Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Good news – we’re finally about to hit a tipping point. The only problem is, nobody will be able to tell the difference.
Climate change ‘tipping point’ could be reached in four weeks
6.6.16 is almost the devil’s number, but it might be much more than that if a leading scientist’s prediction on climate change is correct.
CSIRO fellow Dr Paul Fraser has earmarked June 6 (“plus or minus a week”) as the day when carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere will hit the point of no return, 400 parts per million (ppm).
The atmospheric measuring station at Cape Grim in Tasmania has recorded the current C02 levels in the atmosphere at 399.9ppm.
Dr Fraser said the difference between 399 and 400ppm was trivial, but when it does hit 400ppm mark it would be a “psychological tipping point”.
“Once it reaches 400ppm at Cape Grim it’s very unlikely to drop below 400 again,” Dr Fraser told ninemsn.
…
Cape Grim’s stable environment offers a clearer forecast for the world’s climate change.
“When you get away from the cities and into the background air, that’s the one that really drives climate change, that’s in terms of representing the entire globe,” Dr Fraser said.
To put the 400ppm into perspective, Dr Fraser said if you stood near a highway with cars going past, you could be hit with 500ppm of CO2.
At the higher end of the scale, a smoggy day in the densely polluted cities of Beijing or Shanghai could see carbon figures as high as 600ppm to 700ppm.
When 400ppm becomes the norm in country air, the cities will feel the pain a whole lot more.
The part the authors leave out, with all this talk of “cities in pain”, is that 400ppm CO2 will have no noticeable health impact on people. According to US government documents, navy personnel in charge of US submarines, including nuclear submarines charged with delivering the final response to a nuclear first strike, typically live for months on end at an average CO2 level of 3500ppm, ranging up to 11,300ppm. If 400ppm had any health impact whatsoever – how could sick people be trusted to be in charge of nuclear weapons, at CO2 levels an order of magnitude higher than normal air?
I know its easy to poke fun at climate scientists, for their endlessly embarrassing pronouncements of impending doom which never manifest, but at least the scientists who make such outrageously wrong predictions show real commitment to their ideas. Calling this non event a “tipping point” trivialises the drama of all those other efforts to entertain us.
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“but it might be much more than that if a leading scientist’s prediction on climate change is correct.”
Luckily they haven’t been right about anything so far. I shall rest easy…and chuckle a little.
“… a smoggy day in the densely polluted cities of Beijing or Shanghai could see carbon figures as high as 600ppm to 700ppm …”.
=======================================
The good residents at the US embassy in Beijing seem to be completely oblivious to the serious health risks caused by atmospheric CO2 pollution:
http://aqicn.org/city/beijing/us-embassy/
Weather is a bit warm lately here in Brisbane.Most days around max of 82 F and just over 5 weeks until winter solstice. Average for May is 76 F.
AGWism is cresting a wave right now, it’s at the height of it’s power, and is only going to decline from here because apart from the fact most of their argument is based on complete guesswork, with 2 legs knocked firmly from under the AGW hypothesis, there is also cultural encroachment.
The lefties have invaded our homes almost, speak directly to our kids through education, ruining movies (I cant watch a movie if it has AGW propaganda in it in any form) and created a generation of safe space bed wetters, the push back by people who were not even interested is because of the completely over the top left’s antics.
People are sick of the left, even non political types like myself. The National Socialists were far left, not right.
Obama is a socialist who talks about American Exceptionalism, tell me how he is not a National socialist?
His use of executive orders, his not needing congress to have war, he’s made himself a dictator essentially as much as he can.
The left is never satisfied with the power it has. never. The left is about looking for something they do not yet control.
There are not enough bigots and racists to go round, the left have had to broaden the meanings of those words.
They will call hundreds of caterers and when they eventually find someone who wont cater for a lesbian wedding the Liberal media makes this huge conspiracy theory up that America is racist.
I wish the warmists would agree on a once and for all no going back tipping point so that when it is reached we can stop all this global warming rubbish. In theory once the tipping point is past then any attempts to reverse the trend is futile. Maybe then we can use the cost of those wasted climate dollars on things like education, health and other useful endeavours.
don’t worry- when you tire of this rubbish, there’s plenty more where that came from
hundreds of millions of citizens have generously endowed the institutions that produce it.
