Are Democrats exhibiting epic fail on climate change?

brianluxbrianlux Moving through All Kinds of Terrain. Posts: 42,293
edited September 2020 in A Moving Train
 After I get done writing this, I will go outside in the yard and start breaking shit so I don't hurt anything in the house.  Then I'll come back and hope someone has somehow been able to prove the premise of this article is wrong.


As fires burn the west, top Democrats stay quiet on the climate crisis

Nancy Pelosi has been notably tepid on green legislation – so are the Democrats serious about fighting climate change?



"Pretty cookies, heart squares all around, yeah!"
-Eddie Vedder, "Smile"

"Try to not spook the horse."
-Neil Young













Post edited by brianlux on
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Comments

  • static111static111 Posts: 4,889
    brianlux said:
     After I get done writing this, I will go outside in the yard and start breaking shit so I don't hurt anything in the house.  Then I'll come back and hope someone has somehow been able to prove the premise of this article is wrong.


    As fires burn the west, top Democrats stay quiet on the climate crisis

    Nancy Pelosi has been notably tepid on green legislation – so are the Democrats serious about fighting climate change?



    Nancy “ the green dream or whatever “ Pelosi 
    Scio me nihil scire

    There are no kings inside the gates of eden
  • brianluxbrianlux Moving through All Kinds of Terrain. Posts: 42,293
    static111 said:
    brianlux said:
     After I get done writing this, I will go outside in the yard and start breaking shit so I don't hurt anything in the house.  Then I'll come back and hope someone has somehow been able to prove the premise of this article is wrong.


    As fires burn the west, top Democrats stay quiet on the climate crisis

    Nancy Pelosi has been notably tepid on green legislation – so are the Democrats serious about fighting climate change?



    Nancy “ the green dream or whatever “ Pelosi 

    She disappoints me a lot at times.  Like walking through a hair salon without a mask on.  Wednesday Thursday Friday? What give her the idea she gets to be an exception?  That was a smug and careless action on her part.

    Now, don't get me wrong.  I'm very aware that Democrats in general are more environmentally conscious. Here are some examples:

    "California governor Gavin Newsom on Friday said the debate around climate change was “over”.

    "Washington governor Jay Inslee noted that in just the past five days his state had experienced its second-worst fire season, after 2015. He called the blazes “climate fires”, rather than wildfires."

    “This is not an act of God,” Inslee said. “This has happened because we have changed the climate.”


    But this is all talk and what we need is action.  I don't see it happening nearly fast enough in political circles.  Least of all from the right, but the left is also too weak on environmental commitment.  This is no time for waffling or compromising. 

    Maybe what we need is a Charlotte Field for president from the movie "Long Shot" (fun movie by the way).  But of course, that was just fiction.  Entertaining and right on, but I don't see it happening in reality.  Democrats need to start getting serious about climate and environment.  No just lip-service, but real, immediate, strong action.  Put up or shut up, I say.







    "Pretty cookies, heart squares all around, yeah!"
    -Eddie Vedder, "Smile"

    "Try to not spook the horse."
    -Neil Young













  • static111static111 Posts: 4,889
    Scio me nihil scire

    There are no kings inside the gates of eden
  • static111static111 Posts: 4,889
    I think Ed’s prediction fromDTE was 10 years early.  2020 watch it go to fire
    Scio me nihil scire

    There are no kings inside the gates of eden
  • mace1229mace1229 Posts: 9,482
    It’s hard to take top politician seriously about climate change when they show your their $10,000 freezers to house their top dollar ice cream. Along with multiple houses that they take private jets to travel between. The average person probably wastes less on their one house than they do on their 4th vacation home.
  • brianluxbrianlux Moving through All Kinds of Terrain. Posts: 42,293
    static111 said:

    Disappointing!

    This is a bad time for me to be bad-mouthing Democrats because we would be better off with Dems who are more likely to support environmental initiatives, so let there be no misunderstanding about that.  Dems have better records on environment than Republicans which mean that Republicans in general are PISS POOR on environment.

    But that doesn't get Dems off the hook on this.  I am watching my state as well as Oregon and even parts of Washington burn to the ground and pollute the air in ways that are affecting our health.  I can feel it in my lungs. We are witnessing what is the strongest evidence yet that climate change is a serious issue that is having devastating effects on human life and, even worse, on wild life.  It's time we stop dicking around, friends.  We need to start making changes fast.  Otherwise, we can kiss our asses goodbye.
    "Pretty cookies, heart squares all around, yeah!"
    -Eddie Vedder, "Smile"

    "Try to not spook the horse."
    -Neil Young













  • static111static111 Posts: 4,889
    brianlux said:
    static111 said:

    Disappointing!

    This is a bad time for me to be bad-mouthing Democrats because we would be better off with Dems who are more likely to support environmental initiatives, so let there be no misunderstanding about that.  Dems have better records on environment than Republicans which mean that Republicans in general are PISS POOR on environment.

    But that doesn't get Dems off the hook on this.  I am watching my state as well as Oregon and even parts of Washington burn to the ground and pollute the air in ways that are affecting our health.  I can feel it in my lungs. We are witnessing what is the strongest evidence yet that climate change is a serious issue that is having devastating effects on human life and, even worse, on wild life.  It's time we stop dicking around, friends.  We need to start making changes fast.  Otherwise, we can kiss our asses goodbye.
    I’m with you here bRian.  Like now is not the time to be criticizing Dems because we want to keep trumps whatever from taking over, but we did get here through years of not holding the Dems accountable because the republicans are so bad and now isn’t the time but maybe next year is mentality. Sad
    Scio me nihil scire

    There are no kings inside the gates of eden
  • The American people are weak on climate change. Freedumb, ‘Murica!
    09/15/1998 & 09/16/1998, Mansfield, MA; 08/29/00 08/30/00, Mansfield, MA; 07/02/03, 07/03/03, Mansfield, MA; 09/28/04, 09/29/04, Boston, MA; 09/22/05, Halifax, NS; 05/24/06, 05/25/06, Boston, MA; 07/22/06, 07/23/06, Gorge, WA; 06/27/2008, Hartford; 06/28/08, 06/30/08, Mansfield; 08/18/2009, O2, London, UK; 10/30/09, 10/31/09, Philadelphia, PA; 05/15/10, Hartford, CT; 05/17/10, Boston, MA; 05/20/10, 05/21/10, NY, NY; 06/22/10, Dublin, IRE; 06/23/10, Northern Ireland; 09/03/11, 09/04/11, Alpine Valley, WI; 09/11/11, 09/12/11, Toronto, Ont; 09/14/11, Ottawa, Ont; 09/15/11, Hamilton, Ont; 07/02/2012, Prague, Czech Republic; 07/04/2012 & 07/05/2012, Berlin, Germany; 07/07/2012, Stockholm, Sweden; 09/30/2012, Missoula, MT; 07/16/2013, London, Ont; 07/19/2013, Chicago, IL; 10/15/2013 & 10/16/2013, Worcester, MA; 10/21/2013 & 10/22/2013, Philadelphia, PA; 10/25/2013, Hartford, CT; 11/29/2013, Portland, OR; 11/30/2013, Spokane, WA; 12/04/2013, Vancouver, BC; 12/06/2013, Seattle, WA; 10/03/2014, St. Louis. MO; 10/22/2014, Denver, CO; 10/26/2015, New York, NY; 04/23/2016, New Orleans, LA; 04/28/2016 & 04/29/2016, Philadelphia, PA; 05/01/2016 & 05/02/2016, New York, NY; 05/08/2016, Ottawa, Ont.; 05/10/2016 & 05/12/2016, Toronto, Ont.; 08/05/2016 & 08/07/2016, Boston, MA; 08/20/2016 & 08/22/2016, Chicago, IL; 07/01/2018, Prague, Czech Republic; 07/03/2018, Krakow, Poland; 07/05/2018, Berlin, Germany; 09/02/2018 & 09/04/2018, Boston, MA; 09/08/2022, Toronto, Ont; 09/11/2022, New York, NY; 09/14/2022, Camden, NJ; 09/02/2023, St. Paul, MN; 05/04/2024 & 05/06/2024, Vancouver, BC; 05/10/2024, Portland, OR;

    Libtardaplorable©. And proud of it.

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  • hedonisthedonist Posts: 24,524
    mace1229 said:
    It’s hard to take top politician seriously about climate change when they show your their $10,000 freezers to house their top dollar ice cream. Along with multiple houses that they take private jets to travel between. The average person probably wastes less on their one house than they do on their 4th vacation home.
    You could also apply that to athletes, music-makers/performers, "influencers", and the like.
  • static111static111 Posts: 4,889
    hedonist said:
    mace1229 said:
    It’s hard to take top politician seriously about climate change when they show your their $10,000 freezers to house their top dollar ice cream. Along with multiple houses that they take private jets to travel between. The average person probably wastes less on their one house than they do on their 4th vacation home.
    You could also apply that to athletes, music-makers/performers, "influencers", and the like.
    The people you mentioned aren’t in charge of making policies that effect the entire planet.
    Scio me nihil scire

    There are no kings inside the gates of eden
  • hedonisthedonist Posts: 24,524
    static111 said:
    hedonist said:
    mace1229 said:
    It’s hard to take top politician seriously about climate change when they show your their $10,000 freezers to house their top dollar ice cream. Along with multiple houses that they take private jets to travel between. The average person probably wastes less on their one house than they do on their 4th vacation home.
    You could also apply that to athletes, music-makers/performers, "influencers", and the like.
    The people you mentioned aren’t in charge of making policies that effect the entire planet.
    I realize this; I was pointing out that despite what I think of politicians, it happens all over by those in the spotlight, many of whom are compelled to impart their wisdom but not walk the walk - the old “do as I say” bullshit.
  • HughFreakingDillonHughFreakingDillon Winnipeg Posts: 37,350
    static111 said:
    hedonist said:
    mace1229 said:
    It’s hard to take top politician seriously about climate change when they show your their $10,000 freezers to house their top dollar ice cream. Along with multiple houses that they take private jets to travel between. The average person probably wastes less on their one house than they do on their 4th vacation home.
    You could also apply that to athletes, music-makers/performers, "influencers", and the like.
    The people you mentioned aren’t in charge of making policies that effect the entire planet.
    no, but we need to start voting people in that are serious about change, not lip service. i mean, seriously, what has any liberal done that is of any real significance?

    and the people hedo mentioned do have a voice, a platform to reach people, to inspire, with words and actions. 
    "Oh Canada...you're beautiful when you're drunk"
    -EV  8/14/93




  • Lerxst1992Lerxst1992 Posts: 6,749
    brianlux said:
    static111 said:

    Disappointing!

    This is a bad time for me to be bad-mouthing Democrats because we would be better off with Dems who are more likely to support environmental initiatives, so let there be no misunderstanding about that.  Dems have better records on environment than Republicans which mean that Republicans in general are PISS POOR on environment.

    But that doesn't get Dems off the hook on this.  I am watching my state as well as Oregon and even parts of Washington burn to the ground and pollute the air in ways that are affecting our health.  I can feel it in my lungs. We are witnessing what is the strongest evidence yet that climate change is a serious issue that is having devastating effects on human life and, even worse, on wild life.  It's time we stop dicking around, friends.  We need to start making changes fast.  Otherwise, we can kiss our asses goodbye.

    Here is what Biden said today,

    “If we have four more years of Trump’s climate denial, how many suburbs will be burned in wildfires, how many suburban neighborhoods will have been flooded out, how many suburbs will have been blown away in superstorms?” Biden asked. “If you give a climate arsonist four more years in the White House, why would anyone be surprised if we have more of America ablaze … when more of America is under water?”

    He is campaigning passionately on the climate. Anything in congress could and would  be blocked by the senate. It’s Biden winning or its over for new energy initiatives.

    If we are going to attack Biden on fracking and help trump get re-elected, we need an alternative to nat gas. Heat pumps don’t work in cold climates, electric heat uses double to triple the amount of energy, oil is less efficient and dirtier and the other option is coal. 

    So progressives want Biden to support coal?
  • brianluxbrianlux Moving through All Kinds of Terrain. Posts: 42,293
    brianlux said:
    static111 said:

    Disappointing!

