A plague of extreme weather upon us.

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"We owe it to our children & grandchildren."

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Somebody, kick the dog.

When the planet warms a lot in a relatively short period of time, a particularly nasty condition can develop in the oceans, known as anoxia. Since the polar regions warm more than the equator, the temperature difference between latitudes decreases. As global ocean circulation is driven by this temperature difference, ocean currents weaken significantly and the water becomes relatively stagnant. Without ocean turnover, oxygen doesn’t get mixed in – and it doesn’t help that warmer water can hold less oxygen to begin with. As a result of this oxygen depletion, bacteria in the ocean begins to produce hydrogen sulfide (H2S) instead. That’s what makes rotten eggs smell bad, and it’s actually poisonous in large enough quantities. So if an organism wasn’t killed off by abrupt global warming, and was able to survive without much oxygen in the ocean (or didn’t live in the ocean at all), it would probably soon be poisoned by the hydrogen sulfide being formed in the oceans and eventually released into the atmosphere. Extinction and Climate

That can't be good, can it?
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In just 3 human lifetimes.

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Global Warming is becoming more & more extreme.

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Isaac Asimov on the Greenhouse Effect: 1989

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Or in 1989?
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Where we gonna go?

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The Runaway Greenhouse Effect

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How hot is it?

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Let's try & keep this simple.

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China outpaces the U.S. in wind power, too.

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Extreme ice loss, no sh*t!

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Earth to Houston: The heat is on!

As writer Elizabeth Kolbert points out in the current issue of the New Yorker, “The message from scientists at this point couldn't be clearer: the world's emissions trajectory is extremely dangerous. Goofball weathermen, Climategate, conspiracy theories — these are all a distraction from what's really happening.”

Hurricanes are heat engines, and the ocean waters are already hot, hot, hot.

For those of us living in hurricane-vulnerable areas, keep in mind this ominous measurement: Sea surface temperatures in the Atlantic main development area for tropical storms last month were the warmest ever recorded for March, already reaching levels typical of late June. The conjunction of several climate patterns combined with ongoing overall warming of the world's oceans is thought to be the cause.

This is deadly serious stuff. Deal with it!

Despite all the spinning and hot air, the science is solid and global warming is a real, deadly serious concern. It's time to deal with it.

The heat goes on: After a blitz by climate change skeptics, hard science vindicates their targets
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ClimateTV Debut 4/1/10

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Be there. ClimateTV
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2009 Coldest Winter Ever?

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Dave in SETX,

re: "Coldest. Winter. Ever."

We've always been big fans of NOAA & its National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) & National Weather Service (NWS) & all the honest, dedicated scientists who work diligently to inform concerned citizens about the weather & climate change, Dave.

As far as the "coldest winter ever", as you say, Dave, you may want to check with your Texas State Climatologist instead of cherry-picking unnamed, unlinked sources again (puleez tell us it's not Scooter Libby).

The coldest winter ever came in 1977-1978, he said, which averaged 6.3 degrees below normal. Nielsen-Gammon said the 13-county southeast Texas climate region has averaged between 5 and 6 degrees below normal since Dec. 1. Second-coldest ever

Or try Dr. n-g @ his TAMU office.

February 2010 was a month of record breaking events for the state of Texas, and National Weather Service meteorologists believe this winter has been the coldest winter Texas has seen in 25 years. Current Texas Monthly Summary: February 2010

And while you're there, Dave, be sure to checkout the Societal Impacts of Climate on Texas.

NOAA: U.S. Winter and February Cooler Than Average

And you & your greenhouse furnaces & propane tanks can expect lots more extreme hot & cold weather events, floods & fires, & higher storm surges from stronger hurricanes as you continue to release carbon emissions into the atmosphere & hydrosphere which continue to heat up & destabilize SETX climate, if not the entire planet.

U.S. Climate Change Science Program: Weather and Climate Extremes in a Changing Climate

But fret not, Dave, as another notable local recently wrote in a SETX newspaper:

"Summer's coming. Some preliminary outlooks show July, August and September being a bit warmer than normal."

MOST WANTED DENIERS

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Virtually everyone with cable TV knows who & what Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, & Sean Hannity are & look like, but isn't it about time we had an updated most wanted deck of cards, akin to Monbiot's royal flush, to help the public actually see who the worst offenders are, their denial offenses, & the status of their prosecution, incarceration, or conversion?

Might we suggest the following list of anti-science offenders to get the deck a-shuffling?

James Inhofe - Ace of Spades
Rex Tillerson - King of Diamonds
Steve McIntyre - Queen of Hearts
Anthony Watts - Jack of Clubs
Roger Pielke Jr. -
Jonathan Leake - Joker
Timothy Ball
Richard Lindzen
Bjorn Lomborg
Ross McKitrick
Patrick Michaels
Steve Milloy
Christopher Monckton
Marc Morano
Ian Plimer
Frederick Seitz
S. Fred Singer
Roy Spencer

DeSmogBlog's Disinformation Database
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Same old song; same old denial talking points!

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We've heard them all before, over & over & over again.

Simply ignore what dedicated climate scientists and world-renown scientific organizations have researched & reported:

• The global climate is changing
• Human activities produce heat-trapping gases.
• Heat-trapping gases are very likely responsible for most of the warming observed over the past half century.
• The higher the levels of heat-trapping gases in the atmosphere, the higher the risk of potentially dangerous consequences for humans and our environment.