“Almost without exception, every reef we flew across showed consistently high levels of bleaching, from the reef slope right up onto the top of the reef. We flew for 4000 kilometers (2,485 miles) in the most pristine parts of the Great Barrier Reef and saw only four reefs that had no bleaching. The severity is much greater than in earlier bleaching events in 2002 or 1998.”
http://www.foxnews.com/science/2016/03/30/great-barrier-reef-hit-by-widespread-coral-bleaching.html
Yes coral bleach when El Nino raises water temperatures. Coral in areas that get upwelling do worse than corals that dont, corals that dont get regular cooler water upwelling can take 2c sustained increase.
All corals suffer from sudden sustanied increases, like positive ENSO, and sudden sustained decreases like Negative ENSO also stress coral populations. It depends on how warm or cool and how fast.
Great barrier reef temperatures ENSO driven
http://mclean.ch/climate/docs/GBR_SST_and_ENSO.pdf
Corals in Tahiti from literature.
Also isn’t the northern section of the Great barrier Reef the part that is damaged.
UV I might add fluctuated over 1000 joules dosage in that area between April and May, strong positive ENSO also shifts around Ozone. So there is that too, if El Nino redistributed ozone temporarily corals may be getting far more UV, more than pre ENSO stable UV dosage.
Note where the Barrier Reef is on this map, the north part of the reef is the area suffering worst
Uugg wrong link
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/stratosphere/polar/gif_files/uv_dosage_world_est.gif
Click the UV map to see May’s value, that is April
There are no reputable reports of mass coral bleaching events before 1980. This year’s El Nino and historically high water temperatures have combined to completely devastate northern sections of the reef.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-03-28/great-barrier-reef-coral-bleaching-95-per-cent-north-section/7279338
“There are no reputable reports of mass coral bleaching events before 1980.”
Mike: Are you suggesting that all the reports of mass coral bleachings prior to 1980 are not reputable? What makes those reports disreputable but the ones after 1980 reputable?
I’m saying there are no reports of mass coral bleaching events before 1980.
“There are no reputable reports of mass coral bleaching events before 1980.”
You are either utterly misinformed or very mendacious.
Probably both.
Got any evidence for mass bleaching events before 1980? That deafening silence would be a nooooooooo…
Mike:
What is your point?
Mike says:
I’m saying there are no reports of mass coral bleaching events before 1980.
A 10-second search found this statement:
Mass coral moralities in coral reef ecosystems have been reported in all major reef provinces since the 1870s.
[source]
catweazel says about Mike:
You are either utterly misinformed or very mendacious.
No doubt he’s both.
Mike
Got any more to say on the subject? That deafening silence would be a nooooooooo…
Mike corals bleach every positive ENSO.
?w=700
Corals are in different places with different conditions
We just dont have records pre 1982 of any useful extend. To you that means “it didn’t happen” I have seen this logic before.
MWP is detected in Europe Asia the US, but not the tropics and SH because we have no data, and obviously you warmers compute that has not happening.
Phil Jones at the CRU said “we cant say it was global due to lack of data” he never said it didn’t happen, that was the Hookeyshtick, the discredited junk study.
You’re such a chump stealey. If youd bothered to actually read your link youd see that it supports exactly what ive been saying. What a chump you are.
“Prior to the 1980s, most mass coral moralities were related to non-thermal disturbances such as storms, aerial exposures during extreme low tides, and Acanthaster outbreaks. Coral bleaching accompanied some of the mortality events prior to the 1980s during periods of elevated sea water temperature, but these disturbances were geographically isolated and restricted to particular reefs zones. In contrast, many of the coral bleaching events observed in the 1980s occurred over large geographic regions and at all depths.”
Bosh.
No mike that was another part of the study, I simple used the data to make my own case for ENSO, I did not post the link to the paper the chart comes from to support an argument.
Authors reach their conclusions, not everyone who looks at their data agrees with their conclusions.
It seem such simple things escape you.
‘Mike” says:
“I’m saying there are no reports of mass coral bleaching events before 1980.”
‘Mike” can’t handle the truth. Here is the quote from the link once again, verbatim:
Mass coral moralities in coral reef ecosystems have been reported in all major reef provinces since the 1870s.
‘Mike” stated that there were no known coral bleaching events before 1980. Now that he’s been debunked, he’s name-calling. That’s all he’s got now.
Hey Mike, there are also no reputable reports of cyclones in northern Australia before the early 1900s, so obviously cyclones never happened before then – unless you can show me a reliable report from an earlier time. Get the point?
