Comments on: Australia today = U.S. southwest by 2050

By: Anthony, rabid doomsayer

Anthony, rabid doomsayer — Sat, 07 Feb 2009 15:26:46 +0000

Beefeater,
There is a world of difference between a drought that lasts a few years and one that is expected to last for the foreseeable future ie permanently.

The mega drought is here and will only be broken by floods only to immediately return to drought. That is the future we are facing.

What is now considered normal rainfall will become a rare event. We are entering a world of extremes.

By: Donald B

Donald B — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 20:59:06 +0000

The book “Is the Temperature Rising? The Uncertain Science of Global Warming” by S. George Philander presents the physics of the earth’s atmosphere and oceans in a neutral way and is in at least its fifth printing. In the section on the earth’s energy budget, it shows that the sun’s radiation evaporates, annually, about a meter of water over the surface of the earth. Therefore, if the earth had no land, a meter of water would fall (after evaporating) on each bit of the ocean. The land areas mess this up, naturally and some land areas get much more (Kauai’s mountain peak) and others much less. Some land areas have rainy seasons and dry seasons. If you got all your rain (20″ say) in a couple of consecutive weeks and none for the rest of the year, you would experience floods and droughts at the same location over a year period. If the amount of water evaporated (which GW predicts will) increases, the floods will increase.

By: David B. Benson

David B. Benson — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 00:52:37 +0000

Peter Foley — IPCC AR4 clearly states that current GCMs are not good at predicting precipitation patterns and that regional models are required to make longer range forecasts of precipitation. Unfortunately, the climate modelers are stating that progress on such models proceeds at a snail’s pace…

By: Peter Foley

Peter Foley — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 19:09:12 +0000

Which is it? Death by flood or Death by Drought? It reminds me of the classic joke about the three missionaries in the darkest heart of Africa, captured by the Kawabunga tribe of vicious predatory sodomites, They were offered a choice between, Ceech(multiple sodomy) or Death, the punch line was when the final priest chose death instead of ceech, it was death BY ceech. But seriously if the model can predict temperature can’t it point to rain fall trends like the Nuke winter rehash did? The AGWers don’t want the likely hood that if correct the climate will actually improve over the majority of the planet for the majority of people to become common Knowledge to prevent schisms in the community. We are at the Are there WMDs? stage of the of AGW “war”. Right now for 900$/an acre foot(320,000gallons) we can turn Sea water into potable water.

By: Ronald

Ronald — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 12:26:19 +0000

Peter Foley,

Warmer temperature can lead to more droughts, but also more rain and thus more flooding.
Evaporation will increase with a warmer atmosphere and ground and water temps. The atmosphere will be able to hold more water so when it does rain, more can drop from the sky.

So supposedly we will have both more drought and more flooding.

By: Ronald

Ronald — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 12:17:07 +0000

Beefeater,

You wrote that ‘nothing that happens now or in the future is unprecedented.’

What is being written about is climate change. What is to come in the future is unprecedented to modern day humans.

You are assuming that the dessert that you have now is the dessert you will have in the future. Isn’t the Death Valley desert worse than other desserts? Can’t temperatures get higher in the dessert than it is now? Can’t it get drier in the dessert than it is now?

You write that desserts are nothing new, we live in them now. But how many live in the Sahara dessert, which is mostly sand from one end to another.

Climate change means just that, that desserts that are hot and dry can become hotter and dryer.

You lack the imagination to understand the problem. The imagination I’m writing about is not some fantasy made up impossible world, but what the science is indicating can reasonably happen. The world we leave to future generations can be changed by what we do and not necessarily for the better.

By: David B. Benson

David B. Benson — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 20:17:05 +0000

Joe — I was surprised that the ITCZ has been moving further north recently, since the last time this occured was around 40–30 kya, moving towards LGM. At that time the Amazon basin was mostly savanna, with aeolian sand dunes near the coast, and massive occasional floods.

So I am a bit surprised to see essentially the same predictions for the Amazon basin in the face of global warming. But I suppose it shows just how complex the climate actually is…

By: Joe

Joe — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 01:13:33 +0000

You guys need to read the links — global warming drives the tropics and subtropics (=deserts) to expand, faster than the models projected, as it turns out.

By: David B. Benson

David B. Benson — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 22:49:28 +0000

Peter Foley — Yes, but the non-tropical boundary of the Hadley cells also matters. And for that matter, just where the ITCZ (Intertropical Convergence Zone) migrates to.

Rather to my surprise, the ITCZ has been moving further north during the northern hemisphere summer. This leads to drought in southwestern and also southeastern U.S. This also is causing the Amazon basin to revert to savanna, strarting in the southern portions.

By: Peter Foley

Peter Foley — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 22:38:06 +0000

I thought Higher temps = greater vapor pressure = more evaporation= more rainfall. Have we crossed in to a new dimension with new rules? Most likely higher Ocean temps would lead to more rain in Australia. All other things remaining the same.