hurricane-sandy

and that article is a good read on the choices ahead for the US at the very least and certainly for other industrial nations.

Americans may absorb all of this and decide that the smart choice continues to be a course of inaction. They may continue to believe that the storms—and droughts and heat waves and blizzards and floods—to come will be manageable because they'll be richer and well-equipped to adapt. Hopefully, there will at least be a better sense of what that is likely to mean and the trade-offs it will involve. Adaptation will be an ongoing, costly slog, with a side order of substantial human suffering. It will be one American icon after another threatened. Adaptation is not going to be easy. Hopefully Americans will ask themselves whether it's so much worse than the alternatives—high carbon taxes or large public investments or both—after all.

My question is - while carbon taxes are indeed useful to fund weather insurance - are they perhaps now dated as a strategy since the horse has left the barn in terms of changing the climate?
Should govs focus the income from carbon taxes mostly on coping strategies ( sea walls, flood control, water conservation etc ) rather than mitigation ???

 

[aleCcowaN]

The outlier likelihood here is saying that we know how is it going to be the social, technological, cultural and climatic world some 75 years from now. Such a mastery involving endless complex entwined stochastic processes is beyond the individual or collective capability of people. So, we are left with hypothesis, ranging from tautology to delirium. In the middle there's a range that covers from immune overreactions -like having 75% of the mass destructions weapons of the world ready to use and still invading a country with the lame excuse of mass destructions weapons there, which were never found- to the mythical head buried in the sand -there's no evidence tobacco causes any harm-.

Oh! Was there any intentionality behind those dos/don't dos?. Well, instead we can go back to the original menace-cost of avoiding menace. Certainly any analysis we can perform in "national security" involving the expenditures made to avoid a menace and the likelihood of the menace becoming real with, say, a half of that expenditure -life has no value! that's why it is showed as 0 in ledgers- reveals an investment that is way beyond any current intention of doing something similar in the global warming field. The multiple standard is noted.

Within that context comes global warming and the tepid efforts made to avoid it. I don't think that publicizing ominous consequences, and most of all labelling the long term ones as "inevitable" -term that mismatches any downtuning adjectival complement: "a little bit of inevitable"- is going to promote any healthy action. In fact, "inevitable" calls for inaction and short-termed hedonism. "Inevitable" calls for "don't promote any different set of values for our future".

There's an almost certitude of some global +4°C that implies some dire consequences and heavy disruptions spread through the natural and human systems. There's a hypothesis of that coming in different points in the future. There are present actions that would make it real sooner or later in case nothing changes. We have all the rest to play with it.

There's a phrase that nobody will be using with me about this AGW business: "Behind every cynical there's a frustrated idealist who made the mistake of converting his ideals into expectations". That, and not confusing intellectual understanding with learning, should lead any analysis.

 

[macdoc]

Why - next winter is "inevitable" too - maybe this once your language grasp is rusting a bit
Preparing for a nasty winter with by swapping snow tires out is merely good practice.

The insurance companies understand this - there will be consequences so they prepare accordingly by charging higher premiums for those in higher risk area.

So too the Dutch build up their dikes and London builds their sea surge prevention.

This is nothing more that sensible practice.

Nothing in "inevitable" says end of the world.

So with a limited set of resources to draw on - what policy constitutes sensible practice for the various nations.
Bangladesh has little hope short of actually reversing rising sea levels so salt tolerant plants and fresh water management may be "best practice".
China has a wide variety of choices from mitigation to genetic shifts in plants to a rapid move to domed cities because it has the wealth to do so.
Best practice will shift over time as technology and wealth stream allows. This choice of approaches to determine a set of "best practices" is where the discussion needs to move to as the change that is in progress is inevitable - there WILL be consequences on a large scale - there already are

 

[aleCcowaN]

Why - next winter is "inevitable" too - maybe this once your language grasp is rusting a bit
Preparing for a nasty winter with by swapping snow tires out is merely good practice.

....

Nothing in "inevitable" says end of the world.

...

So with a limited set of resources to draw on - what policy constitutes sensible practice for the various nations.

....