    This is a bad time for me to be bad-mouthing Democrats because we would be better off with Dems who are more likely to support environmental initiatives, so let there be no misunderstanding about that.  Dems have better records on environment than Republicans which mean that Republicans in general are PISS POOR on environment.

    But that doesn't get Dems off the hook on this.  I am watching my state as well as Oregon and even parts of Washington burn to the ground and pollute the air in ways that are affecting our health.  I can feel it in my lungs. We are witnessing what is the strongest evidence yet that climate change is a serious issue that is having devastating effects on human life and, even worse, on wild life.  It's time we stop dicking around, friends.  We need to start making changes fast.  Otherwise, we can kiss our asses goodbye.

    Here is what Biden said today,

    “If we have four more years of Trump’s climate denial, how many suburbs will be burned in wildfires, how many suburban neighborhoods will have been flooded out, how many suburbs will have been blown away in superstorms?” Biden asked. “If you give a climate arsonist four more years in the White House, why would anyone be surprised if we have more of America ablaze … when more of America is under water?”

    He is campaigning passionately on the climate. Anything in congress could and would  be blocked by the senate. It’s Biden winning or its over for new energy initiatives.

    If we are going to attack Biden on fracking and help trump get re-elected, we need an alternative to nat gas. Heat pumps don’t work in cold climates, electric heat uses double to triple the amount of energy, oil is less efficient and dirtier and the other option is coal. 

    So progressives want Biden to support coal?

    I am totally voting for Biden over Trump for every reason imaginable, including environment. 

    I guess I should have waited until after the election is over to post this, but the guardian article I posted got my dander up on this old issue.  I have been actively promoting environmental protection for about 40 years and have been concerned about it for over 50 years- that includes having donated several thousand dollars over all those years to the best run environmental organizations I can find, writing letters, organizing a reduction in carbon emissions rally,  voting, signing petitions in person, calling representatives and disseminating information about environmental concerns.  40 years of this and still the environment degrades (look at the western U.S. right now!) despite all the promises from liberal and progressive politicians. 

    The fact- the undeniable fact- is that these politicians have let us down.  We cannot stand for this any longer.  We cannot just accept lip-service and wish the problems away.  The environmental collapse is changing the planet in ways the will make the lives of younger and following generations very, very difficult.  This is no time for hollow promises.  For five decades now, I've heard them all.  I'm sick and tired of the weak responses from these so-called leaders.  It's now or never or our kids and there's are toast and whatever other species die off before their time.
    "Pretty cookies, heart squares all around, yeah!"
    -Eddie Vedder, "Smile"

    "Try to not spook the horse."
    -Neil Young













  • static111static111 Posts: 4,889
    brianlux said:
    static111 said:

    Disappointing!

    This is a bad time for me to be bad-mouthing Democrats because we would be better off with Dems who are more likely to support environmental initiatives, so let there be no misunderstanding about that.  Dems have better records on environment than Republicans which mean that Republicans in general are PISS POOR on environment.

    But that doesn't get Dems off the hook on this.  I am watching my state as well as Oregon and even parts of Washington burn to the ground and pollute the air in ways that are affecting our health.  I can feel it in my lungs. We are witnessing what is the strongest evidence yet that climate change is a serious issue that is having devastating effects on human life and, even worse, on wild life.  It's time we stop dicking around, friends.  We need to start making changes fast.  Otherwise, we can kiss our asses goodbye.

    Here is what Biden said today,

    “If we have four more years of Trump’s climate denial, how many suburbs will be burned in wildfires, how many suburban neighborhoods will have been flooded out, how many suburbs will have been blown away in superstorms?” Biden asked. “If you give a climate arsonist four more years in the White House, why would anyone be surprised if we have more of America ablaze … when more of America is under water?”

    He is campaigning passionately on the climate. Anything in congress could and would  be blocked by the senate. It’s Biden winning or its over for new energy initiatives.

    If we are going to attack Biden on fracking and help trump get re-elected, we need an alternative to nat gas. Heat pumps don’t work in cold climates, electric heat uses double to triple the amount of energy, oil is less efficient and dirtier and the other option is coal. 

    So progressives want Biden to support coal?
    Demanding more of your politicians and not just passively giving them the vote because the other guy is bad...what a concept.  Since when is it bad for constituents to try to keep the so called progressive party from just becoming moderate republicans.   You can still be critical of Biden or any dem for that matter, demand more of them and still not vote republican.
    Scio me nihil scire

    There are no kings inside the gates of eden
  • static111static111 Posts: 4,889
    brianlux said:
    brianlux said:
    static111 said:

    Disappointing!

    This is a bad time for me to be bad-mouthing Democrats because we would be better off with Dems who are more likely to support environmental initiatives, so let there be no misunderstanding about that.  Dems have better records on environment than Republicans which mean that Republicans in general are PISS POOR on environment.

    But that doesn't get Dems off the hook on this.  I am watching my state as well as Oregon and even parts of Washington burn to the ground and pollute the air in ways that are affecting our health.  I can feel it in my lungs. We are witnessing what is the strongest evidence yet that climate change is a serious issue that is having devastating effects on human life and, even worse, on wild life.  It's time we stop dicking around, friends.  We need to start making changes fast.  Otherwise, we can kiss our asses goodbye.

    Here is what Biden said today,

    “If we have four more years of Trump’s climate denial, how many suburbs will be burned in wildfires, how many suburban neighborhoods will have been flooded out, how many suburbs will have been blown away in superstorms?” Biden asked. “If you give a climate arsonist four more years in the White House, why would anyone be surprised if we have more of America ablaze … when more of America is under water?”

    He is campaigning passionately on the climate. Anything in congress could and would  be blocked by the senate. It’s Biden winning or its over for new energy initiatives.

    If we are going to attack Biden on fracking and help trump get re-elected, we need an alternative to nat gas. Heat pumps don’t work in cold climates, electric heat uses double to triple the amount of energy, oil is less efficient and dirtier and the other option is coal. 

    So progressives want Biden to support coal?

    I am totally voting for Biden over Trump for every reason imaginable, including environment. 

    I guess I should have waited until after the election is over to post this, but the guardian article I posted got my dander up on this old issue.  I have been actively promoting environmental protection for about 40 years and have been concerned about it for over 50 years- that includes having donated several thousand dollars over all those years to the best run environmental organizations I can find, writing letters, organizing a reduction in carbon emissions rally,  voting, signing petitions in person, calling representatives and disseminating information about environmental concerns.  40 years of this and still the environment degrades (look at the western U.S. right now!) despite all the promises from liberal and progressive politicians. 

    The fact- the undeniable fact- is that these politicians have let us down.  We cannot stand for this any longer.  We cannot just accept lip-service and wish the problems away.  The environmental collapse is changing the planet in ways the will make the lives of younger and following generations very, very difficult.  This is no time for hollow promises.  For five decades now, I've heard them all.  I'm sick and tired of the weak responses from these so-called leaders.  It's now or never or our kids and there's are toast and whatever other species die off before their time.
    Amen Brian
    Scio me nihil scire

    There are no kings inside the gates of eden
  • Lerxst1992Lerxst1992 Posts: 6,749
    edited September 2020
    brianlux said:
    brianlux said:
    static111 said:

    Disappointing!

    This is a bad time for me to be bad-mouthing Democrats because we would be better off with Dems who are more likely to support environmental initiatives, so let there be no misunderstanding about that.  Dems have better records on environment than Republicans which mean that Republicans in general are PISS POOR on environment.

    But that doesn't get Dems off the hook on this.  I am watching my state as well as Oregon and even parts of Washington burn to the ground and pollute the air in ways that are affecting our health.  I can feel it in my lungs. We are witnessing what is the strongest evidence yet that climate change is a serious issue that is having devastating effects on human life and, even worse, on wild life.  It's time we stop dicking around, friends.  We need to start making changes fast.  Otherwise, we can kiss our asses goodbye.

    Here is what Biden said today,

    “If we have four more years of Trump’s climate denial, how many suburbs will be burned in wildfires, how many suburban neighborhoods will have been flooded out, how many suburbs will have been blown away in superstorms?” Biden asked. “If you give a climate arsonist four more years in the White House, why would anyone be surprised if we have more of America ablaze … when more of America is under water?”

    He is campaigning passionately on the climate. Anything in congress could and would  be blocked by the senate. It’s Biden winning or its over for new energy initiatives.

    If we are going to attack Biden on fracking and help trump get re-elected, we need an alternative to nat gas. Heat pumps don’t work in cold climates, electric heat uses double to triple the amount of energy, oil is less efficient and dirtier and the other option is coal. 

    So progressives want Biden to support coal?

    I am totally voting for Biden over Trump for every reason imaginable, including environment. 

    I guess I should have waited until after the election is over to post this, but the guardian article I posted got my dander up on this old issue.  I have been actively promoting environmental protection for about 40 years and have been concerned about it for over 50 years- that includes having donated several thousand dollars over all those years to the best run environmental organizations I can find, writing letters, organizing a reduction in carbon emissions rally,  voting, signing petitions in person, calling representatives and disseminating information about environmental concerns.  40 years of this and still the environment degrades (look at the western U.S. right now!) despite all the promises from liberal and progressive politicians. 

    The fact- the undeniable fact- is that these politicians have let us down.  We cannot stand for this any longer.  We cannot just accept lip-service and wish the problems away.  The environmental collapse is changing the planet in ways the will make the lives of younger and following generations very, very difficult.  This is no time for hollow promises.  For five decades now, I've heard them all.  I'm sick and tired of the weak responses from these so-called leaders.  It's now or never or our kids and there's are toast and whatever other species die off before their time.


    Biden spoke passionately on the topic yesterday. I did not hear lip service.

    I did hear Biden campaigning in a electoral system that is biased against him and the left. He gets too close politically to AOC, Sanders, etc. he loses NC FL AZ WI and trump wins. Go ahead and convince me biden wins any of these states tacking all the way to the left.

    It MUCH smarter that biden take the center left lane (coincidentally, that is who he is), defeat trump, then forge a climate deal with the progressives, moderates and centrist Republicans.  

    If Biden starts to forget the bias of the US electoral system, trump wins. How does the climate look then?

    And liberals should consider attacking biden on fracking is not smart as all of the alternatives to fracking in a sub freezing climate use much more energy and are dirtier to the atmosphere. 
    Post edited by Lerxst1992 on
  • brianluxbrianlux Moving through All Kinds of Terrain. Posts: 42,293
    brianlux said:
    brianlux said:
    static111 said:

    Disappointing!

    This is a bad time for me to be bad-mouthing Democrats because we would be better off with Dems who are more likely to support environmental initiatives, so let there be no misunderstanding about that.  Dems have better records on environment than Republicans which mean that Republicans in general are PISS POOR on environment.

    But that doesn't get Dems off the hook on this.  I am watching my state as well as Oregon and even parts of Washington burn to the ground and pollute the air in ways that are affecting our health.  I can feel it in my lungs. We are witnessing what is the strongest evidence yet that climate change is a serious issue that is having devastating effects on human life and, even worse, on wild life.  It's time we stop dicking around, friends.  We need to start making changes fast.  Otherwise, we can kiss our asses goodbye.

    Here is what Biden said today,

    “If we have four more years of Trump’s climate denial, how many suburbs will be burned in wildfires, how many suburban neighborhoods will have been flooded out, how many suburbs will have been blown away in superstorms?” Biden asked. “If you give a climate arsonist four more years in the White House, why would anyone be surprised if we have more of America ablaze … when more of America is under water?”

    He is campaigning passionately on the climate. Anything in congress could and would  be blocked by the senate. It’s Biden winning or its over for new energy initiatives.

    If we are going to attack Biden on fracking and help trump get re-elected, we need an alternative to nat gas. Heat pumps don’t work in cold climates, electric heat uses double to triple the amount of energy, oil is less efficient and dirtier and the other option is coal. 

    So progressives want Biden to support coal?

    I am totally voting for Biden over Trump for every reason imaginable, including environment. 

    I guess I should have waited until after the election is over to post this, but the guardian article I posted got my dander up on this old issue.  I have been actively promoting environmental protection for about 40 years and have been concerned about it for over 50 years- that includes having donated several thousand dollars over all those years to the best run environmental organizations I can find, writing letters, organizing a reduction in carbon emissions rally,  voting, signing petitions in person, calling representatives and disseminating information about environmental concerns.  40 years of this and still the environment degrades (look at the western U.S. right now!) despite all the promises from liberal and progressive politicians. 

