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Serious climate change

Started by jim king, December 18, 2010, 08:18:39 AM

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jim king

I have never heard this before, the arctic was once a jungle.

By ALICIA CHANG, AP Science Writer Alicia Chang, Ap Science Writer – Thu Dec 16, 2:21 pm ET

LOS ANGELES – On a remote island in the Canadian Arctic where no trees now grow, a newly unearthed mummified forest is giving researchers a peek into how plants reacted to ancient climate change.

That knowledge will be key as scientists begin to tease out the impacts of global warming in the Arctic.

The ancient forest found on Ellesmere Island, which lies north of the Arctic Circle in Canada, contained dried out birch, larch, spruce and pine trees. Research scientist Joel Barker of Ohio State University discovered it by chance while camping in 2009.
"At one point I crested a small ridge and the cliff face below me was just riddled with wood," he recalled.

Armed with a research grant, Barker returned this past summer to explore the site, which was buried by an avalanche 2 million to 8 million years ago. Melting snow recently exposed the preserved remains of tree trunks, leaves and needles.

About a dozen such frozen forests exist in the Canadian Arctic, but the newest site is farthest north.

The forest existed during a time when the Arctic climate shifted from being warmer than it is today to its current frigid state. Judging by the lack of diverse wood species and the trees' small leaves, the team suspected that plants at the site struggled to survive the rapid change from deciduous forest to evergreen.

"This community was just hanging on," said Barker, who presented his findings Thursday at the American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco.

The next step is to examine tree rings to better understand how past climate conditions stressed plant life and how the Arctic tundra ecosystem will respond to global warming.
Since 1970, temperatures have climbed more than 4.5 degrees in much of the Arctic, much faster than the global average.

Barker also plans to conduct DNA tests on the remains.

northwoods1

There have been many dinosaur fossils found north of the arctic circle which would seem to indicate climatic conditions were much different when they were around. But they have also found many different kinds in Antarctica. And from what I understand they were able to live in antarctica  , even at the south pole , only because at one time what is now the south pole was located near the equator and it has moved due to continental drift? Yes that is what the scientists say... ???
Around here where I live I am constantly reminded of how much the climate has changed in the last 20,000 years. Almost every land feature that exists here has been created by the receding and advance of the last glaciation, all this land here was covered under ice as deep as 1 mile thick and relatively not very long ago :o It is not uncommon to find trees under the layer of clay called The Valders Till, which is mostly 20-30 ' deep all along the eastern edge of this state. They were crushed and buried under the advancing ice, mostly all fir trees.

jim king

northwoods1 :

As I have said before I for one am quite pleased with climate change or my farm near Balsam Lake in Northern Wisconsin would still be under a mile of glacier as you said.

Toolman

Core samples drilled years ago found evidence of that. That is why there are huge oil reserves up there. You need plant and animal life to make it. I'm with Northwoods, if not for climate change, we certainly would'nt be living here right now.
"A government big enough to give you everything you want, is strong enough to take everything you have" (Thomas Jefferson)

Bandmill Bandit

Climate Change is an indisputable fact of evolutionary history.
Global warming is a figment of a scientific imagination that reside in a none winter climate. That 4.5 degree warmer temp occurred ONCE in 1998. The last 3 years have been colder, longer to the point that the Polar Bears, seals, Narwalls and other norther wild life have been stressed more than any of the few warmer years leading up to 1998  stressed them. Enviroment Canada's temp tracking in the north has that region at just a little colder ( half a degree or so)  now than it was in the 40s and 50s. That put the temp about 5 to 6 degrees colder than the propaganda would have us all believe. Just talk to any one working up there I the oil patch. They will tell you that the last 2 winters have been the coldest they have ever drilled in up there and this winter is setting up to make last winter look like a "holiday in Hawaii" . Snow fall seems to be less but the cold is deeper and longer according the people that work there.