There are no reports of coral bleaching because no one was given a government grant to look for them. These days if your income depends upon finding something wrong with the reef, you’ll find it no matter what. How many aerial surveys of the entire reef were conducted prior to 1980 and how many show a totally unbleached reef? How many scientists were out over the reef in choppers in the 1930s looking for bleaching when the world really was burning up? Your reply will be enlightening I’m sure.
We see the same recycled scare stories from the same recycled quack scientists every couple of years. The reef is always at death’s door, then magically it is OK again ready for their next prediction of doom. Go back through the records and see for yourself just how many times the reef is already supposed to have died – yet it is still there as big as ever.
Bleaching is a natural event that rejuvenates the reef. Reefs grow by dying off then being re-colonised with a greater diversity of species – always to the astonishment of the “scientists” who witness the sudden regrowth. The corals do not die off forever. Go and do some research instead of swallowing the global warming swill dished up by the ABC.
Poor mike cant see how moronic his arguments are.
No evidence for Bleaching pre 1982 = It didn’t happen.
When you point out a lack of records does not support his position either, he goes full rtrd, never go full rtrd
So, what’s your point?
If I pay another 10% for energy production/use will the reef corals thrive into the future … will the “bleaching” cease?
Maybe they should reduce the chopper flights, airplane tours, and even eliminate the future boat surveying tours of the corals to do their part. Maybe not … since it wouldn’t make a bit of difference in the overall scheme. Maybe everyone else should reduce their co2 output … and by June 6th of this year.
I see you ignore the salient points Mike and keep repeating the same ill informed nonsense.
The El Nino in 1878 would certainly have caused coral bleaching.
“To put the 400ppm into perspective, Dr Fraser said if you stood near a highway with cars going past, you could be hit with 500ppm of CO2.”
It is not unusual for continental cities in winter, experiencing an inversion in windless or low wind conditions, to exceed 1000 ppm CO2. The idea that 400 or 500 means anything is silly. The floor-level in a jungle, just before dawn, also has a peak well above the global average.
Wow.
My tropical farm is in a semi-arid region at the base of tree covered low mountains; we get a seasonal rainy season. This data from a “dry” tropical Mexico forest seems to reflect tropical variation. I am not parsing field crops, which tend to have diurnal
CO2 fluctuation.
In cited dry tropical area in Mexico prior to seasonal rains during May 23 gr C02/sq.m. got put out since leaf area had been reduced (& arid). June exponentially put out 200 gr. CO2/sq.m in the same area due to arrival of rain, which started soil microbial activity & vegetation ramped up respiratory cycle. However, June’s heavier rainfall caused plant leaf canopy to start filling out & in that stage 70 g CO2/sq.mt was removed from the same area’s ecosystem. As the rains started to taper off in August the leaf canopy growth peaked at maximum expanse & an impressive 395 g. CO2/sq.mt. was taken out of the air. As the rains declined by half from their high 213 g.CO2/sq.m in that area was taken out of the air in Sept. Apparently leaf sennesence
began to occur in Oct & the vegetation could only take 83g.CO2/sq.m out of the air; leaf loss beginning means less gas exchange.
Data from (2010)”Carbon dioxide and water vapour exchange in a tropical dry forest as influenced by the North American monsoon system”, by Perez-Ruiz, et.al. My point is that we will be breathing different levels of CO2 depending on the stage of moisture & the age of vegetation even if all we know is that we are in the same nature area; the vegetation could be sucking up the CO2 around us, or conversely not.
CO2 concentration in the lungs is about 50,000ppm
Wow.
Hey Mike!
What ever happened to your comments about no known reports of coral bleaching before 1980? Have you just decided to troll forward (so to speak)?
Maybe the psychological tipping point for climate scientists is when they realise it’s not as bad as they thought. Warmists become Luke warmers etc?
Does this constitute bad?
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-03-28/great-barrier-reef-coral-bleaching-95-per-cent-north-section/7279338
It constitutes a giant red herring, and your continued pathetic trolling.
Not sure a rational person would agree with you Brucey boy.
Mike: “Not sure a rational person would agree with you Brucey boy.”
As if you would know what rational persons agree with…
On yer bike!
http://bitsocialmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/Internet-Troll.jpg
I am assuming Mike has dropped the coral bleaching stuff and switch to some really impressive name calling like “Brucey boy”.
Jeeze – even his mama would be embarrassed.
Actually, it constitutes normal for a strong El Nino year. It happens all every time and is 100% natural (Non-man made).
“Actually, it constitutes normal for a strong El Nino year. It happens all every time and is 100% natural (Non-man made).”
Still waiting for someone to provide one instance of a mass bleaching event before 1980?
