The Climate Change Nightmare

FEATURE-Asia faces living nightmare from climate change 25 Nov 2004 01:45:40 GMT Source: Reuters By David Fogarty

SINGAPORE, Nov 25 (Reuters) - The weather predictions for Asia in 2050 read like a script from a doomsday movie.

Except many climatologists and green groups fear they will come true unless there is a concerted global effort to rein in greenhouse gas emissions.

In the decades to come Asia, home to more than half the world's 6.3 billion people, will lurch from one climate extreme to another, with impoverished farmers battling droughts, floods, disease, food shortages and rising sea levels.

'It's not a pretty picture,' said Steve Sawyer, climate policy adviser with Greenpeace in Amsterdam. Global warming and changes to weather patterns are already occurring and there is enough excess carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere to drive climate change for decades to come.

Already, changes are being felt in Asia but worse is likely to come, Sawyer and top climate bodies say, and could lead to mass migration and widespread humanitarian crises.

EATURE-Asia faces living nightmare from climate change 25 Nov 2004 01:45:40 GMT Source: Reuters By David Fogarty

SINGAPORE, Nov 25 (Reuters) - The weather predictions for Asia in 2050 read like a script from a doomsday movie.

Except many climatologists and green groups fear they will come true unless there is a concerted global effort to rein in greenhouse gas emissions.

In the decades to come Asia, home to more than half the world's 6.3 billion people, will lurch from one climate extreme to another, with impoverished farmers battling droughts, floods, disease, food shortages and rising sea levels.

'It's not a pretty picture,' said Steve Sawyer, climate policy adviser with Greenpeace in Amsterdam. Global warming and changes to weather patterns are already occurring and there is enough excess carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere to drive climate change for decades to come.

Already, changes are being felt in Asia but worse is likely to come, Sawyer and top climate bodies say, and could lead to mass migration and widespread humanitarian crises.

[ . . . ]

'The impacts of climate change will fall disproportionately upon developing countries and the poor persons within all countries,' he said, meaning the lot of millions of peasants could become far worse than it is now.

The entire article is at:

Too bad the late twentieth century's warming doesn't bear any of this out with any significant precip change for Asia:

It's all natural climate change Roger. From the Arctic thaw to other phenomena. It does get tiresome and annoying to hear the hysterics over GHGs when no one can describe natural climate change and why it happens. Some recent hysterical headlines are so absurd that they are no longer amusing.

Some recent ones. Dire warnings from global warming report SOUTHERN AFRICA: Global warming threatens to deepen poverty Global Warming May Stymie Development ANALYSIS-Global Warming Seen as Security Threat Examining tree rings shows global warming trend Global warming effects faster than feared -experts Global warming 'could kill off cod and daffodils' Kyoto 'not enough' to fix global warming Global warming: Does doom loom? Do you want global warming, nuclear power or poverty? Global warming a bigger threat to poor Global warming disrupts weather patterns on Earth Climatologists: Global Warming Will Bring Florida More Hurricanes A cry for help as glaciers melt

The arrogance of the consensus you keep talking about is overwhelming.

The map pointed to by the URL has no data points for most of Asia. Also, it is not a map of late twentieth century, it is a map for the full twentieth century. These data are therefore irrelevant to your claim.

Climate change requires huge changes in energy. Where is the energy for this 'natural climate change' coming from? Until you answer that james, you don't have the basis for a scientific theory to explain the observed global warming. Meanwhile, greenhouse gas radiative forcing is well measured and well understood.

Really, no one can? Get a new textbook on climatology.

Some

When one holds all the facts, James, one gets very arrogant. When it comes to global warming we Americans have only just begun to see how arrogant the rest of the world will get.

Precisely the point. There is not a good energy balance explanation of the warming that took place in the early 1900s which is comparable to the current warming. That warming sets the pace of 'natural' warming which we could expect in any thirty year period.

Look again at the legend. White does not indicate lack of data, rather white indicates no significant anomaly. The point persists, global warming, such as it is, has not changed precipitation in Asia as measured in the last thirty years of record.

I believe I've asked that before and no one here has an answer. It sounds as if you are saying if it's not obvious then it must not be happening so we have to go with co2.

Until

That's always the answer to natural climate change when no one knows.

So how does arrogance take root if you don't know all the answers. Perhaps it's self delusion.

No. You are not reading the key.

This is a map of the precipitation anomaly for the years 1971 through 2000 ( the last year of the record ), versus a base period of 1901 through 2000.

Asian precipitation seems to remain about the longer term average.

What has happened to 1940 to 1965? You've cherry picked the thirty-year windows, and you haven't told us why. What ax are you grinding? One might conclude from these data that more CO2 is more warming, A dozen other conjectures, some true, others not true, and most unknown, are also equally unsupported by these two displays. This all sounds like the pseudo-science you'd find on this Idso's 'CO2Science' web site.