    The fact- the undeniable fact- is that these politicians have let us down.  We cannot stand for this any longer.  We cannot just accept lip-service and wish the problems away.  The environmental collapse is changing the planet in ways the will make the lives of younger and following generations very, very difficult.  This is no time for hollow promises.  For five decades now, I've heard them all.  I'm sick and tired of the weak responses from these so-called leaders.  It's now or never or our kids and there's are toast and whatever other species die off before their time.


    Biden spoke passionately on the topic yesterday. I did not hear lip service.

    I did hear Biden campaigning in a electoral system that is biased against him and the left. He gets too close politically to AOC, Sanders, etc. he loses NC FL AZ WI and trump wins. Go ahead and convince me biden wins any of these states tacking all the way to the left.

    It MUCH smarter that biden take the center left lane (coincidentally, that is who he is), defeat trump, then forge a climate deal with the progressives, moderates and centrist Republicans.  

    If Biden starts to forget the bias of the US electoral system, trump wins. How does the climate look then?

    And liberals should consider attacking biden on fracking is not smart as all of the alternatives to fracking in a sub freezing climate use much more energy and are dirtier to the atmosphere. 

    Lerxst, I must not be making myself clear here.   I am sorry for the misunderstanding.  This thread was not meant to focus on Biden.  I am not at all suggesting Biden should campaign as though he were Edward Abbey, Paul Watson, Douglas Peacock, Dave Foreman, Robert Hunter, Julia Butterfly Hill or Bill McKibben.  That would not get him elected.  What I would like to see is for him, and all other politicians who claim to be concerned about climate change and environmental degradation, to step up to the plate once elected and work with the same passion and vigor that any of those aforementioned environmental champions have to raise awareness and enact legislation to bring about environmental improvement. 

    Surely you would agree that the trajectory we are currently on in terms of environment is one that is leading down a dangerous path?  Is not the massive conflagration of the American west evidence enough of that? Is that not enough impetus for us to start demanding our representatives to take bold and timely action to stand up for protecting the planet that sustains us?  Or do we just keep treading down a road that is leading to ours and many other species premature demise?  I think those are the right questions to ask and the demands I am suggesting to be logical steps to take. 
    "Pretty cookies, heart squares all around, yeah!"
    -Eddie Vedder, "Smile"

    "Try to not spook the horse."
    -Neil Young













  • Not to be a Debbie Downer but the American public, in general, could care two shits about this happening. Remember, 1/3 of repub voters, maybe more, think its all a hoax. Until they become engaged and care, our politicians, from both parties, cant/wont do shit. Because, freedumb.

    Two Antarctic glaciers that have long kept scientists awake at night are breaking free from the restraints that have hemmed them in, increasing the threat of large-scale sea-level rise.

    Located along the coast of the Amundsen Sea in West Antarctica, the enormous Pine Island and Thwaites glaciers already contribute around 5 percent of global sea-level rise. The survival of Thwaites has been deemed so critical that the United States and Britain have launched a targeted multimillion-dollar research mission to the glacier. The loss of the glacier could trigger the broader collapse of the West Antarctic ice sheet, which contains enough ice to eventually raise seas by about 10 feet.

    The new findings, published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, come from analysis of satellite images. They show that a naturally occurring buffer system that prevents the glaciers from flowing outward rapidly is breaking down, potentially unleashing far more ice into the sea in coming years.

    The glaciers’ “shear margins,” where their floating ice shelves encounter high levels of friction that constrain the natural flow of ice, are progressively weakening and in some cases breaking into pieces.

    “The stresses that slow down the glacier, they are no longer in place, so the glacier is speeding up,” said Stef Lhermitte, a satellite expert at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands who led the new research along with colleagues from NASA and other research institutions in France, Belgium, Austria and the Netherlands.

    While many of the images have been seen before, the new analysis suggests that they are a sign of further disintegration to come.

    “We already knew that these were glaciers that might matter in the future, but these images to me indicate that these ice shelves are in a very bad state,” Lhermitte said.

    It’s just the latest in a flurry of bad news about the planet’s ice.

    Arctic sea ice is very close to — but likely to not quite reach — a record low for this time of year. Last month, Canada lost a large portion of its last major Arctic ice shelf.

    And in Greenland, the largest still-intact ice shelf in the Northern Hemisphere, sometimes known as 79 North because of its latitude (its full name is Nioghalvfjerdsfjorden), just lost a large chunk of ice, equivalent in size to roughly two Manhattan islands, according to the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland. Experts there blamed the fracture on a strong general warming trend and temperatures that have been “incredibly” high in the northeast of Greenland in recent years.

    Ice shelves are vast floating platforms that extend across the surface of the ocean at the outer edge of marine-based glaciers. As they flow over the water, these shelves freeze onto mountainsides and islands and anchor themselves to bumps in the seafloor. In this way, the shelves provide a braking mechanism on the natural outward flow of ice.

    The buttressing effect occurs in the shear margins, where faster-flowing ice meets ice that is more static and stable, often because it is moored to some part of the landscape. In these places, the ice frequently crumples and contorts, a visible indication of the powerful stresses that it is under.

    But when those stresses become too much, ice breaks. That’s what’s now happening in West Antarctica, the new research argues, suggesting that warm ocean water has thinned the ice shelves out enough from below that they became brittle.

    At the same time, and for the same reason, the glaciers themselves began to flow outward faster. The resulting forces led the shear-margin ice to break into pieces — which means that the glacier, less constrained, will now be able to add ice to the ocean even faster.

    For the Pine Island Glacier, the new study finds that while the cracking and fraying at the shear margin dates to 1999, it accelerated in 2016. Here’s a video based on images from the European Space Agency’s Sentinel satellite, showing the changes in the past four years:

    Even more concerning is the Thwaites Glacier. Here, again, the breakdown of the shear margin has increased in recent years:

    “This is important work,” Richard Alley, a glaciologist at Pennsylvania State University, said of the new study.

    Alley noted that the processes playing out in Antarctica appear to have already reached their completion in parts of Greenland, where one of the largest glaciers, Jakobshavn, no longer has any significant ice shelf at all. When it lost that shelf around the year 2000, Jakobshavn’s rate of ice loss steeply increased.

    The 79 North glacier still has a major ice shelf, as do some of Greenland’s other northernmost glaciers, but many of these have lost considerable size in recent decades.

    “The new paper shows that the Amundsen Sea Embayment ice shelves have gone through most, but not all, of the Jakobshavn steps,” Alley said in an email. “[A] warming ocean thinned the ice shelves, this reduced buttressing, this let the non-floating ice move faster, contributing some to sea-level rise and also starting to break the sides of the ice shelves, but additional acceleration could occur if the rest of the steps (further fracture and ice-shelf loss) should occur.”

    Multiple ice-shelf collapses have already been seen in Canada, Greenland and the warmer Antarctic Peninsula, where the onetime Larsen A and Larsen B ice shelves fractured and, today, no longer exist.

    “When the ice shelves are damaged by climate change, as we saw in the Antarctic Peninsula in the last several decades, their buttressing effect is reduced and the ice streams speed up and raise sea levels,” said Isabella Velicogna, a glaciologist at the University of California at Irvine, commenting on the new study. “The speed-up increases damage, a positive feedback which is not good news.”

    If a similar process plays out in the Amundsen Sea of West Antarctica, where Pine Island and Thwaites are, the sea-level consequences could be enormous.

    Lhermitte provided calculations showing that over the past six years, the western and central parts of the Pine Island ice shelf have shrunk by about 30 percent, from about 1,500 square miles down to closer to 1,000 square miles. In other words, an area about the size of Los Angeles has been lost.

    “This shear margin is so damaged we think it preconditions this ice shelf for destabilization on the longer term,” Lhermitte said. “These are the first signs we see that Pine Island ice shelf is disappearing. This damage is difficult to heal.”

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2020/09/14/glaciers-breaking-antarctica-pine-island-thwaites/

    09/15/1998 & 09/16/1998, Mansfield, MA; 08/29/00 08/30/00, Mansfield, MA; 07/02/03, 07/03/03, Mansfield, MA; 09/28/04, 09/29/04, Boston, MA; 09/22/05, Halifax, NS; 05/24/06, 05/25/06, Boston, MA; 07/22/06, 07/23/06, Gorge, WA; 06/27/2008, Hartford; 06/28/08, 06/30/08, Mansfield; 08/18/2009, O2, London, UK; 10/30/09, 10/31/09, Philadelphia, PA; 05/15/10, Hartford, CT; 05/17/10, Boston, MA; 05/20/10, 05/21/10, NY, NY; 06/22/10, Dublin, IRE; 06/23/10, Northern Ireland; 09/03/11, 09/04/11, Alpine Valley, WI; 09/11/11, 09/12/11, Toronto, Ont; 09/14/11, Ottawa, Ont; 09/15/11, Hamilton, Ont; 07/02/2012, Prague, Czech Republic; 07/04/2012 & 07/05/2012, Berlin, Germany; 07/07/2012, Stockholm, Sweden; 09/30/2012, Missoula, MT; 07/16/2013, London, Ont; 07/19/2013, Chicago, IL; 10/15/2013 & 10/16/2013, Worcester, MA; 10/21/2013 & 10/22/2013, Philadelphia, PA; 10/25/2013, Hartford, CT; 11/29/2013, Portland, OR; 11/30/2013, Spokane, WA; 12/04/2013, Vancouver, BC; 12/06/2013, Seattle, WA; 10/03/2014, St. Louis. MO; 10/22/2014, Denver, CO; 10/26/2015, New York, NY; 04/23/2016, New Orleans, LA; 04/28/2016 & 04/29/2016, Philadelphia, PA; 05/01/2016 & 05/02/2016, New York, NY; 05/08/2016, Ottawa, Ont.; 05/10/2016 & 05/12/2016, Toronto, Ont.; 08/05/2016 & 08/07/2016, Boston, MA; 08/20/2016 & 08/22/2016, Chicago, IL; 07/01/2018, Prague, Czech Republic; 07/03/2018, Krakow, Poland; 07/05/2018, Berlin, Germany; 09/02/2018 & 09/04/2018, Boston, MA; 09/08/2022, Toronto, Ont; 09/11/2022, New York, NY; 09/14/2022, Camden, NJ; 09/02/2023, St. Paul, MN; 05/04/2024 & 05/06/2024, Vancouver, BC; 05/10/2024, Portland, OR;

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  • brianluxbrianlux Moving through All Kinds of Terrain. Posts: 42,293
    Not to be a Debbie Downer but t
    Remember, 1/3 of repub voters, maybe more, think its all a hoax. Until they become engaged and care, our politicians, from both parties, cant/wont do shit. Because, freedumb.

    Two Antarctic glaciers that have long kept scientists awake at night are breaking free from the restraints that have hemmed them in, increasing the threat of large-scale sea-level rise.

    Located along the coast of the Amundsen Sea in West Antarctica, the enormous Pine Island and Thwaites glaciers already contribute around 5 percent of global sea-level rise. The survival of Thwaites has been deemed so critical that the United States and Britain have launched a targeted multimillion-dollar research mission to the glacier. The loss of the glacier could trigger the broader collapse of the West Antarctic ice sheet, which contains enough ice to eventually raise seas by about 10 feet.

    The new findings, published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, come from analysis of satellite images. They show that a naturally occurring buffer system that prevents the glaciers from flowing outward rapidly is breaking down, potentially unleashing far more ice into the sea in coming years.

    The glaciers’ “shear margins,” where their floating ice shelves encounter high levels of friction that constrain the natural flow of ice, are progressively weakening and in some cases breaking into pieces.

    “The stresses that slow down the glacier, they are no longer in place, so the glacier is speeding up,” said Stef Lhermitte, a satellite expert at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands who led the new research along with colleagues from NASA and other research institutions in France, Belgium, Austria and the Netherlands.

    While many of the images have been seen before, the new analysis suggests that they are a sign of further disintegration to come.

    “We already knew that these were glaciers that might matter in the future, but these images to me indicate that these ice shelves are in a very bad state,” Lhermitte said.