So, you are saying now that if we'd return overnight to a 18th century technology still the globe is to warm 4 degrees Celsius in a couple of generations? That's your take on "inevitable"

 

[macdoc]

There is no possibility of that so why even consider it\ in the range of potential scenarios.
Even it we did stop cold there would be a minimum of 1.6C to deal with and under no feasible scenario short of nuclear war will that occur.

a) there is a slight chance- and very low probability that a C02 extraction could return us to the 18th century levels but there is no guarantee that some in situ positive feedbacks would not prevent even that unlikely scenario

b) there is a strong potential of it to be worse than 4 degrees so a response to 4 degrees as a safeguard is sensible.

c) thinking human behaviour and practices will alter from our current trajectory assuming we have an industrial civilization is lotusland thinking.

MIT is on a sensible track of methodology both of the risk

How to limit risk of climate catastrophe
Comprehensive analysis of the odds of climate outcomes under different policy scenarios shows significant benefits from early actions.

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/climate-change-1002.html

except there are no early actions - going on 4 years later so the only sensible planning is for a significantly warmer world to cope with ....not one we can stop.

and the regional consequences are now assessed with new tools from MIT
.

New method could help communities plan for climate risk
MIT researchers develop tool to assess regional risks of climate change, potential impacts on local infrastructure and planning.

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2012/climate-risk-tool-for-communities-1107.html

So the first one was 2009 and put the change at 3-4 degrees C even under some policy.
3 years later - there is little change in policy world wide, continued increases in C02 and growing far eastern economies.

What practical planner would NOT plan for at least 4 degrees given the multiple assessments from around the world, the current trajectory and the lack of global policy.?

It would be foolish not to plan on the assumption of 4 degrees C increase and it's consequences. If anything, as has been the case with all the IPCC forecasts- 4 C may be conservative for 2100 and as the World Bank report suggests - could come as early as 2060.

 

[aleCcowaN]

There is no possibility of that so why even consider it\ in the range of potential scenarios.

So, it wasn't "inevitable" after all, that abused word. But I don't even need such unlikely scenarios to show the would-be ineluctable not to be as inescapable as they are depicting it.

Even it we did stop cold there would be a minimum of 1.6C to deal with and under no feasible scenario short of nuclear war will that occur.

Are you sure. Some 35-45% of this year's human emission of CO2 is going to be absorbed by soils, seas and biology. Do you think that absorption would cease instantly if human emissions stopped cold turkey? Also about one twelfth of atmospheric methane would degrade into CO2 and water. Of course it's not a piece of cake but, do you insist that in a zero emission scenario with GHG in decline there's still a lot of warming "in the pipe"?

a) there is a slight chance- and very low probability that a C02 extraction could return us to the 18th century levels but there is no guarantee that some in situ positive feedbacks would not prevent even that unlikely scenario

Look! Start naming and quantifying those positive feedbacks in a serious way and not as they are the bogeyman. You talk as if positive feedbacks were the most common feedback, and after all, your 4° or whatever are going to be eventually balanced by negative feedbacks. What are they today? dormant feedbacks? All those "positive feedbacks" that take control and bring us to +X° to stop because they'll take a vacation or other convenient negative feedbacks will replace them, are just scripted speech, not science.

Whatever, but your continuous piling up of assorted press articles the "if you don't eat your spinach" like and their ominous scenarios only damages the credibility of what is discussed here and belittles us and puts us down to the level of the decaying mud where denialists swarm.

b) there is a strong potential of it to be worse than 4 degrees so a response to 4 degrees as a safeguard is sensible.

(choose yours)°C value is OK because it may be worse. Sure.

c) thinking human behaviour and practices will alter from our current trajectory assuming we have an industrial civilization is lotusland thinking.

Make it a banner and wave it in any place where is an AA meeting, or where a shrink treats a patient, or in front of temples during ceremonies, in front of the cameras during telethons, in front of every couple that is taking matrimonial vows, any time a politician makes a campaign speech. Some of them will surely tell you what is my opinion on that.

Suddenly if we don't gallop on the mercurial nag of maniac-depression, we all turn into fruityloops living in a world of unicorns and flowers.

MIT is on a sensible track of methodology both of the risk


http://i106.photobucket.com/albums/m269/macdoc/junk album/20091001120105-1.jpg
http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/climate-change-1002.html

except there are no early actions - going on 4 years later so the only sensible planning is for a significantly warmer world to cope with ....not one we can stop.

and the regional consequences are now assessed with new tools from MIT
.

