Deadly collision? Really? This must be before they remove all the automobiles from London per the recent edict from the EU/EC. The author must have suffered through too many “BBQ summer” heat waves in the London tube.
Here’s more:
“We are seeing how urbanisation is growing – we have passed the threshold of 50% (of the world’s population living in urban areas),” he told BBC News.
“There are no signs that we are going to diminish this path of growth, and we know that with urbanisation, energy consumption is higher.
According to UN data, an estimated 59% of the world’s population will be living in urban areas by 2030.
Every year, the number of people who live in cities and town grows by 67 million each year – 91% of this figure is being added to urban populations in developing countries.
The main reasons why urban areas were energy intensive, the UN report observed, was a result of increased transport use, heating and cooling homes and offices, as well as economic activity to generate income.
The report added that as well as cities’ contribution to climate change, towns and cities around the globe were also vulnerable to the potential consequences, such as:
- Increase in the frequency of warm spells/heat waves over most land areas
- Greater number of heavy downpours
- Growing number of areas affected by drought
- Increase in the incidence of extremely high sea levels in some parts of the world
The first two are effects of UHI, especially downwind of city enhanced precipitation effects. The last two have nothing to do with city growth at all.
But who are you to believe, the UN or the lying eyes of the satellites and the data they produce?
Anyone can measure their city UHI effect themselves. It makes a great science fair project.
Of course, my friend Jim Goodridge, former California State Climatologist, had this nailed in 1996 with his study of surface temperature in California:
The full BBC scare story is here h/t to a bunch of people, you know who you are.
I used to get BBC World as one of my subscribed cable channels. I eventually got tired of their biased reporting and removed them from my channel lineup. No more money from me.
In other shock news, a recent study has shown that the world’s industrialised nations contain approximately 100% of the world’s industry, providing a strong correlation with other studies that confirm the world’s populated regions contain approximately 100% of the world’s population. The most robust models available indicate that within a decade these regions could be responsible for 272% of global emissions, unless steps are taken to reduce economic activity to optimal levels (ie none). Bah.
What nonsense. But no surprise coming from the AGW alarmists and the BBC. Surely the best way to reduce the human footprint on the planet is to all live in skyscrapers.
They have clearly identified the enemies of Gaia: too many people, and unacceptable levels of economic growth. The solution is clear: cull billions of people, and the problem of excessive growth will resolve itself. There is no other way of satisfying their needs. I feel a reductio ad Hitlerum moment coming on.
Hi Josh Grella, thanks for your answer. I understand the concept of UHI but was wondering about how it applied in a colder climate than I live in where it rarely goes below freezing for more than a few hours at a time. When friends ask me why I don’t believe in Climate Change (or whatever it’s called today) I like to have data and knowledge to argue my case rather than blind faith. Cheers, Lilacwine.
Aren’t these the same people arguing in the UK that those who live in rural areas should pay a special tax, because their lifestyle isn’t as efficient as living in the city, and provides them with ‘unfair’ quality of living benefits?
You just can’t win with these people.
We Americans use about 70% of our water in the bathroom. That is WAY too much. We need to look for ways to use more water in other rooms. To bring that percentage down, I suggest taking a hose to our sofas and large screen T.V.s.
“Cities ignore climate change at their peril”
This sounds like a threat from the 10:10 people.
“Urban areas are set to become the battleground in the global effort to curb climate change”
I wonder if they’ve considered a new film telling urban dwellers to get with the program or we’ll be forced to try nuclear winter on your cities. …. No Pressure.
The astroturfing on the local level TomRude references is UN Agenda 21 Communitarianism in action. Like the integration of Europe under the EU, and North America under NAFTA and the North American Union, the agenda is implemented gradually by stealth and anyone questioning it is called a loon or conspiracy theorist. Then once it’s essentially in place they simply announce the program, as if everything’s normal.
Communitarianism means balancing individual rights against the perceived welfare of the greater whole. Under this approach, all resources belong to the collective and unelected czars and apparatchiks decide the price of everything – and indeed, who will have and have not.
Back to the Beeb, last night I watched the first episode of Human Earth, a BBC-produced documentary. As I watched I kept wondering when it would invoke the “climate change” and “rising sea level” scaremongering. Sure enough, it categoricaly stated that sea levels are rising at unprecedented levels, and concluded with the narrator wondering aloud how humans will cope as we “change the climate and environment.” Disgusting propaganda placement in an otherwise beautifully produced film.