    It’s just the latest in a flurry of bad news about the planet’s ice.

    Arctic sea ice is very close to — but likely to not quite reach — a record low for this time of year. Last month, Canada lost a large portion of its last major Arctic ice shelf.

    And in Greenland, the largest still-intact ice shelf in the Northern Hemisphere, sometimes known as 79 North because of its latitude (its full name is Nioghalvfjerdsfjorden), just lost a large chunk of ice, equivalent in size to roughly two Manhattan islands, according to the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland. Experts there blamed the fracture on a strong general warming trend and temperatures that have been “incredibly” high in the northeast of Greenland in recent years.

    Ice shelves are vast floating platforms that extend across the surface of the ocean at the outer edge of marine-based glaciers. As they flow over the water, these shelves freeze onto mountainsides and islands and anchor themselves to bumps in the seafloor. In this way, the shelves provide a braking mechanism on the natural outward flow of ice.

    The buttressing effect occurs in the shear margins, where faster-flowing ice meets ice that is more static and stable, often because it is moored to some part of the landscape. In these places, the ice frequently crumples and contorts, a visible indication of the powerful stresses that it is under.

    But when those stresses become too much, ice breaks. That’s what’s now happening in West Antarctica, the new research argues, suggesting that warm ocean water has thinned the ice shelves out enough from below that they became brittle.

    At the same time, and for the same reason, the glaciers themselves began to flow outward faster. The resulting forces led the shear-margin ice to break into pieces — which means that the glacier, less constrained, will now be able to add ice to the ocean even faster.

    For the Pine Island Glacier, the new study finds that while the cracking and fraying at the shear margin dates to 1999, it accelerated in 2016. Here’s a video based on images from the European Space Agency’s Sentinel satellite, showing the changes in the past four years:

    Even more concerning is the Thwaites Glacier. Here, again, the breakdown of the shear margin has increased in recent years:

    “This is important work,” Richard Alley, a glaciologist at Pennsylvania State University, said of the new study.

    Alley noted that the processes playing out in Antarctica appear to have already reached their completion in parts of Greenland, where one of the largest glaciers, Jakobshavn, no longer has any significant ice shelf at all. When it lost that shelf around the year 2000, Jakobshavn’s rate of ice loss steeply increased.

    The 79 North glacier still has a major ice shelf, as do some of Greenland’s other northernmost glaciers, but many of these have lost considerable size in recent decades.

    “The new paper shows that the Amundsen Sea Embayment ice shelves have gone through most, but not all, of the Jakobshavn steps,” Alley said in an email. “[A] warming ocean thinned the ice shelves, this reduced buttressing, this let the non-floating ice move faster, contributing some to sea-level rise and also starting to break the sides of the ice shelves, but additional acceleration could occur if the rest of the steps (further fracture and ice-shelf loss) should occur.”

    Multiple ice-shelf collapses have already been seen in Canada, Greenland and the warmer Antarctic Peninsula, where the onetime Larsen A and Larsen B ice shelves fractured and, today, no longer exist.

    “When the ice shelves are damaged by climate change, as we saw in the Antarctic Peninsula in the last several decades, their buttressing effect is reduced and the ice streams speed up and raise sea levels,” said Isabella Velicogna, a glaciologist at the University of California at Irvine, commenting on the new study. “The speed-up increases damage, a positive feedback which is not good news.”

    If a similar process plays out in the Amundsen Sea of West Antarctica, where Pine Island and Thwaites are, the sea-level consequences could be enormous.

    Lhermitte provided calculations showing that over the past six years, the western and central parts of the Pine Island ice shelf have shrunk by about 30 percent, from about 1,500 square miles down to closer to 1,000 square miles. In other words, an area about the size of Los Angeles has been lost.

    “This shear margin is so damaged we think it preconditions this ice shelf for destabilization on the longer term,” Lhermitte said. “These are the first signs we see that Pine Island ice shelf is disappearing. This damage is difficult to heal.”

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2020/09/14/glaciers-breaking-antarctica-pine-island-thwaites/

    I don't see stating reality as being a Debbie Downer, H2M.  The biggest Debbie Downers are the climate change deniers. 

    "he American public, in general, could care two shits about this happening."  
    I would guess that if you took a survey, you would find the majority- a slim majority perhaps- of Americans (and First World people in general) actually are concerned about climate change and environmental issues. What you won't find is a majority willing to make the sacrifices necessary to make the needed changes.  Recycling cans and bottles is not enough.  We need to also be willing to consume fewer products, buy things that are durable, practice re-use more often, commute fewer miles in cars, live in smaller houses, use less heat and air conditioning, eat less red meat, travel and fly less often, support environmental groups like Sea Shepherds, Natural Resources Defense Committee, Wildlands Network- organizations that do less fund raising and take more action, reproduce in smaller numbers, and be a more active voice for defending wildlife and the planet.  The average First World person is weak in most of these actions.


    "Pretty cookies, heart squares all around, yeah!"
    -Eddie Vedder, "Smile"

    "Try to not spook the horse."
    -Neil Young













  • jeffbrjeffbr Seattle Posts: 7,177
    brianlux said:
    Not to be a Debbie Downer but t
    Remember, 1/3 of repub voters, maybe more, think its all a hoax. Until they become engaged and care, our politicians, from both parties, cant/wont do shit. Because, freedumb.

    Two Antarctic glaciers that have long kept scientists awake at night are breaking free from the restraints that have hemmed them in, increasing the threat of large-scale sea-level rise.

    Located along the coast of the Amundsen Sea in West Antarctica, the enormous Pine Island and Thwaites glaciers already contribute around 5 percent of global sea-level rise. The survival of Thwaites has been deemed so critical that the United States and Britain have launched a targeted multimillion-dollar research mission to the glacier. The loss of the glacier could trigger the broader collapse of the West Antarctic ice sheet, which contains enough ice to eventually raise seas by about 10 feet.

    The new findings, published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, come from analysis of satellite images. They show that a naturally occurring buffer system that prevents the glaciers from flowing outward rapidly is breaking down, potentially unleashing far more ice into the sea in coming years.

    The glaciers’ “shear margins,” where their floating ice shelves encounter high levels of friction that constrain the natural flow of ice, are progressively weakening and in some cases breaking into pieces.

    “The stresses that slow down the glacier, they are no longer in place, so the glacier is speeding up,” said Stef Lhermitte, a satellite expert at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands who led the new research along with colleagues from NASA and other research institutions in France, Belgium, Austria and the Netherlands.

    While many of the images have been seen before, the new analysis suggests that they are a sign of further disintegration to come.

    “We already knew that these were glaciers that might matter in the future, but these images to me indicate that these ice shelves are in a very bad state,” Lhermitte said.

    It’s just the latest in a flurry of bad news about the planet’s ice.

    Arctic sea ice is very close to — but likely to not quite reach — a record low for this time of year. Last month, Canada lost a large portion of its last major Arctic ice shelf.

    And in Greenland, the largest still-intact ice shelf in the Northern Hemisphere, sometimes known as 79 North because of its latitude (its full name is Nioghalvfjerdsfjorden), just lost a large chunk of ice, equivalent in size to roughly two Manhattan islands, according to the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland. Experts there blamed the fracture on a strong general warming trend and temperatures that have been “incredibly” high in the northeast of Greenland in recent years.

    Ice shelves are vast floating platforms that extend across the surface of the ocean at the outer edge of marine-based glaciers. As they flow over the water, these shelves freeze onto mountainsides and islands and anchor themselves to bumps in the seafloor. In this way, the shelves provide a braking mechanism on the natural outward flow of ice.

    The buttressing effect occurs in the shear margins, where faster-flowing ice meets ice that is more static and stable, often because it is moored to some part of the landscape. In these places, the ice frequently crumples and contorts, a visible indication of the powerful stresses that it is under.

    But when those stresses become too much, ice breaks. That’s what’s now happening in West Antarctica, the new research argues, suggesting that warm ocean water has thinned the ice shelves out enough from below that they became brittle.

    At the same time, and for the same reason, the glaciers themselves began to flow outward faster. The resulting forces led the shear-margin ice to break into pieces — which means that the glacier, less constrained, will now be able to add ice to the ocean even faster.

    For the Pine Island Glacier, the new study finds that while the cracking and fraying at the shear margin dates to 1999, it accelerated in 2016. Here’s a video based on images from the European Space Agency’s Sentinel satellite, showing the changes in the past four years:

    Even more concerning is the Thwaites Glacier. Here, again, the breakdown of the shear margin has increased in recent years:

    “This is important work,” Richard Alley, a glaciologist at Pennsylvania State University, said of the new study.

    Alley noted that the processes playing out in Antarctica appear to have already reached their completion in parts of Greenland, where one of the largest glaciers, Jakobshavn, no longer has any significant ice shelf at all. When it lost that shelf around the year 2000, Jakobshavn’s rate of ice loss steeply increased.

    The 79 North glacier still has a major ice shelf, as do some of Greenland’s other northernmost glaciers, but many of these have lost considerable size in recent decades.

    “The new paper shows that the Amundsen Sea Embayment ice shelves have gone through most, but not all, of the Jakobshavn steps,” Alley said in an email. “[A] warming ocean thinned the ice shelves, this reduced buttressing, this let the non-floating ice move faster, contributing some to sea-level rise and also starting to break the sides of the ice shelves, but additional acceleration could occur if the rest of the steps (further fracture and ice-shelf loss) should occur.”

    Multiple ice-shelf collapses have already been seen in Canada, Greenland and the warmer Antarctic Peninsula, where the onetime Larsen A and Larsen B ice shelves fractured and, today, no longer exist.

    “When the ice shelves are damaged by climate change, as we saw in the Antarctic Peninsula in the last several decades, their buttressing effect is reduced and the ice streams speed up and raise sea levels,” said Isabella Velicogna, a glaciologist at the University of California at Irvine, commenting on the new study. “The speed-up increases damage, a positive feedback which is not good news.”

    If a similar process plays out in the Amundsen Sea of West Antarctica, where Pine Island and Thwaites are, the sea-level consequences could be enormous.

    Lhermitte provided calculations showing that over the past six years, the western and central parts of the Pine Island ice shelf have shrunk by about 30 percent, from about 1,500 square miles down to closer to 1,000 square miles. In other words, an area about the size of Los Angeles has been lost.

    “This shear margin is so damaged we think it preconditions this ice shelf for destabilization on the longer term,” Lhermitte said. “These are the first signs we see that Pine Island ice shelf is disappearing. This damage is difficult to heal.”

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2020/09/14/glaciers-breaking-antarctica-pine-island-thwaites/

    I don't see stating reality as being a Debbie Downer, H2M.  The biggest Debbie Downers are the climate change deniers. 

    "he American public, in general, could care two shits about this happening."  
    I would guess that if you took a survey, you would find the majority- a slim majority perhaps- of Americans (and First World people in general) actually are concerned about climate change and environmental issues. What you won't find is a majority willing to make the sacrifices necessary to make the needed changes.  Recycling cans and bottles is not enough.  We need to also be willing to consume fewer products, buy things that are durable, practice re-use more often, commute fewer miles in cars, live in smaller houses, use less heat and air conditioning, eat less red meat, travel and fly less often, support environmental groups like Sea Shepherds, Natural Resources Defense Committee, Wildlands Network- organizations that do less fund raising and take more action, reproduce in smaller numbers, and be a more active voice for defending wildlife and the planet.  The average First World person is weak in most of these actions.


    Yeah, I'm reading a book right now about an expedition in 2013 to traverse the Northwest Passage in a 4 person row boat. The author stopped in an arctic village and an elder was talking to him about how things have changed for him in the last 50 years, and talked about warming. The author wondered if climate deniers would claim that the elder had an agenda and then rhetorically wondered what agenda the climate deniers have. This elder obviously had no agenda, because he has little contact with the the modern world, and was merely observing how his isolated life had changed. He didn't need science, news or an agenda to inform him - he was living it. The science confirms it though, and made the expedition possible. This expedition wouldn't have even been attempted years ago due to ice.
    "I'll use the magic word - let's just shut the fuck up, please." EV, 04/13/08
  • brianluxbrianlux Moving through All Kinds of Terrain. Posts: 42,293
    jeffbr said:
    brianlux said:
    Not to be a Debbie Downer but t
    Remember, 1/3 of repub voters, maybe more, think its all a hoax. Until they become engaged and care, our politicians, from both parties, cant/wont do shit. Because, freedumb.

