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JUNE 2009 • WHITE HOUSE RELEASES
LANDMARK CLIMATE CHANGE REPORT • GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE
IMPACTS IN THE US
 The
report summarizes the science and the impacts of climate change on the United
States, now and in the future. It focuses on climate change impacts on different
regions in the US and on various aspects of the economy and society such as
energy, water, agriculture, and health. It’s also a report written in plain
language, with the goal of better informing public and private decision making
at all levels.
In addition to discussing
the impacts of climate change in the U.S., the report also highlights the
choices we face in response to human-induced climate change. It is clear that
impacts in the United States are already occurring and are projected to increase
in the future, particularly if the concentration of heat-trapping greenhouse
gases in the atmosphere continues to rise. So, choices about how we manage
greenhouse gas emissions will have far-reaching consequences for climate change
impacts. Similarly, there are choices to be made about adaptation strategies
that can help to reduce or avoid some of the undesirable impacts of climate
change. This report provides many of the scientific underpinnings for effective
decisions to be made – at the national and at the regional level.
The entire report and a
video of the actual announcement is on the website of the committee of thirteen
agencies that make up the U.S. Global Change Research Program at
www.globalchange.gov.
This website has a wealth of information and hundreds of photographs of
nature at its finest and and its worst. There are incredible shots from the
shuttle of hurricanes; moving photos of earth's creatures; ice flows and
desserts; forests, fields and floods. These are photos of our earth and a clear
reminder to us all of our responsibility to it.
      
     
January
2009 •
Global
Warming Latest Trends
It seems at first
blush they are strange bedfellows but in reality science and politics are
inextricably linked at the hip. At a recent conference on scientific change held
in Copenhagen, Denmark, environmental experts gave us the startling news that
sea levels are rising at almost double the rate the United Nations forecast in
2006. The dire warnings were aimed and delivered to politicians who met in
Copenhagen in December 2008 to discuss the same subject. Some of them put forth
various agendas to ignore it, deny it or accept it and do nothing, when what is
needed is an international plan and agreement to counter the effects of it.
The major reason for this decidedly unwelcome news is that we have achieved a
far greater ability to monitor it as we develop new gauges and the potential of
the event focuses more and more light on it. These new gauges and awareness are
welcomed, but will undeniably bring even more startling news as we fill the
basket with the various markers and learn ever more about the climate around us.
In 2007 the world scientific community in general and the August body of
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change convened by none other than the United
Nations made its prediction that by 2100 sea levels would rise between 18 and 59
centimeters. That is a considerable variation in estimating, between
approximately 7 and 23 inches. But a lack of database on how the polar ice caps
were behaving prevented a truly meaningful estimate. Since 2006, the polar caps
have been monitored very closely by a variety of devices including geostationary
satellites and manual observations on scene. The results coming in now allowing
a closer view of this new focus are very disturbing.
There are numerous causes for the accelerated rate of melt, from the El Ninos
warming to the droughts in Africa, Southeast Asia, Australia and other locales.
The warming by El Nino corresponds perfectly with a weaker Southwest monsoon,
which leads to drought conditions in certain locales. It is not believed to be
the whole answer however.
Columbia University has an ongoing climate research program which has been hard
at work studying such diverse elements as the tree rings on old growth timber in
Cambodia and elsewhere to measure the growth rate, leading to further knowledge
of climate over a 3-400 year period. Tree cores from the region surrounding
Thailand indicate droughts of 30-40 years so severe that lush rainforest jungles
literally dried out, with reservoirs running completely dry. Some conifers were
found to have lived over 1000 years and they have preserved climate history very
well in their annular rings. In fact evidence points to the fact that the famous
temples at Angkor were possibly abandoned due to droughts in the region that
brought roving marauders seeking relief from other drought stricken regions.
Some researchers believe that droughts in past times have caused neighboring
countries to feud and invade others in various locales around the earth.
There are perplexing questions in the data being assembled however, in that the
droughts of the past did not always result in Pacific warming as would have been
expected. The general consensus shaping now seems to be that the earth is so
complex that we cannot yet begin to understand it well enough to assume it will
follow a given pathway, glacier like and deliberate while we figure out a cure.
