[GWSG] CFCs & g.w.; coasts threatened; new CA solar; SFP; 55 mya; double sensitivity; raise costs; g.w. text; req. coastal reading

[Tilley, Al]

1.  The Montreal Protocol of 1989 restricted the use of CFCs and spared us 1.5° C of warming by 2070, as well as a global ozone hole, according to a new study.  http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2011/01/measures-to-save-ozone-stemmed-a.html?etoc

2.  The world’s most populated port cities will be three times more likely to suffer an extreme weather event by 2070.  http://www.nature.com/nclimate/2011/110111/full/nclimate1029.html

3.  Southern California Edison has contracted for seven new solar plants to produce 830 megawatts by 2016.  Edison is currently offering 17% renewable power.    http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-edison-solar-power-20110111,0,7711489.story

4.    Jordan and Norway have agreed to build a hybrid demonstration center near the Red Sea which will produce crops, water, and solar power.  The Sahara Forest Project design has the potential to turn part of the surrounding desert green.  http://www.sciencemag.org/content/331/6014/136.full

5.  55 million years ago the earth experienced 5° C of warming as CO2 built up in the atmosphere.  Two recent presentations to the American Geophysical Union suggest the sources were Arctic methane clathrates and melting permafrost.  http://www.sciencemag.org/content/331/6014/142.2.full

6.  An article in Science using historical data argues that the sensitivity of the climate to CO2 over long periods of time may be at least double our usual assumptions.  http://www2.ucar.edu/news/3628/earth-s-hot-past-could-be-prologue-future-climate  Joe Romm has a post filling in many questions raised by the article—in particular, the reasons for and pace of changes resulting from the greater sensitivity.  http://climateprogress.org/2011/01/13/science-kiehl-ncar-paleoclimate-lessons-from-earths-hot-past/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+climateprogress%2FlCrX+%28Climate+Progress%29

7.  Nicholas Stern observes that increased carbon sensitivity increases the costs of doing nothing.  http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20110114/sc_afp/climateeconomyspainbritain

8.  Stephen Mulkey’s course on climate change at the University of Idaho uses as a text Arnold Bloom’s Global Climate Change: Convergence of Disciplines (Sinauer Associates, 2010).  Its thorough and reader-friendly presentation is worth the $54 (Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=arnold+bloom&x=12&y=15 ).  You might as well have the most authoritative and current info on our topic.

9.  Include in your book order The Rising Sea by Orrin Pilkey and Rob Young (Island Press, 2009), cheap at $16.35 http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=arnold+bloom&x=12&y=15#/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=rising+sea&rh=i%3Aaps%2Ck%3Arising+sea  The authors are well equipped to inform us on what we must anticipate for our coastal areas.  Truly, this ought to be required equipment for anyone involved in any way with the future of our coasts (and that is all of us).  It is written so as to be easily understood and at the same time is master of its topic.