    Two Antarctic glaciers that have long kept scientists awake at night are breaking free from the restraints that have hemmed them in, increasing the threat of large-scale sea-level rise.

    Located along the coast of the Amundsen Sea in West Antarctica, the enormous Pine Island and Thwaites glaciers already contribute around 5 percent of global sea-level rise. The survival of Thwaites has been deemed so critical that the United States and Britain have launched a targeted multimillion-dollar research mission to the glacier. The loss of the glacier could trigger the broader collapse of the West Antarctic ice sheet, which contains enough ice to eventually raise seas by about 10 feet.

    The new findings, published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, come from analysis of satellite images. They show that a naturally occurring buffer system that prevents the glaciers from flowing outward rapidly is breaking down, potentially unleashing far more ice into the sea in coming years.

    The glaciers’ “shear margins,” where their floating ice shelves encounter high levels of friction that constrain the natural flow of ice, are progressively weakening and in some cases breaking into pieces.

    “The stresses that slow down the glacier, they are no longer in place, so the glacier is speeding up,” said Stef Lhermitte, a satellite expert at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands who led the new research along with colleagues from NASA and other research institutions in France, Belgium, Austria and the Netherlands.

    While many of the images have been seen before, the new analysis suggests that they are a sign of further disintegration to come.

    “We already knew that these were glaciers that might matter in the future, but these images to me indicate that these ice shelves are in a very bad state,” Lhermitte said.

    It’s just the latest in a flurry of bad news about the planet’s ice.

    Arctic sea ice is very close to — but likely to not quite reach — a record low for this time of year. Last month, Canada lost a large portion of its last major Arctic ice shelf.

    And in Greenland, the largest still-intact ice shelf in the Northern Hemisphere, sometimes known as 79 North because of its latitude (its full name is Nioghalvfjerdsfjorden), just lost a large chunk of ice, equivalent in size to roughly two Manhattan islands, according to the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland. Experts there blamed the fracture on a strong general warming trend and temperatures that have been “incredibly” high in the northeast of Greenland in recent years.

    Ice shelves are vast floating platforms that extend across the surface of the ocean at the outer edge of marine-based glaciers. As they flow over the water, these shelves freeze onto mountainsides and islands and anchor themselves to bumps in the seafloor. In this way, the shelves provide a braking mechanism on the natural outward flow of ice.

    The buttressing effect occurs in the shear margins, where faster-flowing ice meets ice that is more static and stable, often because it is moored to some part of the landscape. In these places, the ice frequently crumples and contorts, a visible indication of the powerful stresses that it is under.

    But when those stresses become too much, ice breaks. That’s what’s now happening in West Antarctica, the new research argues, suggesting that warm ocean water has thinned the ice shelves out enough from below that they became brittle.

    At the same time, and for the same reason, the glaciers themselves began to flow outward faster. The resulting forces led the shear-margin ice to break into pieces — which means that the glacier, less constrained, will now be able to add ice to the ocean even faster.

    For the Pine Island Glacier, the new study finds that while the cracking and fraying at the shear margin dates to 1999, it accelerated in 2016. Here’s a video based on images from the European Space Agency’s Sentinel satellite, showing the changes in the past four years:

    Even more concerning is the Thwaites Glacier. Here, again, the breakdown of the shear margin has increased in recent years:

    “This is important work,” Richard Alley, a glaciologist at Pennsylvania State University, said of the new study.

    Alley noted that the processes playing out in Antarctica appear to have already reached their completion in parts of Greenland, where one of the largest glaciers, Jakobshavn, no longer has any significant ice shelf at all. When it lost that shelf around the year 2000, Jakobshavn’s rate of ice loss steeply increased.

    The 79 North glacier still has a major ice shelf, as do some of Greenland’s other northernmost glaciers, but many of these have lost considerable size in recent decades.

    “The new paper shows that the Amundsen Sea Embayment ice shelves have gone through most, but not all, of the Jakobshavn steps,” Alley said in an email. “[A] warming ocean thinned the ice shelves, this reduced buttressing, this let the non-floating ice move faster, contributing some to sea-level rise and also starting to break the sides of the ice shelves, but additional acceleration could occur if the rest of the steps (further fracture and ice-shelf loss) should occur.”

    Multiple ice-shelf collapses have already been seen in Canada, Greenland and the warmer Antarctic Peninsula, where the onetime Larsen A and Larsen B ice shelves fractured and, today, no longer exist.

    “When the ice shelves are damaged by climate change, as we saw in the Antarctic Peninsula in the last several decades, their buttressing effect is reduced and the ice streams speed up and raise sea levels,” said Isabella Velicogna, a glaciologist at the University of California at Irvine, commenting on the new study. “The speed-up increases damage, a positive feedback which is not good news.”

    If a similar process plays out in the Amundsen Sea of West Antarctica, where Pine Island and Thwaites are, the sea-level consequences could be enormous.

    Lhermitte provided calculations showing that over the past six years, the western and central parts of the Pine Island ice shelf have shrunk by about 30 percent, from about 1,500 square miles down to closer to 1,000 square miles. In other words, an area about the size of Los Angeles has been lost.

    “This shear margin is so damaged we think it preconditions this ice shelf for destabilization on the longer term,” Lhermitte said. “These are the first signs we see that Pine Island ice shelf is disappearing. This damage is difficult to heal.”

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2020/09/14/glaciers-breaking-antarctica-pine-island-thwaites/

    I don't see stating reality as being a Debbie Downer, H2M.  The biggest Debbie Downers are the climate change deniers. 

    "he American public, in general, could care two shits about this happening."  
    I would guess that if you took a survey, you would find the majority- a slim majority perhaps- of Americans (and First World people in general) actually are concerned about climate change and environmental issues. What you won't find is a majority willing to make the sacrifices necessary to make the needed changes.  Recycling cans and bottles is not enough.  We need to also be willing to consume fewer products, buy things that are durable, practice re-use more often, commute fewer miles in cars, live in smaller houses, use less heat and air conditioning, eat less red meat, travel and fly less often, support environmental groups like Sea Shepherds, Natural Resources Defense Committee, Wildlands Network- organizations that do less fund raising and take more action, reproduce in smaller numbers, and be a more active voice for defending wildlife and the planet.  The average First World person is weak in most of these actions.


    Yeah, I'm reading a book right now about an expedition in 2013 to traverse the Northwest Passage in a 4 person row boat. The author stopped in an arctic village and an elder was talking to him about how things have changed for him in the last 50 years, and talked about warming. The author wondered if climate deniers would claim that the elder had an agenda and then rhetorically wondered what agenda the climate deniers have. This elder obviously had no agenda, because he has little contact with the the modern world, and was merely observing how his isolated life had changed. He didn't need science, news or an agenda to inform him - he was living it. The science confirms it though, and made the expedition possible. This expedition wouldn't have even been attempted years ago due to ice.

    Sounds like a good book, Jeff. I might want to read it.  Is it this one?
    34304376 sy475

    "Pretty cookies, heart squares all around, yeah!"
    -Eddie Vedder, "Smile"

    "Try to not spook the horse."
    -Neil Young













  • This is why we cant have nice things:

    And boy did they play the part on Tuesday. In a moment that started out with a bit of journalistic meaning, Kilmeade asked Trump how to react to climate change without trashing the economy. Trump said this:

    TRUMP: Well look, Brian, you have forests all over the world. You don’t have fires like you do in California, you know. In Europe, they have forest cities. You look at — you look at countries — Austria. You look at so many countries, they live in the forest. They’re considered forest cities — so many of them. And they don’t have fires like this and they have more explosive trees. They have trees that will catch easier. But they maintain their fire. They have an expression, they thin the fuel. The fuel is what’s on the ground — the leaves.
    DOOCY: Right.
    TRUMP: The trees that fall, they’re dry. They’re like — they’re like a matchstick, you know, after 18 months. If they’re on the ground longer than 18 months, they’re very explosive. And they have to get rid of that stuff and they have to manage their — they have to manage their fires.

    The “Fox & Friends” crew didn’t ask Trump to cite a few examples of these “forest cities.” Twitter, of course, filled in the gaps.


    https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/09/15/how-desperate-is-trump-he-wants-do-weekly-fox-friends-stints/

    09/15/1998 & 09/16/1998, Mansfield, MA; 08/29/00 08/30/00, Mansfield, MA; 07/02/03, 07/03/03, Mansfield, MA; 09/28/04, 09/29/04, Boston, MA; 09/22/05, Halifax, NS; 05/24/06, 05/25/06, Boston, MA; 07/22/06, 07/23/06, Gorge, WA; 06/27/2008, Hartford; 06/28/08, 06/30/08, Mansfield; 08/18/2009, O2, London, UK; 10/30/09, 10/31/09, Philadelphia, PA; 05/15/10, Hartford, CT; 05/17/10, Boston, MA; 05/20/10, 05/21/10, NY, NY; 06/22/10, Dublin, IRE; 06/23/10, Northern Ireland; 09/03/11, 09/04/11, Alpine Valley, WI; 09/11/11, 09/12/11, Toronto, Ont; 09/14/11, Ottawa, Ont; 09/15/11, Hamilton, Ont; 07/02/2012, Prague, Czech Republic; 07/04/2012 & 07/05/2012, Berlin, Germany; 07/07/2012, Stockholm, Sweden; 09/30/2012, Missoula, MT; 07/16/2013, London, Ont; 07/19/2013, Chicago, IL; 10/15/2013 & 10/16/2013, Worcester, MA; 10/21/2013 & 10/22/2013, Philadelphia, PA; 10/25/2013, Hartford, CT; 11/29/2013, Portland, OR; 11/30/2013, Spokane, WA; 12/04/2013, Vancouver, BC; 12/06/2013, Seattle, WA; 10/03/2014, St. Louis. MO; 10/22/2014, Denver, CO; 10/26/2015, New York, NY; 04/23/2016, New Orleans, LA; 04/28/2016 & 04/29/2016, Philadelphia, PA; 05/01/2016 & 05/02/2016, New York, NY; 05/08/2016, Ottawa, Ont.; 05/10/2016 & 05/12/2016, Toronto, Ont.; 08/05/2016 & 08/07/2016, Boston, MA; 08/20/2016 & 08/22/2016, Chicago, IL; 07/01/2018, Prague, Czech Republic; 07/03/2018, Krakow, Poland; 07/05/2018, Berlin, Germany; 09/02/2018 & 09/04/2018, Boston, MA; 09/08/2022, Toronto, Ont; 09/11/2022, New York, NY; 09/14/2022, Camden, NJ; 09/02/2023, St. Paul, MN; 05/04/2024 & 05/06/2024, Vancouver, BC; 05/10/2024, Portland, OR;

    Libtardaplorable©. And proud of it.

    Brilliantati©
  • brianluxbrianlux Moving through All Kinds of Terrain. Posts: 42,293
    This is why we cant have nice things:

    And boy did they play the part on Tuesday. In a moment that started out with a bit of journalistic meaning, Kilmeade asked Trump how to react to climate change without trashing the economy. Trump said this:

    TRUMP: Well look, Brian, you have forests all over the world. You don’t have fires like you do in California, you know. In Europe, they have forest cities. You look at — you look at countries — Austria. You look at so many countries, they live in the forest. They’re considered forest cities — so many of them. And they don’t have fires like this and they have more explosive trees. They have trees that will catch easier. But they maintain their fire. They have an expression, they thin the fuel. The fuel is what’s on the ground — the leaves.
    DOOCY: Right.
    TRUMP: The trees that fall, they’re dry. They’re like — they’re like a matchstick, you know, after 18 months. If they’re on the ground longer than 18 months, they’re very explosive. And they have to get rid of that stuff and they have to manage their — they have to manage their fires.

    The “Fox & Friends” crew didn’t ask Trump to cite a few examples of these “forest cities.” Twitter, of course, filled in the gaps.


    https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/09/15/how-desperate-is-trump-he-wants-do-weekly-fox-friends-stints/


    The crux of the joke here is "The fuel is what’s on the ground — the leaves."

