I'd be interested in another model, this one simulating a more extreme CO2 level. The way I see it, people aren't going to stop burning fossil fuels until they're all gone. So... assume a worse case scenario where sometime next century the CO2 level roughly quadruples from its pre-industrial level. About 1 part per 1000 (1 ppt ?)

How could this come about? Easy, humans burn every last bit of fossil fuels they can there hands on (oil's on its way out, but there's still tonnes of coal, oil shale, tar sands, methane hydrates, etc.). Also, the destruction of CO2 sinks - rainforests, ocean absorption (collapse of plankton)... possible positive feedback effects from melting tundra. You get the idea. It's possible.

How extreme would the warming be then? Any guesses? True 'run-a-away' global warming possible?

If anything I think the current model runs are too conservative, and I don't think they're looking far enough into the future. Still, I think this is an excellent project, and it will be getting what few cycles I have to offer.

Regards, Eric B

>
> I'd be interested in another model, this one simulating a more extreme CO2
> level. The way I see it, people aren't going to stop burning fossil fuels
> until they're all gone. So... assume a worse case scenario where sometime next
> century the CO2 level roughly quadruples from its pre-industrial level. About
> 1 part per 1000 (1 ppt ?)

The current experiment is looking at the climate sensitivity which is defined as the temperature rise for 2x CO2. From this it is possible to extrapolate to 4x CO2, using a log scaling law, so roughly twice as much warming will occur. Like all extrapolations it will have added uncertainty.

> How could this come about? Easy, humans burn every last bit of fossil fuels
> they can there hands on (oil's on its way out, but there's still tonnes of
> coal, oil shale, tar sands, methane hydrates, etc.). Also, the destruction of
> CO2 sinks - rainforests, ocean absorption (collapse of plankton)... possible
> positive feedback effects from melting tundra. You get the idea. It's
> possible.

I agree, and there does not seem to be enough political will to make hard choices. The head of Exxon has been saying he expects that global energy demand will rise 50% by 2030, equivalent to 100M barrels per day or roughly 10x the current daily output of Saudi Arabia. As there probably is not rnough oil capacity most of this increase will be in Coal usage, that produces more CO2 per unit of energy produced. Many commentators would say that a 50% increase is on the low side, the rapid industrialisation of China and India could have created another 2 billion high energy consumers by then (or 3x the current number). The only good statistic is that per capita CO2 has not increased significantly since the 1970's in the US, Europe or the world as a whole.

There is a problem with modelling positive feedback effects at temperatures much higher than they are now. There is no comparison data to tell if the models are on the correct track, the climate may go into another mode, similar to a THC shutdown, but in a completely unforseen way. Temperatures up to 2C above preindustrial levels have been seen in the last few million years, so we can be fairly sure new modes do not exist below that rise. Ecosystem changes are particularly difficult to assess, humans are having a large effect on many ecosystems anyway, and in combination with climate change strange things might happen.

A simple example, about half the native British butterfly species are expected to go extinct, this is in spite of the climate becoming more favourable for butterflies. A couple of these are mountain/artic species which will run out of mountain to retreat up, but the rest will be lost due to habitat fragmentation. The current habitat is split into (often small) areas separated by large expanses of hostile territory. Straying away from these islands leads to almost certain death, so some species (such as the Silver Studded Blue) are adapting by becoming more sedentary. When climate change hits, not only does the habitat need to be recreated in another part of the country (500+ miles north), but the butterflies have got to get there - for many its an impossible task. If it is difficult for mobile species like butterflies, its going to be really difficult for many plants and the less mobile small creatures.

> How extreme would the warming be then? Any guesses? True 'run-a-away' global
> warming possible?

True run-a-way global warming is unlikely, but global temperature rises of more than 6C are likely with 4x CO2 that would cause severe agricultural and ecological destruction in most of the world's most heavily populated areas.

> If anything I think the current model runs are too conservative, and I don't
> think they're looking far enough into the future. Still, I think this is an
> excellent project, and it will be getting what few cycles I have to offer.

The current model runs do not look into the future, they are an experiment to see the climate sensitivity under various (and hopefully in fuure all) combinations of plausible parameters. Experiment 3 will look into the future and run various scenarios, some of which lead to high CO2 levels. Not looking far enough into the future is one of the problems with the IPCC emission scenarios, they arbitarily cut off at 2100, some of the high-end scenarios still have rising temperatures in 2100 and from what I recall of the IPCC report it does not extrapolate those to the ultimate temperature rise.

> Regards, Eric B
>
>

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____________________________<br>
<a href="http://www.boincforum.info/boinc/">boinc forum</a> and <a href="http://www.uk4cp.co.uk/">United Kindom</a> team, my climate change <a href="http://www.livejournal.com/users/mike_atkinson/">blog</a>.

