Living in interesting times
Posted by Heading Out on May 9, 2005 - 2:07pm
Dramatic news does not always appear on the front pages and in the network news. Yesterday there was a story by the science editor of the London Times, on the slowing of the Gulf Stream. Essentially one of the engines that drives the stream of warm water from Florida over to Northwestern Europe has shut down. The engine is the annual melting of the Odden ice shelf. For the past few years the shelf has not formed as the North Polar ice cap has grown thinner.
The article (courtesy of EB) reminds us that this was the basis of the film The Day after Tomorrow. Naturally, the article being written in the UK, the theme is the loss of heat that this will bring to the continent, and the resulting drops in temperature. It is a subject that The Guardian covered earlier in the year, though their conclusion was that this was not likely to happen for a long time.
But there is another concern, for if the heat is no longer drawn out of the Gulf, and sent north, then it may just stay where it is. And the steady build up of more heat in the Gulf and around Florida will not make those any more pleasant places to live, regardless of the effects of the heat on global weather patterns.
Technorati Tags: peak oil, oil
The article (courtesy of EB) reminds us that this was the basis of the film The Day after Tomorrow. Naturally, the article being written in the UK, the theme is the loss of heat that this will bring to the continent, and the resulting drops in temperature. It is a subject that The Guardian covered earlier in the year, though their conclusion was that this was not likely to happen for a long time.
But there is another concern, for if the heat is no longer drawn out of the Gulf, and sent north, then it may just stay where it is. And the steady build up of more heat in the Gulf and around Florida will not make those any more pleasant places to live, regardless of the effects of the heat on global weather patterns.
Technorati Tags: peak oil, oil
“If kindness and comfort are, as I suspect, the results of an energy surplus, then, as the supply contracts, we could be expected to start fighting once again like cats in a sack.”
—George Monbiot
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Sorry folk I missed the comments on this in the earlier blog, since I was fighting the peculiarities of a hotel connection that is making the whole process a bit of a gamble.
The story in the Times quotes an RN submarine, rather than a US one so this may have been someone going back to check the data.
"And the steady build up of more heat in the Gulf and around Florida will not make those any more pleasant places to live, regardless of the effects of the heat on global weather patterns."
Right, increases in hurricanes and their force. Have you noticed the power of some of the storms lashing the east coast over the last month? Those were whimps when they came through Oregon. There was even a low force hurricane that went about as far as Bermuda before it turned, although the NWS declined to name it as a hurricane (which makes you ponder why they didn't).
After the two climate change polar reports were published earlier this year, I walked down to the shore and contemplated where the rising ocean would be in 20 years, when I expect it to be one foot higher and about a meter in 100. Fortunately, the shoreline will stay the 300 or so yards from my house until sea level rise tops the 3 meters likely in now just 200 years. My analysis of available data leads me to conclude that we've already gone beyond the point where the positive feedback loops can be stopped, but a frenzied effort might keep them from operating too long. By frenzied I mean like the efforts you see of a whole town loading and placing sandbags to keep the rising waters out. Reading "Limits to Growth" is very helpful in understanding just how deep we are already. That's why I'm naming my upcoming project "Ark."
karlof -
are you sure you aren't secretly building an ark? Like, in your basement? grin...