State braces for climate change
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
If you go
What: Climate change meeting
When: 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. Dec. 10
Where: Wenatchee Public Library, 310 Douglas St., Wenatchee
WENATCHEE — Officials from several state agencies will gather in Wenatchee early next month to ask people here how the state should prepare for climate change.
“Significant impacts are projected in some sectors as early as the 2020s and certainly by the 2040s — these are not ‘far in the future’ impacts,” according to an executive summary in the Climate Impacts Group’s impacts assessment, released this summer.
A warmer climate will affect everything from snowpack in the mountains, to sea levels on the coast, the report says.
Scientists say temperature records show that the Pacific Northwest has warmed about 1.5 degrees Fahrenheit since 1920. That warming is predicted to hasten, with latest models from the University of Washington’s Climate Impacts Group showing that in another 10 years the average temperature will be 2 degrees warmer, and in 70 years, it will be more than 5 degrees warmer.
To prepare for these impacts, the state Legislature directed several state agencies to develop a strategy by December 2011.
The state departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Ecology, Fish and Wildlife, Natural Resources and Transportation are being asked to come up with ways to address or adapt to the effects of a warmer climate.
Seth Preston, spokesman for the state Department of Ecology, said impacts will vary in different locations of the state. In North Central Washington, water supply will be a critical aspect of climate change, and could have major impacts on farmers, power production, and fish habitat.
A smaller snowpack could also leave the region with drier forests, which could result in larger or more severe wildfires, he noted.
“What happens if there’s less runoff, and not only less, but it’s happening at different times of the year than it has historically?” he asked.
“Those are the kinds of things that people need to be looking around and asking, ‘If these things start happening, what can be done?’”
Among the impacts predicted throughout the Pacific Northwest by the Climate Impacts Group:
• April 1 snowpack will drop by almost one-third across the state by the 2020s, and more than one-half by the 2040s.
• The quality of habitat for salmon will be reduced, particularly in the interior Columbia River Basin and Lake Washington Ship Canal.
• The area burned by wildfires will double by the 2040s, and triple by the 2080s, increasing to more than 2 million acres in a given year.
• Significantly more heat and air pollution-related deaths will occur throughout the century. The group predicts 101 additional deaths among people over 45 years old by 2025 in the Seattle area alone.
The state is asking local agencies, businesses, farmers and residents to help them develop a strategy to prepare for these changes. One of two meetings to gather suggestions is in Wenatchee on Dec. 10, and all are welcome to attend.
K.C. Mehaffey: 997-2512
mehaffey@wenatcheeworld.com
Comments
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mavulous (mav ulous) says...
The science of assumption demands the substance of your faith. Barring that, all one hears is hideous laughter in the background.
And..here...we......GO!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xSLlZh...
November 25, 2009 at 11:44 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
paintguy (D Bennett) says...
Here we go.........someone's paranoid ideas getting the best of them.
November 25, 2009 at 11:55 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
mavulous (mav ulous) says...
>• The area burned by wildfires will double by the 2040s, and triple by the 2080s, increasing to more than 2 million acres in a given year.<
Okay, you see it is assumptions like that which cause me to believe that the Joker is in the details. That's because I read this story in the World just the other day:
http://www.wenatcheeworld.com/news/20...
