A research team out of Yale University has found that the types of increases in carbon dioxide taking place in the atmosphere today could have a much larger effect on global temperatures than anticipated. Mark Pagani, associate professor of geology and geophysics at Yale and the lead author of the paper in the online edition of Nature Geoscience, and his team have found that a relatively small rise in CO2 can have dramatic temperature issues.
The team found that in the beginning of the Pliocene era, three to five million years ago, there was a global temperature of around 2-3 degrees Celsius warmer than today. This increase would not be that difficult to achieve in modern day and would have drastic effects. Today the CO2 in the atmosphere is around 385 parts per million (ppm) and if that were to be doubled to 770 ppm the temperature would raise by 1.5-4.5 degrees Celsius.
The models currently used, and those used by the team at Yale take into account things like changes in atmospheric water vapor, sea ice distribution, clouds and other dynamic processes. This looks at long-term climate sensitivity according to Pagani and can see long term feedbacks like changes in continental ice-sheets, terrestrial ecosystems and greenhouse gasses.
Pagani’s team found that not only would the temperatures comparable to the Pliocene era but that the CO2 levels were comparable to today’s at between 365 and 415 ppm. This research suggests, as other research has as well, that the Earth’s climate is sensitive to even the smallest atmospheric changes. People today can anticipate a few degrees warming, even if we do maintain the status quo for atmospheric CO2 levels. This research also suggests that even a small lowering of the CO2 levels could have positive effects for global warming.
Comments
Why don't you look at all the facts before doing a report! You only report what news that reflect your own ideology! Take a look at this report from NASA that is exactly opposite!
drroyspencer.com
Roy W. Spencer received his Ph.D. in meteorology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1981. Before becoming a Principal Research Scientist at the University of Alabama in Huntsville in 2001, he was a Senior Scientist for Climate Studies at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, where he and Dr. John Christy received NASA’s Exceptional Scientific Achievement Medal for their global temperature monitoring work with satellites. Dr. Spencer’s work with NASA continues as the U.S. Science Team leader for the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer flying on NASA’s Aqua satellite. He has provided congressional testimony several times on the subject of global warming.
Dr. Spencer’s research has been entirely supported by U.S. government agencies: NASA, NOAA, and DOE.
I appreciate the comment but this was not an opinion piece, I was just reporting on a new study looking at the effects of CO2 on the atmosphere. I have read Dr. Spencer's information and frankly despite his prior accolades by NASA he still seems as stuck in his ideology as you are accusing me of being. I look at different sides of an issue before making a decision and in a forum like my capacity as Science News Examiner by ideas don't have a say. This is about the research, if an interesting piece of research comes up tomorrow that is against global warming I am likely to publish an article about that as well. They both have relevance to a controversial topic.
Cheers
Halley
Climate models are based on how that particular modeler thinks that climate works. Climate models are little more than speculation or opinion. The present concentration of CO2 is just under 0.04%. I recently plotted the current rate to see how long it would take to get to 0.08%. That is around two hundred years. Rates could increase of course. But it is likely that the ocean absorption would increase also. So far, I have not seen any really convincing hard evidence that shows that CO2 levels are responsible for the warming from around 1980-2004. A similar warming occurred from around 1912-1942 when CO2 had increase only around a forth of the more recent increase. That warming had to be natural. The same natural forces that were in a warming phase then were in an even stronger warming phase during the 2080-2004 warming. But for some reason, the 1980-2004 warming is be blamed on CO2.
Bjorn Lomborg in case you do not know says that even with all the IPCC recomendations you would only slow down AGW by 6 hours by the end of century. Here is his short bio. He is a very common sense enviromentalist and former Greenpiece member!
Bjorn Lomborg is adjunct professor at the Copenhagen Business School. He is the organizer of the Copenhagen Consensus Center, which brings together some of the world's top economists, including 5 Nobel laureates, to set priorities for the world. Time magazine named Lomborg one of the world's 100 most influential people in 2004. In 2008 he was named "one of the 50 people who could save the planet" by the UK Guardian; "one of the top 100 public intellectuals" by Foreign Policy and Prospect magazine; and "one of the world's 75 most influential people of the 21st century" by Esquire.
All the scientific findings I have read that have been peer reviewed by real climate scientists, not climate pimp political scientists like the crowd at Yale, indicate that CO2 levels follow temperature increases and not cause them. You have to be firmly wrapped around the funding and junk science that is Global Warming to see cause and effect in every exhale or breaking of wind. Of course these people can't break wind because of where their heads are located.
Why do so many laymen suddenly think they know more about atmospheric science than highly educated scientists? Sure, there is a degree of uncertainty regarding where global temperatures will be in 50 or 100 years. However, unless something drastic happens like massive volcanic eruptions or a dimming of the sun, it's quite obvious that the trend in temperature is up, and given the acceleration of fossil fuel burning and natural positive feedbacks from melting tundra and ice, we should assume the world will be warmer. The question really is will this warming be run away warming that will start affecting our ability to survive or will it just be moderate warming that nature works to balance out via negative feedbacks such as increased carbon adsorption?
I will take the advice of highly educated scientists over laymen any day.
