As if we didn’t already have enough to worry about….
Excerpts from the New Scientist
Warming oceans could cause Earth’s axis to tilt in the coming century, a new study suggests. The effect was previously thought to be negligible, but researchers now say the shift will be large enough that it should be taken into account when interpreting how the Earth wobbles.
The Earth spins on an axis that is tilted some 23.5° from the vertical. But this position is far from constant – the planet’s axis is constantly shifting in response to changes in the distribution of mass around the Earth. “The Earth is like a spinning top, and if you put more mass on one side or other, the axis of rotation is going to shift slightly,” says Felix Landerer of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.
The influx of fresh water from shrinking ice sheets also causes the planet to pitch over. Landerer and colleagues estimate that the melting of Greenland’s ice is already causing Earth’s axis to tilt at an annual rate of about 2.6 centimetres – and that rate may increase significantly in the coming years.
Now, they calculate that oceans warmed by the rise in greenhouse gases can also cause the Earth to tilt – a conclusion that runs counter to older models, which suggested that ocean expansion would not create a large shift in the distribution of the Earth’s mass.
…
The team found that as the oceans warm and expand, more water will be pushed up and onto the Earth’s shallower ocean shelves. Over the next century, the subtle effect is expected to cause the northern pole of Earth’s spin axis to shift by roughly 1.5 centimetres per year in the direction of Alaska and Hawaii.
The effect is relatively small. “The pole’s not going to drift away in a crazy manner,” Landerer notes, adding that it shouldn’t induce any unfortunate feedback in Earth’s climate.
…
And climate change can also affect the Earth’s spin. Previously, Landerer and colleagues showed that global warming would cause Earth’s mass to be redistributed towards higher latitudes.
Journal reference: Geophysical Research Letters (in press)
full story here
hmm. New Scientist sure aint nuffin like da Old Scientist. When so, just imagine how little progress we would have had!
Check this out, especially No 59
http://www.scribd.com/doc/18773744/How-to-Publish-a-Scientific-Comment-in-1-2-3-Easy-Steps
“Patrick Davis (00:23:17) :
What about continental drift, growing the Atlantice and shrinking the Pacific? What about tectonic plate action, shifting land masses around, for example Australia is now slightly further north than it was 150 years ago? What about the growth in the distance between the Earth and the Moon? All miniscule changes, but what effects? Who knows!
This is all mind bogglingly silly IMO…Copenhagen is still a long way away plenty of time for more disaster “studies”.
And when the polls shift polarity….
Reply: Was that a really really clever pun, or just an accidental spelling Malaprop? I’m thinking the latter, but it is still brilliant. ~ charles the moderator”
You are right, accidental spelling. I often don’t have much time to respond to articles, a quick blast on the keys and then submit and I am not that clever with words *sigh* though, I am glad it worked.
2.6 cms shift per year=
1 degree per 4.3 millions years
but shhhhhhh 🙂
This Warming hysteria is getting really annoying.
http://www.trekkingexpedition.com
You guys think this is a big joke, but look at that North Pole Cam! Clearly, the Pole is tipping, and will soon slide off the edge of the earth. Something Must Be Done. (send money)
Best,
Frank
Re: a new wobble to our planet, it was but one year and one day ago I pondered the very idea and asked the following question, as recorded at: http://derspatz.blogspot.com/2008/08/burbles-and-wobbles.html
“Anyone got any kind of idea as to how much ice has to turn to water (with accompanying changes in water temperature and current directions, etc) in the far North in comparison to how much water has to turn to ice in the far South before this spinning mis-shappen ball we live upon must naturally see a change to its axis wobble due to weight redistribution ?”
Looks like I’m about to get my answer at long last !
regarDS
to: P Walker (08:32:45)
the series of c02 measurements from 1810-1961 haven’t been debunked. They are scientifically valid real-time measurements from that period – more accurate as a measure of atmospheric c02 than ice core proxies. Ice core proxies show trends between c02 and temperature, the latter leading the former by quite a few hundred years, although they don’t represent exact c02 measurements.
I’d imagine they’re discounted by the IPCC as they directly contradict the popular thesis which states c02 has soared dramatically since the Industrial period. What we in fact find is regular c02 measurements of 450ppm in the northern hemisphere before the 20th century, which often appear greater than contemporary measurements of aerial c02. However, Ernst Beck’s isn’t the only review of this data…..
Why oh why do people get it so wrong?
I mean, anybody knows that the earth doesn’t wobble. My bicycle wobbles, and I feel that easily enough. So I am sure that if something as big as the earth was wobbling, we would all feel it.
Richard (15:08:05) : Re: augdra (12:33:09) : – oops the shadow would be 0.11 metres less if you were 60 N, 0.15 m less if you were 75 N, and less less, if further south, on 21st September, from 1999. Not a great deal really and the sun would be 0.05 degrees further to the west, not noticeable.
I would say that your grass is probably better because of better watering and fertiliser.