“Lilacwine says:
March 29, 2011 at 8:55 am
Is there a temperature below which UHI has no effect?”
To add to what Josh Grella says:
March 29, 2011 at 11:30 am
Let us assume that all buildings in a city are kept at 72 F. The greater the difference in temperature between 72 F and the outside temperature, the greater the UHI effect. When it is colder outside, houses warm the air more. When it is warmer outside, then air conditioners will make the city still warmer than without air conditioners. Then human beings emit heat. The greater the difference between 98.6 F and the outside temperature, the more human beings affect the UHI. Of course we bundle up when it gets cold so we lose less heat. But still, unless the temperature is above our body temperature, we emit some heat into the surroundings. Then there are vehicles. The running engines are much warmer than any air temperature could be, so extra cars will always cause more heat. So I would say the UHI is always there, but it is minimized when the outside temperature is between 70 and 80 F. (I am sure much more can be added to this response.)
As Werner details above, the effects of UHI would be magnified by temperature extremes. Buildings are not perfect insulators (indeed, far from it, and I can dig out the thermal images to prove it), so when they are being heated to well above the ambient temperature there will be a lot of heat lost from the buildings and to the surrounding atmosphere.
When hot, building materials reflect and re-radiate heat much more than vegetated areas (you can feel this effect just by standing close to a brick or concrete wall that has been exposed to direct sunlight). Also, AC works by dumping the extra heat out to the atmosphere.
So Werner is correct that the effect of urban heating through heat escape from buildings is at its minimum when the ambient temperature is in the comfortable range for people (I think his numbers are a tad high, since building interiors are a bit warmer than the surroundings, so the amount of heat lost from buildings is at a minumum at between about 15 and 20 deg C, about 65 to 75 deg F).
There will still be some effect because of reflected and re-radiated heat, but this effect increases with higher temperatures, amount of sunshine and during evenings where this short-term ‘stored’ energy is re-radiating into a cooling atmosphere.
Oh, and as for complaining to the BBC about their presentation of climate change science, forget it as they will make reference to IPCC data as the gospel (I made a complaint a few years ago about a report linking coastal erosion on the east coast of England to warming and sea level rise – anyone that knows the geology and geography of this area knows that erosion is simply a fact of life there and that any rate change with sea level rise and storm action is so trivial as to be lost in the noise).
Idiots. We dont live in urban areas because they require more water and energy, we live there because they provide more water, energy, and etc.
Abundant potable water and abundant energy are the major advantages of our urban lifestyles.
What this article actually reveals is the same old “kill all the humans!” Green-Eugenics-Primitives axis of evil that mankind has been fighting since our arrival on this planet.
Those of you who are familiar with the BBC’s far more USEFUL offering – ‘Fawlty Towers’ – might just be tempted to think that this report falls under the heading of Basil Fawlty’s ‘department of the bleedin’ obvious’….
Thanks Werner and Ian for the extra information. Whilst I understood what UHI did to temperature readings, the effects in hot versus cold weather needed some clarification in my head. Thanks very much for clearing it up. 🙂
“Lilacwine says:
March 30, 2011 at 12:33 pm
Thanks Werner”
You are welcome! For much more, see
http://joannenova.com.au/2011/02/the-urban-heat-island-effect-could-africa-be-more-affected-than-the-us/
I wonder if randomengineer has contemplated the energy use and requirements of the same population dispersed over the countryside — and the consequent loss of arable land, besides. It is notoriously true that cities arise where the best farming was, and already take highly productive land out of the agri-picture. How does he think spreading, say, Tokyo’s 30 million onto Japan’s (extremely limited) farmland would work out?
I think random is becoming more jumbled as time goes on.
Correction, I was thinking of Mexico city’s population. Here’s Tokyo (~13 million):
Is this more control-mentality stuff? Politicians think they can manipulate people by “planning” (for them) in buildings, even parks. Yet they usually make a mess.
(Ludwig von Mises explained that in his book “Planned Chaos”, with examples of how it leads to tyranny, including National Socialist Germany in the first half of the twentieth century.)