PLEASE NOTE:
*
CCNet TERRA 6/2003 - 22 January 2003
-------------------------------------
"At least 24,000 head of livestock have starved or froze to
death in
Mongolia after hectares of meadows in the country are covered by
thick snow
caused by continuous precipitation, making it hard for the
animals to
pasture, a local newspaper reported. Temperatures in some
pastoral areas
have plunged to lows of minus 50 degrees Celsius."
--Xinhua News Agency, 22 January 2003
"The harshest freeze since the Cold War days has brought
Russia's
biggest northern port to a virtual standstill. Vessels locked in
by
deep ice make steam only to warm their crews as the harbour
waters
remain a solid mass of ice more than a metre thick. Even
icebreakers have
had to stay tied up. For the first time since 1947, the Gulf of
Finland's
frozen over. In theory, it's possible to walk the 100 miles from
Scandinavia to Russia."
--Sky TV News, 20 January 2003
"As more and more scientists dig into all parts of the
planet to
study its climatic history, they unearth more and more evidence
for the
global reality of the [likely] solar- forced millennial-scale
climatic
oscillation that has alternately brought us long intervals of
relative
warmth and coolness, such as the Roman Warm Period, the Dark Ages
Cold
Period, the Medieval Warm Period, the Little Ice Age and, most
recently, the Modern Warm Period."
--CO2 Science Magazine, 22 January 2003
(1) COLD AS HELL: DEEP FREEZE AND HEAVY SNOWFALLS CAUSE DISASTER
IN MONGOLIA
Xinhua News Agency, 22 January 2003
(2) KILLER COLD CLAIMS NEARLY 2000 IN SOUTH ASIA
News24.com, 21 January 2003
(3) ST PETERSBURG FROZEN IN: TOO COLD EVEN FOR ICEBREAKERS
Sky News, 20 January 2003
(4) INVADER ICE: LATVIAN PORT IS LOCKED INTO A RARE DEEP FREEZE
International Herald Tribune, 20 January 2003
(5) CHILL PACKING SHELTERS AS HOMELESS SUFFER
New York Daily News, 21 January 2003
(6) COLD SNAP BRINGS CANADA OLD FASHIONED WINTER
Reuters, 21 January 2003
(7) EUROPEAN GLACIERS: WHY ARE SOME EXPANDING?
CO2 Science Magazine, 22 January 2003
(8) MORE EVIDENCE FOR LITTLE ICE AGE AND MEDIEVAL WARM PERIOD IN
CHINA
CO2 Science Magazine, 22 January 2003
(9) WHAT TRIGGERS RAPID CLIMATE CHANGES?
CO2 Science Magazine, 22 January 2003
(10) AND FINALLY: GM COULD RESCUE BANANAS SAYS EXPERT
The New Zealand Herald, 20 January 2003
============
(1) COLD AS HELL: DEEP FREEZE AND HEAVY SNOWFALLS CAUSE DISASTER
IN MONGOLIA
>From Xinhua News Agency, 22 January 2003
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2003-01/22/content_702459.htm
ULAN BATOR, Jan. 22 (Xinhuanet) -- At least 24,000 head of
livestock have
starved or froze to death in Mongolia after hectares of meadows
in the
country are covered by thick snow caused by continuous
precipitation, making
it hard for the animals to pasture, a local newspaper reported.
Most of the steppes in the provinces of Selenge, Hovsgol,
Darhan-uul and
Bulgan have already been covered by thick snow, andin Bulgan's
grasslands,
the snow is 20-35 centimeters deep. Temperatures in some pastoral
areas have
plunged to lows of minus 50 degrees Celsius.
The freezing weather and heavy snowfalls have affected some
660,000 herders.
The government has sent working teams to the disaster-hit
provinces to help
local herdsmen in tiding over their difficulties.
Mongolia's livestock industry has been by and large privatized
since the
process began in 1990. During 1994-1999, Mongolia's livestock
farming
reported one of the best performances in historyfor six years
running due to
favorable weather conditions, and there were 33.5 million head of
livestock
at the end of 1999 in the country, hitting an all-time high in
number.
But Mongolia has suffered droughts and snowstorms every year
since 2000 and
the number of domestic animals dropped by 9.81 million.
Copyright 2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved.
