I have the WWF full report as pdf file. Please feel free to ask.
Lance
“Lance Olsen” <lance@wildrockies.org>
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“…early signs of change suggest that the less than 1°C of global warming
that the world has experienced to date may have already triggered the first
tipping point of the Earth’s climate system”
“The reality of 2008 tells us that climate change is causing dangerous
anthropogenic interference at lower thresholds and earlier than expected..”
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WWF
A CLOSING WINDOW OF OPPORTUNITY –
GLOBAL GREENHOUSE REALITY 2008
By Dr. Martin Sommerkorn, WWF International
Arctic Programme, msommerkorn@wwf.no
Summary
Scientific evidence accumulating since the IPCC’s Fourth Assessment Report reveals that global warming is accelerating, at times far beyond projections outlined in earlier studies, including the latest IPCC Report. New modelling studies are providing updated and more detailed indications of the impacts of continued warming.
The emerging evidence is that important aspects of climate change seem to have been underestimated and the impacts are being felt sooner. For example, early signs of change suggest that the less than 1°C of global warming that the world has experienced to date may have already triggered the first tipping point of the Earth’s climate system -a seasonally ice-free Arctic Ocean. This process could open the gates to rapid and abrupt climate change, rather than the gradual changes that have been projected so far.
At the same time, updated 21st century anthropogenic emission figures reflect the lack of sufficient concerted global actions on reducing atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations. Atmospheric CO2 concentrations are tracking those predicted for IPCC’s non-mitigation “intensive dependency on fossil fuels” scenario (SRES A1FI). Scenario calculation that include the recent atmospheric greenhouse gas levels highlight the pressing urgency for actions achieving those stabilisation levels-identified by the IPCC-that are needed to avoid “dangerous anthropogenic interference” with the climate system in the 21st century.
In combination these two lines of evidence-presented in context in this paper-clearly demonstrate the inexorably closing window of opportunity to confront the challenge and implement stringent emissions cuts sufficient to maintain a functioning planet that we recognise. The reality of 2008 tells us that climate change is causing dangerous anthropogenic interference at lower thresholds and earlier than expected, both for reasons we control (emissions) and have already caused (earlier and stronger than expected impacts). The cogent implication of this closing pair of scissors is that our mitigation response to climate change now needs to be even more rapid and ambitious.
End of summary
I have the full analysis at pdf file. Please feel free to ask
Lance
PS – I also have pdf of the Science article quoted immediately below.
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” ‘… the extreme scenarios that tend to fall out of the IPCC process
may be exactly the ones we should most worry about,’ he says.”
John Bohannan, “Trying to Lasso Climate Uncertainty.”
SCIENCE, 13 OCTOBER 2006
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