Would an interruption of the Gulf Stream be reversible? And if so, at what cost?:
One of the questions that came up lately in my dialogue with commentators is that of the reversibility of major ecological disasters induced by human activity and of the feasibility of reversing such disasters with the tools pertaining to our current technology.
This is a serious question, a very serious one, and I intend to use the popularity of my (French) blog to push the issue a far as needs be. I’ve chosen one example – so that we don’t get locked in trivial generalities – that of a possible interruption of the Gulf Stream due to human activity. The consensus is that such an interruption – which I understand already occurred for ten days in 2004 – would make the temperature in Western Europe drop permanently by 5 to 10 degrees Celsius, that is, 10 to 20 degrees Fahrenheit. Is the interruption a possibility – even remote – and should the event occur, what are our realistic chances of reversing it?
Well, that's a good question. Damned if I know the answer.
What does it mean for my oil bill in Zone 5b?
NOTE I'd hat tip the very welcomed contributor who gave me this link.... But I can't remember who. In any case, alert reader, consider my hat tipped.
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Well that would be me
Herb the Verb.
Thanks folks, I'll be here all night!
I also do charity events.
Buhdah boom!
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Good night and good riddance!
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Around these parts we call cucumber slices circle bites
Hell, at this point
I'm looking forward to it, if it'll drop temps here. It gets so hot, humid sticky in the summer, I can deal.
Just kidding, but not really. I'm fascinated by watching those History & Discovery Channel shows(that's some TV I'll recommend) where they talk about the evolution of the planet. MHO, is that the phase the planet is in right now is coming to a close, we are going to get a severe population check, and the human race and all other existence is going to have to evolve to survive on the new conditions of the planet. We of course, are hastening this process along. But these actions are not the most severe the planet has endured(try a 10,000 yr earthquake that coincided with the asteroid impact that destroyed the dinosaurs), and as George Carlin says, when the Earth is finally tired of us, it will shake us off like a case of fleas.
For the first time, I think life has advanced enough that we could survive our own extinction(which would then be a misnomer) and adapt to it. My plan is to just hang on for the ride, for as long as I can.
Bill Clinton for First Dude!!!
I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than to those attending too small a degree of it.
- Thomas Jefferson
Fundamental misunderstanding of "climate"
The problem is that most people have no idea how quickly climate change can happen and what it actually means.
I don't have the time at the moment to go too much into it, but the gulf stream scenario basically means a return to ice age, of which we typically have an 11K year cycle anyway and we are long overdue. Most quaternary geologists and glaciologists now believe that glacial advances (if not recessions) can happen within the span of dozens of years or less rather than hundreds or thousands of years.
That point is critical.
In the most pedestrian sense, there isn't anything that will affect your property values as much as having it beneath 2000ft of ice or the imminent threat thereof.
The last advance stretched as far south as through Iowa in the midwest. Other areas of extent I am less familiar with.
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Good night and good riddance!
-----------------------------
Around these parts we call cucumber slices circle bites
But weren't we just complaining about global warming?
'Cos you know, that's what the wingnuts are gonna say when they see this...
...for the rest of us
...for the rest of us