============
(2) KILLER COLD CLAIMS NEARLY 2000 IN SOUTH ASIA
>From News24.com, 21 January 2003
http://www.news24.com/News24/World/0,6119,2-10_1309717,00.html
New Delhi - Another 52 people died of cold in India, officials
said Tuesday,
taking the toll in South Asia to over 1 900 since December as
parts of the
region remain gripped by the worst winter in 40 years.
For the first time in decades, temperatures have dipped below
zero in areas
where it is hot and sticky for much of the year.
"The Gangetic plain areas, especially eastern India, have
never witnessed a
temperature as low as 0°," said RK Mukopadhyay, head of the
state
meteorological department.
The 52 deaths occurred in Bihar, pushing the toll in the
impoverished
eastern Indian state to 668, local newspapers reported.
The Bihar state administration on Tuesday extended the closure of
all
schools for the rest of the week, as temperatures plunged to an
all-time low
of freezing point.
"We had ordered the closure of schools until January 20 but
as the cold
conditions deteriorated in the state, the closure has been
extended to
January 25," one official said.
The extreme weather has also affected agriculture.
"Crops of mustard, pulses and green vegetables have been hit
by insects and
as the sun has not come out, flowers of the crops have failed to
bloom to
optimum," said Nurul Ahad, an agricultural scientist.
In India's northern Uttar Pradesh state, the killer cold has
claimed 436
lives so far, with the mercury dipping to 0° for the second time
this winter
in the main city of Kanpur, the Press Trust of India (PTI) news
agency
reported.
Bangladesh, meanwhile, recorded its lowest temperature this
winter of 4.9°
on Tuesday as temperatures dropped across the country, a
government
meteorologist said.
The cold spell, one of the worst for tropical Bangladesh, has
killed almost
700 people. There are no official government figures.
Most of the dead have been poor, elderly or young, those least
prepared for
the frigid weather.
============
(3) ST PETERSBURG FROZEN IN: TOO COLD EVEN FOR ICEBREAKERS
>From Sky TV News, 20 January 2003
http://www.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,30000-1077085,00.html
The harshest freeze since the Cold War days has brought Russia's
biggest
northern port to a virtual standstill. Vessels locked in by deep
ice make
steam only to warm their crews as the harbour waters remain a
solid mass of
ice more than a metre thick, writes Sky's Russian correspondent,
Geoff
Meade.
Even icebreakers have had to stay tied up. In night temperatures
that have
dropped to 40 below, the sea quickly re-freezes in the wake of
any vessels
that try to clear a passage from St Petersburg to open waters....
They've also got miles more to roam than most can ever remember.
For the
first time since 1947, the Gulf of Finland's frozen over. In
theory, it's
possible to walk the 100 miles from Scandinavia to Russia....
==========
(4) INVADER ICE: LATVIAN PORT IS LOCKED INTO A RARE DEEP FREEZE
>From International Herald Tribune, 20 January 2003
http://www.iht.com/articles/83865.html
Wind lashed the standing ships, which were held in place by a
strange new
invader that has taken this Latvian port - quite literally - by
storm.
The occupier did not ride in on Soviet tanks, or German Navy
vessels. It was
blown in by heavy winds, said Gaidis Hartmanis, the operator who
controls
boat traffic here from a six-story control tower originally built
in 1821.
>From the looks of things, it will not be easy to repel it.
"The ice has
come," said Hartmanis as he stood on the observatory deck of
his control
tower, waving an arm toward the ice-filled port....
===========
(5) CHILL PACKING SHELTERS AS HOMELESS SUFFER
>From New York Daily News, 21 January 2003
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/local/story/53603p-50256c.html
By JOANNE WASSERMAN
As a bone-chilling cold gripped the city for the eighth straight
day,
homeless shelters were running close to capacity - with the
mercury set to
plunge even further.
Temperatures tonight and tomorrow night are expected to be among
the coldest
this winter, dipping to nearly 10 degrees in the city and into
single digits
in the northern suburbs.
Forecasters said the relentlessly frigid temperatures will likely
make
January the coldest month in three years.
Besides the deep freeze, National Weather Service meteorologist
Bill Goodman
forecast possible snow flurries tomorrow night and snow showers
on Sunday
night.
But there's a sliver of hope ahead - the area could see a slight
rise to
above-freezing temperatures on Sunday, and even warmer weather
next week.
"We may get above 40 degrees by next Tuesday," Goodman
said.
The arctic weather has been hard on everyone. By 4p.m. yesterday,
the city
got 1,424 heat and hot water complaints, on pace to exceed by far
the 1,500
calls received on an average winter day.
