Eric Worrall writes: The British and Icelandic MET offices are expressing concern about the possible effect on the climate, of a potentially enormous volcanic eruption in Iceland.
According to The Express, a UK daily newspaper;
“BRITAIN could freeze in YEARS of super-cold winters and miserable summers if the erupts, experts have warned.
Britain could face a freezing winter if the Icelandic volcano erupts Britain could face a freezing winter if the Icelandic volcano erupts.
Depending on the force of the explosion, minute particles thrust beyond the earth’s atmosphere can trigger DECADES of chaotic weather patterns.
…
The first effect could be a bitterly cold winter to arrive in weeks with thermometers plunging into minus figures and not rising long before next summer.
The Icelandic Met Office has this week warned of “strong indications of ongoing magma movement” around the volcano prompting them to raise the aviation warning to orange, the second highest and sparking fears the crater could blow at any moment.”
The Bardarbunga eruption could yet be a fizzle – the climatic damage caused by the eruption very much depends on the scale of the eruption, the amount of sulphates and ash hurled into the atmosphere, and even the direction of upper atmospheric wind patterns.
But the potential for serious disruption to the climate – and potentially severe impact on Northern Hemisphere food production, even a new year of food shortages, such as occurred in 1815, cannot be dismissed.
The only silver lining is that, since Iceland is in the far North, the southern hemisphere will be to some extent insulated against any climatic disruption – so unlike the disasters in the 1700s and 1815, it should be possible for food from the south to help mitigate the effects of Northern crop failures.
One thing for sure – Dr. Bob Carter was right, when he warned that the world is unprepared for the very real risk of global cooling.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/09/13/prof-bob-carter-warns-of-unpreparedness-for-global-cooling/
h/t IceAgeNow
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This would be what one Guardianista has called the horror of ‘negative warming’, a kind of warming that is more insidious and dangerous than the better known positive kind. But just as inevitable if we carry on offending the Earth Mother. Negative warming is a little known phenomenon with ice, snow, freezing rain, hail, all kinds of dreadful things. People think warming is only lethal levels of heat, but this negative kind is a real killer too.
Genuine threat or not, I wouldn’t use a newspaper as a source of reliable information, much less the Express.
Agreed, If you need to light a fire, I’d forgive you!
SO2 is a minor irritant in comparison with Hydrogen Fluoride, which is a highly dangerous gas, forming corrosive and penetrating hydrofluoric acid upon contact with tissue. The gas can also cause blindness by rapid destruction of the corneas. I mention this for two reasons. Although 120 million tons of of SO2 were released during the Laki eruption, there were also 8 million tons of Hydrogen Fluoride released, which was devastating. The consequences for Iceland, known as the “Móðuharðindin” (Mist Hardships), were catastrophic.
An estimated 20–25% of the population died in the famine and fluoride poisoning after the fissure eruptions ceased. Around 80% of sheep, 50% of cattle and 50% of horses died because of dental and skeletal fluorosis from the 8 million tons of hydrogen fluoride that were released.
I speak from experience about just how damaging Hydrogen Fluoride is. In 2002, I was unexpectedly exposed to gaseous Hydrofluoric Acid for 20 minutes. My lungs were damaged & since 2005 I have been incapacitated. Yes, I am alive, but the last 9 years have not been what I had planned for my retirement.
http://emergency.cdc.gov/agent/hydrofluoricacid/basics/facts.asp
Does anyone even read my comments with the intention of trying to understand them?
Oh the Ironing..
NO and the cause is women and that they have a habit of choosing men, who are selfconfident or confident in their perceptions, when they are fertile(about to lay an egg or two)?
Good comeback.. 😉
Chicken.. hahaha!
Men just need slippers a burgundy robe and a pipe. Right?
Not this old canard about volcanoes again. The most severe ones have an effect for a season or two but the historic record shows it extends little beyond that. In this case and that of the supposed 1287 event the temperature had already dipped a year or two before the eruption and recovered afterwards. This has been the pattern in the observational record that I can trace from around 1100AD
http://curryja.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/graph09.png
Tonyb
Never listen to any bold predictions made by the Express regarding weather!! Not to detract from the Bardabunga event that may occur…..however the Express is notorious from overstating what the weather may do in following weeks to fill it’s front page, the Editors really don’t care for real forecasts, just the story.
