Weather Acting Funny in Your Neighbourhood?

[figo]

i'm not so sure that the sea level rise predictions are so well thought out.
for example, if you raise the temperature say 5 deg F, the atmosphere will hold significantly more water.
http://weather.cod.edu/notes/moisture.105.html
http://ess.geology.ufl.edu/ess/Notes...atmoscomp.html

an estimate for the mass of the water in the atmosphere is
0.017 x 10^21g or about 2 x 10^19g
in a cubic kilometer you have 10^5 x 10^5 x 10^5 cm^2 = 10^15 cm^2
the atmosphere then contains 2x10^4 or 20000 cubic kilometers of water....
which is a 200 x 100x1 km slab of ice....
when the temperature goes up the total volume of water in the atmosphere will go up by maybe a few hundred of cubic kilometers....

and an increase in overall temperature means the atmosphere will expand too making the over all calculation complex, to this fellow at least....

of course more co2 and h2o means more plant food....
if the overall biomass goes up, many cubic kilometers of water will be absorbed co2 + h2o = carbohydrates=ch2o which is bioconverted to the various organic components of the earths biomass.....

so when the temperature goes up, plants and the atmosphere can suck it up,
how much exactly? who knows.....?

anyway if you don't consider these factors you're calcs are going to be out to lunch.... i mean the current rise in sea level does not correlate one iota with the
dumb ice melts and sea level goes up predictions....

good thing for the internet, these kind of bogus simple minded theories are getting shot down much quicker than in the old days, where some politically powerful group could drag crap theories on and on before the bubble burst.

[Daisy]

Wont they float on their own? 8) :P

Yeah, but I won't!

Couldn't you just grab onto to what ever does float?

i'm not so sure that the sea level rise predictions are so well thought out.
for example, if you raise the temperature say 5 deg F, the atmosphere will hold significantly more water.

Even more rain and snow for the North West? :wink:

[Jack Slocombe]

Global warming....I think not.

Went to Seattle on thursday to get some work done on the boat. Froze our buns off. Came back to the Bay Area on Friday and refroze what had thawed from Seattle. Then went home near Yosemite and had some pipes freeze. Arghhhhhhhh. Going to the big island on Sunday where the temps range from 70 to 84......ahhhhhhhhhhh.

All is right with the world.

[figo]

global warming freezes out southern us....

Florida expects small citrus crop
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/busin...ness-headlines
As California citrus growers braced Friday for freezing weather, Florida orange and grapefruit growers learned that their own crop forecast was unchanged from last month's official forecast.

Citrus Growers Worried About Western Cold Snap
http://www.theledger.com/apps/pbcs.d.../1001/BUSINESS
A cold snap predicted in several western states this weekend is expected to lower temperatures in California to the teens, worrying farmers with a citrus crop still hanging on trees. In the San Joaquin Valley, growers in the middle of the citrus season are firing up huge fans to circulate warm air in the fields and are planning all-night vigils to monitor the health of nearly $1 billion worth of oranges,

[cullman]

good thing for the internet, these kind of bogus simple minded theories are getting shot down much quicker than in the old days, where some politically powerful group could drag crap theories on and on before the bubble burst.

...or it could be used to perpetuate "bogus simple minded theories."

Steve Milloy, former tobacco lobby shill and current mouthpiece for the petrochemical dudes runs this site: http://www.junkscience.com/

cman

[figo]

good thing for the internet, these kind of bogus simple minded theories are getting shot down much quicker than in the old days, where some politically powerful group could drag crap theories on and on before the bubble burst.

...or it could be used to perpetuate "bogus simple minded theories."

Steve Milloy, former tobacco lobby shill and current mouthpiece for the petrochemical dudes runs this site: http://www.junkscience.com/

cman

hmmmm.
got to think about this...
i've thought about these kind of things for quite awhile, which is not to say that i've got a handle on the whole thiing.
i'd buy the thought that simple minded and semi bogus to bogus theories can gather some steam...and get in the way of "serious science.

that said, science proceeds best when you limit the politics and agendas, power groups.

recently with the advent of google-internet you have serious academics having the ability to express theory unencumbered leading to an phenomenal advances.

its a revolution.