&gt; The only good statistic is that per capita CO2 has not
&gt; increased significantly since the 1970's in the US, Europe or the world as a
&gt; whole.
&gt;

This only looks good. In reality, this is true only because US, Europe and other developed nations are already consuming unsustainable levels of energy and in the rest of the world continued population growth is overwhelmingly producing desperately poor people with almost no access to energy at all. These energy poor people just about counteract the effect of consumption growth in China, India and the like. Also, unfortunately, the Earth's resources do not scale with population.

---

&gt; &gt; The only good statistic is that per capita CO2 has not
&gt; &gt; increased significantly since the 1970's in the US, Europe or the world
&gt; as a
&gt; &gt; whole.
&gt; &gt;
&gt;
&gt; This only looks good. In reality, this is true only because US, Europe and
&gt; other developed nations are already consuming unsustainable levels of energy
&gt; and in the rest of the world continued population growth is overwhelmingly
&gt; producing desperately poor people with almost no access to energy at all.
&gt; These energy poor people just about counteract the effect of consumption
&gt; growth in China, India and the like. Also, unfortunately, the Earth's
&gt; resources do not scale with population.

Yes, I realise that, <a href="http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/cabs/carbonemiss/chapter1.html">this page</a> gives overall figures. The massive rise in developing Asia's CO2 emissions at about 5% a year are hidden by the Eastern Europe/FSU decline (which has now reversed). Just looking at the gap between developing Asia's per capita CO2 emissions and that of the OECD shows how much more they could rise.

When wealth and CO2 emission levels reach that of the OECD, it seems that real GDP growth (per capita) can continue at 1.7% a year without any further increase in CO2 emissions. But it seems very difficult to cut emissions. Many of the easy gains have already been made, the switch from coal to gas fired power stations and grossly inefficient appliances for instance.

I disagree about the Earth's resources, they are although finite, still vast, and there is enough coal, oil and gas to last for a couple of hundred years, even at accelerated usage rates. Shure, as conventional oil and gas will run out, perhaps with the peak within the next 10 years, but there are enormous reserves of tar sands, oil shales and methane calthrates. And population growth is declining, current trends seem to indicate population will peak at just over nine billion, and then slowly decline, judging the intensions of people, particularly those as yet unborn is difficult as can be seen by the UN consistently overestimating population growth (IIRC in the 1970's they were estimating a peak of about 15 billion).

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____________________________<br>
<a href="http://www.boincforum.info/boinc/">boinc forum</a> and <a href="http://www.uk4cp.co.uk/">United Kindom</a> team, my climate change <a href="http://www.livejournal.com/users/mike_atkinson/">blog</a>.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4278005.stm

Hello there:

I was following your discussion last night, and today I found the above story on the BBC news.

With uglies like that out there in the universe, are all our efforts for naught? In milliseconds we can be vaporized by something light-years distant.

And maybe the people working on SETI projects are wasting their time, because that big flash has probably fried a lot of bacon in the galaxy.

But I am much too gloomy. We must remain optimistic and keep on trying to find the solutions. I do like your observations on the relationships between energy consumption (i.e.allocations) and population. Answer this question and you have solved half the problem.

Not very many of us are willing to get deeply into discussions of overpopulation, (India, China,Indonesia, Brazil ^^Brazil?!^^) but the consequences of demand for energy in "emerging" economies with little or no effort at population control is definitely on the agenda, recognized or not.

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&gt; http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4278005.stm
&gt;
&gt; Hello there:
&gt;
&gt; I was following your discussion last night, and today I found the above story
&gt; on the BBC news.
&gt;
&gt; With uglies like that out there in the universe, are all our efforts for
&gt; naught? In milliseconds we can be vaporized by something light-years distant.

If it were close

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____________________________<br>
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&gt; &gt; http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4278005.stm
&gt; &gt;
&gt; &gt; Hello there:
&gt; &gt;
&gt; &gt; I was following your discussion last night, and today I found the above
&gt; story
&gt; &gt; on the BBC news.
&gt; &gt;
&gt; &gt; With uglies like that out there in the universe, are all our efforts for
&gt; &gt; naught? In milliseconds we can be vaporized by something light-years
&gt; distant.
&gt;
&gt; If it were close
&gt;
If the Milky Way is 100 thousand light-years (6x10^17 miles) in diameter and one of those has to be within 10 light years. How many of these super-magnetic neutron stars are there in the Milky Way? What else is needed to work out what portion of the Milky Way is uninhabitable due to such events?

---

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One resource that is often overlooked is clean, drinkable, water. There are already arguements in various
places around the world over it. How long belong they change to wars? Or should that be 'Police Actions'?

And as for SETI, it's a waste of time looking at distant stars for signals from alien life forms.
We've been here for centuries. Oops! I wasn't supposed to tell you that.

Les

Opps, my previous post seems to have been truncated.

I said if I recall correctly.