From the above link this is what the Sierra Club's Roberson had to say about removing biomass debris from the forest in order to make biofuels:
►Roberson said biomass incineration, although an alternative to greenhouse gas sources like oil and coal, still pollutes the air. Removing too much woody debris, instead of letting it decay and nourish soils, can damage the health of the forest, he said.◄
In other words, Mr. Roberson from the Sierra Club does not want the very thing removed from the forest that might help prevent the potential risk for forest fire in the lead story above that state climate officials are worried about--even though it would help us reduce our need for fossil fuel! I think hypocrisy is really spelled with a capital "J" when it comes to most all of this stuff! Nobody can agree on anything and yet they all want our tax dollar! Not only do they take our tax dollar, but they steal our common sense in the process as if we can't figure any of this out for ourselves. Environmentalists and climatologists need to get out into the real world more. They need to go see and visit real people who are hurting in this weak economy. They need to forget about global warming for a week and go help the Salvation Army distribute food to needy families. Jokers like Roberson from the Sierra Club need to do the same. These environmentalists and climatologists all disgust me to the core because they all have tunnel-vision and all they can see is their own agenda in conjunction with their own mission to coerce and influence the hearts and minds of trusting Americans. I conclude that the Joker is in the details and so is the devil if you prefer that term. The point is these special interests will continue to push their agenda on us all until the American people finally stand up and push back. In my opinion, that time is now. These Jokers need a revelation! They need a Scrooge moment to redeem themselves in the eyes of their fellow man/woman...♂♀...
November 25, 2009 at 12:52 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Norm (Norm Messer) says...
"In other words, Mr. Roberson from the Sierra Club does not want the very thing removed from the forest that might help prevent the potential risk for forest fire"
.
Surely as an orchardist, you must know enough about soils to understand that they must be replenished.
November 25, 2009 at 4:20 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
DrJones (Dr. Jones) says...
Wrong.
http://www.google.com/#hl=en&source=h...
November 25, 2009 at 4:40 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
seidy68 (Greg Seidenstricker) says...
What a load of marxist crap. Tell the parasites in these do-gooder ministries to shut up to cut down on "greenhouse" CO2 and water vapor. Then fire them. Tell them what the Russians told the soviet slavemasters in 1991 at the fall of the USSR: "tell the ministries to catch mice. If they dont catch mice, then they dont eat."
November 25, 2009 at 5:28 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Norm (Norm Messer) says...
Words have meanings, Greg. This has nothing to do with marxism.
.
Dr Jones, your link doesn't work.
November 25, 2009 at 5:41 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Tim (Tim Lamb) says...
1.5 degrees in 89 years doesn't prove a thing.
Actually, I keep hearing how we will run out of petrolium in thirty years anyway...PROBLEM SOLVED! YEA!!!
Somebody put a cork in Yellowstone, it's destroying the O-zone. :>)
I want to get in the act. I want to help. Send your donations to:
"Change Tim's World"
Entiat USA/Earth
And give him a cooler place to live.
Obama promised change, what's everyone so upset about?
Everyone have a 1.5 degree warmer Turkey day!
Tim
November 25, 2009 at 5:59 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
mavulous (mav ulous) says...
>Surely as an orchardist, you must know enough about soils to understand that they must be replenished.<
I'll bite. Wood contributes little of nothing to the soil profile. In an orchard, if you continually remove a fruit crop, then you must put something back. That's because the fruit contains nitrogen. I believe the actual amount is about two pounds of N per bin of apples. In a forest, the biomass target is cellulose, which contributes nothing to the soil. You see, Norm, in an orchard we have all this brush/cellulose on the ground after we prune the trees every winter. That brush contributes absolutely nothing to soil nutrition as it contains zero N. The same holds true in the forest where all that trash actually becomes a fire hazard during the heat of the summer. Ever hear of slash burning to reduce the risk of fire in the woods? The Forest Service does it all the time. Now then, if these special interests could ever exercise some common sense, we could commercially remove biomass trash from the forest floor and convert it to a biofuel and reduce our consumption of fossil fuel AND, at the same time, diminish the potential risk of a forest fire. You see, Norm, it's a win-win-win. Count 'em, Norm, that's 1-2-3 wins. Only problem is you've got the Sierra Club insisting that biomass debris must remain in the forest where it can pose a fire hazard. Someone will have to pay them off to get them to change their stand on this issue. That's just the way it works in the world of special interests. Cooperation is a good thing, it's just that it costs a lot of money to get it, and the end-user pays any and all procurement costs.
November 25, 2009 at 6:01 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
mavulous (mav ulous) says...
DrJones
Vince, is that you?
