Satellites show world's glaciers melting faster than ever

Been to Franz Josef and Fox Glaciers in NZ and seen the damage first hand. Sadly we are trying to shut the stable door still but this horse has already bolted.

Toyota just announced they sold 980 thousand cars last month world wide. Almost a million new cars sucking gas and exhausting pollutants in just one month of production from just one company. And the real wonder is that anyone still doubts mans activities are altering the Earth's climate.

I have no question that man is the main cause of the climate changes and that it started with the industrial age, but accelerated in the 1950s. Lots of plants and animals will become extinct in the next 50 yrs and we can't stop it. It is already too late. Hundreds of species - gone, perhaps thousands.

https://ourworldindata.org/co2-and-other-greenhouse-gas-emissions At the bottom of the graph, there are 2 sliders to zoom in on different time periods. Grab the left one and slide it towards the right to zoom the scale in.

has a dynamic chart which shows CO2 concentrations for the last 1M BCE years. Before 1920, it was never higher than 300ppm, and usually closer to 200ppm - half the concentration today. 1955 - 2018, it rose from 315ppm to 408ppm. Compared to all other increases, this last one has been nearly straight up - big changes in a very short time - one human's lifetime. Climate change is usually over 10,000 yrs. We are causing changes in 100 yrs now.

The predictions are if humans do what we are doing already, the average global temperature will increase 2.5-3.2 degC. It doesn't sound like much, but that is huge. If humans actually follow through on promised goals, the predicted temperature rise will still be 1.5 degC - which will still cause huge climate changes around the world and bleached (dead) corals.

And the real wonder is that anyone still doubts mans activities are altering the Earth's climate.

I do not doubt that man has altered the living conditions of billions of human beings from abject poverty in the pre-industrial world. The cost? One degree temperature rise that can at least partially be attributed to natural causes as industrialization coincided with the end of the Little Ice Age. The good news is that all of the doom and gloom climate models - 40 in total - are still all wrong in forecasting climate changes 10 years into the future never-mind hundreds. Adapt to change and thrive - humans have always been able to adapt to change. Now is not the time to turn back the clock on human progress.

Satellites show world's glaciers melting faster than ever.

It is a fact which has been a foregone conclusion in the past decades.

The process is becoming irreversible..

Do it like with the corona infection numbers, just produce less satellite photos. lol

Mother nature (not SUVs) melted it all.

Nature has cycles, deal with it.

Cycles have causes, what's the cause of this one? Hint, it isn't some mystical 'Mother Earth' entity randomly warming stuff up just to break the tedium.

What are the risks ?

Warmer ? Then less people will die of coldness and less gas, charcoal and oil will be burnt for heating.

Even windfarms need energy to be build and maintained.

Population grows more and more on Earth without any rules (outside China before), what do you expect ?

200,000 additional humans per day, on our planet.

Don't ask me who to spare because I prefer believing in progress, not doom.

And if we had satellites to shed light on what the glaciers looked like during the millions of years the dinosaurs roamed, we would have seen much more drastic changes.

Satellites show world's glaciers melting faster than ever

Remember the recent CNN exposee by Project Veritas? In private the CNN director said that after having removed Trump from office, they will now swivel their propaganda to concentrate on the "global warming" agenda. And CNN of course does not act alone, the legacy media always moves in lockstep. Stand by for many more scare stories about the "climate".

And if we had satellites to shed light on what the glaciers looked like during the millions of years the dinosaurs roamed, we would have seen much more drastic changes.

False. You have no proof of this. Ice core research has shown that the current pace of change is unprecedented.

in private the CNN director said that after having removed Trump from office, they will now swivel their propaganda to concentrate on the "global warming" agenda.

CNN removed Trump from office? I thought nobosy watched them? Is 'propaganda' or 'agenda' actually in his quotes, or is it your own little conspiracy?

Stand by for many more scare stories about the "climate".

Otherwise known as 'scientific research', and it's understandable you are afraid something that you cannot grasp intellectually.

What are the risks ?

The risks of running a vast experiment on a planet are quite high.

Since when did conservatives become so intellectually lazy that they lost the ability to read? Why are they suddenly so keen on enormous climate change? The level of willful ignorance here is staggering.

@Clipp: You are wrong. Ice cores have proven it as have sediment cores within the oceans and on land masses.