I too agree with Bob Carter – we are unprepared for global cooling. Not necessarily from volcanoes – but from natural variation, This from 2009:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/05/08/more-maunder-than-dalton/#comment-129231
Allan M R MacRae (05:12:46) :
ralph ellis (04:38:57) :
>>If indeed we are heading towards a Maunder
>>type minimum, the die off of humans will be severe.
Why? We survived the Maunder Minimum in good shape, ready for the coming Enlightenment Era. Why will our age be any different?
***************************
What worries me Ralph is that the scoundrels and imbeciles of the global warming cult are driving society in the wrong direction, and wasting trillions of dollars in scarce resources to fight their favorite fantasy – global warming.
If this foolish and destructive direction is not reversed soon, I fear that humanity will suffer greatly.
We are completely unprepared if severe global cooling happens.
===============================================
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/05/08/more-maunder-than-dalton/#comment-129302
Allan M R MacRae (08:34:35) : Your comment is awaiting moderation
http://bourabai.narod.ru/landscheidt/new-e.htm
New Little Ice Age instead of global warming [PDF 429K]
by Dr. Theodor Landscheidt
Energy and Environment 14, 327-350. – 2003
Abstract:
Analysis of the sun’s varying activity in the last two millennia indicates that contrary to the IPCC’s speculation about man-made global warming as high as 5.8° C within the next hundred years, a long period of cool climate with its coldest phase around 2030 is to be expected. It is shown that minima in the 80 to 90-year Gleissberg cycle of solar activity, coinciding with periods of cool climate on Earth, are consistently linked to an 83-year cycle in the change of the rotary force driving the sun’s oscillatory motion about the centre of mass of the solar system. As the future course of this cycle and its amplitudes can be computed, it can be seen that the Gleissberg minimum around 2030 and another one around 2200 will be of the Maunder minimum type accompanied by severe cooling on Earth. This forecast should prove skillful as other long-range forecasts of climate phenomena, based on cycles in the sun’s orbital motion, have turned out correct as for instance the prediction of the last three El Nino years before the respective event.
*******************************
11. Outlook
We need not wait until 2030 to see whether the forecast of the next deep Gleissberg minimum is correct. A declining trend in solar activity and global temperature should become manifest long before the deepest point in the development. The current 11-year sunspot cycle 23 with its considerably weaker activity seems to be a first indication of the new trend, especially as it was predicted on the basis of solar motion cycles two decades ago. As to temperature, only El Niño periods should interrupt the downward trend, but even El Niños should become less frequent and strong. The outcome of this further long-range climate forecast solely based on solar activity may be considered to be a touchstone of the IPCC’s hypothesis of man-made global warming.
***********************************
I do not know if the heading picture is Bardarbunga but the volcano pictured is not causing a problem. The erupted gas is mainly steam here. The eruption itself is effusive which does not cause much cooling because the gasses and dust fail to breach the tropopause. You need a Plinian eruption for that.
It is not. Nothing visible is going on at Bardabunga yet, other than 25m of subsidence.
The eruption in the picture was a subglacial fissure eruption rather nearer Grimsvotn than Bardabunga. The melted ice flowed into the Grimsvotn sub-glacial lake and eventually resulted in a glacial burst (jokullhlaup) to the south of Vatnajokull.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subglacial_eruption#Gjalp_Eruption.2C_Iceland_.281996.29
The maximum that Bardarbunga has thrown at us was a VEI6 in AD 1477. For comparison: Tambora was VEI7, Pinatubo VEI6 and Mt. St. Helens VEI5. So if Bardarbunga does a repeat of 1477, that would be something that could have serious repercussions. But that would only be in a worst case scenario: when the glacier ice comes in direct contact with the magma chamber beneath Bardarbunga, causing a big eruption. For now, it’s just a fissure eruption in Holuhraun, which has only local effects.
Note: VEI = Volcanic Explosivity Index: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volcanic_Explosivity_Index
Eric Worrall said
“Laki, a massive Icelandic eruption, is believed to have caused a significant drop in temperature in 1783.”
The UK was extremely warm while it was engulfed in dense low altitude sulphate aerosols during the summer of 1783. The cold winter of 1783/84 was primarily caused by the same pattern of short term planetary ordering of solar activity that caused the winter of 1962/63.