November 25, 2009 at 6:07 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
mavulous (mav ulous) says...
Okay, I think this is DrJones' link:
http://www.mediaite.com/tv/ed-begley-...
November 25, 2009 at 7:01 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
seidy68 (Greg Seidenstricker) says...
Norm, the marxists are now the pushers of the international "green" agenda. Slavery by another name. Go research Gorbachev, he is a big "green" leader now. Green is the new RED. I am anti-green.
November 25, 2009 at 7:39 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Norm (Norm Messer) says...
Gorbachev ended Marxism in the Soviet Union. Try again.
November 25, 2009 at 8:25 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Norm (Norm Messer) says...
C'mon mav, haven't you ever built a compost pile? You know you've got to balance the nitrogen with carbon - add straw to the manure.
November 25, 2009 at 8:26 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
mavulous (mav ulous) says...
Cellulose doesn't contribute anything to the compost, Norm. Leaves do, but not the wood. Grass clippings do, but not the wood. Green manures are excellent, but not the wood. Banana peels, kitchen wastes are all good, but not the wood. Wood in compost will not degrade quickly or easily. It's a non-essential fiber. Better to make a biofuel out of it and reduce the potential risk of forest fire.
November 25, 2009 at 10:36 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
mavulous (mav ulous) says...
This is a work in progress:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climatic...
November 25, 2009 at 10:38 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Bob_Knows (Bob Knows) says...
So-called "climate change" is a fraud and always has been a fraud. Have you ignored the recent news coming out of the University of East Anglia that they "cooked" data and manipulated science journals that became the basis for the UN Commission on Climate Change? Its a fraud. Instead of "global warming" we are having a solar cold period similar to the Maunder Minimum.
Even locally our Governess Haywire fired the State Environmentalist because he wouldn't go along with the political fraud.
It is frustrating when otherwise good news sources like the World keep pushing the same old tired lies even after they have been demonstrated to be bold face lies. Shame on you.
November 26, 2009 at 8:26 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Bob_Knows (Bob Knows) says...
Here's another prediction:
The World will be pushed out of business by 2020 if they keep pushing this kind of left wing stupidity long after everyone knows its a lie.
November 26, 2009 at 8:28 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
artmann (Art Mann) says...
Why in the World.....would you print this garbage? This article is forecasting doom and gloom 20 - 30 years from now and the weatherman can't even predict tomorrow's weather accurately. Have you heard of the Hadley break-in. The researchers are caught in emails confused on the cooling of the last ten years. Liberal marxism exposed!!!
November 26, 2009 at 8:42 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
artmann (Art Mann) says...
Great article here about Hadley by a Hydrological engineering scientist. One quote "Finally, the CRU hackers should be given the Nobel Peace Prize" is right on.
.
http://caps.fool.com/Blogs/ViewPost.a...
November 26, 2009 at 9:11 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
mavulous (mav ulous) says...
These agencies all work together in an unspoken yet coordinated effort to influence and steer public opinion. There is a huge amount of money on the line surrounding this issue and the faster nations act the more quickly government funds will be made available. That means job security for an awful lot of people in an uncertain economy. Personally, I believe global warming is a valid issue worthy of debate, but I certainly do not believe it poses any kind of imminent risk to anyone anywhere.
This piece from Real Clear Politics summarizes the latest controversy in a clear and concise manner, imo:
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/arti...
November 26, 2009 at 9:51 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
mavulous (mav ulous) says...
Oops, looks like links cannot be copied and pasted from post to post. Apparently the article URL must be copied and pasted separately each time from the address bar for each individual post.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/arti...
November 26, 2009 at 10:22 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
jethro (who cares) says...
Blame it on the peson who invented the internet and global warming, so he says............................... Al Gore.. what an idiot.
November 26, 2009 at 10:51 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
artmann (Art Mann) says...
We have been so scammed!!!
