A Hockey Stick in Melting Ice

Arctic temperatures in the 1990s reached their warmest level of any decade in at least 2,000 years, new research indicates. The study, which incorporates geologic records and computer simulations, provides new evidence that the Arctic would be cooling if not for greenhouse gas emissions that are overpowering natural climate patterns.

So reports the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), which coauthored the study to be published in Science Friday [abstract here].  The Washington Post story notes:

The analysis, based on more than a dozen lake sediment cores as well as glacier ice and tree ring records from the Arctic, provides one of the broadest pictures to date of how industrial emissions have shifted the Arctic’s long-standing natural climate patterns. Coupled with a separate report on the region issued Wednesday by the World Wildlife Fund, the studies suggest human-induced changes could transform not only the Arctic but climate conditions across the globe.

“It’s basically saying the greenhouse gas emissions are overwhelming the system,” said David Schneider, a visiting scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research and one of the Science article’s co-authors.

The same could be said about the entire planetary ecosystem — on our current path, we’re going to overwhelm the whole system (see “Intro to global warming impacts: Hell and High Water “).  Indeed, in some sense we already have, as a number of climate scientists have pointed out.  The NYT‘s Andy Revkin interviewed Thomas Crowley, a climate specialist at the University of Edinburgh:

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Heidi Cullen had a terrific piece last night on the Newshour, “Scientists See More Risk of Wildfires with Forest Changes” (click here for transcript and video).  Reuters even wrote a story on it:

The Dramatic Rise in Western Forest Fires: Is Climate Change to Blame?

Blaming a specific forest fire on the impact of climate change could be asking for trouble; but so too is ignoring obvious trends. That was clear last night from The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer on PBS when Climate Central, an emerging authority on global warming, explored the dramatic increase in forest fires in Washington State over the past few decades.

Correspondent Dr. Heidi Cullen, Climate Central’s Senior Research Scientist, interviewed forest ecologists who see evidence that ecosystems of the Pacific Northwest’s once vibrant forests are under duress because of global warming. Some observers believe that fire management practices by the U.S. Forest Service may help account for the increase in fires. Climate Central, in keeping with its mission to provide objective information on climate change, went deeper.

Dr. Cullen reported that in Washington State, “Average spring temperatures have risen nearly three degrees since 1950. Natural variability makes some years cooler or hotter. But records show an overall warming trend.”

Click here for CP’s take on the climate-wildfire link.

UN chief: rapid progress needed in climate talks

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Harvard Business Review touts space solar in its September piece, “On the Horizon: Six Sources of Limitless Energy?” (subs. req’d)  Of course, they also tout nuclear fusion as one of the six (see HBR figure above), so perhaps that tells you their time horizon is … 50 years from now (or maybe never), long after the climate is destroyed.

More puzzling is Yale e360, which has a long piece on space solar, with the hype “Now, a host of technological advances, coupled with interest from the U.S. military, may be bringing that vision close to reality.” Aside from discussing the military’s interest, which may not be totally benign and in any case is largely irrelevant to the question of commercial viability, the piece discusses the deal Solaren Corporation has with Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) “to provide 200 megawatts of power “” about half the output of an average coal-fired power plant “” by 2016 by launching solar arrays into space.”

As I blogged here, the physicist Marty Hoffert sent an email to the media in the spring on this (which I reprint in full below) that begins:

The PG&E deal is a scam. Pure and simple. We don’t need to study it in detail any more than one needed to study Bernie Madoff’s investment scams.

Since space solar is getting hyped again, let me start with my original discussion (here).

Not many people I know think space solar is a low-cost, scalable solution.

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On Tuesday night, Glenn Beck invoked the red-baiting of a bygone age, making the claim that there are “Communists in the United States government.” Beck’s McCarthyite rampage came during an extended screed attacking White House Special Advisor for Green Jobs Van Jones, a former Center for American Progress senior fellow and the co-founder of Green for All, an environmental-entrepeneurial organization. After renouncing his “rowdy black nationalism” in 2000, Van Jones “has emerged as the perhaps the nation’s chief proponent of using business-based solutions to create jobs and clean up the environment.” However, Glenn Beck is convinced that Van Jones is a Communist sleeper agent in the White House:

I know there are good decent people, left and right, Democrats and Republicans that watch this program! How much more evidence do you need that we have radicals in the White House? Oh, we haven’t even begun. If you think you need more — We need to at least start having the necessary conversation of: Do we really want Communists in the United States government as special advisors to the president? To be honest with ya, and maybe it’s just me, I don’t even want Communists having lunch with our president. When Putin was having an hour with the president, I know he had to do it, but I wasn’t comfortable with it! Barack Obama did not campaign on openly changing the whole system.

Watch it:

In fact, Obama did campaign openly on a message of change. And hope.

Evidently, Beck is attacking Van Jones to divert attention from his accusations that President Obama is a “racist” who “hates white people.” A successful boycott by Color of Change, an organization co-founded by Van Jones in 2005 but with which he has had no active involvement since 2007, has led to 57 advertisers abandoning Beck’s show.

The UK website BusinessGreen reports on a survey of 2,700 UK adults, which “found that half of respondents are interested in finding out whether their home is suitable for renewable energy systems, such as solar panels”:

Meanwhile, over a third said they would be willing to pay more for a house where some of the energy was supplied by renewable sources, suggesting that those investing in microgeneration systems will be able to recoup some of the cost through increased house prices.

The same should apply in this country, especially since a lot Americans understand energy prices are going up whether or not there is a climate bill.  The point is that as peak oil kicks in and the reality of human-caused climate change becomes painfully clear, energy efficiency, geothermal heat pumps, solar panels and the like will increasingly be seen as a desirable if not essential elements of a home, like an up-to-date kitchen, rather than just a “cost.”

The story on the from the Energy Saving Trust survey continues:

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Major U.S. companies must decide if they support clean energy, which delivers clean air and protects clean water for our children — or do they support the greedy corporate polluters?  This ThinkProgress post exposes another company trying to have it both ways.

On Labor Day, tens of thousands of people will be gathering for the coal-powered “Friends of America Rally” in Holden, WV. The point of the gathering is to rail against the Waxman-Markey clean energy legislation. It will feature right-wing guests such as Sean Hannity and Ted Nugent (who once ranted about killing Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton), and is being pushed by mountaintop-removal mining company Massey Energy. Last week, Massey CEO Don Blankenship even recorded a video inviting people to attend the rally, saying they would learn about how “environmental extremists and corporate America are both trying to destroy your jobs.” Watch it:

The sponsors for the rally are mostly regional oil, gas, and coal companies. However, the list also includes the Science and Public Policy Institute “” a fringe climate-denial organization “” and Verizon Wireless. CREDO Action recently launched a campaign calling on Verizon to drop its sponsorship. CREDO Political Director Becky Bond contacted Verizon’s Vice President of Corporate Communications Jim Gerace to inform him that that CREDO would be launching a campaign against Verizon. Gerace responded by disparaging Bond:

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