You can also find similar results in mud core samples for oil exploration. Learn from geologists, not from Fox News.

@Clipp: You are wrong. Ice cores have proven it as have sediment cores within the oceans and on land masses.

No, you are wrong. Those cores have proven that such rapid historical changes in global temperatures have only occured due to catastrophic events such as increased volcanic activity or large meteor strikes.

Since we haven't had those to influence such a sharp change, we are left to look for another source. 'Mother Nature' isn't one of them, never has been, nor do other natural causes observed in the pre-industrial world.

What do you believe was the cause of the 'drastic changes' during the age of the dinosaurs?

Learn from geologists, not from Fox News.

Nobody learns anything from Fox News, we can agree on that.

@Clip: Werespect your thoughts, and arguing is good. Thanks for being civilized as well. We appreciate it.

@Kyaku, kochira koso, appreciated

It is amazing how there are so many climate scientists on this board. Or are people just repeating what the media tell them?

It is amazing how there are so many climate scientists on this board.

It's amazing that you think people who can understand scientific research must be climate scientists. Knowledge seems to intimidate you, especially politically inconvenient knowledge.

Or are people just repeating what the media tell them?

Well, that's what you are doing on pretty much every thread, including this one so far. What is your media telling you to believe about climate change that you haven't bothered to research for yourself?

It is amazing how there are so many climate scientists on this board. Or are people just repeating what the media tell them?

Could you finally post sources to where we should be getting our news and information?

Remember the recent CNN exposee by Project Veritas? In private the CNN director said that after having removed Trump from office, they will now swivel their propaganda to concentrate on the "global warming" agenda. And CNN of course does not act alone, the legacy media always moves in lockstep. Stand by for many more scare stories about the "climate".

Stop your american self-centredness. Global warming is not an american media report only !

Could you finally post sources to where we should be getting our news and information?

I did. https://ourworldindata.org/co2-and-other-greenhouse-gas-emissions

Their data is sourced from NOAA.

https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/data.html

and

https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo-search/study/17975

and

https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/data.html

The first link is for normal people and has multiple pretty graphs. The others are for people not afraid of math and science.

For the record, I haven't seen Fox News or CNN or any other 24-hour news channel in almost a decade, so I'm unaware of which talking points on climate I should be mimicking. Sorry for my ignorance. /s

Warmer ? Then less people will die of coldness and less gas, charcoal and oil will be burnt for heating.

Find one of the many interactive maps that show what happens to coast lines when the seas rise a specified number of meters or feet. A three meter rise in ocean levels, well within predictions of what happens when ice shelves melt, submerges some very big Asian cities. If the ice cap on Greenland melts, which seems increasingly possible, Beijing becomes a beach town. Shanghai however disappears beneath the waves. Much of Florida is gone too and with it its farms and orchards and the San Joaquin Valley of California, one of the most productive agricultural regions in the world, becomes a huge inland bay. Fresno becomes a beach town. Gulf Coast cities are inundated as well. On top of hundreds of millions, maybe billions of people being displaced, major seaports submerged and vast acreages of coastal plains inundated the seas become increasingly acidic as the seawater absorbs more CO2 from the atmosphere. This decreases the concentration of the carbonate ions that are necessary for building the shells of shellfish and for the skeletons of coral reefs. Planktons that are the diet of whales and many other fish are harmed. The whole of the food chain in the ocean is disrupted and this is already starting to affect reefs and shellfish. And it only takes a couple of degree increase in average global temperatures for this to happen. This past summer daytime temperatures in Siberia exceeded 37.7 degrees C (100 F) every day for over a month. Siberia. This is unprecedented heat.

@TheFu: The predictions are if humans do what we are doing already, the average global temperature will increase 2.5-3.2 degC. It doesn't sound like much, but that is huge.

What is the ideal average global temperature? Have you considered that climate change is not unusual in Earths history and that life has flourished anyway? Lastly, if we are so sure that the temperatures will rise x-number of degrees in a hundred years, why can’t any of the 40 major climate models accurately predict temperature changes over a decade?