“The Bardarbunga eruption could yet be a fizzle…But the potential for serious disruption to the climate…cannot be dismissed.”
It would be a nice change of pace if everyone would stop with the hysterical weather predictions. Much of the first half of the year was spent on hysterical predictions of a catastrophic El Nino and instead we have a CA drought due to its lack.
Two years ago the Great Lakes States were hysterical about “record” low lake levels and now they are all above the mean.
So until this thing actual blows up let stop with the hysteria.
Please.
We predicted global cooling, starting by 2020-2030, in an article published on Sept. 1. 2002.
The following post is from 2013:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/10/31/blind-faith-in-climate-models/#comment-1462890
An Open Letter to Baroness Verma
“All of the climate models and policy-relevant pathways of future greenhouse gas and aerosol emissions considered in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC) recent Fifth Assessment Report show a long-term global increase in temperature during the 21st century is expected. In all cases, the warming from increasing greenhouse gases significantly exceeds any cooling from atmospheric aerosols. Other effects such as solar changes and volcanic activity are likely to have only a minor impact over this timescale”.
– Baroness Verma
I have no Sunspot Number data before 1700, but the latter part of the Maunder Minimum had 2 back-to-back low Solar Cycles with SSNmax of 58 in 1705 and 63 in 1717 .
http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/stp/space-weather/solar-data/solar-indices/sunspot-numbers/international/tables/
http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/stp/solar/image/annual.gif
The coldest period of the Maunder was ~1670 to ~1700 (8.48dC year average Central England Temperatures) but the coldest year was 1740 (6.84C year avg CET).
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadcet/data/download.html
The Dalton Minimum had 2 back-to-back low SC’s with SSNmax of 48 in 1804 and 46 in 1816. Tambora erupted in 1815.
Two of the coldest years in the Dalton were 1814 (7.75C year avg CET) and 1816 (7.87C year avg CET).
Now Solar Cycle 24 is a dud with SSNmax estimated at ~65, and very early estimates suggest SC25 will be very low as well.
The warmest recent years for CET were 2002 to 2007 inclusive that averaged 10.55C.
I suggest with confidence that 10.5C is substantially warmer as a yearly average than 8.5C, and the latter may not provide a “lovely year for Chrysanths”.
I further suggest with confidence that individual years averaging 7.8C or even 6.8C are even colder, and the Chrysanths will suffer.
So here is my real concern:
IF the Sun does indeed drive temperature, as I suspect, Baroness Verma, then you and your colleagues on both sides of the House may have brewed the perfect storm.
You are claiming that global cooling will NOT happen, AND you have crippled your energy systems with excessive reliance on ineffective grid-connected “green energy” schemes.
I suggest that global cooling probably WILL happen within the next decade or sooner, and Britain will get colder.
I also suggest that the IPCC and the Met Office have NO track record of successful prediction (or “projection”) of global temperature and thus have no scientific credibility.
I suggest that Winter deaths will increase in the UK as cooling progresses.
I suggest that Excess Winter Mortality, the British rate of which is about double the rate in the Scandinavian countries, should provide an estimate of this unfolding tragedy.
As always in these matters, I hope to be wrong. These are not numbers, they are real people, who “loved and were loved”.
Best regards to all, Allan MacRae
Mount Tambora
[Excerpt from wiki]
With an estimated ejecta volume of 160 km3 (38 cu mi), Tambora’s 1815 outburst was the largest volcanic eruption in recorded history. The explosion was heard on Sumatra island more than 2,000 km (1,200 mi) away. Heavy volcanic ash falls were observed as far away as Borneo, Sulawesi, Java, and Maluku Islands. Most deaths from the eruption were from starvation and disease, as the eruptive fallout ruined agricultural productivity in the local region. The death toll was at least 71,000 people, of whom 11,000–12,000 were killed directly by the eruption;[6] the often-cited figure of 92,000 people killed is believed to be overestimated.[7]
The eruption caused global climate anomalies that included the phenomenon known as “volcanic winter”: 1816 became known as the “Year Without a Summer” because of the effect on North American and European weather. Crops failed and livestock died in much of the Northern Hemisphere, resulting in the worst famine of the 19th century.[6]
[end of excerpt]
[Excerpt from my above post]
The Dalton Minimum had 2 back-to-back low SC’s with SSNmax of 48 in 1804 and 46 in 1816. Tambora erupted in 1815.