   
Skilled Master Sawyer. "Skilled labour don't come cheap. Cheap labour dont come skilled!
2018 F150 FX4, Husqvarna 340, 2 Logright 36 inch cant hooks and a bunch of stuff I built myself

easymoney

 it is starting to be a colder winter in tennesse than in a lot of years past.
i wonder what explanation the folks that have been preaching globol warming will have for it.  they have been saying that the glaciers are melting and that the ocean waters is rising and soon some of the low lying cities will be under water.

SwampDonkey

There has been different finds up there for years, what was this a few metres/kilometres north of the last find?  ;)

Some of the hype you see in these so called documentaries on the north are a bit exaggerated. They are claiming some places never thawed, well they did maybe not every year. Take the site of the York Factory in Manitoba. That place has shifted and changed in the 200 years the site was established. The river has even shifted which is natural for any darn river long before cars, aeroplanes and coal fired electric plants. Heck, the HBC recorded in it's journals that they couldn't use the rivers in parts of the prairies to float furs down stream, they dried up about 160 years ago. Some summers later on they couldn't use paddle wheels on them. Suzuki said we were heading into global cooling back in the 70's. ::)
"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

Bandmill Bandit

Most of the Environmental crap is evaporating methane from the pile of BS that most of it is. Especially when It comes to atmospheric pollution. I do believe it is something that we need to be aware of and implement responsible stewardship to protect. How ever as has been the case through out history NO ONE is willing to address the real core issues. On this planet there is one system upon which all the rest depend for its life giving power to release their own life supporting power. Without it everything dies. If we look after that one resource everything else will look after it self because this resource is the one resource that the entire infrastructure of this planet is built on. It is the corner stone of all that lives. WATER. H2O.

no one is willing to step up to the plate and really be counted when it come to addressing the care of that resource.

The sun looks after a large portion of air borne pollutants that are light enough to be drawn to the outer layers of the atmospheric system through the "HOLES" over the polar regions. That why we have the Aurora Borealis and Australis. I wont go in to the science be hind it but it is profound and amazing and yet no one will talk about it because it contradicts the environmental pundits credibility.

Back to water
Sea water is the single most critical purifier for everything that supports life on this planet. While the rain forest are important there would be no rain  forest with out the massive kelp forests that occupy the ocean. The oceans produce between 60% and 70% of all our oxygen, Hydrogen and a log list of other elements and gases that make our air usable including methane. With out CO2 the rain forests would cease to exist as would the Kelp forests.

Now add to that the human factor that dumps all manner of synthesized man manipulated products in that system and you have a recipe for disaster. Add a few organization like Monsanto and Pfiser and a long list of other completely irresponsible organization that have ZERO regard for human life much less any other life form and you have a prefect environment for a prefect environmental disaster of proportions that would make the worst Nuclear disaster seem like a minor brush fire started by some careless camper.

I could write a book on this topic and i know i would get the support of most of the people on this forum.

I would ask all of you to look around your place of birth and life. How far do you need to look to see the effects of the chemistry that has become so common place on this planet? Tell me you don't see an ever increasing reduction in common native vegetation that was the habitat of so many of the little critters right on up to deer, moose, elk, bear, cougar and the rest. There are no sky scrapers for miles and yet the critters are gone. The brush is drastically reduced or gone. where is the silver sage, the wild roses, crocuses, buffalo beans etc etc  that were so common 50 years ago on the vast plains of this continent? 

It is not the hunters  that have caused those reductions and while urbanization has had an affect, it is not urbanization that has affected those animals 100s of miles from the nearest metropolitan area. Indeed many of those very critters are adapting to life in the city be cause we are make our metropolitan park and recreation areas free of the very chemistry that is destroying and emasculating our rural areas to a point that they will one day have a hard time supporting the wind that will sweep the desert that they will be come. The rain will be be driven by that wind but the water will have no life giving power be cause it will be a soup of man made chemistry that can not live or give that life to a dieing planet. With out the water we might as well have an H2S atmosphere. It wont matter. Clean up the water and the air will be purified because the water will be able to do the job it is designed to do.