When dealing with hypotheticals, science is not exact at all. The Arctic ice cap is supposed to be completely gone based on climate model predictions. So why is the ice still there? I’m not suggesting that the theory of global warming isn’t legitimate. I am saying that it is poorly understood outside of highly controlled lab conditions. You don’t make wholesale changes to an economic system that could lead to huge economic dislocation and poverty based on an educated guess. What we are getting by constant sensationalist news stories is an attempt to influence public opinion for political purposes (aka. propaganda).

Do you expect anything besides doom and gloom from these paid propagandists? If they reported anything else, their gravy train would disappear.

Remember that Project Veritas has zero credibility?

Well to be fair, it wasn’t Project Veritas who stated that CNN’s intention was to influence the election in Biden’s favor and then pivot to pushing the Left’s climate change agenda. It was an actual CNN producer that made those statements.

You may not like the people who uncovered the corruption but that doesn’t mean that corruption was not uncovered. Reality is that a CNN insider revealed how his media corporation operates. That is something the public should see so they can judge the veracity of the news sources they choose to consume. If a Fox news producer was caught stating something similar I certainly would want to know. I don’t want to be fed anyone’s propaganda.

The Arctic ice cap is supposed to be completely gone based on climate model predictions. So why is the ice still there?

No. Where do you come up with these stories? The existing climate models do not and did not predict the disappearance of the Arctic ice cap by now. That is for the future, but that future appears less distant than expected. The Arctic ice cap is retreating faster than the models predicted. Ditto the Greenland ice cap. NOAAs early models called for ice free summers in the Arctic by 2100. That has been pushed back to about 2050 though a few scientists are now suggesting it might happen in the mid 2030s. If you are referring to a comment Al Gore made in 2009 or so, that was his personal conjecture not based on any climate model. All the models still predict some winter ice btw but that ice will be thinner, younger and will melt during the summer.

You believe anyone who works for CNN? Makes sense given how often you bash the liberal MSM.

I am just saying that the CNN producer didn’t do his company any favors by publicly stating their plan to push climate change in their programming after they helped Biden get elected. Sure, I believe that in this unguarded moment he was telling the truth. The question is, do you believe him? And if you do, does it matter that his news network is only giving you a particular side of the news? Do you just want to have your point of view confirmed or are you open to having it challenged?

You think it’s exclusive to CNN? Okay.

No I don’t. I think that the news media used to pretend to be unbiased but they don’t even do that anymore. The only way to get the whole truth is to get out of your bubble - that’s why I come to this site :-) The only way to get close to the truth is to get all sides and weigh their points of view. The Left seems to be repelled by that way of thinking these days.

You don’t want to be fed propaganda but consume Fox “News.” Got it.

Besides JT how would you know where I get my news and information from?

By the way, how can his headline say that the “world's glaciers melting faster than ever”? How could the editors possibly know how fast glaciers have melter over the entirety of the Earth’s history?

The editor is clearly speaking about in the recorded history of the glaciers.

Clearly the article did not say “in recorded history” or anything close to that. I re-read it to be sure. The article starts by mentioning changes over the last 15 years.

Glaciers are melting faster, losing 31% more snow and ice per year than they did 15 years earlier, according to three-dimensional satellite measurements of all the world’s mountain glaciers.

The headline isn’t backed up by the content of the article. Even the claim that glaciers are losing 31% more ice and snow each year can be overly dramatic given that it doesn’t mention changes in the amount of ice and snow that are also added each year. It isn’t necessary to overly dramatize the science. We were once told that the north pole would be ice free by now. Does it bother anyone that predictions are frequently over stated and on occasion just plain wrong? Apparently no one is capable of questioning things they have decided to must believe. That’s not logical in the least.

Now is not the time to turn back the clock on human progress.

As someone born about the time of Eisenhower's inauguration, I have witnessed little evidence of human progress.

Oh, we have more things, (cell phones, PC's, color TV, Internet, jet airliners, etc), but the content of cell phones, PC's, color TV's Internet and jet airliners tells me we haven't progressed as a species.

Actually, we've gotten dumber.

How could the editors possibly know how fast glaciers have melter over the entirety of the Earth’s history?

I'm guessing they listen to science and scientific research.

The far right alternative is too scary to contemplate.

why can’t any of the 40 major climate models accurately predict temperature changes over a decade?