Crickets…
You are not rational Mike, you keep denying science and pasting the same link. irony
Well, can somebody explain why CO2 is rising in the atmosphere?
Man is most likely responsible for most of it, especially the past half-century or so, for which Gaia is very thankful.
Joel in warm times, like the end of last century, a lot more CO2 is liberated from the oceans. In comparison the human induced variety is fairly small.
As you know CO2 will warm dry air in a controlled environment, but temperatures remain the same if the air is wet.
In the real world we see the largest and driest continent on the planet getting cooler and I’m inclined to believe CO2 does not cause warming.
Remember the AGW mantra, cool dry regions will warm faster than the tropics, its a massive fail.
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/03/150331-antarctica-hottest-temperature-climate-change-global-warming-science/
Mike,
From your link, the temperature was measured at…
…the northern tip of the Antarctic Peninsula…
That’s not even in the Antarctic. Look at a map.
And:
…glaciers farther inland on the continent are actually growing.
“That has not been satisfactorily explained,”…
As usual, their opinions are not based on any credible evidence. So why would anyone assume they know what’s causing this, or whether it’s anything unusual?
Answer: they don’t. The bandwagon is going in their direction, and they’re on it. Science has nothing to do with it.
Here’s the location (at the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula, next to the Shetland Islands) that got so ‘warm’:
Pretty close to Argentina. But the implkication is that the South Pole is melting.
Typical alarmist propaganda — and Mike fell for it!
Mike, the headline – ‘Antarctica May Have Hit Highest Temperature on Record’
Records of Antarctica are sparse. Most seem to stem from 1951.
‘Much of the original version of this dataset was obtained from the World Weather Records (WWR) volumes (1951-1970)’
https://ixquick-proxy.com/do/spg/proxy2?ep=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&epile=4q6n41784r6n41314q5455774q6p387n4s5335725n586o3q&edata=74ab7fb9e7b3617e2583a8f9f3620f56&ek=5956397n4n6n46535343687n55544931516p356r4r6n526r5045786q59334n6s5931646151566s71&ekdata=ebc4c2401e7a36997be63ca28dc3bb7b
You did not read the “MAY” in the headline?
“Scientists have measured what is likely the highest temperature ever on Antarctica: 63.5 degrees Fahrenheit (17.5 Celsius) …” (National Geographic).
==============================
Absolute nonsense, it may have been the highest temperature ever measured but so what?
Anything like comprehensive meteorological data from the Antarctic goes back to only 1957 and shows no trend whatsoever:
Mike there is a cooling trend in Antarctica.
At this point we can talk about mass balance.
http://jonova.s3.amazonaws.com/graphs/antarctic/antarctic-surface-mass-ice-graph.jpg
Mike comes in, gets owned, disappears, reappears and posts the same nonsense again lol.
I personally would like to thank this “scientist” for giving me the best reason yet why they are so wrong ,as someone else pointed out .
If low Co2 is good and high Co2 is bad ,where in earths history has this been evident ,the opposite is actually the case !
As a footnote we can say the same thing for temperatures surely ?
If a “tipping point” is a point of no return, then I’ll be glad to see it pass by. After 6/6/16 alarmists will no longer have any reason to demand that we stop using coal or other fossil fuels. It will be too late to do any good. I guess we’ll find out soon if they believe their own hype, or if they will extend the deadline to give us more time to meet their blackmail demands. I suspect the latter because this has little to do with climate change and everything to do with money and power.
They made a big mistake. 6/6/16 is right around the corner.
I’ll join the laughter and ridicule when nothing happens.
We’re way pass “tipping point” for the sinking of the credibility of science institutions.
We might reach “peek ridicule” soon.
CO2’s forcing effect is a logarithmic function, so each incremental increase of CO2 has less and less of an effect…..
The silly CAGW hypothesis erroneously projects an exponential rise of global warming from CO2 forcing, which is physically impossible and NOT supported by the physics nor the empirical evidence….
We’ve enjoyed about 0.2C of beneficial CO2 warming recovery out of the total 0.82C of total warming recovery since the end of the Little Ice Age in 1850..
Moreover, we’ve enjoyed a 25% increase of crop yields from CO2 fertilization since 1850, and about 25~50% of global greening from CO2 fertilization just since 1980…
How do the above CO2 benefits from rising CO2 levels equate to passing ” dangerous tipping point” next week: higher crop yields, more global greening, increased water efficiency from shrinking leaf stomata, higher plant drought resistance, more phytoplankton for healthier ocean life, slightly less alkaline oceans, slightly more global precipitation from slightly higher ocean evaporation, less severe winters, earlier springs, longer growing seasons, more arable land in Northern latitudes, expanding tree lines, etc…
Are we “tipping” into a greener and healthier planet from slightly higher CO2 concentrations?
