[lbo-talk] NO TIME FOR CLIMATE CHANGE?

[Nicholas Roberts]

*NO TIME FOR CLIMATE CHANGE?*  The climate conference in Durbin seems to be
earning more derision than these things normally do. This stems from
frustration with governments' inaction on the part of most normal people,
and dismissal of climate change science altogether by the goon squads right
wing. (Now it's reported that John Huntsman, formerly known as the only
sane candidate in the GOP race, has flipped on climate change.) But from the
panel of scientists that study climate change <http://www.ipcc.ch/> came
this last week regarding extreme events as a result of climate change.
Co-chair Thomas Stocker was speaking:

I now would like to summarize the most important findings:

       • It is very likely that the number of extreme warm days and nights
has increased worldwide since 1950, and this is likely due to the increase
of greenhouse gas concentrations.

       • In the future, for the higher emissions scenarios, what is today a
1-in-20 year hottest day will become a 1-in-2 year event. This means the
frequency of these extreme events will increase by a factor of about 4 in
the next 30 to 40 years and by a factor of 10 by the end of the 21st
century.

       • In consequence, heat waves are projected to very likely last
longer, to occur more frequently and to increase in intensity.

       • Heavy precipitation has intensified on a global scale and with
medium confidence this is already attributed to anthropogenic climate
change. It is likely that a 1-in-20 year event of heavy precipitation will
become a 1-in-5 to 1-in-15 year event by the end of the 21st century.

       • Tropical cyclone activity is in the focus of many countries
because their impact can be devastating. While there is low confidence of
observed long-term trends over the past four decades, is likely that
maximum wind speed will increase in the 21 century in response to the
warming.

       • More intense and longer droughts have been observed in some
regions, and there is medium confidence that they will intensify in the
21st century, particularly in S Europe, in the Mediterranean, Central North
America and Mexico, NE Brazil and Southern Africa.

http://www.johntirman.com/

http://web.mit.edu/cis/tirman.html