https://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-oceans-temperature-record-20190116-story.html A dead and eroding section of Australia's Great Barrier Reef that bleached because of rising sea temperatures. The world's oceans hit record-high temperatures in 2018, scientists said. (AFP Photo / James Cook University and ARC CoE for Coral Reef Studies/ Greg Torda) Earth’s oceans had their warmest year on record in 2018, a stark indication of the enormous amount of heat being absorbed by the sea as greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise, scientists reported Wednesday. The analysis by an international team of scientists confirms the oceans are heating up much faster than previously recognized, and that the pace of warming has accelerated sharply since the 1990s. Rising ocean temperatures are already having profound consequences across the globe, scientists say, contributing to more intense hurricanes, destroying coral reefs and causing sea levels to rise. The report in the journal Advances in Atmospheric Sciences builds on a study last week that found oceans are warming 40% more, on average, than was estimated by a United Nations scientific panel just five years ago. In fact, each of the last 10 years is among the 10 warmest on record, according to data from Lijing Cheng of the Institute of Atmospheric Physics in Beijing, who led the research. The unrelenting pattern is “incontrovertible proof that the Earth is warming,” and an unmistakable signal of the serious damage humans are already causing through climate change, the authors of the new study wrote. Earth’s oceans provide a crucial buffer against climate change by swallowing 93% of the excess heat trapped by the greenhouse gases humans are spewing into the atmosphere. “The oceans are really the Earth’s thermometer,” said Zeke Hausfather, a climate scientist with the academic nonprofit Berkeley Earth who collaborated on the research. “They’re where all the heat ends up. They’re where we’d expect the strongest signs of climate change to be. And that’s exactly what we see.” (Los Angeles Times) In contrast with rising surface temperatures, which can vary from year to year with the influence of weather and cyclical climate patterns like El Niño, the warming of the ocean has been inexorable, with virtually every year breaking the heat record set just 12 months earlier. “There’s no sign of any slowdown or pause,” Hausfather said. “The ocean temperature is increasing year over year in lockstep with increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases.” Indeed, emissions have accelerated as President Trump and some other world leaders have pursued energy policies that promote fossil fuels. Global carbon emissions increased 1.6% between 2016 and 2017, then jumped an additional 2.7% in 2018, according to estimates published last month in the journal Environmental Research Letters. Last week, the research firm Rhodium Group reported that U.S. carbon emissions rose 3.4% in 2018 after years of declines. Rather than measure the water’s temperature, the researchers focused on the amount of energy the oceans had taken in. They determined that the heat content has increased by around 370 zettajoules since 1955. The amount of heat gained in 2018 — about 9 zettajoules — was about 100 million times greater than the heat released by the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan, Hausfather said. The rate of warming in the ocean’s upper 6,500 feet has been up to five times faster since 1991 than it was in the 1970s and ’80s, scientists found. The warming is more pronounced in shallower waters, with about two-thirds of the energy accumulating within 2,000 feet of the surface. The effects will grow more devastating the longer oceans continue to warm, scientists say. Wetter, more powerful hurricanes, like Harvey in 2017, will become more frequent. Marine ecosystems, including coral reefs already stressed by past warming, will be unable to recover from marine heat waves and bleaching. A map of the world's oceans shows the average change in heat content in 2018 relative to 1981–2010. (Institute of Atmospheric Physics) Oceans cover 71% of the Earth’s surface, but the heat they contain is distributed unevenly. In 2018, one of the warmest spots was along the East Coast of the United States, where Hurricane Florence caused severe flood damage in the Carolinas last summer. Warming ocean waters have had a direct influence on storms like Florence and Harvey, scientists said, feeding them more energy and allowing them to hold more water vapor that rains down on coastal communities. “It leads to an intensification of the storm, and a bigger storm,” said Kevin Trenberth, a climate scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo., and a co-author of both recent studies. Ocean warming is also the main driver of the rising sea levels that are threatening coastal communities and ecosystems in addition to causing more severe flooding. Without global action to slash greenhouse gas emissions, the study projects, the planet could see about another foot of sea level rise just from warmer water taking up more space. That so-called thermal expansion doesn’t factor in additional increases expected as ice sheets melt in Greenland and Antarctica. Lisa Suatoni, a marine ecologist at the Natural Resources Defense Council, said that the warming detected to date is already causing rapid transformation of ocean ecosystems, including certain marine species moving toward the poles and economically harmful disruptions to fisheries that provide food and livelihoods to hundreds of millions of people worldwide. “The ocean is playing this silent but important service to the Earth in absorbing most of the heat that’s being trapped by our greenhouse gas emissions, but that service comes at a cost,” Suatoni said. “The transformation that global warming is having on the oceans is largely unseen because we’re land animals and it’s hard to observe.” The transformation that global warming is having on the oceans is largely unseen because we’re land animals and it’s hard to observe. LISA SUATONI, A MARINE ECOLOGIST AT THE NATURAL RESOURCES DEFENSE COUNCIL Share quote & link That’s changing. Scientists’ observations are improving considerably thanks to new measurement techniques, particularly Argo, a network of drifting, automated floats in operation since the mid-2000s that periodically descend into the ocean to measure temperature and salinity, then transmit the readings to satellites. The new analysis is based on Argo’s measurements of the upper 6,500 feet of the ocean combined with earlier readings that go back to the 1950s. Scientists compared four different estimates of ocean warming completed since the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report in 2014 and found them converging in agreement: Oceans were warming faster than prior estimates. The findings of record ocean warming come one day before the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA were scheduled to release data on the average global surface temperature for 2018. The federal agencies are expected to report that 2018 was the fourth-hottest year on record, but their announcements have been delayed indefinitely by the partial government shutdown. Once full operations are restored, it will take a least three days for scientists to finalize their reports, said Gavin Schmidt, head of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies. The shutdown has also halted the flow of information to the United Kingdom’s Met Office, its national weather service, which hasn’t been able to finish its calculations of last year’s average global surface temperature, said spokesman Grahame Madge. "With the United States accounting for around 3% of the world’s land surface, the absence of American data, even for one month, would skew the final figure,” he said. “We’re hoping that the data can be released before the end of January.” A report last week from the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Servicesaid the last four years have been the warmest on record, with 2018 in the No. 4 slot. With a weak El Niño likely underway in the Pacific Ocean, 2019 air temperatures have a good chance of being hotter than they were last year.