"If it were close withing 10 light years it would cause a mass extinction and even within 50 light years would cause major problems. However there are no magnetostars, or similar energetic objects anywhere near that close."

There are I think only a few within the milky way, Scientific American had an article on them a couple of months ago (what good timing!), but it is at my other home, so I can't get the exact number.

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____________________________<br>
<a href="http://www.boincforum.info/boinc/">boinc forum</a> and <a href="http://www.uk4cp.co.uk/">United Kindom</a> team, my climate change <a href="http://www.livejournal.com/users/mike_atkinson/">blog</a>.

&gt; One resource that is often overlooked is clean, drinkable, water. There are
&gt; already arguements in various
&gt; places around the world over it. How long belong they change to wars? Or
&gt; should that be 'Police Actions'?

I agree, its not just drinking water, many of the most heavily populated areas of the world rely on irrigated crops a good example is Egypt. They are totally dependent on the Nile, countries further upstream particularly Sudan (where my wife is currently working) and Ethiopia want more use of the flow. Egypt gets the vast majority of the flow under a treaty set up when Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia where under British rule/protectorates, Egypt was by far the most important so got the lions share. That is a likely place for conflict.

Another is the Middle East, almost all surface runoff is used and acquafers are being depleted, the Gaza strip is particularly badly affected as salt water encroaches into the acquafer which is the main source of water. Small differences in precipitation levels due to climate change could have a major effect here as the situation is already volatile.


&gt; And as for SETI, it's a waste of time looking at distant stars for signals
&gt; from alien life forms.
&gt; We've been here for centuries. Oops! I wasn't supposed to tell you that.

The Fermi paradox "why aren't they here?", has been answered at last.

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____________________________<br>
<a href="http://www.boincforum.info/boinc/">boinc forum</a> and <a href="http://www.uk4cp.co.uk/">United Kindom</a> team, my climate change <a href="http://www.livejournal.com/users/mike_atkinson/">blog</a>.

If CO2 output per capita remains about level (which seems to me unlikely, despite Kyoto) but world population increases from 6 billion to the projected 9b, or even 8b or 7b, then the rate of increase in the amount of CO2 in the air will continue to rise.

Most emerging economies are in fact making efforts towards population control. Family-size statistics world-wide show births per family falling irrespective of culture, religion or national policy towards family planning. Millions of families are limiting births with little or no outside help or intervention. The important factors seem to be standard of living and access to education, particularly for girls.

This means that intervention to reduce poverty everywhere will also reduce future rises in population and thereby help combat climate change.

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__________________________________________________

&gt; If CO2 output per capita remains about level (which seems to me unlikely,
&gt; despite Kyoto) but world population increases from 6 billion to the projected
&gt; 9b, or even 8b or 7b, then the rate of increase in the amount of CO2 in the
&gt; air will continue to rise.

We agree.

&gt; Most emerging economies are in fact making efforts towards population control.
&gt; Family-size statistics world-wide show births per family falling irrespective
&gt; of culture, religion or national policy towards family planning. Millions of
&gt; families are limiting births with little or no outside help or intervention.
&gt; The important factors seem to be standard of living and access to education,
&gt; particularly for girls.

We agree. Almost word for word what I said in another post.

&gt; This means that intervention to reduce poverty everywhere will also reduce
&gt; future rises in population and thereby help combat climate change.

This is where is disagree, any significant increase in the wealth of the poorest (those under $1/day) will lead to increased CO2 emissions. This effect will be much greater than any reduction in the rate of population increase. If they reach current western levels of affluence they will be emitting far more CO2, even if the CO2 intensity of GDP is 20% of what it is now.

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____________________________<br>
<a href="http://www.boincforum.info/boinc/">boinc forum</a> and <a href="http://www.uk4cp.co.uk/">United Kindom</a> team, my climate change <a href="http://www.livejournal.com/users/mike_atkinson/">blog</a>.

Hi Mike

Your reasoning is logical, and you have researched the detailed arithmetic involved. But we can't combat GW by keeping the poor in continued poverty as this would push them further down the road towards fighting over land, water and other resources, as well as being selfish and hypocritical on our part.

My own view is that generous family planning aid for everyone who wants it should be offered alongside financial/development projects, this being a way of helping both individuals and societies simultaneously. Many people will not agree with me.

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__________________________________________________

I do not advocate keeping poor people poor, quite the opposite in fact. I was just pointing out that the goals of lifting people out of poverty and preventing dangerous climate change (both highly desirable) are in conflict.

I believe we can "square the circle", by a mixture of trade reform, aid and technology transfer, but it will be difficult. Generous family planning aid is one small measure, but it won't be enough. If the 2B very poor in the world had not another child, but rose to average OECD level of wealth, CO2 emissions would be a lot higher. Probably over half of those 2B are under 20 and with moderate levels of wealth and heathcare can expect to live another 50 years.

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____________________________<br>
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