Federal report on global warming predicts widespread impact on U.S.greenspun.com : LUSENET : TB2K spinoff uncensored : One Thread |
Federal report on global warming predicts widespread impact on U.S.June 12, 2000 Web posted at: 6:54 a.m. EDT (1054 GMT)
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Global warming will produce widespread changes in the U.S. climate in future decades, a government report to be released Monday predicts.
Drought-like conditions will hit every region of the country, sea levels will rise and urban populations may wilt under searing temperatures, according to "Climate Change Impacts on the United States."
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The report is the first national assessment of how global warming might affect the country and economy. It projects an increase in average U.S. temperatures of between 5 and 10 degrees Fahrenheit over the next century, and details possible effects, including:
Disproportionately hotter cities. Urban areas will face the double whammy of global warming and the urban heat-island effect, under which buildings and streets absorb heat, raising cities' temperatures.
More extreme precipitation and faster evaporation, leading to greater frequency of very wet and very dry conditions. Drought is expected to be a growing concern in every part of the country. Floods are more likely in some regions.
Extensive damage to some ecosystems. Alpine meadows in the Rocky Mountains might disappear; Southeast forests could break up into a tapestry of grasslands and woods; tree species in Northeast forests could change, with sugar maples, for example, dying out.
Rising sea levels in coastal areas. That means coastal wetlands -- which serve as nurseries for marine animals, and as storm buffers for inland communities -- will continue to shrink. Coastal communities may be at greater risk for storm surges.
More heat waves
Increased crop yields
The assessment predicts little impact on the U.S. economy as a whole, but predicts a rough time for some communities, such as coastal areas, and some businesses, such as maple-sugar producers and ski resorts.
The report was prepared by an advisory panel that included government officials, academics, and representatives of industry and non-governmental organizations.
The report is a draft. After a public-comment period, the final assessment will be presented in the fall to Congress and the president.
The national temperature increase projected in the report is higher than global predictions for the next century, which are from 2 to 6.3 degrees Fahrenheit.
One researcher said land masses show bigger increases in temperature than the Earth as a whole, because oceans moderate the effect.
-- Hawk (flyin@hi.again), June 12, 2000
Increased crop yields?
-- ??? (@ .), June 12, 2000.
In the Valley of the Sun we have already experienced 122 degrees and survived. It was a Monday back in the early 90's. I believe the report stated we could expect more rain as the climate shifts around the country.I'm having a well drilled on my 5 acres south of Phoenix. Expect to get 16 gallons a minute from 270 feet depth.....will drill to 340. My 5 grandkids living in Phoenix may someday be glad we have our own well. Rainfall for Phx over the past 8 months stinks....only an inch or so.
Phoenix is much like Vegas in that mucho water is used for pleasure. We may see life style changes in the future.
-- fauna (x@x.x), June 12, 2000.
Yes, indeed, time for the rest of you to move to beautiful Minnesota. Where the crop yields will be higher, the winters milder, and the forests greener.Seriously, I just feel inclined to point out what both the mammels and the dinosaurs learned so many years ago -- climatic change has both winners and losers. In Minnesota, all predicitions are that global warming will be a net plus.
If I thought I'd be around a hundred years from now, I'd definitely get into the real estate business up here.
-- E.H. Porter (Just Wondering@About.it), June 12, 2000.
Wasn't posted last week? As I recall the report said that if we experience 5 to 10 degrees warmer temperatures, these kinds of things could happen. Be deal. If the sun doesn't shine tomorrow, we'll experience even bigger changes. Just another doomer talking about things that have no chance of happening.
-- Maria (anon@ymous.com), June 12, 2000.
E.H.,You must have missed my reply to you on the last global warming thread. Either that or you have a very thick head.
Maria,
Sorry I can't reply to you, I don't speak the Retard language.
-- Hawk (flyin@hi.again), June 12, 2000.
Oh and BTW Maria, fuck off.
-- Hawk (flyin@hi.again), June 12, 2000.
Hawk, :)
-- Maria (anon@ymous.com), June 12, 2000.
I didn't post that last one with the "f" word, the asshole impostor is obviously back.OTFR please track that IP address and e-mail it to me. Thanks.
The REAL Hawk
-- Hawk (flyin@hi.again), June 12, 2000.
Hawk -- was this your post: "You must have missed my reply to you on the last global warming thread. Either that or you have a very thick head."If you did send me something, yes I missed it. Please repost. No idea on how thick my head is. It seems to be normal diameter and density.
-- E.H. Porter (Just Wondering@About.it), June 12, 2000.
Hawk:Maria, Sorry I can't reply to you, I don't speak the Retard language.
Build up some self esteem. You speak many languages; much better than me. I envy you.
