Fwd: FW: Former Vice President Cheney stated that if there was a 1% chance that weapons of mass destruction existed in Iraq, we needed to destroy them.......THEREFORE, TAKING THE FORMER VP'S LOGIC AS SOUND THINKING, I PUT FORTH THAT IF THERE IS A 1% CHANCE THAT THE CO2, METHANE AND OTHER GREENHOUSE GASES THAT WE ARE PUMPING INTO THE SKY VIA INDUSTRY AND AUTO EMISSIONS ARE GOING TO FOREVER CHANGE THE WEATHER PATTERNS OF THE WORLD………………THEN WE NEED TO STOP PUMPING THEM INTO THE SKY ASAP……………..preservation of the homeland by stopping weapons of mass destruction includes stopping manmade greenhouse gases from getting into our atmosphere……….do you not agree?

  Severe Amazon Droughts
Have Led to Huge Release of Carbon Dioxide

A severe drought in the Amazon last year, coupled with a "once-in-a-century" drought in 2005, has led to the deaths of countless trees and temporarily turned the vast rainforest into a source of CO2 emissions, rather than a sink. Reporting in the journal Science, scientists from the University of Leeds said that the 2010 drought killed so many trees in Amazonia that emissions last year are likely to exceed the 5.4 billion tons of CO2 annually released by fossil fuel burning in the United States. The 2005 drought, which caused rainfall shortages over a 734,000-square-mile area, released an estimated 5 billion tons of CO2 into the atmosphere. Last year's drought, which led to rainfall shortages over a 1.16 million square-mile area, is expected to release even more CO2. The Amazon usually absorbs 1.5 billion tons of CO2 annually, but the Leeds researchers warned that global warming could reverse that role. "If events like this happen more often, the Amazon rain forest could reach a point where it shifts from being a valuable carbon sink slowing climate change to a major source of greenhouse gases that could speed it up," said Simon Lewis, an ecologist at Leeds.

 Heavier Downpours Linked
To Increasing Greenhouse Gas Emissions

A comprehensive computer analysis of heavy precipitation events in the Northern Hemisphere from 1951 to 1999 has shown that the intense downpours that have hit many countries in recent decades are at least partly the result of human influence on climate. Reporting in the journal Nature, a team of climate scientists said their analysis showed that the likelihood of extreme precipitation on any given day rose by about 7 percent over the last half of the 20th century. The study, the first of its kind, said that detailed computer analyses showed that the increase in severe rainstorms and heavy snowfalls could not be explained by natural variability in the atmosphere. The study did not include the many extreme precipitation events of the past decade, including catastrophic floods in Pakistan, China, Australia, the United Kingdom, and parts of the United States. The study seems to confirm what many climate scientists have been forecasting for years — that as the Earth warms, heavy precipitation events will become increasingly common because warmer air carries more water vapor.

 Arctic Sea Ice Extent in January
is Lowest in Recorded History, NASA Says

While extreme weather conditions and unusually cold temperatures have gripped much of North America and Europe this winter, unusually warm temperatures farther north produced the lowest Arctic sea ice extent ever recorded for the month of January, according to NASA. Areas such as Hudson Bay, Hudson Strait, and Davis Strait — which typically freeze over by late November — did not completely freeze until mid-January, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC). And the Labrador Sea was also unusually ice-free. In this NASA graphic (right), based on satellite data, blue indicates open water, white illustrates high sea ice concentrations, and turquoise indicates loosely packed ice. The yellow line indicates the average January sea ice extent from 1979 through 2000. Scientists say the bizarre weather may be the result of a shift in a climate pattern known as the Arctic Oscillation, which has led to frigid Arctic air pouring south across North America and Europe while regions in the Arctic have been unusually warm.

 Severe Amazon Droughts
Have Led to Huge Release of Carbon Dioxide

A severe drought in the Amazon last year, coupled with a "once-in-a-century" drought in 2005, has led to the deaths of countless trees and temporarily turned the vast rainforest into a source of CO2 emissions, rather than a sink. Reporting in the journal Science, scientists from the University of Leeds said that the 2010 drought killed so many trees in Amazonia that emissions last year are likely to exceed the 5.4 billion tons of CO2 annually released by fossil fuel burning in the United States. The 2005 drought, which caused rainfall shortages over a 734,000-square-mile area, released an estimated 5 billion tons of CO2 into the atmosphere. Last year's drought, which led to rainfall shortages over a 1.16 million square-mile area, is expected to release even more CO2. The Amazon usually absorbs 1.5 billion tons of CO2 annually, but the Leeds researchers warned that global warming could reverse that role. "If events like this happen more often, the Amazon rain forest could reach a point where it shifts from being a valuable carbon sink slowing climate change to a major source of greenhouse gases that could speed it up," said Simon Lewis, an ecologist at Leeds.