"This shows that scientists “artificially adjusted” temperature data to hide the decline in temperatures after 1960. The graphs cited by global warming advocates to argue for continued man-made global warming in the modern era are therefore largely fraudulent. This is not about “rancor,” “debate” or “insults,” as the media spin machine would frame it, this is about hardcore evidence of deliberate deception."
http://www.prisonplanet.com/forget-th...
November 27, 2009 at 10:14 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Chuck (C. Ulysses Farley) says...
And what of the emails hacked from the University of Anglia's Climate Reserach Unit? http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php...
This pretty much proves that the "source" data on anthropogenic global warming is fatally flawed--and yet our leaders are INSISTING we surrender our sovereignty, our liberty, and perhaps even our very lives for this momumental non-sequiter.
November 27, 2009 at 12:56 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Chuck (C. Ulysses Farley) says...
Why isn't the World reporting on the current "climategate" shttp://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/geraldwarner/100018034/climategate-%20%20e-mails-sweep-america-may-scuttle-barack-obamas-cap-and-trade-laws/candal? are they too busy trying to become palatable to Seattle society to actually look into an issue? For an interesting perspective on how the leaked emails in my previous post are affecting the entire planet in a more reasonable, rational way, click on the following link:
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/ger...
November 27, 2009 at 1:14 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
robbins (Jefferson Robbins) says...
"Why isn't the World reporting on the current "climategate" scandal? are they too busy trying to become palatable to Seattle society to actually look into an issue?"
http://www.wenatcheeworld.com/news/20...
November 27, 2009 at 7:55 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Chuck (C. Ulysses Farley) says...
One weak Washington Post reprint that covers none of the actual numbers, and instead refers to one email about threatening to "beat up" one skeptic. Have you read through these emails? Looked at the math? Was it hackers or a whistle-blower? There is much more to this than a cursory glance, and no mention of it in the article to which this thread is dedicated. Maybe Mehaffey could have at LEAST questioned the validity of holding such state-wide meetings in light of the reams of previously witheld information we need to fully understand before making life-altering decisions on a legislative level. On the Climategate story the climate alarmists have been eerily silent while contiuning to march to the same tired drum and I personally find that, well, alarming.
November 27, 2009 at 8:17 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Tim (Tim Lamb) says...
"That warming is predicted to hasten, with latest models from the University of Washington’s Climate Impacts Group showing that in another 10 years the average temperature will be 2 degrees warmer, and in 70 years, it will be more than 5 degrees warmer."
Here is the biggest missleading part of the equasion. Their "predicitons" are held up as fact and used to scare people into submission.
Because they can say with some "evidence" that the average temp is 1.5 degrees higher than 90 years ago does not give them any grounds for predictions. I could just as easily predict that the trend will be to cool off because THAT is the historical record of weather patterns, cycling.
November 28, 2009 at 10:33 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
mavulous (mav ulous) says...
The University of East Anglia's Climate Research Unit's official response:
https://www.uea.ac.uk/mac/comm/media/...
November 28, 2009 at 10:43 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Norm (Norm Messer) says...
Yeah, Tim, and you could build a rocketship that could land on the moon, too. Those durn scientists think they're so smart, just because they read books and stuff. What do they know? Climate change can't be real because I want to drive a reely big shiny car reely fast.
November 29, 2009 at 3:20 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
mavulous (mav ulous) says...
Climate change can be real, but it doesn't necessarily mean that we must tax the American people in order to manage the climate in the name of green science and big government if the hard data cannot support the scientific consensus. What is really at issue here is whether or not there has been a concerted effort on the part of the scientific community to deceive the public and discredit and marginalize dissent in order to promote a focused agenda worth billions of dollars to green energy interests. If the public is expected to support the green movement with their tax dollars, then the public has a right to know the truth behind the movement including the data that drives the scientific consensus. This is especially true during a global recession when many people are out of work. Cap and trade and a global warming summit should be way down the list of Washington priorities when Americans are out of work. If Obama is smart and in touch with the American people, he will realize that fact at once before his poll numbers render him totally ineffective.