Best wishes,,,,,
Z
-- Z1X4Y7 (Z1X4Y7@aol.com), June 12, 2000.
You can find the actual report online at: http://www.nacc.usgcrp.gov/
-- E.H. Porter (Just Wondering@About.it), June 12, 2000.
Hawk the number is 216.34.244.46 Knock yourself out.OTFR
-- OTFR (free_speech@yahoo.com), June 12, 2000.
The IP won't do you any good Hawk...Whois Server Version 1.1
Domain names in the .com, .net, and .org domains can now be registered with many different competing registrars. Go to http://www.internic.net for detailed information.
Domain Name: ANONYMIZER.COM Registrar: NETWORK SOLUTIONS, INC. Whois Server: whois.networksolutions.com Referral URL: www.networksolutions.com Name Server: NS1.INFONEX.NET Name Server: NS2.INFONEX.NET Updated Date: 30-aug-1999
>>> Last update of whois database: Mon, 12 Jun 00 04:09:40 EDT <<<
The Registry database contains ONLY .COM, .NET, .ORG, .EDU domains and Registrars.
-- Netghost (ng@no.yr), June 12, 2000.
Increased crop yeilds sounds alot like the oil producers that are uncomfortable with higher prices over on today's oil thread....
-- Will (righthere@home.now), June 13, 2000.
The imposter is a. There's a fine line between love and hate, and he can't tell if he loves or hates me. Whatever he feels, he feels is passionately.Hawk, you still know nothing about global warming trends.
-- Maria (anon@ymous.com), June 13, 2000.
I obviously know a hell of a lot more than you do Maria. My hypotheses are supported by world renowned scientists and experts in this field, as verified once again by this most recent report.You, on the other hand, continue to believe that this is some kind of conspiratorial plot by the government to get you to buy an air conditioner even though you think you don't need one. Lol!
-- Hawk (flyin@hi.again), June 13, 2000.
"...world renowned scientists and experts", like the ones who supported Y2K havoc? Hawk, you know nothing about me, either, but that doesn't stop you from making statements like, "believe that this is some kind of conspiratorial plot". Have fun with your ranting :)
-- Maria (anon@ymous.com), June 13, 2000.
Maria, kiss my ass.You know NOTHING about me, yet you make statements like...
"Hawk, you still know nothing about global warming trends."
You're full of shit, I've been studying global warming for over 20 years.
-- Hawk (flyin@hi.again), June 13, 2000.
For some balance:BOLD emphasis mine
-Buddy
Drastic Climate Changes Forecast
By Curt Suplee Washington Post Staff Writer Monday , June 12, 2000 ; A03
Global warming in the 21st century will likely cause drastic changes in the climate of the United States, including potentially severe droughts, increased risk of flood, mass migrations of species, substantial shifts in agriculture and widespread erosion of coastal zones, a new federal report says.
Yet "for the nation as a whole, direct economic impacts are likely to be modest," concludes the report, which is based on computer models and historical data, and "American society would likely be able to adapt to most of the impacts," although "particular strategies and costs [are] not known."
"Climate Change Impacts on the United States," scheduled for public release today after four years of preparation, has an ample array of ominous projections:
Average temperatures will probably rise 5 to 10 degrees Fahrenheit nearly twice the projected warming for the planet as a whole prompting more summer urban heat waves and gentler winters across the nation.
Agricultural production will likely surge, and forests will probably flourish, thanks to the fertilizing effect of more carbon dioxide in the air. But many long-suffering ecosystems, such as alpine meadows, coral reefs, coastal wetlands and Alaskan permafrost, will likely deteriorate further. Some may disappear altogether.
Snowpack will probably diminish by 50 percent on average, while winter rains are likely to increase, bringing 60 to 100 percent more showers to much of Southern California and the parched Southwest.
Total precipitation nationwide, which rose 5 to 10 percent during the 20th century, will probably increase another 10 percent by 2100, chiefly in the form of extreme storms, exacerbating runoff pollution in the Chesapeake Bay and other sensitive areas.
Paradoxically, however, the threat of drought especially in the western Kansas-eastern Colorado breadbasket will rise because hotter conditions enhance evaporation. For the same reason, water levels could drop as much as five feet in the Great Lakes.
As for health effects, the report projects doubling or tripling of heat-related deaths in Minneapolis, Chicago and other cities that rarely experience extreme high temperatures. The July heat index is likely to rise by 10 to 20 degrees in the mid-Atlantic region.
Warming may also cause substantial shifts in the habitats of disease-bearing mosquitoes and other animal sources of disease. But the authors conclude that "not enough is known about our adaptive capabilities to say whether or not climate changes will make us more vulnerable to health problems."