Climatologist have always worked in 500+ yr timeframes. All their training is for that, until very recently. Weather forcasting used to suck by the standards we have today, it took them many decades to get more and more accurate and the ability to handle much more input data. Still, they get it wrong all the time in some parts of the world. But looking at trends from weather stations world-wide and satellite data captured since the 1970s makes it very clear what the current trend it for anyone willing to open their eyes and see.

Did you actually look at any of the provided links and data - or is your mind stuck? Before I looked at all the data, I was hanging on to volcanoes being the main cause of greenhouse warming. After seeing the data from reputable sources, I became convinced that humans were the primary cause and the 2x increase of the greenhouse gases from 1955 - today, compared to any prior measured time the last 100M years, is truly one of the largest issues for humans on this planet today.

The Earth will still be here, just with much less bio-diversity. No need to "save the planet." It isn't going anywhere. You and I probably won't be injured by the coming changes, but out kids will and grandkids will

If science is intimidating to you or scares you, please just don't say anything until you actually understand it.

As someone born about the time of Eisenhower's inauguration, I have witnessed little evidence of human progress.

Less than a decade after WW2 the vast majority of people in most countries in Europe and Asia were dirt poor. That is no longer the case now. There has been astounding progress. Global poverty rates have declined significantly since 2000 alone. You may long for the days when people didn’t have tv’s and cell phones, but the poverty and human suffering were immense.

I'm guessing they listen to science and scientific research.

What research? What research states that in Earths history glaciers are retreating faster now than ever? Ever heard of snowball Earth? Retreating glaciers make tremendous changes to topography.

Did you actually look at any of the provided links and data - or is your mind stuck?

I believe the scientists when they say that CO2 makes up 413 parts per million of the atmosphere - up from an estimated 300 ppm in the 1840’s. I believe that much of that increase was caused by man. I believe the planet is hotter is now by about one degree warmer than before the industrial revolution. I believe man can accurately measure CO2 content in the atmosphere and atmospheric temperature with relative precision. What I don’t believe is that climate models are accurate. The climate is averse to accurate prediction. They always estimate more warming than is actually observed.

Climate models predicted the Arctic ice cap should have disappeared about seven years ago. It’s still there! This falsified prediction was used in the media and by politicians to push a political agenda. Is it too much to ask for scientists to prove their science? I don’t think so. I just don’t think they are able to predict future climate very well yet.

I don’t consume CNN, so don’t care

Why ask if I believe CNN when you don’t even know anything about them?

Even Biden admitted during his address to a nearly empty House chamber, the US accounts for only 15% of global CO2 emissions (in line with GDP). He admits “ even if we do everything perfectly, it’s not going to ultimately matter.”

So impose trillions of costs on yourself counting on China and India to throttle back and save the US?

They always estimate more warming than is actually observed.

2 years ago, I saw a number of models which had accurately predicted the global average temperatures seen at the time.

With the scientific method, being wrong isn't a death sentence. Scientist adjust based on available data and try again. This way, they get better and better at predicting. Models from 5 yrs ago are less accurate, but the trend they predicted is still the best that science has to offer. If we wait until every possible model you might see is 100% accurate, billions of humans will already be negatively impacted. We just don't have the time to wait.

Climate models predicted the Arctic ice cap should have disappeared about seven years ago. It’s still there!

No, they didn't. Almost everything you have said is twisted, dishonest and politicized. Back in 2008 one model predicted that the Arctic ice cap in summer may disappear by 2015. Quite different to what you are saying.

This falsified prediction was used in the media and by politicians to push a political agenda

No it wasn't 'falsified'. You are keen to impose a conspiracy on whatever you consider inaccurate. Do you consider inaccurate weather reports to be 'falsified' or to have 'an agenda'? What agenda, and to what end? Why is everything politics and CNN with you?

Is it too much to ask for scientists to prove their science? I don’t think so. I just don’t think they are able to predict future climate very well yet

You cannot accurately and precisely predict the exact outcome of an entire planet influenced by 7 billion people and changing economic, industrial and technological circumstances. Despite this, climate change models have proven to be very accurate in their general predictions, and you know it.

He admits “ even if we do everything perfectly, it’s not going to ultimately matter.”

Classic right-winger cop-out cowardice and contextual manipulation. What did Biden say immediately prior to this?

Your argument is that no country should attempt to reduce emissions because another country isn't trying to. It's nice for you because, as always, conservatives can do what they do best; blame it on someone else and do absolutely nothing.