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Since 1850: Ref: IPCC-AR4 Temperature is up 1°C (1.8°F) and climbing steeply Sea Level is up 2 cm (5”) and climbing fa

Since 1850: Ref: IPCC-AR4 Temperature is up 1°C (1.8°F) and climbing steeply Sea Level is up 2 cm (5”) and climbing fast (due to melting ice & snow) NH Snow Cover is down 3,000,000 km 2 and dropping.

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Since 1850: Ref: IPCC-AR4 Temperature is up 1°C (1.8°F) and climbing steeply Sea Level is up 2 cm (5”) and climbing fa

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  1. Since 1850: Ref: IPCC-AR4 Temperature is up 1°C (1.8°F) and climbing steeply Sea Level is up 2 cm (5”) and climbing fast (due to melting ice & snow) NH Snow Cover is down 3,000,000 km2 and dropping The Climate-Change Skeptics are Wrong: Man-Caused Climate Change is Well Underway … And Very, Very Scary! 1958-76 1993-97 In 30 years Arctic Sea Ice has thinned by half. Barry Huebert, huebert@hawaii.edu

  2. Before the Industrial Revolution, CO2, CH4, and N2Oin the air hardly changed. Now all these greenhouse gases are skyrocketing due to human activities. The Earth is in Energy Balance: The same amount of energy is absorbed from the Sun and lost as Infrared radiation. Greenhouse gases prevent the escape of some IR, causing the Earth to warm up. Warming is not the only effect, though: rain changes, storms intensify, and ice melts.

  3. Positive Feedback: Some Warming Causes More Warming! 1 Light colored ice reflects back the Sun’s energy efficiently. 2 Exposed land is darker and absorbs more energy; warming. 3 As the ice melts, more land is exposed. This absorbs more heat, melting more ice, and causing further warming. 4 The altitude of the melting ice is reduced so it becomes harder for new ice to form (esp for Greenland). Ice-melt Positive Feedback can cause a Runaway Warming, by darkening originally-light surfaces. Indeed, ice is melting MUCH faster than glaciologists had forecast: Since the inhabited Earth has never experienced these conditions, there were no observations of rapidly melting ice on which to base predictions. Melt descending into a moulin, a vertical shaft carrying water to the base of the Greenland ice sheet.

  4. Everything you consume* uses fossil fuels in its manufacture, packaging, and transport, producing CO2 at every step. What Can you DO? Conserve Everything Reduce Waste Recycle everything you can Educate family and friends about the need for their help Campaign hard for Green politicians Write letters to policymakers demanding fuel economy standards Use renewable energy every time you can (solar hot water) Turn off lights & switch to fluorescents Minimize air-conditioning Use just one towel in restrooms Carry groceries in reusable cloth bags Use feet, bicycles, and public transit rather than automobiles Give dirty looks to people driving SUVs and Hummers to the mall Take shorter, cooler showers Don’t live alone

  5. The nature of our future environment depends strongly on which “scenario” forecasters use. The scenarios differ only in the extent of society’s effort to conserve and reduce fossil-fuel use. YOUR behavior will determine how badly Earth is damaged. Oil and power companies are not to blame for climate change. You are!! Not “us!”

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