But the real impact has been on the city's homeless. When the
temperature is
below freezing, the city is authorized to force the homeless off
the streets
and into shelters - or jails, if they refuse help.....
=========
(6) COLD SNAP BRINGS CANADA OLD FASHIONED WINTER
>From Reuters, 21 January 2003
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20030121/wl_canada_nm/canada_weatherd_col_1
By Patrick White
MONTREAL (Reuters) - After a few years of balmy weather, Canada's
got a real
one this year -- a face-numbing, frozen-toes kind of a winter,
and the
locals are taking advantage.
Ski resort operators can't wipe the smiles from their faces and
the outdoor
ice rinks and sledding hills are alive with children's shrieks,
tears and
icicle fingers.
For the past week, central Canada has been dealing with a nasty
combination
of extreme wind chill and an Arctic air mass and the deep freeze
has now
locked in most parts of the country, with big snowfalls on the
East Coast.
In Montreal and Ottawa, mild in recent years, temperatures are
reaching
minus 37 Celsius degrees (-34.6 Fahrenheit) with the windchill
factor......
========
(7) EUROPEAN GLACIERS: WHY ARE SOME EXPANDING?
>From CO2 Science Magazine, 22 January 2003
http://www.co2science.org/subject/e/summaries/europegla.htm
Most European glaciers, according to Hall and Denton (2002),
experienced
significant expansion and advance during the Little Ice Age
(LIA).
Subsequently, however, many have experienced significant retreat.
But this
behavior is not uniform.
A typical example is described by D'Orefice et al. (2000), who
assembled and
analyzed a wealth of historical data to derive a history of
post-LIA
shrinkage of the surface area of the southernmost glacier of
Europe,
Ghiacciaio del Calderone. From the first available information on
the
glacier's surface area in 1794, there was a very slow ice wastage
that
lasted until 1884, whereupon the glacier began to experience a
more rapid
area reduction that continued, with some irregularities, to 1990,
resulting
in a loss of just over half the glacier's LIA surface area.
Not all European glaciers, however, have experienced continuous
declines
since the end of the Little Ice Age. Hormes et al. (2001), for
example,
report that glaciers in the Central Swiss Alps experienced two
periods of
readvancement, one around 1920 and another as recent as 1980. In
addition,
Braithwaite (2002) reports that for the period 1980-1995,
"Scandinavian
glaciers [have been] growing, and glaciers in the Caucasus are
close to
equilibrium," while "there is no obvious common or
global trend of
increasing glacier melt."
Fifty years of mass balance data from the storied Storglaciaren
of
northwestern Sweden also demonstrate a trend reversal in the late
20th
Century. According to Braithwaite and Zhang (2000), there has
been a
significant upward trend in the mass balance of this glacier over
the past
30-40 years, and it has been in a state of mass accumulation for
at least
the past decade.
Additional evidence for post-LIA glacial expansion is provided by
the
history of the Solheimajokull outlet glacier on the southern
coast of
Iceland. In a review of its length over the past 300 years,
Mackintosh et
al. (2002) report a post-LIA minimum of 13.8 km in 1970,
whereupon the
glacier began to expand, growing to a length of about 14.3 km by
1995. The
minimum length of 13.8 km observed in 1970 also did not eclipse
an earlier
minimum in which the glacier had decreased from a 300-year
maximum length of
15.2 km in 1740 to a 300-year minimum of 13.2 km in 1783.
The advances and retreats of glaciers are often interpreted as
signs of
climate change; and teams of glaciologists have been working for
years to
provide an assessment of the state of the world's many glaciers
to help
decipher global climate trends. Although this effort has only
scratched the
surface of what must ultimately be done, climate alarmists have
already
concluded there has been a massive and widespread retreat of
glaciers over
the past century, which they predict will only intensify under
continued
CO2-induced global warming. In considering the results of the
studies
summarized above, however, it would appear that several European
glaciers
are marching to the beat of a different drummer: holding their
own -- or
actually advancing -- over the past quarter century, a period of
time in
which climate alarmists claim the earth has warmed to its highest
temperature of the past thousand years.
References
Braithwaite, R.J. 2002. Glacier mass balance: the first 50 years
of
international monitoring. Progress in Physical Geography
26: 76-95.
Braithwaite, R.J. and Zhang, Y. 2000. Relationships between
interannual
variability of glacier mass balance and climate. Journal of
Glaciology 45:
456-462.
D'Orefice, M., Pecci, M., Smiraglia, C. and Ventura, R. 2000.