Recent research by Henrik Svensmark and his group at the Danish National
Space Center points to the real cause of the recent warming trend. In a
series of experiments on the formation of clouds, these scientists have
shown that fluctuations in the Sun's output cause the observed changes in the
Earth's temperature.
In the past, scientists believed the fluctuations in the Sun's output were
too small to cause the observed amount of temperature change, hence the need
to look for other causes like carbon dioxide. However, these new
experiments show that fluctuations in the Sun's output are in fact large
enough, so there is no longer a need to resort to carbon dioxide as the
cause of the recent warming trend.
The discovery of the real cause of the recent increase in the Earth's
temperature is indeed a convenient truth. It means humans are not to blame
for the increase. It also means there is absolutely nothing we can, much
less do, to correct the situation.
Climate change is controversial like evolution is.
I bet that the denialists will continue to deny even when Bangladesh is underwater and a tomato costs 5 bucks.
more crap that is trotted out as science!!!
First of all, NONE OF THIS IS SETTLED! Sure, there is much money that believes it is, but that does not make it right.
Secondly, Global Warming and Climate Change are THEORIES!!! That by itself make them not settled. But that also means they are a guess. There are alternate theories and any REAL SCIENTIST would examine alternate theories to learn more and to find ways to prove correctness of the theory.
Thirdly, the people who are promoting the idea that CO2 leads temperature lied about the data. The truth is that CO2 lags temperature. AL GORE LIES!!! IPCC LIES!!! Look at the graph, that is the truth, CO2 lags. So this very article is bogus.
What the Pliocene temperature really suggest is that the planet has a wide ranging CO2 level, that the oceans are a big CO2 sink, that the Sun has a big effect, that man did not do it, that nature has cycles, that no matter what we do, it won't make any difference.
If it feels like something isn't right, it probably isn't right.
I feel the military assault across the planet to steal oil with the blood of our soldiers being the currency is immoral. If we institute the draft, the world would change for the better.
If we tax gasoline 5 dollars a gallon to pay for Iraq and Afghanistan the world would be better off.
But it ain't gonna happen. America, the land of the immoral is ruled by hedonism and lavish lifestyles based on the slaughter and enslavement of 3rd world nations.
See oil for food, see cell phones for African child slaves...
blah blah blah...merry christmas you pathetic polluting cavepeople...
watch on youtube for proof that CO2 is good for the environment.
Is CO2 the cause?
Carbon Dioxide: The Breath of Life
type them into your search engines.
If it feels like something isn't right, it probably isn't right.
I feel the military assault across the planet to steal oil with the blood of our soldiers being the currency is immoral. If we institute the draft, the world would change for the better.
If we tax gasoline 5 dollars a gallon to pay for Iraq and Afghanistan the world would be better off.
But it ain't gonna happen. America, the land of the immoral is ruled by hedonism and lavish lifestyles based on the slaughter and enslavement of 3rd world nations.
See oil for food, see cell phones for African child slaves...
blah blah blah...merry christmas you pathetic polluting cavepeople...
Halley DeLay: Because Dr. Roy Spencer does fit your idiology you ridicul him! Ok, I give you that but what about Bjorn Lomborg, he is a former Greenpiece member, professor at the Copenhagen Business School. He is the organizer of the Copenhagen Consensus Center, which brings together some of the world's top economists, including 5 Nobel laureates, to set priorities for the world. Time magazine named Lomborg one of the world's 100 most influential people in 2004. In 2008 he was named "one of the 50 people who could save the planet" He still does not agree with you! Doesn't he lean to the left to fit your ideology? YOu haven't posted anything about this post!
Bjorn Lomborg argues that many of the elaborate and expensive actions now being considered to stop global warming will cost hundreds of billions of dollars, are often based on emotional rather than strictly scientific assumptions, and may very well have little impact on the world's temperature for hundreds of years. Please Reply
Update! You really picked a reputable scientist to do a report on!
The European Union's "carbon credit" scheme, one set up to reduce carbon emissions in Europe and one of many schemes being tossed around in Copenhagen, could prove to be a cash cow for IPCC chairman Rajendra K. Pachauri.
Pachauri, who has ties to Tata, a Mumbai-based Indian multinational conglomerate with business interests in a number of European steel making companies, stands to profit hundreds of millions of dollars by cashing in carbon credits it got from the EU just by closing Corus Redcar, a steel plant in England. More than 1,700 people will lose their jobs.
Dr. Bjorn Lomborg, a Danish economist who Al Gore refuses to debate, has never disputed the fact that developing nations require financial assistance to rid themselves of poverty, hunger and disease but taxing carbon, he says, is not the way to go. Lomborg says that for every dollar spent on reducing carbon emissions you only get $0.02 of benefit.
Sorry, wrong post on page! Please disregard last post!
Personally, I am with John C on this subject - I listen to science. This report was just that, a report. The team at Yale had done some research I thought people might like to hear about and so I wrote about it.
@steve - I am sorry but a youtube video is not a reputable source for an argument, do you have something that is published in a peer-reviewed journal to bring to the table? It would give your argument some weight that it does not carry right now.
@Barry Please familiarize yourself with what a theory is in science. Thank you.
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