    Tree leaves:
    Tree Leaves Name Images Stock Photos  Vectors  Shutterstock
    Evergreen needles:

    Types Of Pine Trees Needles  7300 30 plastic long needle pine branch 6  tips 2 pine cones 8 width   Types of pine trees Pine tree tattoo Tree  identification

    Most of what is burning in the west:
    Coniferous Trees bandana hankie  Types of evergreen trees Conifer trees  Types of pine trees




    "Pretty cookies, heart squares all around, yeah!"
    -Eddie Vedder, "Smile"

    "Try to not spook the horse."
    -Neil Young













  • brianlux said:
    This is why we cant have nice things:

    And boy did they play the part on Tuesday. In a moment that started out with a bit of journalistic meaning, Kilmeade asked Trump how to react to climate change without trashing the economy. Trump said this:

    TRUMP: Well look, Brian, you have forests all over the world. You don’t have fires like you do in California, you know. In Europe, they have forest cities. You look at — you look at countries — Austria. You look at so many countries, they live in the forest. They’re considered forest cities — so many of them. And they don’t have fires like this and they have more explosive trees. They have trees that will catch easier. But they maintain their fire. They have an expression, they thin the fuel. The fuel is what’s on the ground — the leaves.
    DOOCY: Right.
    TRUMP: The trees that fall, they’re dry. They’re like — they’re like a matchstick, you know, after 18 months. If they’re on the ground longer than 18 months, they’re very explosive. And they have to get rid of that stuff and they have to manage their — they have to manage their fires.

    The “Fox & Friends” crew didn’t ask Trump to cite a few examples of these “forest cities.” Twitter, of course, filled in the gaps.


    https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/09/15/how-desperate-is-trump-he-wants-do-weekly-fox-friends-stints/


    The crux of the joke here is "The fuel is what’s on the ground — the leaves."

    Tree leaves:
    Tree Leaves Name Images Stock Photos  Vectors  Shutterstock
    Evergreen needles:

    Types Of Pine Trees Needles  7300 30 plastic long needle pine branch 6  tips 2 pine cones 8 width   Types of pine trees Pine tree tattoo Tree  identification

    Most of what is burning in the west:
    Coniferous Trees bandana hankie  Types of evergreen trees Conifer trees  Types of pine trees




    Forest cities? Is that where the elves lived outside the Shire?
    09/15/1998 & 09/16/1998, Mansfield, MA; 08/29/00 08/30/00, Mansfield, MA; 07/02/03, 07/03/03, Mansfield, MA; 09/28/04, 09/29/04, Boston, MA; 09/22/05, Halifax, NS; 05/24/06, 05/25/06, Boston, MA; 07/22/06, 07/23/06, Gorge, WA; 06/27/2008, Hartford; 06/28/08, 06/30/08, Mansfield; 08/18/2009, O2, London, UK; 10/30/09, 10/31/09, Philadelphia, PA; 05/15/10, Hartford, CT; 05/17/10, Boston, MA; 05/20/10, 05/21/10, NY, NY; 06/22/10, Dublin, IRE; 06/23/10, Northern Ireland; 09/03/11, 09/04/11, Alpine Valley, WI; 09/11/11, 09/12/11, Toronto, Ont; 09/14/11, Ottawa, Ont; 09/15/11, Hamilton, Ont; 07/02/2012, Prague, Czech Republic; 07/04/2012 & 07/05/2012, Berlin, Germany; 07/07/2012, Stockholm, Sweden; 09/30/2012, Missoula, MT; 07/16/2013, London, Ont; 07/19/2013, Chicago, IL; 10/15/2013 & 10/16/2013, Worcester, MA; 10/21/2013 & 10/22/2013, Philadelphia, PA; 10/25/2013, Hartford, CT; 11/29/2013, Portland, OR; 11/30/2013, Spokane, WA; 12/04/2013, Vancouver, BC; 12/06/2013, Seattle, WA; 10/03/2014, St. Louis. MO; 10/22/2014, Denver, CO; 10/26/2015, New York, NY; 04/23/2016, New Orleans, LA; 04/28/2016 & 04/29/2016, Philadelphia, PA; 05/01/2016 & 05/02/2016, New York, NY; 05/08/2016, Ottawa, Ont.; 05/10/2016 & 05/12/2016, Toronto, Ont.; 08/05/2016 & 08/07/2016, Boston, MA; 08/20/2016 & 08/22/2016, Chicago, IL; 07/01/2018, Prague, Czech Republic; 07/03/2018, Krakow, Poland; 07/05/2018, Berlin, Germany; 09/02/2018 & 09/04/2018, Boston, MA; 09/08/2022, Toronto, Ont; 09/11/2022, New York, NY; 09/14/2022, Camden, NJ; 09/02/2023, St. Paul, MN; 05/04/2024 & 05/06/2024, Vancouver, BC; 05/10/2024, Portland, OR;

    Libtardaplorable©. And proud of it.

    Brilliantati©
  • brianluxbrianlux Moving through All Kinds of Terrain. Posts: 42,293
    brianlux said:
    This is why we cant have nice things:

    And boy did they play the part on Tuesday. In a moment that started out with a bit of journalistic meaning, Kilmeade asked Trump how to react to climate change without trashing the economy. Trump said this:

    TRUMP: Well look, Brian, you have forests all over the world. You don’t have fires like you do in California, you know. In Europe, they have forest cities. You look at — you look at countries — Austria. You look at so many countries, they live in the forest. They’re considered forest cities — so many of them. And they don’t have fires like this and they have more explosive trees. They have trees that will catch easier. But they maintain their fire. They have an expression, they thin the fuel. The fuel is what’s on the ground — the leaves.
    DOOCY: Right.
    TRUMP: The trees that fall, they’re dry. They’re like — they’re like a matchstick, you know, after 18 months. If they’re on the ground longer than 18 months, they’re very explosive. And they have to get rid of that stuff and they have to manage their — they have to manage their fires.

    The “Fox & Friends” crew didn’t ask Trump to cite a few examples of these “forest cities.” Twitter, of course, filled in the gaps.


    https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/09/15/how-desperate-is-trump-he-wants-do-weekly-fox-friends-stints/


    The crux of the joke here is "The fuel is what’s on the ground — the leaves."

    Tree leaves:
    Tree Leaves Name Images Stock Photos  Vectors  Shutterstock
    Evergreen needles:

    Types Of Pine Trees Needles  7300 30 plastic long needle pine branch 6  tips 2 pine cones 8 width   Types of pine trees Pine tree tattoo Tree  identification

    Most of what is burning in the west:
    Coniferous Trees bandana hankie  Types of evergreen trees Conifer trees  Types of pine trees




    Forest cities? Is that where the elves lived outside the Shire?

    Bingo!  :lol:
    "Pretty cookies, heart squares all around, yeah!"
    -Eddie Vedder, "Smile"

    "Try to not spook the horse."
    -Neil Young













  • HughFreakingDillonHughFreakingDillon Winnipeg Posts: 37,350
    jeffbr said:
    brianlux said:
    Not to be a Debbie Downer but t
    Remember, 1/3 of repub voters, maybe more, think its all a hoax. Until they become engaged and care, our politicians, from both parties, cant/wont do shit. Because, freedumb.

    Two Antarctic glaciers that have long kept scientists awake at night are breaking free from the restraints that have hemmed them in, increasing the threat of large-scale sea-level rise.

    Located along the coast of the Amundsen Sea in West Antarctica, the enormous Pine Island and Thwaites glaciers already contribute around 5 percent of global sea-level rise. The survival of Thwaites has been deemed so critical that the United States and Britain have launched a targeted multimillion-dollar research mission to the glacier. The loss of the glacier could trigger the broader collapse of the West Antarctic ice sheet, which contains enough ice to eventually raise seas by about 10 feet.

    The new findings, published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, come from analysis of satellite images. They show that a naturally occurring buffer system that prevents the glaciers from flowing outward rapidly is breaking down, potentially unleashing far more ice into the sea in coming years.

    The glaciers’ “shear margins,” where their floating ice shelves encounter high levels of friction that constrain the natural flow of ice, are progressively weakening and in some cases breaking into pieces.

    “The stresses that slow down the glacier, they are no longer in place, so the glacier is speeding up,” said Stef Lhermitte, a satellite expert at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands who led the new research along with colleagues from NASA and other research institutions in France, Belgium, Austria and the Netherlands.

    While many of the images have been seen before, the new analysis suggests that they are a sign of further disintegration to come.

    “We already knew that these were glaciers that might matter in the future, but these images to me indicate that these ice shelves are in a very bad state,” Lhermitte said.

    It’s just the latest in a flurry of bad news about the planet’s ice.

    Arctic sea ice is very close to — but likely to not quite reach — a record low for this time of year. Last month, Canada lost a large portion of its last major Arctic ice shelf.

    And in Greenland, the largest still-intact ice shelf in the Northern Hemisphere, sometimes known as 79 North because of its latitude (its full name is Nioghalvfjerdsfjorden), just lost a large chunk of ice, equivalent in size to roughly two Manhattan islands, according to the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland. Experts there blamed the fracture on a strong general warming trend and temperatures that have been “incredibly” high in the northeast of Greenland in recent years.

    Ice shelves are vast floating platforms that extend across the surface of the ocean at the outer edge of marine-based glaciers. As they flow over the water, these shelves freeze onto mountainsides and islands and anchor themselves to bumps in the seafloor. In this way, the shelves provide a braking mechanism on the natural outward flow of ice.

    The buttressing effect occurs in the shear margins, where faster-flowing ice meets ice that is more static and stable, often because it is moored to some part of the landscape. In these places, the ice frequently crumples and contorts, a visible indication of the powerful stresses that it is under.

    But when those stresses become too much, ice breaks. That’s what’s now happening in West Antarctica, the new research argues, suggesting that warm ocean water has thinned the ice shelves out enough from below that they became brittle.

    At the same time, and for the same reason, the glaciers themselves began to flow outward faster. The resulting forces led the shear-margin ice to break into pieces — which means that the glacier, less constrained, will now be able to add ice to the ocean even faster.

    For the Pine Island Glacier, the new study finds that while the cracking and fraying at the shear margin dates to 1999, it accelerated in 2016. Here’s a video based on images from the European Space Agency’s Sentinel satellite, showing the changes in the past four years:

    Even more concerning is the Thwaites Glacier. Here, again, the breakdown of the shear margin has increased in recent years:

    “This is important work,” Richard Alley, a glaciologist at Pennsylvania State University, said of the new study.

    Alley noted that the processes playing out in Antarctica appear to have already reached their completion in parts of Greenland, where one of the largest glaciers, Jakobshavn, no longer has any significant ice shelf at all. When it lost that shelf around the year 2000, Jakobshavn’s rate of ice loss steeply increased.

    The 79 North glacier still has a major ice shelf, as do some of Greenland’s other northernmost glaciers, but many of these have lost considerable size in recent decades.

    “The new paper shows that the Amundsen Sea Embayment ice shelves have gone through most, but not all, of the Jakobshavn steps,” Alley said in an email. “[A] warming ocean thinned the ice shelves, this reduced buttressing, this let the non-floating ice move faster, contributing some to sea-level rise and also starting to break the sides of the ice shelves, but additional acceleration could occur if the rest of the steps (further fracture and ice-shelf loss) should occur.”

    Multiple ice-shelf collapses have already been seen in Canada, Greenland and the warmer Antarctic Peninsula, where the onetime Larsen A and Larsen B ice shelves fractured and, today, no longer exist.

    “When the ice shelves are damaged by climate change, as we saw in the Antarctic Peninsula in the last several decades, their buttressing effect is reduced and the ice streams speed up and raise sea levels,” said Isabella Velicogna, a glaciologist at the University of California at Irvine, commenting on the new study. “The speed-up increases damage, a positive feedback which is not good news.”

    If a similar process plays out in the Amundsen Sea of West Antarctica, where Pine Island and Thwaites are, the sea-level consequences could be enormous.

    Lhermitte provided calculations showing that over the past six years, the western and central parts of the Pine Island ice shelf have shrunk by about 30 percent, from about 1,500 square miles down to closer to 1,000 square miles. In other words, an area about the size of Los Angeles has been lost.

