Key Dates in the Story of a Warming Planet

[dtotire]

Key Dates in the Story of a Warming Planet


By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: December 5, 2009

Filed at 10:02 a.m. ET

1750 -- Before Industrial Revolution, atmosphere holds 280 parts per million of heat-trapping carbon dioxide (CO2).

1898 -- Swedish scientist Svante Ahrrenius calculates that CO2 from coal and oil burning will warm the planet.

1955 -- U.S. scientist Charles Keeling finds atmospheric CO2 has risen to 315 parts per million.

1971 -- First international conference on climate change is held in Sweden.

1986 -- Atmospheric CO2 reaches 350 ppm.

1988 -- NASA scientist James Hansen tells U.S. Congress global warming ''is already happening now.''

1988 -- U.N. creates the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a clearinghouse for climate science.

1990 -- IPCC issues its First Assessment Report, noting Earth is warming.

1992 -- Climate treaty sets voluntary goals to lower CO2 and other greenhouse gas emissions.

1995 -- IPCC's Second Assessment Report says the ''balance of evidence suggests a discernible human influence on global climate.''

1997 -- Climate treaty parties approve Kyoto Protocol ordering emission cuts by industrial nations; approach rejected in advance by U.S. Senate.

1998 -- Warmest year globally since record-keeping began in mid-19th century.

2001 -- IPCC's Third Assessment Report cites ''new and stronger evidence'' that mankind is altering climate.

2001 -- U.S. President George W. Bush renounces Kyoto Protocol.

2004 -- Russia ratifies Kyoto Protocol, bringing it into force in February 2005.

2007 -- IPCC Fourth Assessment Report says most warming is ''very likely'' due to manmade emission. Report shows global temperatures rose 0.74 degrees C (1.3 degrees F) from 1906 to 2005.

2007 -- IPCC and former U.S. Vice President Al Gore win Nobel Prize for their climate work.

2007 -- In Bali, annual U.N. climate conference agrees on two-year timetable for successor agreement to Kyoto.

2009 -- Atmospheric CO2 hits a record 390 ppm.

2009 -- Delegates of 192 nations prepare for a crucial annual U.N. conference in Copenhagen, Denmark.



http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2009/12/05/world/AP-Climate-Timeline.html

[doc03]

1. What about the contradictory information they have

suppressed?

[Schema Thing]

2. there isn't any

no one said there would be a straight, unyielding arc of warming upward; but nothing so far has contradicted the prediction made by Swedish scientist Svante Ahrrenius in 1898.

[MH1]

3. Contradictory to what? Here is a simplified version:

1750 -- Before Industrial Revolution, atmosphere holds 280 parts per million of heat-trapping carbon dioxide (CO2).

1955 -- U.S. scientist Charles Keeling finds atmospheric CO2 has risen to 315 parts per million.

1986 -- Atmospheric CO2 reaches 350 ppm.

2009 -- Atmospheric CO2 hits a record 390 ppm.


Are these figures in dispute?

[Traveling_Home]

4. I was just told by my other ....

that it's all about the medieval warming period.

[doc03]

5. What about the e-mails among the scientists

about suppressing data that doesn't support their claims?

[bhikkhu]

7. oh please...not this again.

What exactly do you think is being suppressed?

[MH1]

8. what about all the emails between Exxon head honchos and their cronies

scheming about how to forestall any action on climate change, that might cut into their profits?

oh wait, their emails weren't hacked.

And regardless, what do those emails have to do with the reality of the rapid increase of CO2 in the atmosphere, and the scientific facts of how that affects climate?

[bhikkhu]

6. They're missing at least one important point

"Nobody mounted a serious attack on the problem (after all, very few people were doing any kind of planetary astronomy in those decades). Finally in 1960 a young doctoral student, Carl Sagan, took up the problem and got a solution that made his name known among astronomers. Using what he later recalled as "embarrassingly crude" methods, taking data from tables designed for steam boiler engineering, he confirmed that Venus could indeed be a greenhouse effect furnace..."
http://www.aip.org/history/climate/Venus.htm

-------------------------

If he didn't coin the term "greenhouse effect", and wasn't the first to suggest that it was a danger to our planet, he was at least instrumental in helping millions to understand it, and our place in the universe, by his BBC production "Cosmos" in 1980.

[stuntcat]

9. I have AP articles from over 30 years ago telling of exactly what's happening now.

Associate press articles my grandmother clipped from her local newspapers back in the 70's. They're pretty short and simple, and it's weird reading them, seeing how long the clear science was ignored.

And now that it's got some of the humans' attention the science is being fought the hardest by people who've never made it through any college level science courses :puke:

I blame religion 100%.. excuse the hell out of me if that offends any of y'all :hi:

[Viking12]

10. "The Discovery of Global Warming" by Spencer Weart

Complete history online...

http://www.aip.org/history/climate/