Retreat of
Mediterranean glaciers since the Little Ice Age: Case study of
Ghiacciaio
del Calderone, central Apennines, Italy. Arctic, Antarctic,
and Alpine
Research 32: 197-201.
Hall, B.L. and Denton, G.H. 2002. Holocene history of
the Wilson Piedmont
Glacier along the southern Scott Coast, Antarctica. The
Holocene 12:
619-627.
Hormes, A., Müller, B.U. and Schlüchter, C. 2001.
The Alps with little
ice: evidence for eight Holocene phases of reduced glacier extent
in the
Central Swiss Alps. The Holocene 11: 255-265.
Mackintosh, A.N., Dugmore, A.J. and Hubbard, A.L.
2002. Holocene climatic
changes in Iceland: evidence from modeling glacier length
fluctuations at
Solheimajokull. Quaternary International 91: 39-52.
Copyright © 2003. Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide
and Global Change
=============
(8) MORE EVIDENCE FOR LITTLE ICE AGE AND MEDIEVAL WARM PERIOD IN
CHINA
>From CO2 Science Magazine, 22 January 2003
http://www.co2science.org/journal/2003/v6n4c3.htm
Reference
Xu, H., Hong, Y., Lin, Q., Hong, B., Jiang, H. and Zhu, Y. 2002.
Temperature
variations in the past 6000 years inferred from ğ18O of peat
cellulose from
Hongyuan, China. Chinese Science Bulletin 47: 1578-1584.
What was done
The authors report the results of their study of plant cellulose
ğ18O
variations in cores retrieved from peat deposits west of Hongyuan
County at
the northeastern edge of the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau (32° 46'N,
102° 30'E)
in China.
What was learned
Following the demise of what has been called the Roman Warm
Period, the
authors note the existence of three consistently cold events that
were
centered at approximately 500, 700 and 900 AD, during what is
sometimes
referred to as the Dark Ages Cold Period. Then, from
1100-1300 AD, they
report "the ğ18O of Hongyuan peat cellulose increased,
consistent with that
of Jinchuan peat cellulose and corresponding to the 'Medieval
Warm Period'."
Finally, they note that "the periods 1370-1400 AD, 1550-1610
AD, [and]
1780-1880 AD recorded three cold events, corresponding to the
'Little Ice
Age'."
Regarding the origins of these climatic fluctuations, power
spectrum
analyses of their data revealed periodicities of 79, 88 and
123-127 years,
"suggesting," in the words of the authors, "that
the main driving force of
Hongyuan climate change is from solar activities."
What it means
As more and more scientists dig into all parts of the planet to
study its
climatic history, they unearth more and more evidence for the
global reality
of the [likely] solar-forced millennial-scale climatic
oscillation that has
alternately brought us long intervals of relative warmth and
coolness, such
as the Roman Warm Period, the Dark Ages Cold Period, the Medieval
Warm
Period, the Little Ice Age and, most recently, the Modern Warm
Period.
Copyright © 2003. Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide
and Global Change
===========
(9) WHAT TRIGGERS RAPID CLIMATE CHANGES?
>From CO2 Science Magazine, 22 January 2003
http://www.co2science.org/journal/2003/v6n4c1.htm
Reference
Bard, E. 2002. Climate shock: Abrupt changes over millennial time
scales.
Physics Today 55(12): 32-38.
What was done
The author - a professor at College de France, where he holds the
chaire
d'evolution du climat et de l'ocean, and works at CEREGE in
Aix-en-Provence,
France - reviews what is known about abrupt climate changes over
millennial
time scales as deduced from both models and observations.
What was learned
With respect to what has been learned from models (but not
necessarily
confirmed), Bard says "it is now recognized that the
ocean-atmosphere system
exhibits several stable regimes under equivalent external
forcings" and that
"the transition from one state to another occurs very
rapidly when certain
climatic parameters attain threshold values." Specifically,
he notes that in
the models "a slight increase in the freshwater flux above
the modern level
F produces a decrease in the NADW [North Atlantic Deep Water]
convection and
a moderate cooling in the North Atlantic," but that
"the system flips to
another state once the flux reaches a threshold value F +
deltaF," which
state has no deep convection and "is characterized by
surface temperatures
up to 6°C lower in and around the North Atlantic."