The report, known as the "national assessment," was ordered by Congress in 1990 and assembled by the U.S. Global Change Research Program, an executive branch initiative incorporating projects in nine federal agencies and the Smithsonian Institution. The first such comprehensive effort by any country, it will be available for public review at http://www.usgcrp.gov and elsewhere as part of a long-term effort to understand and plan for the effects of climate change.
"We're not making a specific prediction about what the future will be like. It would be farcical to try to do that," said Anthony Janetos of the World Resources Institute, co-chairman of the 14-member panel that wrote the 145-page overview. (An additional 700-page "foundation document" provides scientific details.) Instead, "given our current understanding, these are reasonable scenarios of how the future might play out."
Then it is very misleading by making statements in terms of absolutes! -Buddy
The report employs conventional assumptions, such as an annual increase of 1 percent in the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. It assumes that sea levels which have risen four to eight inches globally over the past century will rise an additional five to 35 inches by 2100. A 20-inch rise, the authors say, would eliminate about 4,000 square miles of coastal wetlands in addition to the nearly 2,000 square miles lost in the past half-century.
The analysis is based largely on two computer simulations of future climate (from the Canadian Meteorological Centre and the Hadley Centre in the United Kingdom) that often produce very different or even antithetical results.
For example, climate-change skeptic S. Fred Singer of the Science & Environmental Policy Project in Fairfax said, "look at North Dakota. One [model] turns it into a desert, the other into a swamp. Neither will probably happen." Central Kansas shows an increase in soil moisture of 25 percent in one projection; in the other, it loses 50 percent. North and South Carolina have dramatic rainfall increases in one model, and decreases of up to 10 percent in the other.
Such discrepancies are common among sophisticated computer climate models, each of which represents the interactions among heat, air, water, cloud and land somewhat differently. The smaller the geographic scale, the larger the disparities can be.
"But we can't just say, 'Well, this is hard. Therefore we can't say anything,' " Janetos said. "There are a lot of local and regional decisions that have to be made now not just federal policies and people have to start thinking hard about what they might want to do."
The model contradictions are enough to "make you tear your hair out," said Tom Wigley of the National Center for Atmospheric Research, who was not involved in the report. "At the regional level, there's a tremendous amount of uncertainty." Nonetheless, he said, even "model results that are radically different" serve to notify residents that "there's a good chance that we're in for a big change in the future, but we don't know what direction it's in."
Several environmental groups hailed the report as a timely warning. "America's alarm bells should go off today," said Jennifer Morgan of the World Wildlife Fund.
But numerous skeptics contend that the language is strongly biased toward negative conclusions. That was also the initial reaction of some staff and external reviewers.
"I think we have fixed most of that problem," Janetos said. "We've made an enormous effort to be balanced."
Not everyone will agree. For example, in the forestry section, the analysis indicates that even in the Southeast, where the likelihood of drought stress during the next century is considered fairly high, timber stands will increase by 8 percent to 25 percent depending on species. Yet the strong emphasis in the text is on the threat of reduced producer profits as more trees bring prices down.
Similarly, the section on agriculture projects 15 to 50 percent yield increases for nearly all commercial crops, including wheat, rice, barley, oats, potatoes and most vegetables. That would entail the use of 5 to 20 percent more pesticides, the report suggests, and would raise the threat of more nitrogen-fertilizer runoff into bays and estuaries. But the net effect would be extraordinary.
Moreover, the analysis suggests that a warmer, accelerated growing season and increased rainfall nationally will probably reduce the need for crop irrigation 30 to 40 percent by the end of the 21st century. That would be a huge change in a nation where more than 80 percent of all fresh water now goes to agricultural uses.
Yet the text notes laconically that climate change probably "will not imperil the ability of the U.S. to feed its population and to export foodstuffs."
Janetos is looking forward to hearing all comments. "This is a serious issue. It's not ideological," he said. "There is a wide range of changes coming around the country, and we have to start thinking about that. My hope is that [millions of Americans] will take a look at this assessment. I'd love for this Web site to set new records."
) 2000 The Washington Post Company
-- Buddy (buddydc@go.com), June 13, 2000.
The model contradictions are enough to "make you tear your hair out," said Tom Wigley of the National Center for Atmospheric Research, who was not involved in the report. "At the regional level, there's a tremendous amount of uncertainty." Nonetheless, he said, even "model results that are radically different" serve to notify residents that "there's a good chance that we're in for a big change in the future, but we don't know what direction it's in."Most stupid statement on global warming. Models are as good as the assumptions they make. So if they result in radically different conclusions, we can't say anything.
-- Maria (anon@ymous.com), June 13, 2000.
I'm not sure how anyone could tell the dif between a "real" and a fake hawk, but we DO NOT need the forum moderator posting IP information for all to see. There is no excuse for that.
-- Suddenly Nervous (afraid@of.nutcases.like.hawk), June 14, 2000.