Climate // Current TV

U.S. experiences 4th warmest January on record; Mississippi 14th warmest

This winter season continues to push the envelope for warmth across the country with... more

stormchaser4850
added this
3 days ago
|
22 comments

GenevaLunch » Brrrrr, why it’s 5C in the Arctic when it’s -7C in Milan

GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – If you’ve been talking to friends about our Arctic... more

Vierotchka
added this
3 days ago
|
1 comment

Science behind the big freeze: is climate change bringing the Arctic to Europe?

A loss of sea ice could be a cause of the bitter winds that have swept across the UK... more

JanforGore
added this
6 days ago
|
95 comments

18 mile crack seen by NASA in Antarctic glacier

Antarctica is so vast that the pictures give you no sense of scale. The pencil-thin... more

JanforGore
added this
7 days ago
|
52 comments

Greenland's ice is growing darker

In the past, the bright surface of the Greenland Ice Sheet reflected well over half of the sunlight that fell on it. This reflectiveness helped keep the ice sheet stable, as less absorbed sunlight meant less heating and melting. In the past decade, however, satellites have observed a decrease in Greenland’s reflectiveness. This darker surface now absorbs more sunlight, which accelerates melting.

The map above shows the difference between the amount of sunlight Greenland reflected in the summer of 2011 versus the average percent it reflected between 2000 to 2006. Virtually the entire ice sheet shows some change, with some areas reflecting close to 20 percent less light than a decade ago. The map is based on observations from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) instruments on NASA’s Terra and Aqua satellites. It was produced as part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Arctic Report Card.

Climate scientists have long expected that Earth’s polar regions will become less reflective as global temperatures rise. Rising temperatures melt snow and ice, and the uncovered terrain—water, vegetation, bare ground—is darker and absorbs more sunlight. The loss of reflectiveness then amplifies the initial warming.

Most of the patterns on the map fit expectations. Warmer, lower-elevation areas of the ice sheet have darkened more than the colder, higher-altitude interior. Each summer, winter snow retreats from the edge of the ice sheet. Dark pools of melt water form on the surface of the ice, and windblown dust and other particles also collect near the surface, making it even less reflective.

But the darkening in the interior is just as remarkable as the changes at the margins, according to Jason Box of Ohio State University, who analyzed the reflectiveness data. The interior is the high point of the ice sheet, nearly two miles above sea level, and there is no visible melting in the summer. So why is the area becoming darker?

The darkening, says Box, is due to changes in the shape and size of the ice crystals in the snowpack. As temperatures rise, snow grains clump together and reflect less light than the many-faceted, smaller crystals (see lower image from a scanning electron microscope). Additional heat rounds the sharp edges of the crystals, and round particles absorb more sunlight than jagged ones.

More at the linkIn the past, the bright surface of the Greenland Ice Sheet reflected well over half of... more

JanforGore
added this
27 days ago
|
72 comments

Delusion & Fraud: 'Global warming nonsense lobby to collapse'

Canada has pulled out of the 1997 anti-global warming Kyoto protocol, saying the... more

rodstradamus
added this
1 month ago
|
0 comments

Worldwide Hippies News Briefs Sunday

Gunmen free American teenager in southern Philippines New U.N. climate deal struck,... more

joeeddy
added this
2 months ago
|
0 comments

Inhofe to UN Climate Conference in Durban

CarlosBobthe3rd
added this
2 months ago
|
0 comments

Family Planning as adaptation to climate change

Contraception, for those who want it, can be a helpful tool to deal with resource... more

acsberringer
added this
2 months ago
|
0 comments

Naomi Klein schools Keystone XL

PLEASE SHARE this Thought Bubble by RETWEETING: TWEET: #Canada hates unethical... more

thoughtbubbler
added this
3 months ago
|
0 comments

Traditional/Indigenous culture helps with climate change adaptation: report

Governments are ignoring a vast store of knowledge -- generated over thousands of years -- that could protect food supplies and make agriculture more resilient to climate change, says a briefing published today by the International Institute for Environment and Development. [paper attached here]

It urges negotiators at the UN climate change conference in Durban later this month to give stronger support to traditional knowledge and address the threats posed by commercial agriculture and intellectual property rights.

The paper includes case studies from Bolivia, China and Kenya that show traditional knowledge and local farming systems have proved vital in adapting to the climatic changes that farmers there face.

This includes using local plants to control pests, choosing traditional crop varieties that tolerate extreme conditions such as droughts and floods, planting a diversity of crops to hedge bets against uncertain futures, breeding new varieties based on quality traits, and having systems in place to protect biological diversity and share seeds within and between communities.

But the paper warns that government policies tend to overlook such knowledge and fail to protect farmers' rights to grow traditional crops, benefit from their use and access markets.

“Policies, subsidies, research and intellectual property rights promote a few modern commercial varieties and intensive agriculture at the expense of traditional crops and practices,” says the paper's lead author Krystyna Swiderska, a senior researcher at the International Institute for Environment and Development.

“This is perverse as it forces countries and communities to depend on an ever decreasing variety of crops and threatens with extinction the knowledge and biological diversity that form the foundations of resilience.”

The paper says that while modern agriculture and varieties may increase productivity, environmental stress and climatic variability mean the survival of poor farmers depends on more resilient and readily available traditional varieties.

“It is because of famers' intimate knowledge of nature that traditional farming practices have persisted for thousands of years and overcome climatic threats,” adds Swiderska.

“To sweep away all of that knowledge and the biological diversity it relates to in favour of a limited set of modern seed varieties means putting the private interests of commercial seed corporations ahead of the public interest of sustaining food and agriculture.”

More at the linkGovernments are ignoring a vast store of knowledge -- generated over thousands of... more