With respect to what has been learned from observations, Bard
concentrates
on the region of the North Atlantic, describing glacial-period
millennial-scale episodes of dramatic warming called
Dansgaard-Oeschger
events (with temperature increases "of more than
10°C"), which are evident
in Greenland ice core records, and episodes of "drastic
cooling" called
Heinrich events (with temperature drops "of up to about
5°C"), which are
evident in sea surface temperature records derived from the study
of North
Atlantic deep-sea sediment cores. In the Greenland record,
he reports that
"the temperature warms abruptly to reach a maximum and then
slowly decreases
for a few centuries before reaching a threshold, after which it
drops back
to the cold values that prevailed before the warm event."
What it means
Although much is made of the role of models in studying "the
complex
interplay between Dansgaard-Oeschger warm phases and Heinrich
cold events,"
Bard correctly reports that "at present, models coupling the
atmosphere,
ocean, and ice sheets are still unable to correctly simulate that
variability on all scales in both time and space," which
suggests we do not
fully understand the dynamics of these rapid climate changes.
Indeed, he
forcefully notes that "all the studies so far carried out
fail to answer the
crucial question: How close are we to the next bifurcation [which
could
cause a rapid change-of-state in earth's climate system]?"
In this regard,
he also notes that "an intense debate continues in the
modeling community
about the reality of such instabilities under warm conditions
[our
italics]," which is a particularly important point, seeing
that all dramatic
warming and cooling events have been observed in either full
glacial or
transitional periods between glacials and interglacials.
This latter real-world fact clearly suggests we are unlikely to
experience
any dramatic warming or cooling surprises, as long as the earth
does not
beginning drifting towards glacial conditions, which is but
another reason
to not be concerned about the ongoing rise in the air's CO2
content. Indeed,
it suggests that more CO2 in the atmosphere and its potential for
modest
warming are actually to be preferred as a preventive measure or
"insurance
policy" against unexpected abrupt climate changes.
Interglacial warmth seems
to inoculate the planet against climatic instabilities, allowing
only the
mild millennial-scale climatic oscillation that alternately
brings the earth
slightly warmer and cooler conditions typical of the Medieval
Warm Period
and Little Ice Age. Hence, and in light of the fact that the four
preceding
interglacials were able to tolerate temperatures fully 2°C
warmer than those
of the current interglacial (Petit et al., 1999), without any
adverse
climatic consequences, humanity would probably be wise to not
surrender the
atmospheric CO2 insurance policy we worked so hard to put in
place over the
course of the Industrial Revolution.
Reference
Petit, J.R., Jouzel, J., Raynaud, D., Barkov, N.I., Barnola,
J.-M., Basile,
I., Bender, M., Chappellaz, J., Davis, M., Delaygue, G.,
Delmotte, M.,
Kotlyakov, V.M., Legrand, M., Lipenkov, V.Y., Lorius, C., Pepin,
L., Ritz,
C., Saltzman, E. and Stievenard, M. 1999. Climate and atmospheric
history of
the past 420,000 years from the Vostok ice core, Antarctica.
Nature 399:
429-436.
Copyright © 2003. Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide
and Global Change
=========
(10) AND FINALLY: GM COULD RESCUE BANANAS SAYS EXPERT
>From The New Zealand Herald, 20 January 2003
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/storydisplay.cfm?reportID=53009
Canterbury scientists believe they can save bananas from
extinction using
the same genetic engineering techniques they used to create
pest-resistant
potatoes.
Crop and Food, Lincoln, scientist Maqbool Ahmad, a banana expert,
said GM
could be used to develop a banana with resistance to black
sigatoka disease,
which experts predict could wipe out conventional bananas within
10 years.
Crop and Food has already developed pest resistant potatoes and
will apply
to plant them all over New Zealand once a moratorium on release
of
genetically modified organisms expires in October.
Dr Ahmad said developing a disease resistant banana would involve
the same
techniques used at Crop and Food, Lincoln, to create the GM
potatoes and
other GM plants.
"It is the same technology. You insert a gene that would
make the bananas
resistant to the disease."
Dr Ahmad, who recently returned from a trip to Pakistan, said
black sigatoka
was devastating banana plantations between Karachi and Hyderabad,
near the
Indian border.
"Normal banana trees are 2m tall. The diseased trees shrink
to less than 1m,
become shrivelled and black, and eventually die," he said.
Unless bananas were developed with resistance to the disease,
many
communities in the Third World faced economic and social ruin.
New Zealand
provides $230 million of foreign aid to countries all over Asia
and the
Pacific and sponsors aid projects in Africa and Latin America...
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