 In Epic Nine-Day Swim,
Polar Bear Loses Her Yearling Cub

Faced with rapidly disappearing summer sea ice in the Beaufort Sea, north of Alaska, a female polar bear was forced to make a nine-day, 426-mile swim in search of ice floes, a trip that caused her to lose 22 percent of her body fat and killed her yearling cub, according to U.S. researchers. Scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey placed a GPS collar on the female bear to track its movement for two months as it sought out ice floes from which to hunt its favored prey, ringed seals. The resulting data showed that the female made the longest swim ever recorded by a polar bear, as it continuously paddled through waters that were 2 to 6 degrees C (3.6 to 11 F) for nine days. (A data logger under the bear's skin recorded sea temperatures.) "We were in awe that an animal that spends most of its time on the surface of the sea could swim constantly for so long in water so cold," said zoologist George M. Durner. "It is truly an amazing feat." The energy expended in the swim caused the bear to lose 22 percent of her body fat in two months and also killed her year-old cub. Such stress on polar bears is leading to declines in more southerly populations as rapidly rising Arctic temperatures melt summer sea ice.PERMALINK

 Climate Benefits of Natural Gas
May Be Overstated, U.S. Report Says

A new U.S. study casts doubt on the contention that natural gas delivers significantly cleaner energy than other fossil fuels. While natural gas advocates have said that it generates 50 percent less greenhouse gases than coal, that calculation does not include the methane and other pollutants emitted during the extraction of natural gas, according to the analysis by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The study finds that the amount of methane that seeps from loose pipe fittings and gas wells is twice earlier estimates, and the emissions released during the controversial drilling process known as hydraulic fracturing are 9,000 times higher than previously reported, according to the Web site ProPublica. All told, natural gas may be just 25 percent cleaner than coal, according to the analysis. As U.S. lawmakers tackle a new energy bill, the latest analysis might weaken the political argument in favor of investing billions in natural gas as a cleaner, domestic energy alternative. PERMALINK

 Analysis Contends CO2 Levels May
Reach Levels Not Seen in 30 Million Years

If industrial carbon dioxide emissions continue unabated, atmospheric concentrations of CO2 could by 2100 reach levels not seen in at least 30 million years, when Earth's average temperature was 25 to 30 degrees F warmer than today, according to an analysis by a U.S. scientist. Writing in the journal, Science, Jeffrey Kiehl of the National Center for Atmospheric Research said that if carbon dioxide emissions continue to grow, atmospheric concentrations of CO2 could reach 900 to 1,000 parts per million by 2100 — triple levels two centuries ago. Analyses of molecular structures in fossilized organic materials show that the last time atmospheric concentrations of CO2 reached those levels was 30 million to 100 million years ago, Kiehl writes. Average temperatures in much of that era were as much as 30 degrees F warmer than today, Kiehl says. Kiehl is not forecasting such a drastic temperature increase within a century, but he warns, "If we don't start seriously working toward a reduction of carbon emissions, we are putting our planet on a trajectory that the human species has never experienced." Kiehl also says the planet's climate system may be twice as sensitive to carbon dioxide as currently believed, since models do not factor in the amplifying effect that melting ice sheets and sea ice will have on warming.

 Projecting Warming's Impact
On Ice and Oceans for up to 1,000 Years

Two new studies project that the long-term effects of global warming could pump so much heat into the oceans that warming will continue until the year 3000 and that, in the short term, three-quarters of the Alps' glaciers could melt by 2100. The long-range study, conducted by researchers at the Canadian Center for Climate Modeling and Analysis, said that even if CO2 emissions are brought under control this century, enough heat will be transferred from the atmosphere to the deep oceans that temperatures in the Southern Ocean, which surrounds Antarctica, could rise by 9 degrees F in the next 1,000 years, leading to the melting of the Western Antarctic Ice Sheet and an increase in global sea levels of 13 feet. But the scientists said that significantly lowering CO2 emissions could prevent even steeper temperature increases and more calamitous effects of warming. The global glacier study, conducted by scientists from the University of British Columbia and the University of Alaska, projected that the world's mountain glaciers will shrink by 15 to 27 percent by 2100, with New Zealand's glaciers losing 72 percent of their mass, the Alps 75 percent, Greenland's small glaciers 8 percent, and high-mountain Asian glaciers 10 percent.