Two of the coldest years in the Dalton were 1814 (7.75C year avg CET) and 1816 (7.87C year avg CET).
[end of excerpt]
Commentary:
So, for CET’s, it appears that the 1815 eruption of Tambora had minimal effect, since CET’s in 1814 were slightly lower than CET’s for 1816.
However, the anecdotal evidence suggests that 1816 was a much harder year for humanity than 1814.
What to believe?
Reblogged this on Manuel Simonini and commented:
Volcano Bardarbunga: possible evolution scenarios, webcam live streaming.
http://www.ruv.is/frett/another-eruption-if-the-current-one-stops
http://www.volcanodiscovery.com/bardarbunga/news/47903/Bardarbunga-volcano-update-Holuhraun-eruption-and-subsidence-of-Bardarbunga-caldera-continue.html
Professor Magnús Tumi Guðmundsson, professor of geophysics at the University of Iceland´s Institute of Earth Sciences and the foremost Icelandic expert on subglacial eruptions outlines the three following scenarios:
1) The eruption at Holuhraun stops and with it the depletion of the magma reservoir of the Bardarbunga system also stops.
2) The eruption at Holuhraun continues as does the depletion with an accompanying subsidence at the Bardarbunga caldera. (As this goes on, the risk of possibility #3 increases, our note).
3) The deflation reaches a critical point where part of the roof of the Bardarbunga caldera collapses which allows water, liquid or in the form of ice, to interact directly with the magmatic main body. (This will lead to a series of very violent explosions which will only stop when either the body of water/ice or the body of magma are exhausted, our note).
http://volcanocafe.wordpress.com/2014/09/10/bardarbunga-holuhraun-update-140910/
http://www.youreporter.it/video_Impressionante_intensificazione_eruzione_nord_Bardarbunga
Bardarbunga11
Volcano Bardarbunga: straeaming.
http://www.livefromiceland.is/webcams/bardarbunga-2/
Vulcano Bardarbunga, l’esperto: “il magma è risalito dal mantello”. Le immagini dallo spazio
http://www.meteoweb.eu/2014/09/vulcano-bardarbunga-lesperto-magma-risalito-dal-mantello-immagini-dallo-spazio/319703/
Volcano Bardarbunga: info.
http://volcanocafe.wordpress.com/info-on-bardarbunga/
Poco dopo la mezzanotte di venerdì 29/08/2014 è iniziata una piccola eruzione con emissione di lava e fumo da fratture in prossimità del vulcano.
Il traffico aereo al momento non ha subito ritardi, anche se l’allarme è tornato al livello rosso. Nei prossimi giorni ci si può aspettare un peggioramento a causa dei venti che potrebbero spingere la nube di ceneri verso sud, sull’oceano atlantico.
A livello locale il maggior rischio è costituito dai ghiacci che ricoprono il vulcano che potrebbero sciogliersi a causa dell’eruzione provocando allagamenti.
http://www.businessinsider.com/icelandic-bardarbunga-volcano-erupts-2014-8
Nel caso si verificasse lo scenario N° 3. Il problema è serio anche per quanto riguarda il clima, se la quantità di ceneri immesse in atmosfera fosse davvero abbondante, potrebbe influenzare il clima di tutta l’Europa provocando una piccola era glaciale nei prossimi anni. I danni economici, soprattutto per l’agricoltura sarebbero enormi.
I find this piece in Wikipedia rather amusing:
“Sir John Cullum of Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk, England, recorded his observations on 23 June 1783 (the same date on which Gilbert White noted the onset of the unusual atmospheric phenomena), in a letter to Sir Joseph Banks, then President of the Royal Society
…‘about six o’clock, that morning, I observed the air very much condensed in my chamber-window; and, upon getting up, was informed by a tenant that finding himself cold in bed, about three o’clock in the morning, he looked out at his window, and to his great surprise saw the ground covered with a white frost: and I was assured that two men at Barton, about 3 miles (4.8 km) off, saw in some shallow tubs, ice of the thickness of a crown-piece.”
