Thursday, June 01, 2006
APPY DAYS
The BBC reports:
Fifty-five million years ago the North Pole was an ice-free zone with tropical temperatures, according to research.
Polar bears didn’t exist 55 million years ago. Presumably because they’d all been drowned.
An international team has been able to pin-point the changes that occurred as the Arctic transformed from green house to ice house.
Let me guess: did proto-primates sign the Kyoto Treaty?
"This time period is associated with a very enhanced green house effect,” explained Appy Sluijs, a palaeoecologist from Utrecht University in the Netherlands, and the lead author on one of the papers.
"Basically, it looks like the Earth released a gigantic fart of green house gases into the atmosphere - and globally the Earth warmed by about 5C (9F).”
Big old farty earth is the ecological enemy! The enemy of itself!
Appy Sluijs points out that the data reveals that some of the climate models used to detail the Arctic’s history got things wrong, and as they are the same models that predict our future climate they may need adjusting.
Let the adjustments commence!
ENVIRO UPDATE. Al Gore has a fear of steam.
ENVIRO UPDATE II. Dave S.: “NOOOOOOOOOOO! Not the climate models! They’re infallible!”
(Via Larry T. and J.F. Beck)