     

         
Skilled Master Sawyer. "Skilled labour don't come cheap. Cheap labour dont come skilled!
2018 F150 FX4, Husqvarna 340, 2 Logright 36 inch cant hooks and a bunch of stuff I built myself

mrcaptainbob

Global warm is a FACT!!! Why else are there no more glaciers as far south as Kentucky?!! And Al is right. They're all gone now because of us! We've been depleting them for thousands of years before we were even here!

Bandmill Bandit

Oh Yes i did forget about all the farts produced by all that great southern cooking. That is the one thing i did not account for. :D
Skilled Master Sawyer. "Skilled labour don't come cheap. Cheap labour dont come skilled!
2018 F150 FX4, Husqvarna 340, 2 Logright 36 inch cant hooks and a bunch of stuff I built myself

Texas Ranger

Yup, those bean burritos are tough.
The Ranger, home of Texas Forestry

northwoods1

I'm always a little puzzled when I sit back and listen to people talk about global warming, climate change, the weather and this entire topic.

The discussion always seems to degenerate in to a lot of jokes about how cold it is here and there, "how could the globe be warming when it is so cold" "record snows" and "record cold" and the like... all that talk designed to give doubt to the theory that the globe is "warming."

more or less because they are making a political or social statement about who should run this country and how....

that is all a waste of time as far as I am concerned and I'll also say that the climatic changes that are occurring, have been occurring and will always be occurring on this planet is something

everyone needs to be concerned about!!

Anyone who wastes there time trying to disprove the idea of global warming is not spending there time very wisely. The fact is it is warming... and it is is cooling in places... but in a nutshell, it IS changing! And these changes are gonna effect everybody,, hello.... The way we live, what we eat, where we live, the whole ball of wax. This is not debatable at all, just a fact. Nothing to do with political parties.

I don't see enough people talking about the important issues they just want to take sides on the "global warming" issue... it shouldn't be about taking sides we should be talking about how we are going to adjust to the changes that are coming, who cares about why it is happening? Even if you don't think the climatic changes are caused by mankind they are still changes and they are still going to effect everyone on this planet. This is a fact! Plain and simple...

If a person looks into and learns about the changes in climate the earth has undergone in even the past few thousand years it is easy to see and apparent that there where times when the climate did change, and quickly at times. Why? Who knows... but it did.

Bandmill Bandit

Quote from: northwoods1 on December 19, 2010, 06:32:18 AM
I'm always a little puzzled when I sit back and listen to people talk about global warming, climate change, the weather and this entire topic.

If a person looks into and learns about the changes in climate the earth has undergone in even the past few thousand years it is easy to see and apparent that there where times when the climate did change, and quickly at times. Why? Who knows... but it did.

You are correct in most of your statement Northwoods but as a Canadian I really don't give 2 hoots who runs your country. Hell we cant even find some body to a half decent job of running this one and it has 1 tenth the people and about half a again as much land to look after. Quite frankly I don't think either of the parties in your country have the ability to run it either. Both parties have become exactly what it is they set sail to escape from on a little boat called the May Flower over 300 years ago. Our country is headed the same direction. Go figure! The more things change the more the are the same! the human race is not capable of pulling up its own socks regardless of how educated we THINK we are. so far EVERY society that has ever had the privilege of occupying the surface of this globe ultimate denigrates to the lowest possible common denominator and then vanishes from the planet. Following generations find the remnants of these great and powerful societies and then interpret what is buried in context of the time that they live in, through extrapolation and fanciful theories that are based on ASS U ME ptions perpetrated by people that never walked in the shoes of the people that lived back in the historical time. Are these theories right? Probably not! Are They wrong? probably not! So where does that leave us? We have no way of knowing for sure.

