Faster Global Warming From Permafrost Melt 119
jc42 writes, "A recent study published in Nature documents the accelerating release of methane from melting permafrost. Methane is a greenhouse gas 23 times more potent than carbon dioxide, so this may signal more rapid warming in the near future. If you don't subscribe to Nature, the Guardian has a good summary of the piece." It's not just Siberian permafrost. One of the major concerns is bogs — they account for a relatively small percent of total surface space, but have a large amount of carbon locked up. No one is sure if the greenhouse effect will cause them to lock up more, or to release more carbon.
Also in a country near you.... (Score:2, Interesting)
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Oh nOOS (Score:2)
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Chemistry (Score:1)
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Not a problem. (Score:1)
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The ice method would require so much energy production it would be counter productive.
Actually it's simpler (Score:4, Interesting)
http://www.whynot.net/ideas/2195 [whynot.net]
People in hot areas will start adding insulation, whitewashing their houses, adding trees and ivy people in cold areas will start adding insulation, heat pumps etc.
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1) Make energy expensive
2) Piss off businesses and consumers who want luxury and economic security now
3) Along comes a guy who promises to lower energy prices
4) Get voted out
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Coming up next (Score:2, Funny)
bogs (Score:4, Interesting)
They also have a fair number of bogmen in them. Thanks to the highly acidic and low oxygen environment of bogs, the softer parts of animals (skin, hair, organs) remain intact while the bones dissolve. What you end up with is essentially a nice "sack of meat." Totally offtopic, but pretty fascinating stuff, imho.
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There are several factors involved in determining the rate of exchange. Increased temperature implies increased average energy level in the atmosphere and increased
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for our purposes, in only has to become inhabitable to us to be a problem. A problem we might want to think about seriously.
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http://carcino.gen.nz/images/index.php/00b9a680/5
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Also, the oceans would get watered down and the lower amount of salt would screw up the climate and all the ecosystems in the ocean. (I don't think it would get watered down enough to drink though.)
The ocean has
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Global warming will be a distaster, but I don't think we're going to stop it. Even if we all make the effort now to change our ways, there is simply too much inertia. Our next step shouldn't be aimed at stopping it, but slowing it down, and beginning to prepare for the effects.
Personally, I'm not too worried about thousand-year-old ecosystems. They've
In light of the article, (Score:2)
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That's not entirely off base.
Who woulda thunk that swamp-gas flares would actually decrease the greenhouse effect? The only thing I'd be concerned about would be whether the heat released from "wasteful" burning would outweight the greenhouse effect energy trapping.
In addition, there have been several attempts to harness escaping methane for energy before it is dispersed into the at
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Seconded.
And I propose we put Maxwell's Demon in charge of the project.
It's your fault (Score:2, Insightful)
And they will be right. The only way to stop it is to slow down the circulation of money.
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In terms of cause and effect (Score:1)
The die is cast. Humans have majorly polluted the planet and the planet is fighting back, however gradually. I predict the final score will be planet 1 : humans 0.
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Re:In terms of cause and effect (Score:5, Funny)
Yes, plus the Earth doesn't really like being anthropomorphized all that much, so if you won't stop for environmental science, stop for the sake of Earth's feelings.
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Yum! (Score:1)
Vox? (Score:1)
The Gurdian lies (Score:1, Informative)
A gas can not warm the planet. The sun is the main heat source for the planet. We have to assume that the planet's own heat is constant. Increase the sun's output by fractions of a percentage to produce very dramatic warming on the earth. Greenhouse effect only relates to how much (or how little) the earth cools after it's been heated by the sun. Even man's exhaust f
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Slimy Defense Attorney: "Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, the prosecution has told you that my client the defendant ran over the deceased several times. But my client has knee injury and cannot run, let alone run over a person. And the deceased was covered by tire tracks, not footprints. The prosecution is obviously lying!"
Weary District Attorney: "As the jury obviously understood, I meant that the ran over the deceased with his car."
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Sure it can, just light a match.
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Re:The Gurdian lies (Score:4, Insightful)
A gas can not warm the planet.
So neither can a blanket warm you, then.
Any other sophistries you'd like to share?
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Actually, a blanket cannot warm you just as a gas cannot warm you.
What both can do, incidentally, is keep you warm. A blanket just keeps your metabolic waste energy trapped close to you as warmth. Various gases just keep solar energy trapped close to the planet longer.
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Thank you, Captain Obvious.
For your next trick, please explain that water is wet. This ought to keep you missing the point for another short while.
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So we can all save a fortune next winter by throwing away our gas heaters and electric blankets?
Disclaimer: The above statement is just as silly as your attempt to nit-pick.
Opps (Score:2)
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As for TFA, methane from per
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Yeah, I know; picky, picky, picky
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OTOH, a few years ago some researchers tracked down the source of another 1/3 of the
Chicken-little titles... (Score:5, Insightful)
"No one is sure if the greenhouse effect will cause them to lock up more, or to release more carbon"...
Sensationalist titles like this are why I still have my doubts about global warning. Every time any climate data is released, the global warning crowd comes out with another sensationalist global warning blurb.
