100 Month Warning

Richard,

Sadly, the 100 Month Warning in August came out before September's tragic news about methane hydrates off the Siberian coastal shelf now releasing methane to the atmosphere. This carbon feedback is what we've feared ever since 1990 -- that warming in the Arctic would destabilize them. Since methane hydrates are the largest source of carbon on the planet, this means there is a good chance that runaway global heating has been triggered or is imminent.

This can no longer be about switching to CFLs. Only a massive, multinational effort to convert totally and rapidly from fossil fuel energy to renewable energy (and to transform our fossil fueled economic system to an economics based on safe, clean, peaceful, perpetual energy sources) can save us now. This is a true planetary emergency.

This news proves how correct UNEP's GEO-4 (November 2007) state of the planet assessment was -- global climate change is a "threat to the very survival of humanity." 

The movie that Carol Dollard sent round last week explains carbon feedbacks and tipping points very well. If you haven't watched it and shared it yet, here's the link to Wake Up, Freak Out ? Then Get a Grip again: 

http://wakeupfreakout.org/film/tipping.html 

If you're short of time, you can click on the script and references to review it quickly. 

p.s. Richard, please send us more news from the Our Common Future conference. Thanks!

For the Earth, the Future, and the Children of All Species,
Julie Johnston 

GreenHeart Education 
Pender Island, BC, Canada
http://www.greenhearted.org/greening-the-curriculum.html

Julie,

Re your post referenced to Richard below. Taking a paragraph (about 7 or 8 down from the start) from the wakeupfreakout URL, I don't see the logic in claiming two disaster activities increasing the tipping point when they actually cancel each other out. According to that paragraph the following 'logic' is proffered

First case:
1. Acidity is increasing because concentration of CO2 in sea water is increasing. 2. Warm water holds less CO2 ie less acidic
3. So water Temperature must be cooling not increasing with increased acidity.

Second part of paragraph:
1. Ocean surface temperature rising releasing more of the CO2.
2. Ocean water temperature must be reducing in acidity as more CO2 being released.
3. Plankton more likely to survive in less acidic water, thus more plankton available to lock out CO2.

Normally, about half the CO2 emitted each year from human activities is re-absorbed by a combination of forests, plankton, and the ocean itself12.  But the ocean surface is becoming more and more acidic as concentrations of CO2 dissolved in it rise . At the same time the water temperature at the surface is also going up, forming a layer of warm, acidic water that is spreading across the ocean surface, killing off the plankton that lock CO2 out of the atmosphere13 . Worse, warm water holds less CO2 than cold water14 , so as it heats up it actually starts releasing some of the CO2 15 it had previously absorbed16

These seem to be self adjusting mechanisms when referring to the movie script. I guess what I am saying is that we need to think through what is being offered and not accept selected information at face value. Perhaps we should be concerned but not alarmed.

Peeter Kallista
Environment Project Coordinator
Glen Eira City Council

Thanks, Richard.

This received good coverage here at the time. I think the important thing to understand about this is that it provides a neat, manageable construct with which people can engage, which encites, encourages and channels sustainable behavioural efforts. 100 months is simply a useful count down technique. Clearly some might say we have reached that tipping point already, but I think beyond the excellent info and background in the article itself, it is a good example of the need ordinary people have to be given a framework, and a timetable, with which they can engage, and a sense of thought through, productive actions they can engage in which will contribute to a systematic effort to manage climate change - in some ways a popular (ie of the people) equivalent to sokos wedges. In the absence of these systematic frameworks coming from our governing bodies, the only sign of them is from the not for priviate profit or social enterprise sector - as usually happens. I would say that the conclusion is that we need to ramp up our efforts to get behind the ones that seem to work, and collaborate to push for government support and proper, intelligent backing.

Warm regards,
Manda