In the latest communication from NASA scientist James Hansen to his subscribers, he said he has given a recent talk at the Club of Rome in Amsterdam, Netherlands, titled “Global Warming Time Bomb“. His presentation begins, “Global warming IS a time bomb.
“There may still be time to defuse it, but that requires policy-makers to take the actions that are needed, not the ineffectual actions they are discussing.” He means the climate/jobs/energy legislation in Congress, for which he has obvious disdain due to its inability to slow down climate change quickly enough. Dr. Hansen wrote in his presentation:
He also revealed that he will be involved in some activism soon in Massachusetts, that you can get involved in too. (See the bottom of this post). In his presentation he wrote:
“Despite the publicity that global warming has received, there is a large gap between what is understood by the relevant scientific community, and what is known by the people who need to know, the public and policymakers Global warming is small compared to day-to-day weather fluctuations, so it is hard for people to recognize that we have a crisis – but we do.
The climate system has great inertia, caused, e.g., by the 4-kilometer-deep ocean and the thick ice sheets on Antarctica and Greenland – they have only partly responded to the humanmade changes of atmospheric composition. But that inertia is not our friend – it is a Trojan horse – by the time the public notices that change is underway the momentum of the climate system may be sufficient to guarantee much larger changes. The climate system can pass tipping points, such that large change continues out of our control. The bad news is that we have already passed into a dangerous range of atmospheric carbon dioxide. The good news is that if we act smart and promptly it is still feasible to achieve a safe level of atmospheric gases, and the actions needed to achieve that would have multiple benefits in addition to climate stability.”
He also explains ice sheet melting and the process. He also discusses more of how the current legislation will not be enough, fast enough.
Continue Reading → Climate Scientist James Hansen–New Presentation and Activism
