From a Georgia Tech Press Release:
Reducing Greenhouse Gases May Not Be Enough to Slow Climate Change
Georgia Tech City and Regional Planning Professor Brian Stone publishes a paper in the December edition of Environmental Science and Technology that suggests policymakers need to address the influence of global deforestation and urbanization on climate change, in addition to greenhouse gas emissions.
According to Stone’s paper, as the international community meets in Copenhagen in December to develop a new framework for responding to climate change, policymakers need to give serious consideration to broadening the range of management strategies beyond greenhouse gas reductions alone.
“Across the U.S. as a whole, approximately 50 percent of the warming that has occurred since 1950 is due to land use changes (usually in the form of clearing forest for crops or cities) rather than to the emission of greenhouse gases,” said Stone. “Most large U.S. cities, including Atlanta, are warming at more than twice the rate of the planet as a whole – a rate that is mostly attributable to land use change. As a result, emissions reduction programs – like the cap and trade program under consideration by the U.S. Congress – may not sufficiently slow climate change in large cities where most people live and where land use change is the dominant driver of warming.”
According to Stone’s research, slowing the rate of forest loss around the world, and regenerating forests where lost, could significantly slow the pace of global warming.
“Treaty negotiators should formally recognize land use change as a key driver of warming,” said Stone. “The role of land use in global warming is the most important climate-related story that has not been widely covered in the media.”
Stone recommends slowing what he terms the “green loss effect” through the planting of millions of trees in urbanized areas and through the protection and regeneration of global forests outside of urbanized regions. Forested areas provide the combined benefits of directly cooling the atmosphere and of absorbing greenhouse gases, leading to additional cooling. Green architecture in cities, including green roofs and more highly reflective construction materials, would further contribute to a slowing of warming rates. Stone envisions local and state governments taking the lead in addressing the land use drivers of climate change, while the federal government takes the lead in implementing carbon reduction initiatives, like cap and trade programs.
“As we look to address the climate change issue from a land use perspective, there is a huge opportunity for local and state governments,” said Stone. “Presently, local government capacity is largely unharnessed in climate management structures under consideration by the U.S. Congress. Yet local governments possess extensive powers to manage the land use activities in both the urban and rural areas.”
The Environmental Science and Technology article is available at http://pubs.acs.org/journal/esthag.
For more on land use change in the USA, see this NASA resource
Temperature variation is just temperature variation and for the sake of the debate and to help eliminate confusion, all we need to do is concentrate on CO2 only. Nothing else matters.
So the question becomes:
How does CO2 trap in heat?
Answer: It doesn’t.
No substance traps in heat. Therefore CO2 cannot cause an increase in temperature. Sure if temperature increases due to an increase in the Suns output the gasses such as Oxygen Nitrogen and perhaps CO2 will absorb more of that energy but none of them can trap that energy. That would be impossible. NO SUBSTANCE CAN TRAP IN HEAT.
For a comprehensive examination of how CO2 does not increase temperature with more than 20,000 words dedicated to the subject get CO2 The Debate Is Not Over, as a free .pdf download here
http://www.spinonthat.com/CO2.html
50% from land use changes…the other 50% is split between a more active sun and rural surface station dropout. 🙂
Land use and land cover effects are local and while they would have an effect on local temperature readings, they would not have any significant impact on global temperatures.
This is just reinforcement for why we should stop using temperature measurements as a metric global heating or cooling. This study doesn’t give any insight that hasn’t already been repeated many times by Roger Pilke, Sr.
According to Stone’s research, slowing the rate of forest loss around the world, and regenerating forests where lost, could significantly slow the pace of global warming.
If this is true, why do the Green Warmists work overtime ruining every attempt at re-forestation in the Pacific Northwest?
What used to happen: People chained themselves to trees to save the forest
Whan now happens: People file lawsuits to make sure forest salvage and replanting efforts are stopped dead in their tracks.
It makes no sense at all, what these fanatics are doing.
How did we end up with Green Anti-Tree Lawsuits?
I get what a Tree Hugger is doing.
I don’t get what a Tree Torter is doing.
Could someone explain the logic behind preventing forests from being replanted?
Bah, humbug. All I get from this summary is another iteration of the usual obsessive compulsive controllist’s wet dream, with humanity’s technological development as the villian.
Such people allege they are trying to “save” us, or something equally grandiose, when, if they actually had any ethics, they should have just stuck to repetitively washing their own hands and left the rest of us alone.
Around here where I live, for example, the noble “land use” controllists – who want to save the large predators, or whatever else they alone decide is “natural” – want to turn the whole county back to “pre-white” conditions. You can’t make this stuff up, but they sure can.
Changing the earth’s albedo, plastering the surface of the earth with concrete and asphalt, cutting trees increase the urban heat island effect, and this accounts for most of the measured warming since the 1950’s. And that’s before we go back and calculate the UHI bias in the US temp record (thanks for the weather station siting study, AW).