    “This shear margin is so damaged we think it preconditions this ice shelf for destabilization on the longer term,” Lhermitte said. “These are the first signs we see that Pine Island ice shelf is disappearing. This damage is difficult to heal.”

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2020/09/14/glaciers-breaking-antarctica-pine-island-thwaites/

    I don't see stating reality as being a Debbie Downer, H2M.  The biggest Debbie Downers are the climate change deniers. 

    "he American public, in general, could care two shits about this happening."  
    I would guess that if you took a survey, you would find the majority- a slim majority perhaps- of Americans (and First World people in general) actually are concerned about climate change and environmental issues. What you won't find is a majority willing to make the sacrifices necessary to make the needed changes.  Recycling cans and bottles is not enough.  We need to also be willing to consume fewer products, buy things that are durable, practice re-use more often, commute fewer miles in cars, live in smaller houses, use less heat and air conditioning, eat less red meat, travel and fly less often, support environmental groups like Sea Shepherds, Natural Resources Defense Committee, Wildlands Network- organizations that do less fund raising and take more action, reproduce in smaller numbers, and be a more active voice for defending wildlife and the planet.  The average First World person is weak in most of these actions.


    Yeah, I'm reading a book right now about an expedition in 2013 to traverse the Northwest Passage in a 4 person row boat. The author stopped in an arctic village and an elder was talking to him about how things have changed for him in the last 50 years, and talked about warming. The author wondered if climate deniers would claim that the elder had an agenda and then rhetorically wondered what agenda the climate deniers have. This elder obviously had no agenda, because he has little contact with the the modern world, and was merely observing how his isolated life had changed. He didn't need science, news or an agenda to inform him - he was living it. The science confirms it though, and made the expedition possible. This expedition wouldn't have even been attempted years ago due to ice.
    the problem though, with climate change deniers, is two fold; you tell them the planet's climate is changing in dramatic fashion, they say "no it's not". you show them data, they shift to "climate is cyclical; there's no way to prove it won't revert back like it always does". 

    there is no convincing them. 
    "Oh Canada...you're beautiful when you're drunk"
    -EV  8/14/93




  • jeffbrjeffbr Seattle Posts: 7,177
    jeffbr said:
    brianlux said:
    Not to be a Debbie Downer but t
    Remember, 1/3 of repub voters, maybe more, think its all a hoax. Until they become engaged and care, our politicians, from both parties, cant/wont do shit. Because, freedumb.

    Two Antarctic glaciers that have long kept scientists awake at night are breaking free from the restraints that have hemmed them in, increasing the threat of large-scale sea-level rise.

    Located along the coast of the Amundsen Sea in West Antarctica, the enormous Pine Island and Thwaites glaciers already contribute around 5 percent of global sea-level rise. The survival of Thwaites has been deemed so critical that the United States and Britain have launched a targeted multimillion-dollar research mission to the glacier. The loss of the glacier could trigger the broader collapse of the West Antarctic ice sheet, which contains enough ice to eventually raise seas by about 10 feet.

    The new findings, published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, come from analysis of satellite images. They show that a naturally occurring buffer system that prevents the glaciers from flowing outward rapidly is breaking down, potentially unleashing far more ice into the sea in coming years.

    The glaciers’ “shear margins,” where their floating ice shelves encounter high levels of friction that constrain the natural flow of ice, are progressively weakening and in some cases breaking into pieces.

    “The stresses that slow down the glacier, they are no longer in place, so the glacier is speeding up,” said Stef Lhermitte, a satellite expert at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands who led the new research along with colleagues from NASA and other research institutions in France, Belgium, Austria and the Netherlands.

    While many of the images have been seen before, the new analysis suggests that they are a sign of further disintegration to come.

    “We already knew that these were glaciers that might matter in the future, but these images to me indicate that these ice shelves are in a very bad state,” Lhermitte said.

    It’s just the latest in a flurry of bad news about the planet’s ice.

    Arctic sea ice is very close to — but likely to not quite reach — a record low for this time of year. Last month, Canada lost a large portion of its last major Arctic ice shelf.

    And in Greenland, the largest still-intact ice shelf in the Northern Hemisphere, sometimes known as 79 North because of its latitude (its full name is Nioghalvfjerdsfjorden), just lost a large chunk of ice, equivalent in size to roughly two Manhattan islands, according to the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland. Experts there blamed the fracture on a strong general warming trend and temperatures that have been “incredibly” high in the northeast of Greenland in recent years.

    Ice shelves are vast floating platforms that extend across the surface of the ocean at the outer edge of marine-based glaciers. As they flow over the water, these shelves freeze onto mountainsides and islands and anchor themselves to bumps in the seafloor. In this way, the shelves provide a braking mechanism on the natural outward flow of ice.

    The buttressing effect occurs in the shear margins, where faster-flowing ice meets ice that is more static and stable, often because it is moored to some part of the landscape. In these places, the ice frequently crumples and contorts, a visible indication of the powerful stresses that it is under.

    But when those stresses become too much, ice breaks. That’s what’s now happening in West Antarctica, the new research argues, suggesting that warm ocean water has thinned the ice shelves out enough from below that they became brittle.

    At the same time, and for the same reason, the glaciers themselves began to flow outward faster. The resulting forces led the shear-margin ice to break into pieces — which means that the glacier, less constrained, will now be able to add ice to the ocean even faster.

    For the Pine Island Glacier, the new study finds that while the cracking and fraying at the shear margin dates to 1999, it accelerated in 2016. Here’s a video based on images from the European Space Agency’s Sentinel satellite, showing the changes in the past four years:

    Even more concerning is the Thwaites Glacier. Here, again, the breakdown of the shear margin has increased in recent years:

    “This is important work,” Richard Alley, a glaciologist at Pennsylvania State University, said of the new study.

    Alley noted that the processes playing out in Antarctica appear to have already reached their completion in parts of Greenland, where one of the largest glaciers, Jakobshavn, no longer has any significant ice shelf at all. When it lost that shelf around the year 2000, Jakobshavn’s rate of ice loss steeply increased.

    The 79 North glacier still has a major ice shelf, as do some of Greenland’s other northernmost glaciers, but many of these have lost considerable size in recent decades.

    “The new paper shows that the Amundsen Sea Embayment ice shelves have gone through most, but not all, of the Jakobshavn steps,” Alley said in an email. “[A] warming ocean thinned the ice shelves, this reduced buttressing, this let the non-floating ice move faster, contributing some to sea-level rise and also starting to break the sides of the ice shelves, but additional acceleration could occur if the rest of the steps (further fracture and ice-shelf loss) should occur.”

    Multiple ice-shelf collapses have already been seen in Canada, Greenland and the warmer Antarctic Peninsula, where the onetime Larsen A and Larsen B ice shelves fractured and, today, no longer exist.

    “When the ice shelves are damaged by climate change, as we saw in the Antarctic Peninsula in the last several decades, their buttressing effect is reduced and the ice streams speed up and raise sea levels,” said Isabella Velicogna, a glaciologist at the University of California at Irvine, commenting on the new study. “The speed-up increases damage, a positive feedback which is not good news.”

    If a similar process plays out in the Amundsen Sea of West Antarctica, where Pine Island and Thwaites are, the sea-level consequences could be enormous.

    Lhermitte provided calculations showing that over the past six years, the western and central parts of the Pine Island ice shelf have shrunk by about 30 percent, from about 1,500 square miles down to closer to 1,000 square miles. In other words, an area about the size of Los Angeles has been lost.

    “This shear margin is so damaged we think it preconditions this ice shelf for destabilization on the longer term,” Lhermitte said. “These are the first signs we see that Pine Island ice shelf is disappearing. This damage is difficult to heal.”

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2020/09/14/glaciers-breaking-antarctica-pine-island-thwaites/

    I don't see stating reality as being a Debbie Downer, H2M.  The biggest Debbie Downers are the climate change deniers. 

    "he American public, in general, could care two shits about this happening."  
    I would guess that if you took a survey, you would find the majority- a slim majority perhaps- of Americans (and First World people in general) actually are concerned about climate change and environmental issues. What you won't find is a majority willing to make the sacrifices necessary to make the needed changes.  Recycling cans and bottles is not enough.  We need to also be willing to consume fewer products, buy things that are durable, practice re-use more often, commute fewer miles in cars, live in smaller houses, use less heat and air conditioning, eat less red meat, travel and fly less often, support environmental groups like Sea Shepherds, Natural Resources Defense Committee, Wildlands Network- organizations that do less fund raising and take more action, reproduce in smaller numbers, and be a more active voice for defending wildlife and the planet.  The average First World person is weak in most of these actions.


    Yeah, I'm reading a book right now about an expedition in 2013 to traverse the Northwest Passage in a 4 person row boat. The author stopped in an arctic village and an elder was talking to him about how things have changed for him in the last 50 years, and talked about warming. The author wondered if climate deniers would claim that the elder had an agenda and then rhetorically wondered what agenda the climate deniers have. This elder obviously had no agenda, because he has little contact with the the modern world, and was merely observing how his isolated life had changed. He didn't need science, news or an agenda to inform him - he was living it. The science confirms it though, and made the expedition possible. This expedition wouldn't have even been attempted years ago due to ice.
    the problem though, with climate change deniers, is two fold; you tell them the planet's climate is changing in dramatic fashion, they say "no it's not". you show them data, they shift to "climate is cyclical; there's no way to prove it won't revert back like it always does". 

    there is no convincing them. 
    Absolutely right. Convincing the deniers seems to be an impossible task. No amount of data will be enough for them.
    "I'll use the magic word - let's just shut the fuck up, please." EV, 04/13/08
  • jeffbrjeffbr Seattle Posts: 7,177
    brianlux said:
    jeffbr said:
    brianlux said:
    Not to be a Debbie Downer but t
    Remember, 1/3 of repub voters, maybe more, think its all a hoax. Until they become engaged and care, our politicians, from both parties, cant/wont do shit. Because, freedumb.

    Two Antarctic glaciers that have long kept scientists awake at night are breaking free from the restraints that have hemmed them in, increasing the threat of large-scale sea-level rise.

    Located along the coast of the Amundsen Sea in West Antarctica, the enormous Pine Island and Thwaites glaciers already contribute around 5 percent of global sea-level rise. The survival of Thwaites has been deemed so critical that the United States and Britain have launched a targeted multimillion-dollar research mission to the glacier. The loss of the glacier could trigger the broader collapse of the West Antarctic ice sheet, which contains enough ice to eventually raise seas by about 10 feet.

    The new findings, published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, come from analysis of satellite images. They show that a naturally occurring buffer system that prevents the glaciers from flowing outward rapidly is breaking down, potentially unleashing far more ice into the sea in coming years.

    The glaciers’ “shear margins,” where their floating ice shelves encounter high levels of friction that constrain the natural flow of ice, are progressively weakening and in some cases breaking into pieces.

    “The stresses that slow down the glacier, they are no longer in place, so the glacier is speeding up,” said Stef Lhermitte, a satellite expert at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands who led the new research along with colleagues from NASA and other research institutions in France, Belgium, Austria and the Netherlands.

    While many of the images have been seen before, the new analysis suggests that they are a sign of further disintegration to come.

    “We already knew that these were glaciers that might matter in the future, but these images to me indicate that these ice shelves are in a very bad state,” Lhermitte said.

    It’s just the latest in a flurry of bad news about the planet’s ice.

    Arctic sea ice is very close to — but likely to not quite reach — a record low for this time of year. Last month, Canada lost a large portion of its last major Arctic ice shelf.

    And in Greenland, the largest still-intact ice shelf in the Northern Hemisphere, sometimes known as 79 North because of its latitude (its full name is Nioghalvfjerdsfjorden), just lost a large chunk of ice, equivalent in size to roughly two Manhattan islands, according to the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland. Experts there blamed the fracture on a strong general warming trend and temperatures that have been “incredibly” high in the northeast of Greenland in recent years.

    Ice shelves are vast floating platforms that extend across the surface of the ocean at the outer edge of marine-based glaciers. As they flow over the water, these shelves freeze onto mountainsides and islands and anchor themselves to bumps in the seafloor. In this way, the shelves provide a braking mechanism on the natural outward flow of ice.

