Global warming nears ‘dangerous’ level

[RedEarth]

Updated: 6:00 p.m. CT Sept 25, 2006
Global temperatures are dangerously close to the highest ever estimated to have occurred in the past million years, scientists reported Monday.

In a study that analyzed temperatures around the globe, researchers found that Earth has been warming rapidly, nearly 0.36 degrees Fahrenheit (0.2 degrees Celsius) in the last 30 years. "The average surface temperature is 15, maybe 16 degrees Celsius (60 degrees Fahrenheit)," said Alan Robock, a meteorologist and climate researcher from Rutgers University who was not involved with the study.

If global temperatures go up another 1.8 degrees F (1 degree C), it would be equal to the maximum temperature of the past million years. "This evidence implies that we are getting close to dangerous levels of human-made (anthropogenic) pollution," said study leader James Hansen of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies.

According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, human-caused greenhouse gases are responsible for most of the warming of the last 50 years. The gases, released by burning of fossil fuels and land clearing, among other factors, trap heat in the atmosphere and warm Earth's surface. Further global warming of 1.8 degrees F (1 degree C) defines a critical level, Hanson said.

Robock agrees that temperatures are getting up there. "It's certainly the warmest it's been in the last couple of thousand years," Robock said. "I don't have access to the data about the last million years but it's probably right. I just haven't looked at it in detail.

"During the warmest interglacial periods the Earth was reasonably similar to today. But if further global warming reaches 2 or 3 degrees Celsius, we will likely see changes that make Earth a different planet than the one we know," he said. "The last time it was that warm was in the middle Pliocene, about 3 million years ago, when sea level was estimated to have been about 25 meters <80 feet> higher than today."

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/15003895/

[Deja Q]

1. Pity we can't plant more trees or develop a technology

that will recycle some of those gasses.

[kestrel91316]

2. ......or alter our lifestyles to produce less of those gases.......

[Nihil]

4. Shush!

Don't go suggesting that people's lifestyles might have to *change* ...
it's un-American and giving in to terra-ists ...

[kestrel91316]

5. Remember: "The American way of life is non-negotiable."

[Gregorian]

3. My freeper friend thinks it'll all vanish with the next big volcano.

And the dingbat is a friking engineer! He even commutes by bicycle. He even seems to care. But he picks his facts from sources other than EVERY SCIENTIST ON EARTH.

What the hell happens to people that turns them into freepers? It's a study. It divides families. And it has divided me from one of the best friends I ever had.

Having said all of that, no one is going to alter their behavior. We ARE going to melt down. Even my most liberal acquantances still advocate travel and having children. And those are the very things we need to start putting on hold in order to stabilize the patient planet.