What a joke !
Global warming has been created to Tax the population – the earth is actually cooling and has been since the temp peak 10 years ago……….funny how that is published!
Water finds it’s own natural level so come on think about – how the hell could one side of the earth have more weight than the other due to excessive water!
OT, but how’s this for unusual cloud forms…
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/whats-the-story-morning-glory-20090825-exlt.html
Awesome.
Barry Foster (14:28:13) :
“Mercury is bad for the environment.”
But now they’re making us use mercury vapour light bulbs.
But they’d really rather that we didn’t use any at all.
these ‘scientists’ should have their computers and climate models taken away from them, it might force them to go outside and see the real world.
If you visit the New Scientist article from which this post originated, there are about 150+ comments…of which almost half have been deleted as violations. That is “This comment breached our terms of use and has been removed”.
It got real mean in that blog the past two days until the moderators finally looked at the AGWers going at it with the skeptics. It was fun !! Who spoiled it?
Mike Strong (08:53:41) :I have just seen your web page. You are losing money!, you are the right person to make “Global Warming-The End of the world”, “the greatest and most terrific entertainment for you and your family”, or whatever you imagine, after Gordo Al fantasies.
John Galt (13:24:37) :
It could happen. Almost anything could happen and the precautionary principle demands we do whatever it takes to prevent something from happing that could happen, correct?
Runaway global warming could happen.
Runaway global cooling could happen.
Preventing one could cause the other!! I’m so confusticated!
Nogw (11:43:11).
About Gordo Al Fantasies. We ex-Imagineers thought we would make one of our attactions about global warming and maybe add in a new thrill ride where you sit on top of a big globe of the earth (like the subject of this posting so I am not OT)….where you wobble and spin (sort of like one of those bull ride things at country-western bars…and you whirl around until you fall off onto a nearly melted mock Arctic iceberg…with starving polar bears on it waiting to feed. Only to be rescued by another Catlin expedition…who were even hungier than the polar bears…with steak knives in hand.
The writers rejected the idea as being too Gorey.
Get it? Gorey.
(I just made myself chuckle… oh stop….hehehehe…)
>>>New Scientist is actually hurting themselves.
>>>Think of the controversy (and units sold) if they
>>>printed an article that provides balance.
Damn, damn good point. They are not only supporting a non-scientific agenda, but committing commercial suicide too.
But then there are many organisations who are doing likewise.
The UK Met Office has recently lost their Tesco (big supermarket) forecasting contract, due to their inability to predict cooling.
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/retailing/article6806373.ece
And what about most governments? Most have tied their flag to the AGW mast – so what happens when we get frost fairs on the Thames, for instance. Do entire governments topple too??
..
I raised the idea that during the LIA when the Earth appeared to have passed through a meteor swarm, as recorded in the Korean Choson Annals, that it’s axial orientation might have been changed slightly causing the observed cessation of the MWP from Greenland and other European countries suddenly finding themselves in higher latitudes than previously.
In terms of the Plasma Model, the forces to do this are available.
Tim Lambert however, decided it was the worst global warming argument ever.
🙂
“”” Steve M. (12:31:44) :
John Galt (13:24:37) :
It could happen. Almost anything could happen and the precautionary principle demands we do whatever it takes to prevent something from happing that could happen, correct?
Runaway global warming could happen.
Runaway global cooling could happen.
Preventing one could cause the other!! I’m so confusticated! “””
If we had religiously followed the precautionary principle; we would still be clambering around in fig trees; trying to beat the monkeys to the tastiest free green renewable energy source; and probably the termites or cockroaches would be debating global warming.
George
So AGW over-rides the Law of Conservation of Angular Momentum now? Granted redistribution of a little mass on a rotating body will change the angular velocity, I see no physical reason that the orientation of the total angular momentum pseudovector should change. This can ONLY occur as a result of an applied EXTERNAL force such as the gravitation of the Sun, Moon, or other planets. Such forces are already well characterized and affect the orbital eccentricity and obliquity as well as the rotational axis and precession. There is no known physical mechanism short of directed energy outputs that can allow an _internal change_ of a body to have such an effect.
Warming?what warming?Melting ice?and it just freezes again in the winter.
Ha ha,get a life.
Wuddyamean “could” cause a tilt? Anyone with eyes to see with can tell that we’re wobbling pretty good and have been since 2006!
Google “sun too far north”
Check out divulgence.net
check out eh2r dot com
check out:
http://www.isuma.tv/lo/en/inuit-knowledge-and-climate-change-project/earth-has-shifted
Many of us have seen a very noticeable change in sun rise/set location as well as lunar orbit variance for awhile now. And come Dec. 21st of this year, MANY more will pry their lids open to the issue. The sun isn’t supposed to come up THAT far south is it? And don’t bother responding with the old:
“Who you gonna believe, ME or those under educated lying eyes of yours?”
Soon, the emperor’s moth ridden clothes will be donated to the Good Will….if they’ll have them.