IPCC report leaked: global warming impacts are speeding up.

[wtmusic]

"The Fifth — and hopefully final — Assessment Report (AR5) from the UN Intergovernmental Panel On Climate Change (IPCC) is due next month. The leaks are already here:"

Drafts seen by Reuters of the study by the UN panel of experts, due to be published next month, say it is at least 95 percent likely that human activities – chiefly the burning of fossil fuels – are the main cause of warming since the 1950s.

That is up from at least 90 percent in the last report in 2007, 66 percent in 2001, and just over 50 in 1995, steadily squeezing out the arguments by a small minority of scientists that natural variations in the climate might be to blame.

<>

"So the alarming disruption in our previously stable, civilization-supporting climate depicted in the top figure is our future. On our current emissions path, the main question the ECS answers is whether 9°F warming happens closer to 2080, 2100, or 2120 — hardly a cause for any celebration. Quite the reverse. Warming beyond 7F is “incompatible with organized global community, is likely to be beyond ‘adaptation’, is devastating to the majority of ecosystems & has a high probability of not being stable (i.e. 4°C [7F] would be an interim temperature on the way to a much higher equilibrium level,” as climate expert Kevin Anderson explains here.

Dr. Michael Mann emailed me:"

The report is simply an exclamation mark on what we already knew: Climate change is real and it continues unabated, the primary cause is fossil fuel burning, and if we don’t do something to reduce carbon emissions we can expect far more dangerous and potentially irreversible impacts on us and our environment in the decades to come.

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/08/18/2484711/ipcc-report-more-certain-global-warming-is-caused-by-humans-impacts-speeding-up/

[Mojorabbit]

1. This topic is the most important thing in the world. nt

[wtmusic]

2. Yes, it is.

I don't think we can overemphasize that, or how critical taking action is becoming.

[defacto7]

6. This topic is the most important thing in the history of humankind. nt

[joshcryer]

7. Indeed.

We're fucked.

[CrispyQ]

9. I agree.

About five years ago I told my husband, "Hon, we're gonna exit this planet in the nick of time." Now, every week I read articles stating that 'things are accelerating faster than our models predicted," & I'm not so sure anymore. Future generations will look back to this period & shake their heads wondering how we were so stupid. Sometimes I wonder if we would be on a more sustainable path if Carter had won in 1980? I remember being sad, but not surprised, when Reagan had the solar panels removed from the WH. We've squandered precious years & now it's too late.

[NickB79]

3. Finally looking beyond 2100, I see

Good. I fear too many people have gotten complacent looking at reports that say "by the end of this century" when in reality, the planet will keep warming for CENTURIES to come even if we manage to stabilize CO2 concentrations at current levels.

[pscot]

10. But we aren't even trying to stabilize CO2

Our annual output of emissions keeps increasing:

[NickB79]

12. I know

[SunSeeker]

4. That is one scary chart.

How anybody can be a climate change denier is beyond me. Unfortunately, my rep, Dana Rohrabacher, is one of those idiots.

The problem is so huge and so daunting...and the Republicans have made sure we don't even have a functioning Congress.

[limpyhobbler]

5. that's rather alarming -nt

[CRH]

8. I just wish the AR5 report, ...

would print an honest graph or model similar to the graph in the OP produced by Science and ClimateProgress.org. - That would get the attention of a few people, BAU produces a rising global temperature with no plateau in sight.

No quick plateau, equals mass extinctions, humans included. What does the time line matter, whether it is fifty years or a couple of centuries.

K&R

[wtmusic]

13. Criticism of AR4 will probably mean that AR5 is conservative

in its projections.

Good science is conservative, but in situations where immediate action may be critical there has to be a lower standard of proof. That's exactly what the petroleum industry and their army of deniers is exploiting.

[CRH]

14. Criticism the IPCC was too conservative, ...

will lead to the IPCC being more conservative? My goodness, double speak is alive and well.

Please do expand on your thoughts, so I might ascertain if you are pulling my leg.

[joshcryer]

17. Read again.

[CRH]

18. Ok , I think I see what he is trying to communicate, ...

My mistake.

[joshcryer]

19. No worries.

I know wtmute gets crap for their position on nuclear but I think it's true that scientists are reluctant to tell the full story because they get shit on for it. Just look at how the media treated Wadams' paper, when he was basing his entire argument on science that the other scientists were ignorant of.

[NickB79]

11. But, but, global warming stopped in 1998!

Haven't you heard the new denier talking point yet? We're saved!

[Yo_Mama]

15. Really?

http://www.woodfortrees.org/graph/hadsst2gl/plot/rss

[hatrack]

16. Al Gore is fat! Freedumb! Antarctic sea ice is GROWING! Cow farts! LIEberal elitists!

There, I think that should cover it.