    The buttressing effect occurs in the shear margins, where faster-flowing ice meets ice that is more static and stable, often because it is moored to some part of the landscape. In these places, the ice frequently crumples and contorts, a visible indication of the powerful stresses that it is under.

    But when those stresses become too much, ice breaks. That’s what’s now happening in West Antarctica, the new research argues, suggesting that warm ocean water has thinned the ice shelves out enough from below that they became brittle.

    At the same time, and for the same reason, the glaciers themselves began to flow outward faster. The resulting forces led the shear-margin ice to break into pieces — which means that the glacier, less constrained, will now be able to add ice to the ocean even faster.

    For the Pine Island Glacier, the new study finds that while the cracking and fraying at the shear margin dates to 1999, it accelerated in 2016. Here’s a video based on images from the European Space Agency’s Sentinel satellite, showing the changes in the past four years:

    Even more concerning is the Thwaites Glacier. Here, again, the breakdown of the shear margin has increased in recent years:

    “This is important work,” Richard Alley, a glaciologist at Pennsylvania State University, said of the new study.

    Alley noted that the processes playing out in Antarctica appear to have already reached their completion in parts of Greenland, where one of the largest glaciers, Jakobshavn, no longer has any significant ice shelf at all. When it lost that shelf around the year 2000, Jakobshavn’s rate of ice loss steeply increased.

    The 79 North glacier still has a major ice shelf, as do some of Greenland’s other northernmost glaciers, but many of these have lost considerable size in recent decades.

    “The new paper shows that the Amundsen Sea Embayment ice shelves have gone through most, but not all, of the Jakobshavn steps,” Alley said in an email. “[A] warming ocean thinned the ice shelves, this reduced buttressing, this let the non-floating ice move faster, contributing some to sea-level rise and also starting to break the sides of the ice shelves, but additional acceleration could occur if the rest of the steps (further fracture and ice-shelf loss) should occur.”

    Multiple ice-shelf collapses have already been seen in Canada, Greenland and the warmer Antarctic Peninsula, where the onetime Larsen A and Larsen B ice shelves fractured and, today, no longer exist.

    “When the ice shelves are damaged by climate change, as we saw in the Antarctic Peninsula in the last several decades, their buttressing effect is reduced and the ice streams speed up and raise sea levels,” said Isabella Velicogna, a glaciologist at the University of California at Irvine, commenting on the new study. “The speed-up increases damage, a positive feedback which is not good news.”

    If a similar process plays out in the Amundsen Sea of West Antarctica, where Pine Island and Thwaites are, the sea-level consequences could be enormous.

    Lhermitte provided calculations showing that over the past six years, the western and central parts of the Pine Island ice shelf have shrunk by about 30 percent, from about 1,500 square miles down to closer to 1,000 square miles. In other words, an area about the size of Los Angeles has been lost.

    “This shear margin is so damaged we think it preconditions this ice shelf for destabilization on the longer term,” Lhermitte said. “These are the first signs we see that Pine Island ice shelf is disappearing. This damage is difficult to heal.”

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2020/09/14/glaciers-breaking-antarctica-pine-island-thwaites/

    I don't see stating reality as being a Debbie Downer, H2M.  The biggest Debbie Downers are the climate change deniers. 

    "he American public, in general, could care two shits about this happening."  
    I would guess that if you took a survey, you would find the majority- a slim majority perhaps- of Americans (and First World people in general) actually are concerned about climate change and environmental issues. What you won't find is a majority willing to make the sacrifices necessary to make the needed changes.  Recycling cans and bottles is not enough.  We need to also be willing to consume fewer products, buy things that are durable, practice re-use more often, commute fewer miles in cars, live in smaller houses, use less heat and air conditioning, eat less red meat, travel and fly less often, support environmental groups like Sea Shepherds, Natural Resources Defense Committee, Wildlands Network- organizations that do less fund raising and take more action, reproduce in smaller numbers, and be a more active voice for defending wildlife and the planet.  The average First World person is weak in most of these actions.


    Yeah, I'm reading a book right now about an expedition in 2013 to traverse the Northwest Passage in a 4 person row boat. The author stopped in an arctic village and an elder was talking to him about how things have changed for him in the last 50 years, and talked about warming. The author wondered if climate deniers would claim that the elder had an agenda and then rhetorically wondered what agenda the climate deniers have. This elder obviously had no agenda, because he has little contact with the the modern world, and was merely observing how his isolated life had changed. He didn't need science, news or an agenda to inform him - he was living it. The science confirms it though, and made the expedition possible. This expedition wouldn't have even been attempted years ago due to ice.

    Sounds like a good book, Jeff. I might want to read it.  Is it this one?
    34304376 sy475
    That's the one, Brian! I'm about 1/3 of the way in, and it is hard to put down.
    "I'll use the magic word - let's just shut the fuck up, please." EV, 04/13/08
  • brianluxbrianlux Moving through All Kinds of Terrain. Posts: 42,293
    jeffbr said:
    brianlux said:
    jeffbr said:
    brianlux said:
    Not to be a Debbie Downer but t
    Remember, 1/3 of repub voters, maybe more, think its all a hoax. Until they become engaged and care, our politicians, from both parties, cant/wont do shit. Because, freedumb.

    Two Antarctic glaciers that have long kept scientists awake at night are breaking free from the restraints that have hemmed them in, increasing the threat of large-scale sea-level rise.

    Located along the coast of the Amundsen Sea in West Antarctica, the enormous Pine Island and Thwaites glaciers already contribute around 5 percent of global sea-level rise. The survival of Thwaites has been deemed so critical that the United States and Britain have launched a targeted multimillion-dollar research mission to the glacier. The loss of the glacier could trigger the broader collapse of the West Antarctic ice sheet, which contains enough ice to eventually raise seas by about 10 feet.

    The new findings, published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, come from analysis of satellite images. They show that a naturally occurring buffer system that prevents the glaciers from flowing outward rapidly is breaking down, potentially unleashing far more ice into the sea in coming years.

    The glaciers’ “shear margins,” where their floating ice shelves encounter high levels of friction that constrain the natural flow of ice, are progressively weakening and in some cases breaking into pieces.

    “The stresses that slow down the glacier, they are no longer in place, so the glacier is speeding up,” said Stef Lhermitte, a satellite expert at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands who led the new research along with colleagues from NASA and other research institutions in France, Belgium, Austria and the Netherlands.

    While many of the images have been seen before, the new analysis suggests that they are a sign of further disintegration to come.

    “We already knew that these were glaciers that might matter in the future, but these images to me indicate that these ice shelves are in a very bad state,” Lhermitte said.

    It’s just the latest in a flurry of bad news about the planet’s ice.

    Arctic sea ice is very close to — but likely to not quite reach — a record low for this time of year. Last month, Canada lost a large portion of its last major Arctic ice shelf.

    And in Greenland, the largest still-intact ice shelf in the Northern Hemisphere, sometimes known as 79 North because of its latitude (its full name is Nioghalvfjerdsfjorden), just lost a large chunk of ice, equivalent in size to roughly two Manhattan islands, according to the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland. Experts there blamed the fracture on a strong general warming trend and temperatures that have been “incredibly” high in the northeast of Greenland in recent years.

    Ice shelves are vast floating platforms that extend across the surface of the ocean at the outer edge of marine-based glaciers. As they flow over the water, these shelves freeze onto mountainsides and islands and anchor themselves to bumps in the seafloor. In this way, the shelves provide a braking mechanism on the natural outward flow of ice.

    The buttressing effect occurs in the shear margins, where faster-flowing ice meets ice that is more static and stable, often because it is moored to some part of the landscape. In these places, the ice frequently crumples and contorts, a visible indication of the powerful stresses that it is under.

    But when those stresses become too much, ice breaks. That’s what’s now happening in West Antarctica, the new research argues, suggesting that warm ocean water has thinned the ice shelves out enough from below that they became brittle.

    At the same time, and for the same reason, the glaciers themselves began to flow outward faster. The resulting forces led the shear-margin ice to break into pieces — which means that the glacier, less constrained, will now be able to add ice to the ocean even faster.

    For the Pine Island Glacier, the new study finds that while the cracking and fraying at the shear margin dates to 1999, it accelerated in 2016. Here’s a video based on images from the European Space Agency’s Sentinel satellite, showing the changes in the past four years:

    Even more concerning is the Thwaites Glacier. Here, again, the breakdown of the shear margin has increased in recent years:

    “This is important work,” Richard Alley, a glaciologist at Pennsylvania State University, said of the new study.

    Alley noted that the processes playing out in Antarctica appear to have already reached their completion in parts of Greenland, where one of the largest glaciers, Jakobshavn, no longer has any significant ice shelf at all. When it lost that shelf around the year 2000, Jakobshavn’s rate of ice loss steeply increased.

    The 79 North glacier still has a major ice shelf, as do some of Greenland’s other northernmost glaciers, but many of these have lost considerable size in recent decades.

    “The new paper shows that the Amundsen Sea Embayment ice shelves have gone through most, but not all, of the Jakobshavn steps,” Alley said in an email. “[A] warming ocean thinned the ice shelves, this reduced buttressing, this let the non-floating ice move faster, contributing some to sea-level rise and also starting to break the sides of the ice shelves, but additional acceleration could occur if the rest of the steps (further fracture and ice-shelf loss) should occur.”

    Multiple ice-shelf collapses have already been seen in Canada, Greenland and the warmer Antarctic Peninsula, where the onetime Larsen A and Larsen B ice shelves fractured and, today, no longer exist.

    “When the ice shelves are damaged by climate change, as we saw in the Antarctic Peninsula in the last several decades, their buttressing effect is reduced and the ice streams speed up and raise sea levels,” said Isabella Velicogna, a glaciologist at the University of California at Irvine, commenting on the new study. “The speed-up increases damage, a positive feedback which is not good news.”

    If a similar process plays out in the Amundsen Sea of West Antarctica, where Pine Island and Thwaites are, the sea-level consequences could be enormous.

    Lhermitte provided calculations showing that over the past six years, the western and central parts of the Pine Island ice shelf have shrunk by about 30 percent, from about 1,500 square miles down to closer to 1,000 square miles. In other words, an area about the size of Los Angeles has been lost.

    “This shear margin is so damaged we think it preconditions this ice shelf for destabilization on the longer term,” Lhermitte said. “These are the first signs we see that Pine Island ice shelf is disappearing. This damage is difficult to heal.”

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2020/09/14/glaciers-breaking-antarctica-pine-island-thwaites/

    I don't see stating reality as being a Debbie Downer, H2M.  The biggest Debbie Downers are the climate change deniers. 

    "he American public, in general, could care two shits about this happening."  
    I would guess that if you took a survey, you would find the majority- a slim majority perhaps- of Americans (and First World people in general) actually are concerned about climate change and environmental issues. What you won't find is a majority willing to make the sacrifices necessary to make the needed changes.  Recycling cans and bottles is not enough.  We need to also be willing to consume fewer products, buy things that are durable, practice re-use more often, commute fewer miles in cars, live in smaller houses, use less heat and air conditioning, eat less red meat, travel and fly less often, support environmental groups like Sea Shepherds, Natural Resources Defense Committee, Wildlands Network- organizations that do less fund raising and take more action, reproduce in smaller numbers, and be a more active voice for defending wildlife and the planet.  The average First World person is weak in most of these actions.


    Yeah, I'm reading a book right now about an expedition in 2013 to traverse the Northwest Passage in a 4 person row boat. The author stopped in an arctic village and an elder was talking to him about how things have changed for him in the last 50 years, and talked about warming. The author wondered if climate deniers would claim that the elder had an agenda and then rhetorically wondered what agenda the climate deniers have. This elder obviously had no agenda, because he has little contact with the the modern world, and was merely observing how his isolated life had changed. He didn't need science, news or an agenda to inform him - he was living it. The science confirms it though, and made the expedition possible. This expedition wouldn't have even been attempted years ago due to ice.

    Sounds like a good book, Jeff. I might want to read it.  Is it this one?
    34304376 sy475
    That's the one, Brian! I'm about 1/3 of the way in, and it is hard to put down.

    Cool, thanks Jeff.
    "Pretty cookies, heart squares all around, yeah!"
    -Eddie Vedder, "Smile"

    "Try to not spook the horse."
    -Neil Young













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