Where is the catastrophe?
Why is CAGW still a thing?
http://climateclarity.uk/img/arrhenius.png
Couldn’t help myself: (and I’m hoping the link appears).
[Please re-post. Sometimes WordPress truncates links. -mod]
Thanks mod, it was just a cartoon I thought was funny.
No great loss.
That’s a Monday. If the world is going to enter it’s final stages of drain circling, I’d expect it to happen on Monday. Obviously fate knows about our arbitrary dating scheme, too.
Patrick Moore said in a lecture that average global temp for the last billion years was 22.5 C…..AV global temp now is 14.5C. We are in an ice age.
” Mike
May 14, 2016 at 7:04 pm
Got any evidence for mass bleaching events before 1980? That deafening silence would be a nooooooooo…”
Ever hear of null hypothesis, you have no evidence it didn’t happen either. Yet you claim “IT didnt happen”
Exactly- there a zero records of it happening- as far as we know it’s never happened- and yet folks have been diving in the ocean for a long long time. And yet now it’s a regular event with every El Nino.
I’m sure that folks given a day or two on here will come up with some convoluted explanation like bleaching events were common place during the medieval warm period or some nonsense when great herds of wilderbeast strode majestically across greenland’s plains and the inhabitants sipped wine from olives they grew on the balmy shores of Godthåb. The cognitive dissonance must be extraordinary trying to think up explanations for the bleeding obvious, but libertarians were never the most intelligent or balanced folk.
Well Marky Mark it’s been fun. I wish I could say I could be arsed arguing with you a bit longer, but you’re clearly a bit of a moron driven by ideology. Get a degree. Learn something about the world. Your ex-wife and children will thank you for it.
Toodles. xo
Hey Mike ,so your a greenie and a cowboy who knew , Mark is driven by science you are driven by ideology .
You have that wrong as well , when you have proof of any CAGW let the IPCC know because they have no evidence at all just a prediction on computer .
Please feel free to return the insult don’t worry about evidence there is none .
‘Mike’ ignores the posted link showing that coral bleaching happened routinely back in the 1800’s (and undoubtedly before); well before human emissions could have had an effect.
Therefore, coral bleaching is a natural event, Mike is flat wrong, and now he tucks tail and runs. Typical igorant commenter, parroting what he reads from other ignorant parrots.
This is a science site, ‘Mike’. [trimmed, .mod]
He had to leave. His panties were in such a twist they were cutting off bllood flow to his brain.
Not that there’s much there to begin with.
Again, you simpleton, if you have no data you cant make any claim, you made a specific claim.
What we do know is positive ENSO being temps over the the thermal limit for corals.
Everything else you say is bunk.
“By far the most devastating impacts in terms of suffering and loss of life occurred in the semiarid region of northeast Brazil where several hundreds of thousands of people died from starvation and diseases during the drought that started in 1877.”
http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs10584-008-9470-5
1877\78 el nino
Sorry Mike, this was a significant event, and it would have almost certainly caused coral bleaching.
Yes the bleaching is worse than we thought the sky is falling the sky is falling 97 percent agree .
Blah blah blah , you realise Mike your churning out Co2 at an alarming rate but then you would be a hypocrite unless you are peddling right now .
6.6.16 is within a few days of my birthday. What an honor!!
Federal election July 2nd here in Aus, and the Greens are going nowhere while the economy tanks. Lowest cash interest rates EVAH in Aus means only one thing. The economy *IS* tanking. Lets hope all those rich people keep selling a buying multi-million dollar properties or the Aussie economy will go bust! LOL Oh wait!
“”When you get away from the cities and into the background air, that’s the one that really drives climate change, that’s in terms of representing the entire globe,” Dr Fraser said.”
Surely when you get away from the cities and into the background air the whole problem goes away, no more UHI corrupting the temperature data!
665 was the number of the beast. It’s just easier to remember his neighbour, at 666 when potted!
A psychological tipping point? Hmm, consensus science at work? Declare an emergency before anything happens? Hmm…they are warning us to prepare for heat but it looks like a cold summer, this year, where I live. Not ready for primetime, IMO, these claims are becoming more and more ridiculous but those gruberite-lemmingss don’t seem to pick up on it – do they?