Global Warming: Now With 200% More Certainty
Illustration by Mother Jones
[The top climate scientists'] 155-page report said average global surface temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere rose about 1 degree during the 20th century.
This is shown in boreholes, retreating glaciers and other evidence found in nature, said Gerald North, a geosciences professor at Texas A&M University who chaired the academy’s panel.
The report was requested in November by the chairman of the House Science Committee, Rep. Sherwood Boehlert, R-New York, to address naysayers who question whether global warming is a major threat.
Last year, when the House Energy and Commerce Committee chairman, Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, launched an investigation of three climate scientists, Boehlert said Barton should try to learn from scientists, not intimidate them.
Boehlert said Thursday the report shows the value of having scientists advise Congress.
“There is nothing in this report that should raise any doubts about the broad scientific consensus on global climate change,” he said.
In a case of climate-change synchronicity, a study sponsored by the National Center for Atmospheric Research concludes that “global warming helped fuel 2005’s destructive hurricane season.” From USAToday.com:
“About half of last year’s extra (ocean) warmth was due to global warming,” says a co-author of the study, Kevin Trenberth of the federally funded National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo. That translates into an increase in ocean temperatures of just under 1 degree Fahrenheit above natural year-to-year variability in temperatures.
According to the study, the 2005 hurricane season was a record one with 28 named storms. The season extended beyond its normal November close, lasting until Dec. 30. It was the first year on record with three Category 5 storms, the strongest hurricanes. Hurricane Wilma was the most intense Atlantic storm; Rita was the most intense in the Gulf of Mexico; and Katrina was the most damaging storm. It led to the deaths of more than 1,800 people.
Last month, researchers with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said there’s an 80 percent chance of an “above-average” hurricane season with four to six major hurricanes this year. The season began June 1 and runs till Nov. 30.
(Emphasis is mine.)
The hub and I need to get off our procrastinating tushies and assemble that emergency kit we keep talking about. FEMA better gird its loins because the Bush administration “values the economy”—and the potential loss of 5 million jobs to new pollution controls—over saving the entire planet and the potential loss of billions of lives.
Should we get this life jacket for Chekhov or this? I’m not even kidding, y’all.