What is known with certainty is that the Greenland Cap and the Antarctic Cap are
melting at a rate never imagined and the effect of this increased melt rate is
exponential, further speeding the progress as white heat reflecting snow cover
and glaciers are converted into dark, heat absorbing ocean waters. Given the
current measured rate of melt scientists are now issuing forecasts of more than
double the previously given melt rates, advising that we could see the level
previously calculated for 2100 by mid century, if the rate of melt
stabilizes and increases no further. Very few scientists would take that wager,
as the opposite is far more likely barring a reversal of the now clearly defined
and inarguable warming trend.
Noted researcher Konrad Steffen of the University of Colorado is the head of one
group assigned to monitor the Greenland ice sheet. He recently advised the
scientific community that the problem is getting worse even now because the
melted water seeping into the cracks and crevices is breaking the cap apart.
This simple result of expansion, contraction and erosion has never been
calculated in the prognoses of the past. John Church of the center for weather
in Australia informed the conference that satellite and ground based observation
points indicate the sea level has been rising much more rapidly since 1993
compared to earlier in the 20th century.
The Institute for Climate Research has completed preliminary examination of
records kept for over 100 years related to sea water temperatures and rising sea
levels. His data states that the sea level rise will increase, accelerating as
the planet gets even slightly hotter. Scientific leaders the world around are
calling with ever louder voices and ever more factual scientific data, to arouse
a moribund world political order from its slumber before our feet are wet and
worse, we lose the natural air conditioning that makes our planet unique and
habitable for evolved humans and other species.
This year’s Climate Change Conference in Bonn will bring forth ever more
sinister predictions based on hard evidence now growing by leaps and bounds. It
is no secret that many scientists, typically the most reserved of humans are
issuing startling warnings of catastrophic events if we do not change our
habits, quickly. While there is still much to argue scientifically over, what is
irrefutable is that global warming is worse than anyone thought.
Perhaps the largest problem we face is that the decisions to embrace and
overcome the problems (or not) are going to be made by our elected officials,
many who are not the shining examples of knowledgeable, honest and committed
individuals we thought were leading us into this century.
We can all help reverse the now almost universally accepted fact that we humans
are the cause. We can all buy less plastic, plant a tree (several), shut off the
idling engines in our cars, buy locally grown produce and protein, change the
light bulbs, raise the thermostat one degree and a hundred other things that we
will never miss. We can demand clean power sources and rapid, convenient public
transportation that makes sense in lieu of subsidizing the robber barons of
today who loot companies like GM and others they are charged to manage with
ignorance and lack of fiduciary responsibility.
In April, 2009, one of the most pristine places on our earth, devoid of humans,
is strangling under the weight of our thoughtless actions. At the neck of the
Chuchki Sea, joining the Bering and Beaufort Sea between Kamchatka to the
Southwest and Point Barrow in the Northeast, vast, gaping holes in the sea ice
and polar cap were seen, where only ten years ago, an unbroken, frozen landscape
existed for all of the calendar year.
Norsemen Marlow will continue its course, but quicken its pace to do our part
and much more, if such is possible. Though our heart beats proud with the
achievement of significant reductions in fuel burn rates on all models in the
past twelve months and our solar powered hardtop modules can save 35% of the
typical hydrocarbon emissions in a completely passive user environment, we have
only begun. Though in recent years we have reforested an area as large as the
county we are headquartered in, we can do more. Though we have received global
awards for green environmental policies and practices, unique within our
industry, we can do more and we will.
The local schoolmaster has hand delivered to us a heartwarming thank you for our
efforts to improve the environment and structure of his elementary school
located near our VIP center. We will sponsor environmental awareness classes for
these young and malleable minds so that when they grow to be adults their habits
will influence wherever they go, whatever they do. We will begin by sponsoring
education on the most basic of lessons about the real blood of life, clean water
for our planet. We will help instill in them through classroom and field
exercises the value of an environment that is respected, healthy and supportive
of all life. And we will continue to guide, or scold when necessary,
complimenting when due, the actions of our own workers to become aware and ever
more proactive in our manufacturing habits and processes.
Think about it, do you really want to live in an apocalyptic wasteland
reminiscent of a Mel Gibson Road Warrior movie? Do your part to pass on
something worth inheriting, our children and their children are dependent on it.
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Norsemen
Shipyard Ltd., Inc.