Daily mean CET for the 21st June 1783 was 12.4°C, but by the 23rd June it had risen to 17.2°C. The monthly mean for July 1783 at 18.8°C, was not beaten until 1983, and one more time in 2006. While the Rev Gilbert White reports that the pavements were hot enough to cook meat on, the learned folk at the Royal Society decided that all that smog dimming the Sun should be causing cold weather, and either mistook ash deposits for frost, or the year is wrong and it was in June 1784.
“Sir John’s vegetable garden did not escape; he noted that the plants looked ‘exactly as if a fire had been lighted near them, that had shrivelled and discoloured their leaves.’”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laki#cite_note-J.C.-24
SO2 in the lower troposphere from Aura satellite OMI instrument yesterday. There is usually some similar traces in the high latitude measurements but there is certainly SO2 getting into the atmosphere from the Bardabunga eruption.
http://s28.postimg.org/4p6z5m2lp/SO2_Aura_OMI_Sept_19_2014.jpg
Over Not independent Scotland now.
http://satepsanone.nesdis.noaa.gov/pub/OMI/OMISO2/images/OMI_NH_SO2_DDC2.GIF
Farmers in Brazil, Argentina and Australia will be rooting for the volcano.
If the volcano does erupted, what can we do to protect ourselves. Because we have loads of discussion about how bad it will or could be but what about what we could do. I bet the government have a plan in action and place to go when shit hits the fan. But the the government won’t tell anyone they are only going to save their own arse. Could we build buildings to protect from the bad weather etc. Or am I being stupid?
Could – or could not…
Just think of the eruption as a runaway 100GW powerstation.
All the geothermal fans must be very enthusiastic.
Sorry, but volcanoes have nothing like the catastrophic effect on the weather claimed in the head post. The most powerful volcano of modern times, Pinatubo, scarcely caused a perceptible disturbance in the force. I’ve written a number of posts on the subject of volcanoes. In chronological order they are:
Overshoot and Undershoot
Prediction is hard, especially of the future.
Volcanic Disruptions
Dronning Maud Meets the Little Ice Age
Missing the Missing Summer
New Data, Old Claims About Volcanoes
BEST, Volcanoes and Climate Sensitivity
Volcanic Corroboration
Volcanoes: Active, Inactive, and Retroactive
Stacked Volcanoes Falsify Models
The Eruption Over the IPCC AR5
Volcanoes Erupt Again
Eruptions and Ocean Heat Content
Short answer? The effect of the volcanoes is small, local, and transient … and most volcanoes cannot be identified in the temperature records, they make no more difference than the natural temperature fluctuations.
w.
And then there is Yellowstone and a few other super volcanoes….. Just sayin.
Thanks, Bill. I can see that an eruption the size of the Yellowstone Caldera would definitely affect the weather by some measurable amount in given locations.
What happens globally, however, is that when the incoming sunlight goes down for any reason, the tropical clouds form later in the day. This lets in additional hours of sunlight, and the energy balance is maintained. See my post cited above called “Volcanoes Erupt Again” for an example of this process at work.
w.
How long does it take for the compensating heating in the tropics to reach temperate zones? For that matter, how does it heat northern areas (e.g. Europe and Canada, or latitudes 45-55) without affecting southern areas, say latitudes 30-40?
Willis, if additional hours of sunlight are themselves diminished by a stratospheric veil, I don’t see where your “balance” is achieved.
Pamela Gray September 20, 2014 at 3:14 pm
More hours times less sunlight = no change. Not sure where your problem is.
All the best,
w.
Interesting trickery going on with your Hohenpeissenberg graphs Willis:
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/hohenpeissenberg_tambora-_temps_dates.jpg
Your arrows to occasional peak temperatures certainly do not represent the monthly and seasonal means in the original series:
http://members.casema.nl/errenwijlens/co2/t_hohenpeissenberg_200512.txt
Ulrich, while I have made many errors in my scientific work, as has any serious scientist, I don’t deal in trickery of any kind, interesting or not.
In addition, I have no clue what you are calling “trickery”, your comment is far too vague.
Your unexplained accusation is unwarranted, wrong, and most unpleasant, and I have no interest in further discussion.
If you want to apologize and start over, fine. I’m happy to discuss any error I might have made in re Hohenpeissenberg. Otherwise … bye bye, go insult someone else, I’ve got no time for sleazy accusations.
w.
