gregladen | November 26, 2013Published on Nov 21, 2013
The IPCC has produced a video on its Fifth Assessment Report (AR5). The first part on the Working Group I contribution to AR5 is now available. The other parts will be released with the successive approvals of the other two Working Group contributions and the Synthesis Report in the course of 2014.
gregladen | November 26, 2013This just in:
New Oil Change International interactive graphic shows growing fossil fuel reserves in contrast to shrinking global carbon budget
WASHINGTON, DC – New analysis by Oil Change International shows that global fossil fuel reserves continue to expand while the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and other scientific and industry analysts repeatedly show that our remaining budget for burning fossil fuels has shrunk to less than one third of existing reserves.
The Oil Change analysis shows that fossil fuel companies gained access to more than twice as much in fossil fuels as they…
gregladen | November 26, 2013Here is a letter from the Yale Project on Climate Change Communication:
Dear Friends,
The Yale Project on Climate Change Communication has much to be thankful for, including wonderful support from our friends and colleagues. That is why this Thanksgiving, we’re giving #ClimateThanks. Together with the climate community, we are taking a moment to tweet or post who or what we are thankful for in the fight for a safe climate. Please tweet #ClimateThanks and help us raise awareness about the amazing things people here in the US and around the world are doing.
Starting on Monday, November 25th, as…
gregladen | November 25, 2013One Hiroshima, Two Hiroshimas, Three Hirosimas, Four
On August 6th, 1945, the United States military detonated what was to date the largest and most terrible bomb ever created by humanity in the city of Hiroshima Japan. Since that time, the word "Hiroshima" has come to mean awesome power. In fact, the energy released by this bomb is beyond comprehension by the average person. Aside from the unbelievable power associated with that one human made machine, we also think, when we think of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima, of horrible consequences arising from human activity. It does not matter what…
gregladen | November 24, 2013Catching Fire is apparently a very popular book and/or movie that everyone is very excited about. But Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human is a different a book about some interesting research I was involved in about the origin of our genus, Homo.
You can pick up a copy of our paper on this page. We call it "The Cooking Hypothesis." The basic idea can be summarized with these points:
1) Cooking food transformed human ecology. Many potential foods in the environment can't be consumed by humans (or apes in general) without cooking. But adding cooking to our species-specific technology,…
gregladen | November 23, 2013I'm sure that several years ago a bunch of out of work "oceanographers" like the people here got board and started faking various "fish" that only they ever saw in the wild and only they ever photographed and that lived in the "deep" ocean where nobody could verify their existence. I assume this was a funny joke that got out of hand and now they're stuck with having to come up with a new "fish" every so often to keep up the ruse. Here's the latest, a fish with a see-through head:
For the first time, a large Pacific barreleye fish - complete with transparent head - has been caught on film by…
gregladen | November 23, 2013“Simply assuming that this is an interesting controversy that we should check in on occasionally is not correct. The survival of human civilization is at risk. The news media should be making this existential crisis the No. 1 topic they cover.”
That was Vice President Al Gore being quoted in a New York Times piece by the newspaper's public editor, Margaret Sullivan. Sullivan's article, "After Changes, How Green Is The Times?" examines environmental reporting since the Times dismantled its environmental reporting facility last January. Sullivan's analysis, which seems fair, actually shows…
gregladen | November 22, 2013There is a storm (this one) moving across the southern part of the United States that forecasters predict will turn north over the Atlantic and menace the east coast somewhere between Northern New England and Washington DC or Virginia, possibly much of that area. The storm may develop, forecasters say, into a Nor'easter. I looked at the predicted Jet Stream configuration for next Wednesday and I noticed that is will be all curvy-durvy like it has been so often lately. This curvy jet stream is so much more common these days because, climate scientists think, of the phenomenon of Arctic…
gregladen | November 22, 2013TEPCO is removing some of those famous spent fuel rod assemblies, here's some video:
gregladen | November 22, 2013If you are in, going to, or coming from New England, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, or as far south as Maryland/Virginia/DC area, on or around Thanksgiving, you better keep track of Boreas, a storm heading in that general direction that long-range forecasts suggest might be a snow-dumping rainy windy Nor'easter.
Jeff Masters says:
(Boreas) is bringing snow and difficult travel conditions to Arizona, and will spread a variety of dangerous winter weather across Texas, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Kansas, Colorado, and Utah over the weekend. On Monday and Tuesday, the storm will dump heavy rains…
gregladen | November 22, 2013The Harry Potter Stamp
The US Postal Service has issued stamps depicting people who are not American many times. The US Postal Service has issues stamps with people who are not real. So far, though, no wizards have been venerated in this place of honor to my knowledge. This makes me wonder why the former head stamp collector at the American Philatelic Society complained that "Harry Potter is not American. It's foreign, and it's so blatantly commercial it's off the charts."