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OK, AC troll, I'll bite.
First, AFAIK, 'real' scientific journals can be very elitist and very narrow minded. What gets published in most journals must be acceptable to the community at large for the journal to remain a respected institution. On top of that, article submission is expensive, difficult and lengthy, even if you do have a nice safe acceptable paper to
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This is an ad hominem attack known as poisoning the well.
Plus most of wh
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-ccm
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If we act without understanding, the outcome is unpredictable, and is as likely to be worse as it is to be better. If we understand the system, and can thus predict the outcome of our actions with some accuracy, we stand a much better chance of fixing whatever problems actually exist.
M
Re:Chicken-little titles... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Chicken-little titles... (Score:5, Interesting)
Ok, ignore the JOURNALIST'S READER-BAIT title, and think for a moment about the fact at hand:
The permafrost is melting.
The layer of soil named after the fact that it is permanently frozen is melting.
Think about it.
It's not the titles, it's the editors (Score:2)
The title deals only with permafrost, while the comment from the editor deals with bogs, something that has nothing to do with permafrost aside from being another kind of terrain common in more nordic regions. If the editor had stayed on track, there wouldn't be any confusion.
As for the articles, the only thing remotely close to disagreement is the comment that if if it gets hot enough for all the permafrost underneath the lakes to melt then the water will be able to sink into the ground and you won't ha
Did you pass basic reading comprehension? (Score:4, Insightful)
"No one is sure if the greenhouse effect will cause them to lock up more, or to release more carbon"...
Um no. First of all, you obviously haven't read TFA because it doesn't say this. It was apparently written by the
Sensationalist titles like this are why I still have my doubts about global warning.
You decide whether or not to accept scientific studies based on Slashdot headlines? We're in more trouble than I thought.
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Of course, that will still leave the question of WHOSE FAULT IT IS, man or nature, so clearly since the whole thing will never prove someone right, we should simply not worry about it at all, because it's ON
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I can remember back to the 70's when most climatologists were warning about our impending doom from an impending Ice Age! Niven & Pournelle wrote a book about it. When you see the same
Feedback: why climate research is expensive (Score:4, Insightful)
There are also negative feedback loops. The warmer it gets, the more water evaporates, the more clouds there are, and clouds reflect sunlight. On the other hand, clouds can also hold heat in, and water vapor is a greenhouse gas.
If you want to make forecasts you have to put numbers on all those effects, and they have to be fairly precise numbers or you get hit by the uncertainties of (approximate large number minus other approximate large number). You've also got to account for discontinuities, things that only start happening at threshold temperatures (permafrost melting) or that stop happening after some amount of C)2 gets absorbed (oceanic absorption).
That's where all your tax money is going. It's paying to send highly trained people to uncomfortable places to get hard facts.
That also tells you that it's taken a huge amount of field data to get general agreement on what our CO2 output does to climate.
Decimal places (Score:2)
No one is sure if the greenhouse effect will cause them to lock up more, or to release more carbon.
Oh, well, case closed then!
Old news, sorry (Score:2)
So... (Score:2)
There's a bad Soviet Russia joke in here.
Sorry, I am still sceptical (Score:2)
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CLIMATE != WEATHER (Score:2)
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Consideringe climatology is different from meterology, I would say you comparison is....crap.
I predict that comparison will still be crap in 100 years.
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Have a look at this graph. There's a lot of noise. If you were to look at 3 years in a row, it's pretty much impossible to guess what the temperature will be in the next year. But if you look at the whole graph, then it's pretty clear that things are on the whole getting hotter. Notice especially how fast the heating trend is in the last 10 years (9 of which are the hottest years ever recorded)
It's actually easier to predict things in th
I seem to remember... (Score:2)
OH PLease ! (Score:1)
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The scientists release the facts - that the permafrost is changing. Then the people who pay the scientists say 'Why should we care, why should we pay for your expensive field trips?' and the scientist replies 'Because we need to know, we need to find out what's going on, so we might have a chance of surviving (and me keeping my job)'
So, to sum up, scienists have released some facts - there are significant changes in the permafrost which are yet another significant pointer to global climate change. Furtherm
On Facts and Theories (Score:3, Insightful)
Fact is a pretty strong word in science. Instead you'll generally see "consensus" or "strongly suggests" or "the theory supports". Facts tend to be only used when discussing measurable data, and even then they discuss margin of errors and possible problems in taking the readings.
If I jump off a building, a group of scientists would cheerfully predict when I'll hit the bottom and with how much force, though
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Actually, typically we have both. Except that "fact" isn't a common technical term, perhaps because it's monosyllabic. Usually scientists talk about "observations" or "data". "Fact" is just the informal (layman's) term for observed data.
The release of methane from permafrost isn't a hypothesis. It's observed data, as described in the recent Nature article. The recent increase in the release rate is also
Re:This is why people can't rely on spin doctors. (Score:1)
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Well, I tried a few such headlines, but found that
(But
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scare mongering media and politicos catering to ignorance cause rumours and mis-ideas about global warming, not science.
All sciences starts with observation.