Hell we don't even know for sure what happened in Dallas TX on the November 23, 1963 and many of us on this site where sitting in a school room some where when it happened. All we know is that a man was shot and he died.  Once you attempt to get past that point, every thing else is speculation.          

Yes we need to be responsible in regards to climate change but the eternal evolution on this planet very cleary demonstrates that the human factor is in deed a non factor when it come to that issue.

Water how ever is another matter. The irresponsible chemistry that "We The People" are allowing will kill this entire planet long before climate change will have even a minute affect on how we live. Now that scares me.  
Skilled Master Sawyer. "Skilled labour don't come cheap. Cheap labour dont come skilled!
2018 F150 FX4, Husqvarna 340, 2 Logright 36 inch cant hooks and a bunch of stuff I built myself

barbender

The problem for me is when debates turn political, like Northwoods is saying. I can't tell fact from fiction in a lot of the climate change controversy because the parties sharing the information all have an agenda. I think the climate is changing, is it man made? Maybe a little, I don't really know. But I'm not getting behind some cap and trade policy some stand to get rich from. It's obvious to me that the climate has been in a constant state of fluctuation, really I'm more concerned about real pollution like mercury, fertilizers, people's lakeshore septics leaking into the lake, etc. We can't even get a handle on these types of things and we think we can go and alter the make up of the atmosphere?
Too many irons in the fire

mrcaptainbob

I agree, Barbender and Bandit....It's been going on for ever. Humans most likely affect it, but to what degree? (No pun intended..). I'm not a fan of indiscriminate waste, as I'm sure most of us feel that way, too. Using what's available is just a natural thing to do. The planet has and will change. Whether we like it or not.

Don_Papenburg

Global warming will flood the coastal towns ??  As the polar caps melt ?  No buy that house on the coast without worry .  You see as ice melts the water volume is smaller than in its solid form. Your beach property might even expand.
Frick saw mill  '58   820 John Deere power. Diamond T trucks

SwampDonkey

They say the Canadian Shield is still rebounding from the last ice sheet that slid across the continent. And it's about 40-100 km thick in places. Them big lakes out in the midwest are getting shallower they say. ;D I think someone pulled the drain plug if you ask me. If I was going to run from the sea, I guess I would head to the high spot of the Shield, which was the first dry land after the first flood. ;)
"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

DouginUtah


Don,

It's not the ice that is already in the oceans, it's the ice/snow that is on land that could melt and raise the ocean's levels, i.e., Greenland and Antarctica. There is a tremendous amount of frozen water on Antarctica. At one time I thought that ice melting would be trivial as far as raising the level of the oceans so I did the calculations and was surprised at what the effect would be.   
-Doug
When you hang around with good people, good things happen. -Darrell Waltrip

There is no need to say 'unleaded regular gas'. It's all unleaded. Just say 'regular gas'. It's not the 70s anymore. (At least that's what my wife tells me.)

---

Toolman

The idea that these politicians think that they can stop something that has been occuring since this planet was born is unbeleivable arrogance. We can be responsible stewards without getting extreme and resorting to environmental socialism. One major volcanic eruption on this planet could be all it takes to change this planet for hundreds of years. It's happened many times before. This planet could shake us off as quickly as a dog shakes off water from his fur. This planet has changed,will continue changing and there is'nt a *DanG thing we can do about it.
"A government big enough to give you everything you want, is strong enough to take everything you have" (Thomas Jefferson)

Gilman

If all of the ice on Antarctic and Greenland melted (5.4E6 + 0.6E6 mi^3 of ice) and the ocean area didn't increase then the oceans would raise by 22 feet (7 meters)
WM LT70, WM 40 Super, WM  '89 40HD
Cat throwing champion 1996, 1997, 1999. (retired)

Warbird

Quote from: Gilman on December 21, 2010, 12:30:42 PM
If all of the ice on Antarctic and Greenland melted (5.4E6 + 0.6E6 mi^3 of ice) and the ocean area didn't increase then the oceans would raise by 22 feet (7 meters)

No they wouldn't.  You have not calculated in the land masses shifting and raising due to the billions of tons of ice that are no longer weighing them down.