Willis, you tricked yourself, I wasn’t accusing you of deliberate deception. Your green arrow, which you suggest is showing warmer summer temperatures than in say 1815, or 1843 where you placed your blue arrow, is merely down to a few days of higher temperature. The seasonal mean clearly shows that the summer of 1816 was the coldest in the whole temp series.
http://members.casema.nl/errenwijlens/co2/t_hohenpeissenberg_200512.txt
Ulrich, accusing someone of “trickery” is indeed accusing them of deliberate deception. That’s what trickery means, look it up. Sorry, I don’t buy that you meant something else.
I’m still waiting for an apology.
Sadly,
w.
Willis, it is obvious that you had made an oversight (which I have pointed out) and were not deliberately being deceptive, so no apology is due. But nonetheless, your conclusions did have the value of a conjuring trick, even though unintentional. And please could you have the courtesy to spell my name correctly.
Ulric, you falsely accused me of trickery. From the dictionary:
In other words, you falsely accused me of deception, or deceit, or dishonesty, or cheating, or duplicity. I still await your apology. Perhaps it was totally unintentional, like accidentally stepping on someone’s toe … and just as I would in that case, I still await your apology. Perhaps you didn’t realize what the word meant. I still await your apology.
Because when you insult a man with a false accusation, deliberately or not, whether you meant to or not, whether you understood what you were saying or not, you owe him an apology.
As to spelling your name, when you falsely accuse me of deception and deceit, and then you refuse to apologize for your actions, why should I pay the slightest attention to how you spell your name?
w.
Willis said:
“In other words, you falsely accused me of deception, or deceit, or dishonesty, or cheating, or duplicity. I still await your apology. Perhaps it was totally unintentional, like accidentally stepping on someone’s toe … and just as I would in that case, I still await your apology. Perhaps you didn’t realize what the word meant. I still await your apology. ”
As I explained, you conclusions are deceptive, but in no way did I accuse you of knowingly being deceitful, as patently you were unaware of you error. So you can stop digging for an apology that is is not due, and hopefully man up and admit to the mistake that you made.
In fact you still owe me an apology on a technical matter, your erroneous claim that the NAO was not positive in July and August 2013:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/09/13/like-the-pause-in-surface-temperatures-the-slump-in-solar-activity-continues/#comment-1420719
Ulric, my only possible conclusion is that you don’t understand English. You say:
You don’t seem to understand that when you accuse someone of “trickery”, you are accusing them of “knowingly being deceitful”, in your words. That’s the meaning of “trickery”, as I clearly demonstrated from the dictionary. “Trickery” and “deception” are both things that can only be done knowingly.
If your actions are not knowing, then what you do is called an error or a mistake or an oversight. None of these imply bad motives or an attempt to deceive … but “trickery” is deliberately trying to fool someone.
Here’s a protip about the English language, Ulric, which you obviously don’t know. Trickery and deceit both mean that the person consciously set out to deceive people. In fact we have a whole list of words which mean the same thing, a conscious, deliberate attempt to deceive someone. Here’s the list, from my comment above:
All of those, Ulric, imply underhanded motives. All of them include the idea that the deception is not accidental but is deliberate. All of them mean it’s not an innocent error, it’s done on purpose. All of them means that the author set out to fool people …
So when you accused me of trickery, Ulric, you damn well DID accuse me of “knowingly being deceitful”, because THAT’S WHAT “TRICKERY” MEANS! Read the dictionary, my friend.
In any case, you’ve successfully convinced me to give up paying the slightest attention to your comments. Satisfied now?
w.
Willis, my comment “Interesting trickery” in no way accuses you of deliberately deceiving, it was a humorous play on your “trick questions” in your original post. But still nonetheless your conclusions are deceptive, as they do not portray the relative summer season mean temperatures in the series. This could easily misinform others, as did your comments about the NAO not being positive in July and August 2013, i.e. Richard Courtney.
Willis, I will have to disagree with you. Catastrophic eruptions marked by significant sulfur emissions high up into the stratosphere have indeed triggered significant and in rare cases, global climate disruptions that have the potential to domino through more than a year after such an eruption. Why? Due to a significant stratospheric sulfuric acid veil leading to a diminution of solar insolation recharging our stores of ocean heat. The effect is especially significant when that veil, along with fine particulate matter, reduces equatorial insolation.