Clearly, the Dark Lord who shall not be named is behind this.
You can get your harry potter stamps here.
Here's the…
gregladen | November 19, 2013HERE I discuss climate change and bird migrations, give you a bird cam, and some other stuff.
gregladen | November 19, 2013Update on Haiyan/Yolanda Death Toll
The final figures are not likely in but the numbers have stabilized and we can now probably put a number to the human toll of this storm that will not change dramatically in the future, at least in terms of orders of magnitude. The current “official” death toll in the Philippines from Typhoon Yolanda/Haiyan is 6,009 with 1,779 missing and 27,022 injured, with the largest concentration of casualties in Eastern Visayas. This comes from a December 13th report of the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council, which you can (probably) download here…
gregladen | November 18, 2013The National Center for Science Education (NCSE) has been ably run by Genie Scott since back in the days, well, the days when she started the damn thing up, if I recall correctly. But Genie retires at the end of this year.
Ann Reid will take over as NCSE Executive Director on January 2nd, 2014.
From the NCSE:
As a molecular biologist at the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology, she co-led the team that sequenced the 1918 flu virus—an effort that was hailed as "a watershed event for influenza researchers worldwide." She then served as a Senior Program Officer at the National Research Council'…
gregladen | November 18, 2013Storm surges are amazing. I've never seen one happen but I've seen the aftermath. A video has surfaced of a storm surge hitting Hernani in Eastern Samar, shot from the second floor of a house that was a few hundred meters from the coast.
A storm surge is a mound of water caused by the wind of a hurricane (or other storm) pushing the water ahead of it, and further heightened by the low pressure system of the storm. In a given major storm there can be many, but there seems to be one big one most of the time. If the surge happens at high tide it is worse. If it happens at spring high tide…
gregladen | November 17, 2013I would like to propose a lottery.
Cost of ticket: $10.00
Prize: The winner's choice of an American-made electric car or hybrid car off of an approved list.
The cars would be provided at discount from them manufacturer. The manufacturer benefits from the publicity (free-ish advertising) and from having more of their cars on the road in communities where they might otherwise be very rare.
This would act like a Rotating Savings and Credit Association (ROSCA). A ROSCA is a way that a group of people can obtain a costly item with little available cash and low or zero interest loan. Every…
gregladen | November 17, 2013There is an unprecidented high risk of significant tornado activity in your area TODAY and/or TONIGHT.
Check with the Storm Prediction Center at the NWS for the latest.
There will almost certainly be severe thunderstorms in the Mid-Mississippi and Ohio Valleys and up into Michigan today and early evening/night. It is distinctly possible that there will be tornadoes.
If there is a biggish tornado outbreak today, this may be a highly unusual weather event, and it could count in the Weather Whiplash category of climate-change caused problems.
We will be watching. But if you live in the…
gregladen | November 17, 2013Added:
The depression has spun up to form a tropical storm. It will probaqbly remain a storm as it works its way up the Atlantic Ocean avoiding land (though it seems to be aimed ultimately at Greenland). The storm is named Melissa.
Details here.
________________
We have had a record breakingly anemic hurricane season in the North Atlantic this year. How anemic? If this year's hurricane season was a rug, you'd have a floor. If this year's hurricane season was a car you'd have a bicycle. If this year's hurricane season was a stack of pancakes, you'd have one pancake. That's now anemic.…
gregladen | November 15, 2013TEPCO was going to start removing the fuel rods from the less-damaged reactor building Numnber 4 over the next few days. Today, it was announced that damage to the fuel rod assemblies, some or most of which predated the tsunami and earthquake, this could not be done. There is now uncertainty as to what is going to happen.
Here is a video by Fairewinds about this operation, which I believe was made before TEPCO decided to not continue with the removal at this time:
As you can see, there are several possible problems. Most of these problems are not related to the reasons TEPCO has given to…
gregladen | November 13, 2013That nefarious leech of an organization, the Heartland Institute, the one that put up the billboards implying that people who think climate change is important are mad bombers, has done something really offensive, again. They made a fake packet of information with fake stuff about climate change and sent it to teachers and other educators, as well as graduate students, to try to trick them into passing the lies and deceptions on to their students. According to the National Center for Science Education:
Around Halloween, thousands of science teachers, science professors, and graduate…