Kansas

I still go back to the same thing I said on another thread. I don't know if carbon dioxide emissions are causing global warming. I really don't care. Lets use those emissions and create oil from algae. Pull the plug on Chavez and the Arabs. The technology is there. If we use that CO2 then it becomes irrelevant whether it is the cause of it. Plus we don't have to put our soldiers in harms way defending the Middle East. Not to mention drastically improve our trade imbalance.

SPIKER

Quote from: Kansas on December 21, 2010, 01:14:22 PM
I still go back to the same thing I said on another thread. I don't know if carbon dioxide emissions are causing global warming. I really don't care. Lets use those emissions and create oil from algae. Pull the plug on Chavez and the Arabs. Not to mention drastically improve our trade imbalance.

at current design stages getting fuel of any real amounts from the algae growing is still all wet :D  ::)   While it can be useful in an experimentation stages and could make use of vast south west dry areas that are full of sun the ability and costs to keep air CO2 going into and through the water systems costs a great deal of power that must be generated.   Using that power to generate Hydrogen is a better more direct use for a fuel source.   that hydrogen can be burnt, or stuffed through fuel cell tech and turned into electricity remotely.   

We would be far better off to begin making synthetic diesel fuel with Nat Gas and converting new production vehicles to a straight Nat Gas as a fuel.   Check up on RTK stock (RENTECK) company making jet and car/truck ready drop in diesel using a process known as "Fischer-tropic" and can make fuel with just about any type of carbon feed stock including residential trash, commercial trash such as Bag-ass from sugar cane making.  then CLNE is Clean Energy (think Boone Pickens guy) which is the company converting cars & trucks to run on Nat Gas directly and also make the fueling stations to re-fill the cars/trucks.  both are lower carbon footprint companies.  There are several others but these two seem to be farther ahead on the actual production phases.

Mark
I'm looking for help all the shrinks have given up on me :o

SwampDonkey

I thought Pickens threw in the towel, no Government handouts.
"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

Brucer

Quote from: Gilman on December 21, 2010, 12:30:42 PM
If all of the ice on Antarctic and Greenland melted (5.4E6 + 0.6E6 mi^3 of ice) and the ocean area didn't increase then the oceans would raise by 22 feet (7 meters)

Check your numbers, Gilman. My ice volume calculations are in the same ballpark, but when I divide by the surface of the worlds oceans, I get an ocean rise about 10 times as high -- either that or the earth is about 24,000 miles in diameter.   :D

Greenland ice alone would cause the oceans to rise 7 metres (20+ feet) if it were all deposited in the ocean. That's enough to incapacitate every major seaport in the world.

Quote from: Warbird on December 21, 2010, 12:42:55 PM
No they wouldn't.  You have not calculated in the land masses shifting and raising due to the billions of tons of ice that are no longer weighing them down.

Which would make the situation worse. But current thinking is that it will take a very long time for the land masses to rebound.

Quote from: Kansas on December 21, 2010, 01:14:22 PM
Lets use those emissions and create oil from algae.

There's a lot of good research going on with "oilgae". It has a number of things going for it:

  • it can be made using seawater.
  • it uses atmospheric CO2 and sunlight, so it won't increase atmospheric CO2 significantly.
  • it would use the massive existing infrastructure that we use to distribute liquid hydrocarbon fuels. Experts talk a lot about electric vehicles and fuel cell vehicles, but the don't mention the problems of distributing the electricity and hydrogen.
  • there are plenty of suitable locations in North America to grow and process it.

It's not the whole solution by any means, but it's an important part of the picture.
Bruce    LT40HDG28 bandsaw
"Complex problems have simple, easy to understand wrong answers."

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