Pamela, always good to hear from you. You say:
However, a claim such as you have made, devoid of data, citations, names, years, or locations, and without the slightest bit of actual facts, is less than convincing … I’ve given you 13 citations to my work discussing a host of eruptions. If you are discussing one of those eruptions, you’ll have to show where I was wrong.
And if you’re talking about some other volcano … which one?
All the best,
w.
I have linked to many studies regarding volcanic disruption of climate and I know you are aware of those links and those studies. The 1257 eruption, one that volcanologists have been aware of for decades, has only recently been identified as an equatorial sulfur-rich eruption of the now ancient (and Crater Lake styled decapitated volcano I might add) Samalas Volcano. The following link will get into the research papers if you follow the links therein. Bottom line, it appears that sulfur rich extended ultraplinian phase equatorial eruptions appear capable of marked reduction in solar insulation. That alone will have local and regional affects immediately and eventually on ocean warming, especially in the equatorial band. And that would then have consequences on a global basis as the domino affect of reduced ocean recharge commences along the ocean circulation path.
http://www.wired.com/2013/09/samalas-in-indonesia-identified-source-of-the-1258-a-d-missing-eruption/
Pamela, you cannot convince ‘Granite Heads’ when their minds are made up to attack the opposition for their reason for the pause. These folks could be running with it and simply pointing out that the only reason for the warming prior to the pause was a squeaky clean stratosphere.
Pamela, your comment was not directed at me but at the world. So whether or not I am aware of “those links and studies” is immaterial.
However, in fact I have no clue which “links and studies” you are referring to. I deal with hundreds and hundreds of comments in a given month.
Next, when I point out that your claims are vague and uncited, your saying that I should know what you are referring to is both meaningless and useless. I assure you, I don’t ask for citations because I know what you mean. I ask specifically because I don’t know what you are referring to.
Finally, the link you offer to an eruption in 1258 gives only scattered anecdotal evidence for what it calls a “temporary disturbance of the world’s climate” … color me unimpressed.
Yes, volcanoes do create short-term effects. The very rare supervolcanoes have a somewhat larger effect, and the 1258 eruption was very large.
But in NO case does this provide support for the claim in the head post, which was that:
Decades of disruption? There’s no evidence for that at all, neither in your citation nor anywhere I know of.
All the best,
w.
Pretty sure that Pam is not talking about just one lone eruption. They often come in clusters over a decade.
Ed Martin September 20, 2014 at 8:12 pm Edit
Thanks, Ed. Pretty sure we don’t know what Pam is talking about, but since she’s only mentioned one volcano, I took that as a best guess …
w.
By the way, barag$uar/bun*$ga (sorry bout the spelling) is SHAKING inside the caldera right now!
Sparks and lava coming out of the caldera in the distance. Cool! The Hawaii of the North.
http://www.livefromiceland.is/webcams/bardarbunga-2/
That web site doesn’t like my old Firefox and chrome browsers, but I’m confident that the Bárðarbunga volcano is not erupting. It is undergoing a (for the moment) well-behaved collapse, but that could change at any time. Many of the magnitude 5+ earthquakes there are associated with a GPS system there measured a few centimeter drop atop the 850 meters of ice that makes the top layer of the caldera.
The magma there and more from as deep as 10 km is forming a dike to the northeast, and that has breached the surface in the Holuhraun lava field as a fissure eruption (Laki was also a fissure eruption, it’s unclear if this will grow into something comparable.
http://en.vedur.is/earthquakes-and-volcanism/earthquakes/vatnajokull/ shows the caldera (look for green stars), the dike, and I think the fissure eruption is near the southern end of the northern most line of earthquakes.
Ric, I’ve been under the impression that the fissure eruption is toward the north end of the middle dike swarm. SSE of the Askja caldera lake.
This map puts the fissure center at about 64d 52′ 30″ N 16d 50′ W. The lava flows from there to the NE.
So the fissure is near the north end of the middle dike swarm, just north of the big ice cap.
Ric, you appear to be correct in terms of the sparks and magma not being from the caldera (but not as far away as before either). But the earthquakes are in the caldera and rim. Which are likely to be subsidence related. Those are the ones that if they keep going, could mean a caldera collapse is happening (slowly right now but it could speed up) followed by explosive fireworks from all that snow and ice capping the magma, IE BOOM.