[lonewolf]

Another complicating factor in changing sea level debate that I have not seen discussed:
The melted ice now below water will occupy less volume as water.
perhaps balanced by the addition of water volume when ice now above water melts.
I have not idea what the percenage of ice above an below water is:
I dunno, just a thought.

[figo]

Another complicating factor in changing sea level debate that I have not seen discussed:
The melted ice now below water will occupy less volume as water.
perhaps balanced by the addition of water volume when ice now above water melts.
I have not idea what the percenage of ice above an below water is:
I dunno, just a thought.

good point, something which is obvious which i did not think of...
certainly should have.....
ice in the sea melting won't make much difference at all in the sea level.

the whole thing gets more complex in that much of antarctica is below sea level, the soulth pole is under water... but if the ice melts, the continent will rise, due to the mile (high) or so of ice of "its back"

given that antarctica is reported to be cooling off or is at least stable in temperature, really you only have greenland ice to consider.

i'm sure that proper scientists will factor all of the above into upcomming predictions of sea level rising...

no 50 foot rise in sea levels it would seem. perhaps a meter? in the next 20 years...

anyway, with this little conversation on track and field news we have exposed many variables in the ice melting sea rise equation, some of which were not considered by some of the so called experts working in high places.....like us gov....

really, it makes you wonder about a so called scientist that simply calculated the total volume of ice in the world and figured that it would automatically go into sea level rise, alarming the track and field world for no reason...

but time and time again this is the way it goes when so called experts opinions are not subject to critique .....

[lonewolf]

[/quote} no 50 foot rise in sea levels it would seem. perhaps a meter? in the next 20 years....[/quote]

In my semi-professional opinion, I think any worldwide rise in sea level will be minimal for a verrry long time. There is natural subsidence in some coastal areas ( South Louisiana, for example) partially because the delta is not being replinished with annual floods as it was for 15,000 years after the last ice age before we started messing with Mother Nature.
I am certainly no authority on Antartica but as a geologist, I am skeptical that there will be any appreciable rise in the Antartic continent, even if all the ice melts, an unlikely event. Antartica is hard rock which I do not expect to rebound.
Even though unconsolidated sediments can and do subside when large amount of liquids (oil and water) are removed (Long Beach oil field, for example) I cannot think of an example where the reverse is true.

[figo]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:A...ockSurface.jpg

The geological study of Antarctica has been greatly hindered by the fact that nearly all of the continent is permanently covered with a thick layer of ice. However, new techniques such as remote sensing have begun to reveal the structures beneath the ice.


Geologically, West Antarctica closely resembles the Andes of South America...
http://<br /> <a href="http://en.wi...sula</a><br />
The Scandinavian peninsula occupies part of the Baltic Shield, a stable and large crust segment formed of very old, metamorphic crystalline rocks. Most of the soil covering this substrate was scraped by glaciers during continental glaciation, specially in the northern part, where the shield is nearest the surface. As a consequence of this scouring, the elevation and the climate, a very small percentage of land is arable (3% in Norway)[4]. The glaciers also deepened river valleys, which were invaded by the sea when the ice melted, creating the famous fjords. In the south the glaciers deposited many sedimental deposits, configuring a very chaotic landscape.[5]

Altought the Baltic Shield is largely stable and resistant to the influences of other neighboring tectonic formations, the weight of nearly four kilometers of ice sheet caused the terrain to sink down. When the ice sheet disappeared, the shield rose again, a tendency that continues to this day at a rate of about 1 meter per century[5]. Conversely, the south part has tended to sink down to compensate, causing the flooding of the Low Countries and Denmark.

The crystalline substrate and absence of soil exposes mineral deposits of metals, like iron, copper, nickel, zinc, silver and gold.

reality in these concepts is that old viking ports are now 20-50 km inland....

the point of all of this is that the geology of antarctica is not well known. the known gelolgy of the situation implies to me that if the ice is rermoved the land mass will rise big time and long time......

anyway, antarctica may ice actually be growing in size

here is a fun site that lists many many glaciers growing in recent years...\
http://www.iceagenow.com/Growing_Glaciers.htm
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/7/...ectid=10363304
New Zealand Herald
The Department of Conservation is worried someone will be killed as giant chunks of ice are falling from rapidly advancing glaciers in the middle of the peak visitor season.