And what more recent scientific studies reveal about the dangerous impacts of anthropogenic global warming right here at home:

• 10°F temperature rise across the states
• Dust bowls over much of the U.S.
• 50% loss of land & sea life
• 5 ft plus sea level rise
• More destructive killer hurricanes along the Gulf
• Much bigger storm surges along the Gulf
• More rain & flooding & snow & other extreme weather events

Then parrot the debunked anti-science of EXXOM-funded denial front groups & hired guns to hide the truth about EXXOM foreign oil mega-profits and taxpayer mega-subsidies at the criminal cost of even more deadly carbon emissions & human suffering & death.

Yes, we've all seen the stages of denial before, over & over & over again.

Deniers don't like the idea of climate change, they don't believe it is possible for humans to change the climate, they don't like the implications of climate change, they don't like the things we might have to do to address it, or they just don't like government or science. The best argument against global warming

For more than a decade the Global Climate Coalition, a group representing industries with profits tied to fossil fuels, led an aggressive lobbying and public relations campaign against the idea that emissions of heat-trapping gases could lead to global warming. Oil Industry Ignored Its Scientists on Climate

Evidence Provided In UK Parliamentary Inquiry Into Climate Scientists Was Prepared By Oil and Gas Industry Consultant

Intelligent Designers Enlist Climate Skeptics in the War on Reality
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Merchants of Doubt

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Dr. Naomi Oreskes has an answer for Climate Change Skeptics.

Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming

The U.S. scientific community has long led the world in research on such areas as public health, environmental science, and issues affecting quality of life. Our scientists have produced landmark studies on the dangers of DDT, tobacco smoke, acid rain, and global warming. But at the same time, a small yet potent subset of this community leads the world in vehement denial of these dangers.

Merchants of Doubt tells the story of how a loose-knit group of high-level scientists and scientific advisers, with deep connections in politics and industry, ran effective campaigns to mislead the public and deny well-established scientific knowledge over four decades. Remarkably, the same individuals surface repeatedly—some of the same figures who have claimed that the science of global warming is “not settled” denied the truth of studies linking smoking to lung cancer, coal smoke to acid rain, and CFCs to the ozone hole. “Doubt is our product,” wrote one tobacco executive. These “experts” supplied it. Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway, historians of science, roll back the rug on this dark corner of the American scientific community, showing how ideology and corporate interests, aided by a too-compliant media, have skewed public understanding of some of the most pressing issues of our era.

Texas climate scientists stick it to EXXOM-funded deniers.

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Bravo Zulu! Texas climate scientists stick it to EXXOM-backed deniers.

Texas' challenge to the EPA's endangerment finding on carbon dioxide contains very little science. Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott admitted that the state did not consult any climate scientists, including the many here in the state, before putting together the challenge to the EPA. Instead, the footnotes in the document reveal that the state relied mainly on British newspaper articles to make its case.

Contrary to what one might read in newspapers, the science of climate change is strong.

• The global climate is changing
• Human activities produce heat-trapping gases.
• Heat-trapping gases are very likely responsible for most of the warming observed over the past half century.
• The higher the levels of heat-trapping gases in the atmosphere, the higher the risk of potentially dangerous consequences for humans and our environment.

The national academies of science of 32 nations, and every major scientific organization in the United States whose members include climate experts, have issued statements endorsing these points.... In fact, to the best of our knowledge, there are no climate scientists in Texas who disagree with the mainstream view of climate science.

We are all aware of the news reports describing the stolen e-mails from climate scientists and the errors in the IPCC reports. While aspects of climate change impacts have been overstated, none of the errors or allegations of misbehavior undermine the science behind any of the statements made above. In particular, they do not alter the conclusions that humans have taken over from nature as the dominant influence on our climate.

On global warming, the science is solid
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If only we could see the gases.

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Partisan, anti-science tirades against respected scientists have no place in respectable mainstream news outlets including their editorials & science blogs. They only accentuate the lack of understanding & appreciation for what climate science tells us about our future on this planet.

Time to get back to the basics of empirical evidence.

Atmospheric carbon dioxide is increasing. This is measured by hundreds of monitoring stations across the globe, all finding the same increasing trend (NOAA). The rising trend is confirmed by satellite measurements conducted independently by NASA, the European Space Agency and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency. Combined with ice core measurements from Greenland and Antarctica, this tells us that atmospheric CO2 levels are the highest in over 15 million years (Tripati 2009).

Humans are emitting nearly twice as much CO2 as ends up remaining in the atmosphere. Measurements of carbon isotopes confirm that the rising CO2 originates from the burning of fossil fuel (Ghosh 2003). Further independent confirmation comes from observed falling oxygen levels caused by the burning of fossil fuel (Manning 2006).

Satellite measurements of outgoing longwave radiation find an enhanced greenhouse effect (Harries 2001, Griggs 2004, Chen 2007).

This heat build-up is manifesting itself across the globe. Arctic sea-ice loss is accelerating beyond the worst case scenarios of model forecasts (Stroeve 2007).

Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets are losing ice mass at an accelerating rate (Velicogna 2009).

This is speeding up sea level rise as observed by tidal gauges and satellite altimeters (Church 2006). Skeptical Science

If only we could see the gases.
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