I have lots of footage of the last volcanic eruption. Effaga-evaja ka-uul, evog-ull. you know the one.. Thanks, love it 🙂 I do like to keep an eye on volcanoes.
JK btw! 😉
It is the first I have noticed the Bardarbunga2 web cam is on a programmed pan.
There is a blinking marker (2 quick flashes, a second pause) that is in view for whole pan, on the left when looking at the fissure eruption, then the webcam pans left to put the blinker on the right. When it is panned right on the fissure, it zooms in holds for maybe 15 sec, zooms out. The whole cycle may be about 2-3 minutes long. This is new in the past four days.
So if you click on the Bardarbunga-2 webcam and don’t see anything, wait it out a couple of minutes.
There is a blinker visible in t he Bardarbunga-1 webcam, but it is a slow, single blink. This webcam appears to be non-pan and non-zoom.
Yes, I noticed that too. It is now panning. It did not before today.
Been following the action on the Iceland Metrology site, http://volcanocafe.wordpress.com and iceland geology http://www.jonfr.com/volcano/ . Lots of knowledgable commenters on both sites.
Looks like the biggest danger is if the eruption gets under the glacier, either along the rift or in the caldera. That could cause a very large flood. See the video Fire on Ice (uTube at 41 minutes) for what that might be like. A big problem for Iceland as some of the outlets go down valleys to hydro plants, but no danger to the rest of the world.
Ah the Daily Express, that well known reliable source of weather forecasting and climate science – not.
This is the same Daily Express that last autumn was predicting a Great Freeze in the UK, when actually we had one of the mildest and wettest winters on record.
Anyway, back to Laki, yes Iceland is a potent source of potential short term weather changing eruptions. Laki was a huge eruption that affected the weather – and health – in Europe in the short term.
I have a bit of eruption material from Laki in my living room – picked up when on holiday in Iceland in 2004.
But it is pure speculation to say that the current rumblings will develop into a Laki situation.
And even if there was a major Icelandic eruption, it will not have an impact on the long term rise in global temperatures due to rising GHG concentrations.
The article is just another excuse for claims of “global cooling is on its way” as also predicted in this thread by Allan MacRae.
Its all wishful thinking from those who have become obsessed in their mission to “prove climate science wrong”. However, the evidence is that warming is continuing (NOAA report for August 2014), just not as rapidly as expected.
You need to get a Geiger counter on your piece of lava from Laki. My bits of lava from Hamarinn in 1970 are quite radioactive. A lead box rather than the living room may be more appropriate storage.
Have they been telling you, James Abbot that your view of climate processes is wrong? Then perhaps you should listen – you could pick up some interesting ideas.
James Abbott said:
“It’s all wishful thinking from those who have become obsessed in their mission to “prove climate science wrong”. However, the evidence is that warming is continuing (NOAA report for August 2014), just not as rapidly as expected.”
_____________
James, the problem is that NOAA, the Hadley Centre, the IPCC and all other warmist institutions have NO successful predictive track record – every one of their dire predictions of global warming, wild weather, etc has failed to materialize. I suggest that in science, one’s predictive track record is perhaps the only objective measure of competence.
The fundamental problem of the warmists is that they insist upon modeling a ridiculously high Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity (ECS) to CO2 for which there is no supporting evidence, and considerable evidence to the contrary. That, and the little detail that CO2 lags temperature at all measured time scales.
An alternative theory that appears more promising is that atmospheric CO2 has little impact on global temperatures, which seem to vary naturally and somewhat cyclically, probably in response to solar activity. If that is true, then imminent global cooling, whether mild or severe, seems to be more probable than increased warming, after the current ~20-year flattening of global temperatures (in warm-speak labelled the “pause”, or the “hiatus hernia”).
I hope that your NOAA citation proves correct, because more warming would be good for humanity and the planet. However, my bet is that we can expect mild or severe global cooling starting by 2020 or sooner, regardless of volcanic activity.
Regards to all, Allan
Denver Post has a set of pictures taken Sept 11 and 14.
Slide show
But in case anyone missed it, here is a repost of a fantastic 3 minute helicopter vimeo video by John Gustafsson: “Volcano at Night” – September 4, 2014