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2012/climate-risk-tool-for-communities-1107.html

So the first one was 2009 and put the change at 3-4 degrees C even under some policy.
3 years later - there is little change in policy world wide, continued increases in C02 and growing far eastern economies.

What I've read on that suffers the same problems I detect in your concepts. They did succeed in translating the doctrine of national security to global warming.

What practical planner would NOT plan for at least 4 degrees given the multiple assessments from around the world, the current trajectory and the lack of global policy.?

It would be foolish not to plan on the assumption of 4 degrees C increase and it's consequences. If anything, as has been the case with all the IPCC forecasts- 4 C may be conservative for 2100 and as the World Bank report suggests - could come as early as 2060.

As a "planner" I prefer 6-7°C. I'm involved in several things that include a finger in this topic, one of them is building commercially and I'm selling house projects prepared to stand hurricanes -there was never one here- and rains of 400 mm in 24 hours - 1000 mm in a month. So planning and "the inevitable" are strikingly different things. Like having a lot of weapons for national security purposes, or use them just because they are becoming old while they are idle.

 

[macdoc]

You are still trying to defend your language stricture and diversions like C when we've been discussing C all along are puerile
4 C is inevitable for practical purposes - nitpicking that is semantics of no value to the discussion ..idle minds n'all

 

[aleCcowaN]

What you've just said implies that you don't have to be precise when you write a post, as typing 4 degrees instead of typing 4 degrees Celsius or 4 degrees centigrade or 4°C is a lot of effort and a detail. But you are right when you say what the future holds -within an error margin- for the whole planet including what are going to do the human race for ourselves. Surely nitpicking, yeah.

If you want to take a target value and make an evaluation and selection of projects with both economical, social and environmental impacts, be my guest, I'd love to discuss that here. I did it as a practice during my studies many years ago, using CEPAL's (UNECLAC in English) manual. But don't make your choices "inevitable".

Oh, and I prefer this roulette:

 

[a_unique_person]

agreed.

but when there are known physical processes which are important for regional climate, and may well trigger local feedbacks on regional scales, when such processes are not realistically simulated in global models, does this not put a limit on how far into the future the global models can be informative even on the larger scales?

No. The models don't claim to be that informative on local scales, but it's what everyone wants to know. Even a one dimensional model can be informative, that makes no attempt at any real replication of earth. The need for small scales is more for the need to model clouds and energy transfers to the deep ocean.

 

[macdoc]

You'd love that roulette wheel as would I except it's managed policy and there is not one. Without one - and there is no sign there will be one.....it's 4C or more.

 

[aleCcowaN]

I'm not so sure. I hope that after some climatic turmoil in a not so far future Europe will be brave enough to set differential custom duties based on GHG emissions. No group smaller than that could set such thing in motion. I and some people I know try to avoid using products made in highly polluting countries. The fact that continental China is becoming that is going to pose some difficulties. I'm not saying that I can do it without "Intel inside", but certainly I renounced to a variety of products like Alaskan surimi or dishwasher detergent besides a life of fidelity to companies like Hewlett-Packard.

 

[macdoc]

Some progress on the "bravery" front.

Full steam ahead for carbon trading

* 17:32 20 November 2012 by Michael Marshall
* For similar stories, visit the Climate Change Topic Guide

How can you force firms to cut down their carbon emissions? Put a price on them. That's the idea behind carbon trading, which got a boost last week when California launched the world's second-largest carbon market. Other new and improved trading systems are springing up around the globe and could eventually work together.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn22516-full-steam-ahead-for-carbon-trading.html

and further down

One remaining problem with local carbon markets is that firms can avoid paying for emissions by outsourcing manufacturing abroad. This may explain why the UK's emissions fell in recent years. "A lot of emissions got exported to countries like China," says Taschini.

But as more carbon markets launch, fewer countries will be willing to import emissions. China, for example, is launching seven prototype markets, and hopes to have a national system by 2016. South Korea will set up a market next year, and Brazil, Mexico and India are considering setting them up too.

The system will work better if markets link up to trade internationally – greater competition for permits should add to the incentive to cut emissions. The first such link will be between the ETS and Australia's new trading system, after it launches in 2015. "Linking is the holy grail," says Burtraw.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn22516-full-steam-ahead-for-carbon-trading.html