Nah, let's wait for the conspiratards to post a blog post by a dying lobbyist as evidence of the contrary.
Wamer climate means greater potential biological productivity. Maybe not for polar bears, but climate change and particulary strong seasons have been affecting life for millenia. How big of a role mankind has on the climate is debatable. It should be obvious that nature is be able to deal with it, if not actually benefit from climate change. Long term, the sun’s energy output will increase as more of it’s increasing helium supply is utilized as energy. In about a billion years, it is expected the sun’s energy output will double. The Guardian had an article that asserted that over 90% of ground insects have disappeared in Puerto Rico. Populations of birds, frogs, and other animals that use insects as a food source have allegedly declined over 50%. I don’t recall if this study was pre or post hurricane, but either way, there should be no significant difference in biological activity. As anecdotal evidence, while travelling on local roads in rural Western PA in the early fall last year, it was conspicuous there was an absence of birds and insects on that warm day. I travelled several hundred miles and my windshield never needed cleaning. A few years ago, actually more than a few years ago at this point, there were reports of a massive bird dieoff in the United States. Was it avian flu? Birds and certain insects are a significant disease vector. Was there a stealth Government campaign to reduce the populations of bird and insects in order to combat viruses such as Zitka? If there has been truly a significant population decline of birds and insects in the United States, it seems unlikely that long term climate change would be the cause. Seasonal variation has long been a greater stressor for wildlife and is a cause of long established annual and long term migration patterns. Edit: Travelling in Western PA, not Eastern PA.
Canada's 'insufficient' climate policies would help increase global warming by 5 C, study finds https://www.nationalobserver.com/20...-would-help-increase-global-warming-5-c-study
Coal is an plentiful energy resource that has a large export market. It would be great to develop and or utilize technology to reduce harmful emissions. In addition, flyash contains many valuable minerals. Hopefully someday it will be economical to recover those minerals. Furthermore, coal can be converted to liquid fuel that can help with energy security during emergencies. It is critical that the US maintain coal capital equipment and knowhow for the foreseeable future. I can live with Trump’s appointment of a coal industry expert, although I would prefer an environmental radical with real power to head the EPA. Nothing new would get done by either the EPA or the energy industry unless agreements could be reached. Eventually ideas along the lines of “exchanging” relatively biologically sensitive areas for increased continuous areas and protection for less biological sensitive areas for increased energy exploration. Perhaps the US tax code can help address some of the the energy-environmental challenges as well.
1. Regrading reefs. You agw loons realize that the latest research is indicating Sun Screen has been doing big damage to reefs. If you were to go to Hawaii right now you would find out the two very common ingredients are banned from sun screens sold in HI. One was bene something and I have forgotten the name of the other but its easily ascertained. The good news is the Suncreen they now sell in HI seems to work better in the ocean anyway. At least it did for me.... and I used less of it last month when I was snorkeling and body surfing. Florida and other places are also considering banning certain sun screens a well. I looked up some of the research. It showed how some reefs were badly bleached and reefs just down the beach where there were no tourists had little or no damage. That got the marine biologist thinking and testing. And you what they found out? sun screen. 2. The oceans are warming. And all indications most of the warming is the Indian Ocean and a lot of warming is happening natural because of vents and underwater volcanoes. 3. And yes my wife even commented that the weather is acting like its an el nino year here in So Cal.
Key West Moves To Ban Sunscreens That Could Damage Reefs https://www.baynews9.com/fl/tampa/a...ves-to-ban-sunscreens-that-could-damage-reefs Officials in Key West took the initial steps toward banning the sale of sunscreens containing two ingredients that could be harmful to coral reefs. The Miami Herald reports the Key West City Commission approved the measure 7-0 on Tuesday night. Commissioners now must review the ordinance a second time and pass it again on Feb. 5 before it can become law. It would ban products containing oxybenzone and octinoxate. Some studies have shown that the chemicals encourage coral bleaching. Nearly 100 people turned out for the discussion, with 50 signing up to speak. They included dermatologists, boat captains and school children. Commissioner Jimmy Weekley said people could still get a prescription for the sunscreens. Last year, Hawaii banned the sale or distribution of sunscreens containing the ingredients beginning in 2021.
Michelle Obama used to charter 747s at tax payer expense to shop in Europe. When it comes to carbon footprints, the Obamas are Big Foot.