Duh.
G. Karst (09:14:57) : Al Gore causes Cooling not Warming.
I also second Chip Knappenberger’s point about heat related mortality.
AGW is looking a lot like the plot of “The Producers”, where the crooked Boradway promoters sold interests in 1000% of their great musical.
IT’S A CYCLE,IT’S A CYCLE,IT’S A CYCLE,IT’S A CYCLE, IT’S A CYCLE, Do you get the picture now or do I need to repeat.
“Treaty negotiators should formally recognize land use change as a key driver of warming,” said Stone.
This statement is not credible, but one cannot look sensible suggesting less trees & more pavement is a good idea.
“rbateman (10:04:46) : Whan now happens: People file lawsuits to make sure forest salvage and replanting efforts are stopped dead in their tracks.”
I was unaware of this. Do you have specific references?
“Across the U.S. as a whole, approximately 50 percent of the perceived warming that has occurred since 1950 is due to land use changes”…
There. Fixed.
From the article: “Stone recommends slowing what he terms the “green loss effect” through the planting of millions of trees in urbanized areas and through the protection and regeneration of global forests outside of urbanized regions.”
You all do know that this means vacating the rights of property owners so the government can take over and save us from ourselves, right?
We live in truly insane times. It is too often depressing and the fish are no longer biting here in New Hampshire so I can’t go fishing and forget about it for awhile.
Have we become but census-takers perched atop a giant petard?
Well then, we should stop recycling, because recycling slows down the replanting of forests by paper companies.
OT seems the NZ climate scientists have learnt a lesson from big Al’s conference with journalists technique. Ian Wishart. Author of Air Con was disconnected during a teleconference call.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/environment/3054281/Muted-Wishart-angry-at-scientists
re Woodfish
Make sure those trees are not eucalypts as they seem to cause localised sudden warmings.
For the list add another 50% for wind driven changes in sea-surface emissivity.
50% from land use.
50% from location error
50% from aerosol cleanup
50% from CO2
50% from Solar cycles
50% from cosmic ray changes
50% from orbital changes
50% from planet attitude (tilt)
50% from ozone
50% from water vapor
50% from Al Gore
Is this Mann Maths again?
Nice article
Rural Land use (forests, crops etc) and Urban land use (buildings, roads people etc) both make a substantial contribution. I am inclined to think UHI is the biggest factor in temperature rises in the increasingly urbanised ‘global’ temperatures from Giss and Hadley.
The UHI effect was noted as far back as Ancient Rome. At 1.5 million this was a huge city by the standards of the time. From statements by Pliny the Elder and entreaties to Nero to ‘provide narrow streets with high houses to provide shade’ the Ancient Romans were fully aware of the UHI effect, designed their city accordingly, and there are many records of the great and the good leaving it for the cool of the surrounding country in the summer.
In my opinion it is UHI we ought be addressing- not co2- assuming UHi is a problem. Many Northern European cities are glad of the extra heat but this would not apply to all urbanisations.
tonyb.
What warming since 1950 ? According to the ” 2009 Shaping Up ” thread , temps have remained relatively flat since 1900 . In the US , at least . As for Atlanta , well the ATL is an urban blister that has spread dramatically across North Georgia for at least forty of the last fifty years . Oh , and Georgia Tech is right in the middle of it .
Aren’t the large cities excluded from the record already. They only use rural stations don’t they? “Most large U.S. cities, including Atlanta, are warming at more than twice the rate of the planet as a whole…” So the UHI exists; otherwise, they would not exclude any records. At the same time people say that UHI does not exist…
Oi!
Thank God we did not have cities nor farms before 1950!
John M Reynolds
hunter (10:47:44) :
AGW is looking a lot like the plot of “The Producers”, where the crooked Boradway promoters sold interests in 1000% of their great musical.
And the play was so terrible – people found it hilarious! Where’s Mr. Brooks when we need him?
Off topic, admittedly, but here are excerpts from a letter from American Geophysial Union reps to AGU members:
“I am writing to encourage hundreds of you to participate in a unique opportunity to improve the public’s climate knowledge during the week before and the week of this year’s AGU Fall Meeting.
As you know, the Copenhagen negotiations (Dec. 7-18) are attracting hundreds of journalists and will result in a proliferation of media articles about climate change. Recently, the American public’s “belief” in climate change has waned (36% think humans are warming the earth according to the Pew Center’s October poll), and December’s media blitz provides an opportunity to reverse the trend.”
“If you have any questions, feel free to email Stacy Jackson at the email address below. ************@berkeley.edu.”
Not forgetting the 50% of warming caused by the invisible giant mutant space goat’s methane emissions.
***************
Rod Smith (09:04:59) :
I notice a new, at least to me, phrase in the next-to-last paragraph.
“Climate Management.”
****************
I’d call it something more like climate scientist hubris.