[GWSG] Climate rap; SunShot; Hansen and slr; FL's DEP & Gov. on planning; strong UK target; Aus. rept. urges action

[Tilley, Al]

1.  Australian climate scientists have recorded a rap video affirming their findings.  http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20110513/od_afp/australiaclimateoffbeat  The video:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LiYZxOlCN10

2.  May’s issue of Solar Today has several articles worth your time.  “Streamlining Solar Technology” profiles the Department of Energy’s SunShot initiative to cut solar costs by about 75% this decade.  Using a “thousand little cuts” approach they are identifying ways to cut costs for modules, installation, electronics, and operations and maintenance.  The article is not available on line; here is SunShot’s site.  http://www1.eere.energy.gov/solar/sunshot/

3.  “Paleoclimate Implications for Human-Made Climate Change” by James Hansen and Makiko Sato warns that we are within less than 1° C of the interglacial maximum, flirting with destructive feedback processes, and risking multi-meter sea level rise this century.  The authors propose 5 meters, 16’5”, by the end of the century, leveling off at a meter of rise a decade.  Their discussion of sea level is on pages 14-17, followed by the summary discussion.   http://arxiv.org/abs/1105.0968 (with a link to a PDF file of the paper).  For Hansen’s other recent pubs and a good picture of him and his grandchildren:  http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1

For the last couple of years I have been using Duke coastal geologist Orrin Pilke’s recommendation from 2007’s The Rising Sea that we plan for 7 feet of sea level rise this century.    A responsible and more current figure would now more than double that.  If Hansen, our leading climatologist, says that we are probably in for about 16.5 feet of sea level rise this century, leveling off at a meter a decade in the next one, and if our planning horizon is “the foreseeable future,” we should be planning for a major reshaping of coastal areas.  Whether lowlying areas are actually inundated or not, they will be destabilized as the changes take hold, and such infrastructure as sewer lines, water supply, and transportation lines will be disrupted.  Our coastal planning needs to add the dimension of time, for it will thrust itself upon us destructively if we do not.

4.  Florida’s Department of Environmental Protection is “not pursuing any programs or projects regarding climate change,” and Governor Scott remains unconvinced that any such thing is in progress.  Thanks to Deirdre Irwin for the news.  http://www.wateryfoundation.com/?p=2367

5.  Britain is announcing a new target of a 50% cut in emission levels by 2025 on a 1990 base.  It is the first binding commitment of any nation beyond 2020 (as I understand), and a strong target.  Britain has left room to reevaluate the target in 2014 in light of current policies of the European Union.   http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20110517/wl_uk_afp/britainenvironmentclimate

6.  An Australian government report asserts the necessity to pass peak greenhouse gas emissions within this decade and begin reducing emissions by 9% a year if we wish to avoid more than 2° of warming, the commonly held DAI point (though Hansen and a growing number of others place it at least half a degree lower).  http://www.carbonpositive.net/viewarticle.aspx?articleID=2329
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.unf.edu/pipermail/gwsg/attachments/20110524/1eb80de9/attachment.html