MIRLI BOOKS
  • Home
  • Books
    • Henry's Trials >
      • Extract from Henry's Trials
    • Smethurst's Luck >
      • Extract from Smethurst's Luck
    • Murder in the Red Barn >
      • Extract from Murder in the Red Barn
    • Reverend Duke and the Amesbury Oliver
  • Talks
    • Talk on Henry's Trials
    • Talk on Smethurst's Luck
    • Talk on Isambard Kingdom Brunel
    • Talk on the Murder in the Red Barn
    • BBC
  • Publications
    • The Amesbury Union Workhouse
    • The Separate System
  • Peter Maggs
  • Shop
  • Blog
  • Family History
    • Mirli
    • BM Creeper >
      • The Significance of Stonehenge
      • Educating Ealing I: How Lady Byron Did It
      • Educating Ealing II: Church of England Primary in the 1920s
      • All Because of Crystal Palace
      • Innocent in Ealing - Extract
      • Miss McDonald

Global warning (sic)

1/11/2021

0 Comments

 
Picture
I am convinced that global warming leading to climate change, is a direct result of historic and on-going emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) into the atmosphere by human agency. However, there are no certainties in the science behind climate change; science is not like that. Science is about the analysis of probabilities, the construction of theories, correlations, and probable cause and effect, backed up by intense peer review. Nevertheless, as they say in the interminable detective series on the TV at the moment, ‘Follow the evidence...’
 
Two things are abundantly clear: firstly, there is no doubt that for more than one hundred years, the average temperature on Earth has been rising. This rise has been far more rapid than the slow increase that has taken place over the previous 10,000 years or so since the last ice age. See below data from five independent sources:

Picture
There are far too many contemporary indicators to question whether the effect is real: the accelerating rise in sea level, the retreating Arctic ice-cap—resulting in the final opening up of the North West passage—the melting of glaciers in Greenland and the Antarctic, the bleaching of corals, the huge increase in extreme weather events all over the world, and so on. 

Secondly, the levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere have been increasing steadily since the start of the industrial revolution. Currently, the CO2 in the atmosphere is 50% higher than pre-industrial levels, when it had been more or less stable for at least 10,000 years. CO2 is the second most abundant greenhouse gas (after water vapour), and contributes to the warming of the atmosphere via the greenhouse effect.
 
Atmospheric CO2 levels have fluctuated considerably over geological history; see, for example, the data from NASA on variations over the last 800,000 years:

Picture
The changes are very apparent, rising and falling every 100,000 years or so, and correlating with warm periods interspersed with ice ages. Note that the current level of CO2 is 50% higher than it has been for more than 800,000 years; it had been rising steadily over the last 10,000 years or so as the result of natural processes—well before large scale human activity—but the recent rise is so fast, it looks vertical on the graph.
 
We have to ask ourselves two questions: does the current increase in atmospheric CO2 directly and unequivocally result from human activity? And if it does, is it responsible for, or does it contribute to, global warming? The graph below shows atmospheric CO2 from 1750 to the present (magenta line), and emissions of the gas from human activities—industry etc.—(blue line):

Picture
I defy any rational person whose mind is not permanently damaged by wild conspiracy theories, to deny that from 1970 or thereabouts there is an almost perfect correlation between the two, and that, therefore, the excess CO2 in the atmosphere is the result of industrial activity. But does increased CO2 in the atmosphere cause the planet to heat up? That is a far more difficult question. 
 
The graph below from NOAA (US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) shows the concentration of atmospheric CO2 and global average temperature over the last 800,000 years:

The level of correlation here is quite remarkable and is far too good for there to be any doubt that the two measures—atmospheric CO2 and global temperature—are very closely related. The $64,000 question is: does the one cause the other, or are both affected similarly by a more obscure effect? NOAA is quite candid: ‘While it might seem simple to determine cause and effect between carbon dioxide and climate from which change occurs first, or from some other means, the determination of cause and effect remains exceedingly difficult.’ In other words, the climate on Earth is complicated and is dependent on many factors; no easy answers regarding how it works emerge. 
 
One thing though is unequivocal; however complex is the interaction between the various contributors to the average global temperature, CO2 in the atmosphere appears to track it perfectly.
 
So what has happened over the last hundred and forty years or so? The graph below shows average global temperate and atmospheric CO2:
Picture
Over a period of 140 years to the present day, global average temperature tracks CO2 in the atmosphere; from the 1960s, the correlation is astonishingly good.
 
The conclusion seems inevitable and unavoidable: atmospheric CO2 is a very good indicator of average global temperature, and both are steadily increasing at a very much higher rate than pre-industrial levels. It certainly convinces me, as it does the majority of the world’s scientists.
 
What does all of this this mean for the planet? The immediate global consequences of warming are: a steady increase in sea-level both from the simple expansion of the sea as it gets hotter, as well as melting glaciers; the doomsday scenario would occur if large parts of the ice sheet covering Antarctica, Greenland and elsewhere start to melt; most of Holland and much of the UK east coast—including London—would be inundated. In Asia, the Far East, and elsewhere, tens, possibly hundreds of millions of people in low lying areas will become displaced. A number of island nations will just disappear.
 
Extreme weather events will result in life-threatening storms, wildfires, and floods becoming normal. More ominously, changes in climate will affect crop yields. There will be also be acute water shortages as parts of the planet heat up. ‘Existential’ is a very overworked word at present, but it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that climate change really is an existential crisis that will affect every person on the planet over the next fifty to one hundred years.
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Author

    Welcome to the Mirli Books blog written by Peter Maggs

    Archives

    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    May 2018
    March 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

Website and Contents © Peter Maggs 2023
  • Home
  • Books
    • Henry's Trials >
      • Extract from Henry's Trials
    • Smethurst's Luck >
      • Extract from Smethurst's Luck
    • Murder in the Red Barn >
      • Extract from Murder in the Red Barn
    • Reverend Duke and the Amesbury Oliver
  • Talks
    • Talk on Henry's Trials
    • Talk on Smethurst's Luck
    • Talk on Isambard Kingdom Brunel
    • Talk on the Murder in the Red Barn
    • BBC
  • Publications
    • The Amesbury Union Workhouse
    • The Separate System
  • Peter Maggs
  • Shop
  • Blog
  • Family History
    • Mirli
    • BM Creeper >
      • The Significance of Stonehenge
      • Educating Ealing I: How Lady Byron Did It
      • Educating Ealing II: Church of England Primary in the 1920s
      • All Because of Crystal Palace
      • Innocent in Ealing - Extract
      • Miss McDonald