Staff believe the risk of ice collapse at the face of the Fox and Franz Josef Glaciers is high and visitors are ignoring warning signs and putting themselves at risk.

Both glaciers are advancing at the rate of about a metre a week.

http://www.iceagenow.com/Antarctic_I...ls_Falling.htm

[Daisy]

I have not idea what the percenage of ice above an below water is:
I dunno, just a thought.

As far as i am aware part of the calculations are based on the Greenland ice sheet, which is all above water.

"If the Greenland ice sheet melted completely, it would raise global sea levels by about 7m." from http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4720536.stm

[lonewolf]

Thank you for the reference figo and Daisy.

I am not qualified to debate these learned bodies quantatively but I am not ready to panic.
The earth, in some configuration, will survive the inevitable, slow, massive changes induced by geologic forces and weather cycles. Species, including man, will adapt or become extinct as they always have .
Many former seaports are now inland, others are underwater., some gradually, some cataclysmically . Mountain chains, comprised of the detritus of older land masses were once sea beds.
We are only here for a century or so, future generations will cope. There is really nothing we can do about it. I am just gonna relax , wait for this ice storm to pass and not sweat the big stuff..

[figo]

http://www.iceagenow.com/A_hundred_y...lf_an_inch.htm

greenland melting....

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6069506.stm

0.3 mm per year estimated rise of oceans..... maybe.
or 0.4 inches per 100 years....
estimates vary by 200-300%
some say the ice in the center of greenland is getting thicker while losing ice on the edge..
need more data to figure out what's what.

and antarctica may well take up that precipitation, not to mention changes in the biomass and atmospheric total h20........ there are reports of record snow accumulation in 2006......

.......

[figo]

Falling sea levels

The tiny country of Tuvalu is not cooperating with global warming models. In the early 1990s, scientists warned that the Pacific coral atoll of nine islands - only 12 feet above sea level at its highest point - would vanish within decades, swamped by rising seas. Sea levels were supposedly rising at the rate of 1.5 inches per year.

However, new measurements show that sea levels have fallen 2.5 inches since that time. Similar sea-level declines have been recorded in Nauru and the Solomon Islands. (London Telegraph, 6 Aug 2000)

"The Maldives in the central Indian Ocean consist of some 1,200
individual islands grouped in about 20 larger atolls," says Mörner.
In-as-much as the islands rise only three to seven feet above sea
level, they have been condemned by the IPCC to flooding in the
near future.

Mörner disagrees with this scenario. "In our study of the coastal
dynamics and the geomorphology of the shores," writes Mörner,
"we were unable to detect any traces of a recent sea level rise.
On the contrary, we found quite clear morphological indications
of a recent fall in sea level."

Mörner’s group found that sea levels stood about 60 cm higher
around A.D. 1150 than today, and more recently, about 30 cm
higher than today.
http://www.iceagenow.com/Sea_levels_are_falling.htm

Arctic sea level has been falling by a little over 2mm a year - a movement that sets the region against the global trend of rising waters.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/5076322.stm

http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO.../V9/N45/C2.jsp
atlantic, southern oceans measurements indicate a drop in sea level....

this global warming water rising stuff is getting very laughable..... maybe the science joke of the century, kind of like year 2k?

[lonewolf]

Another thought:

How do we evaluate the relative effect of seafloor volcano growth displacing water, theoretically raising sea level in a smaller total ocean basin concurrent with sea floor spreading and continental drift compression theoretically increasing basin capacity?

One monstrous volcanic eruption can blanket the earth with sun blocking material, inducing a mini-ice age, setting global warming back decades, centuries, milleniums. Who knows? Not I. Or you.

The incomprehensible number of variables render puny mankind unable to identify them all or do anything about those he can.

There is a finite amount of water and rock, excluding insignificant occasional additions from outer space, in the world. God, Mother Nature or whoever is in charge of distribution of this material will arrange it as he/she/it, they see fit.

So, I renew my recommendation to lighten up about auto emissions and bovine flatulance and enjoy our alloted life span. Dismissing the improbability of reincarnation,it is the only one we get.