November 29, 2009 at 11:19 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Tim (Tim Lamb) says...
I'd love to build that rocket just for you, Norm!
I did not say climate had not changed, just that it always changes, it's normal.
It's not the science that's the problem it's the preconcieved ideas that interpret it.
November 29, 2009 at 2:09 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
BeenThere (John Smith) says...
I wonder how much the temp has warmed over the last 10,000 years when there was a glacier just north of us? Hum???
November 29, 2009 at 5:37 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
mavulous (mav ulous) says...
This certainly doesn't look good:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news...
November 29, 2009 at 9:01 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Tim (Tim Lamb) says...
Oh what a tangled web we weave....
November 29, 2009 at 9:33 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Norm (Norm Messer) says...
"Climate change can be real, but it doesn't necessarily mean that we must tax the American people in order to manage the climate in the name of green science and big government if the hard data cannot support the scientific consensus. "
.
It would have to be the most massive conspiracy in the history of mankind to get the entire scientific community to fudge the data, as you suggest is happening. The odds against that happening are pretty astronomical.
.
"If the public is expected to support the green movement with their tax dollars,"
.
Half a million dollars PER Soldier per year is the Pentagon's low-ball estimate for teh cost of the war in Afghanistan.
.
"then the public has a right to know the truth behind the movement including the data that drives the scientific consensus"
.
None of the data is hidden; I've seen the scientists on this board post many links that seem to go largely unclicked. If "the public" wants to know the truth, it's gonna have to read it.
November 29, 2009 at 10:57 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Norm (Norm Messer) says...
"I did not say climate had not changed, just that it always changes, it's normal."
.
Try digging a hole with a shovel. Compare your rate of earth moving to that of a backhoe. Then look at some of the house-sized machines they use in industrial mining. Try cutting down a big tree with an ax. Compare your rate of timber production with that of a feller-buncher. How many billions of barrels of oil has mankind pumped from the earth in the last 50 years? We have transformed nearly every drop of that oil into smoke. What's new is the massive scale of mankind's ability to quickly cause incredibly massive changes to our environment. To think that the human transformation of the environment on such a massive scale doesn't or can't have equally massive side-effects is absurd.
November 29, 2009 at 11:04 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
BeenThere (John Smith) says...
"Half a million dollars PER Soldier per year is the Pentagon's low-ball estimate for teh cost of the war in Afghanistan."
From the guy who wants open boards so anyone and everyone can come in. Norm, if you dislike the way the US does things, move! Go back to live in Mexico where you found the citizens to be so much better than here in the US.
Rember when the scientists said red wine was bad for you - now it's good. Seems like the same thing with coffee and a bunch of other things. They look at a very small point in time and yell the sky is falling. After a more years of research, they change their minds.
It just politically correct right now to say what they are saying.
"We have transformed nearly every drop of that oil into smoke."
Wrong again Norm!
November 30, 2009 at 7:03 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
mavulous (mav ulous) says...
Would you trust this man?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment...
November 30, 2009 at 2:16 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Annsboy (Jerald Sargent) says...
Back a few years ago it was said that a few degrees warmer would equal a net positive for global hunger due to more land available for farming. It is also interesting to note almost no hurricanes this year, weren't we told of massive storms to come? the sky is a falling.
November 30, 2009 at 7:02 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Norm (Norm Messer) says...
One year of few hurricanes is not statistically significant. It's like looking at a 10 minute time period in which Saddam Hussein didn't execute anybody and pronouncing him Gandhi.
December 1, 2009 at 11:45 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
mavulous (mav ulous) says...
>One year of few hurricanes is not statistically significant. <
Nor is 75 years of global warming data within the context of the last 10,000 years of earthly history--especially if you dump recent raw data and leave only the homogenized results upon which to base your conclusions. That's not science. That's the politics of manipulation in the name of "green" grants and advocacy funding.
December 4, 2009 at 10:38 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )