The Carbon Cycle below show the importance of the CO2 sink in cold surface water.
More fossil fuel and less cold surface water will tip the balance.
More warm outgassing surface water is catastrophic.
Melting permafrost releasing methane and CO2 has to be added.
Methane is a byproduct of the decomposition of biomass. It can be trapped/frozen
as methane hydrate in a crystalline form known as Clathrates (CH4)₈(H₂O)₄₆

The buildup of Methane Hydrates makes tings worse as I can se no safety margin.
It made me add a growing number of comments and links on this page and Page 3.
The change in climate can be huge.
Hopeful enough people will realize what is happening before the forces of nature becomes too strong.
July 2007 / Kaj Jensen, Ph.D.
A very little rise in temperature will be amplified by several nonlinear feedback loops.
It has started to do irreversible change to the delicate balance of nature and it might trigger a
major devastating  oceanic methane and CO2 eruption last seen 55 million, 251 million and
635 million years ago.

The Carbon Cycle. - Modified Carbon Cycle.
The cooling of the ocean surface and the formation of sea-ice during winter
produce dense salty water, which sinks from the sea surface into the deep sea.
Dense water transport CO2 down.   Meltwater is not dense.
The CO2 take-up from land vegetation goes down, when the temperature goes up !
Carbon in the atmosphere is out of balance what increases greenhouse gases in the Energy Budget below.

Earth's annual mean radiated Energy Budget.
Greenhouse Gases has to be adjusted up in the old illustrative figure. The net unbalance
is warming the surface, melting ice and heating up the huge amount of water in the oceans.
The energy balance is illustrated in this video.
Aerosols did cover-up the increase in greenhouse gases for years.   Man-made sulfates, smog, industrial fumes etc. still do.
The burning of sulfur rich coal and fossil fuels do cover up part of the CO2 problem and produces damaging acid rain.
Black soot from air pollution  makes bright snow and ice darker so less sunlight is reflected - more warming.
The big brown clouds hanging over most of Asia is a serious problem - video.
Short winters with only little white snow reflects less sunlight - more warming.
Less reflected sunlight by white polar ice, as it melts  - more warming.
Phytoplankton, the major CO2 sink start to suffer - more warming.
More Wildfires - more warming until CO2 returns by grow back.
More rot and fungi releases CO2 - more warming.
Deforestation continue - more warming.
Ocean turning to acid - more warming.
Flooded land reflects less sunlight - more warming.
Flooded permafrost melts and releases methane - more warming.
Destruction of  tropical peat swamps and old Wetlands - more warming.
Increase in surface temperature increases water vapor as a greenhouse gas - more warming.
Trapped under permafrost a huge amount of Greenhouse Gases starts to leak - more warming.
More moisture in the air  - more warming as it is a major greenhouse gas, but also cooling as more
white snow falls on land and on sea ice. Until snow is replaced by rain able to melt ice at an increased speed.
Overpopulation continue - much more warming.

Audio interviews  ---   Sea Level Rise - Consequences   ---   Ice cap is melting so quickly   ---    Polar ocean is soaking up less CO2
 
The island of Tuvalu is already pleading for help - but it is doomed.  Bangladesh is next.

The graphs of solar irradiance and cosmic rays has recently been quite flat.
Slight lower Solar irradiance during the last 25 years did not cool the earth.
Neither did the downturn of the 11 year sunspot cycle, now at minima = 0,
but the orange curve above shows that it will contribute very little. More details are shown below.

Please look at the axis - the numbers are small  - MUCH smaller than other factors as the Insolation
graph below ! - Very important - compare W/m² to see what matters.
The number of sunspots changes further as the position of gravity from
Jupiter and Saturn changes, but the number can not go under zero.
The low number of sunspots is equal to a cooler sun as long as it last.

The Forcings above miss one factor - Global Dimming - it can make things even worse.

We have already lowered the sunlight reaching the earth by dimming the sun
like dirt from volcanoes, but the temperature deep in the oceans continue
to rise killing species every day.
Some scientist are horrified at the same time as others are claming that
it all is a "hoax" as they are only focusing on the cooling effects without
putting everything on the same scale in order to calculate the net effect.

Long-term changes in the Earths orbit around the Sun
changes global warming substantially as it controls
ice sheet growth in the Northern Hemisphere.
This effect is normal like a precise "clock" in time - turning the
heat up and down in earths history and it is easy to calculate.
However the normal free spinning planets are altered by passing and
hitting bodies or superwaves from space and those difficult to calculate
alterations has to be added if the "clock" is used over very long time.

At summer 65N the insolation turns up for the next 30 000 years
predicted by Jan Hollan - a little more warming in small steps.
( The same curve shown below is calculated by Berger - se page 24 )

The last 10 000 year downturn were substantial, but the temperature did not fall.
Earlier downturns resulted in lower temperature and new ice ages, so new
forcings must have been added beginning 8 000 years ago.
CO2 and methane from agriculture and from the seabed may be the cause.
Deforestation as part of early farming also contributed to offset the
falling insolation  - no glaciation as the trigger were defused.
The good thing is that a new ice age were stopped.
During the last 8 000 years, humans did benefit from a rising CO2 level
and global warming, but further exponential warming is the way to mass extinction.

The importance of the insolation can be illustrated by the peak 130 000
years ago rising the sea level several meters above the present level.
Just in time, the increasing temperature were stopped before a thermal
runaway as earths orbit made a sharp fall in summer insulation 65N.
However the fall were so deep that a new ice-age followed as the CO2 level
and the insolation became too low - se historical data on page 7 fig. 2.
Take a look further back in time.  High temperature as today were canceled
by a sharp fall in insolation.
Today there will be no further fall in insolation to stop a flip to "hot house".

CO2 were a key factor last time earth were in "hot house" or warm greenhouse  -  Homo sapiens has not been there before.

Eruption of a super volcano or sulfur dioxide from several volcanoes will cool the earth for a few years.
Black smoke in the upper atmosphere injected by nuclear bombs, asteroids or comets, will also
cool the earth but a lot of greenhouse gasses will also be added and they remain in the air for centuries.
When the skies clear after a few years the greenhouse effect is normally stronger - hot climate, but the
outcome is uncertain as it depend on the actual event as e.g. the rapid cooling  12,900 years ago.
Some explanation may be found here as summer/winter temperatures fluctuated much more than now,
making rapid climate change 11,500 years ago.
Cooling is possible if we can takeout the pressure of volcanoes in a new controlled way bringing CO2 from volcanoes to a halt.

The present weakening of Earth's magnetic field is a common event in earths history.  It makes us
more vulnerable to solar eruptions and radiation from space.
The field is generated 3000 kilometers below the surface by a gigantic electric generator driven by a flow of liquid
metals, too deep to alter the geothermal heating, but at present changing probably for a "reversal" - not a halt. 
A little part of our atmosphere might be blown away by the solar wind if the magnetic field shuts down for some time,
but many smaller local north and south poles will probably cover the earth during a reversal and give some protection.
Radiation will go up, so it is important to keep the man made part (nuclear contamination) very low to give plants, animals and
humans a chance to survive.
Solar Superstorm's as in 1859 will make huge damage especially to electrical wires and electronics when the protecting field is weak.
Stress from the deep underground alterations behind the magnetic field may increase the number of earthquakes and make new
cracks in the earth's crust. 
The crust or "skin of the earth" is thin and delicate but may look solid within a short time period.
If Greenland starts to move up by losing a heavy weight of ice, the situation can become more critical. Solid landmasses may
break up and the tectonic plates will move more than usual.

Traveling through "a not completely empty space" our solar system do hit high energy radiation, gas and particles.
Planet earth is a "spaceship" traveling fast in formation with our sun and neighboring stars in our galaxy and the
combined electromagnetic shield protects us.  Hopeful planet earth is not in a front position in the flight formation,
when our magnetic field is down during the coming "magnetic field reversal" or pole shift.
The sun's magnetic field is also weakening what might partly explain the huge influx of more cosmic dust.
The heating, our solar system receives from traveling through space, might be cyclic as we rotate around the center
of our galaxy and wobble up an down through the galactic plane.
One revolution of the galactic arm containing our sun is about 225–250 million years.
The Sun oscillates up and down relative to the galactic plane approximately 2.7 times per orbit.
Little is known about orbiting the milky way and flying through interstellar clouds. Different types of change happens
on all planets in our solar system right now - some of those changes are huge but not reported to the public.
 
The atmosphere probably absorbs far more cosmic rays in hot periods with e.g. a lot of water vapor so records of cosmic
rays in the ground is probably useless without knowledge of the filtering effect of the atmosphere and the magnetic
field.  Exposed meteors landing on the earth surface do contain radioactive traces that may give a rough picture of the
historic cosmic radiation in the path in space where planet earth travels.
The magnetosphere absorbs less hard solar radiation and cosmic rays as the single north/south pole breaks up in several
smaller local poles until a full pole shift.  It may have started 150 years ago and be in process.

Derbies from our galaxy and remains from a colliding galaxy may hit planet earth periodically like comets orbiting the sun.
It probably add to global warming and so do cosmic rays and a cloud of fine cosmic dust becoming extra fuel thrown on our sun.
However we have to bring down the temperature (under the dangerous tipping point to avoid a runaway situation) using
the means available to us to survive and to take care of other species.  What else can we do.

Comments as "all planets are heating up - it is not just the earth" is useless as we have to stop runaway heating.
Do You like to enter a plane if you know there is a 5% chance of a fatal crash ?  -  Do You like to travel with "spaceship earth"
if you know that there is a 5% chance that it is on the edge of turning extreme hot like Venus ?
 
[ All planets in our solar system may heat up as they are in a tight formation traveling through space, but it does not mean
that  humans/CO2 is not to blame. 
Even if humans did not at all contribute to global warming,  we must do what we can to understand and to avoid the
"point of no return" for human life on planet earth using all means to protect precious living species including ourselves.
Even if humans only control a little rudder on "spaceship earth", we have to use that "rudder" wisely to smoothing out
climate change and other hazards. ]

Periodically quasar like outburst of superwaves of electromagnetic energy from our galactic center may synchronize the speed
of the zodiac driven by the Earth's rotation axis. The Earth's axis wobbles around the perpendicular to its orbit with a period of
26,000 years.
Such outburst of gamma rays and other magnetic waves makes a huge change in our solar system by direct radiation and
secondary by moving clouds of dust that might end up on the sun as extra fuel or as dust shields around the planets.
The result can be major instant change in climate - warming or freezing.
A gravity wave may be a day or two in front of major "superwaves" traveling at the speed of light triggering huge seismic activity
and setting off volcanoes as a warning.

        The 2004 Indonesian earthquake and Tsunami might be a small example of what is coming.
The heliosphere bubble created by the solar wind, normally going further out than Pluto, is giving some protection from the
harsh interstellar environment, especially from cosmic rays.  It may be pushed inwards or even blown away by superwaves.
Cosmic dust from those periodic small and huge superwaves are found in ice cores.
The size of mass in our galactic center is so huge that major outbursts are hitting our rotating "gyro" earth very hard.
Some superwave scientists have a theory of several degrees of abrupt change in the earth's rotation axis as a consequence.
 If so land masses at the new equator goes substantial up and the new polar regions goes down.
The rotating earth is 25 miles / 41 km wider than it is tall .
The outburst may even remove some of our ozone layer and cancel out part of the earths magnetic field by a ring current
from huge amounts of charged particles.
Even a local coronal mass ejection, as the one in 1859, will roast a large part of ordinary modern electronics as well as
a large part of the electrical grid.
People who cares about the future should at least get the electrical grid below ground before the next hit.
 
"Climate oscillations" 15,800 years ago may relate to this theory. Going that time back in time, using computer simulations of stars,
is what it takes to fine adjust the galactic center to be exactly in front of the arrow of the star sign Sagittarius next to the tail of Scorpio.

Change in heat flow to oceans from inside the earth may count very little if the average  geothermal energy is below
0.1 Watt pr. square meter.  However more heat are transmitted from the Mid-Atlantic area with a thin or missing crust.
Heat from this source may be behind El Nino near the Galapagos Islands.
CO2 from seafloor spreading is probably also low at this time in history and so is heating from Deep Sea Vents.

Changing clouds will affect the climate in both directions depending on height, latitude and color.
Ocean circulation is important as water is the main accumulator or buffer of heat.
It takes several hundred years for the water to make a complete "conveyor belt" circulation around the globe, introducing a
delay for heating up the deep sea.
Outgassing of CO2, when deep sea water returns to a hot surface, will of cause also have a delay of several hundred years.
CO2 and temperature are connected in an amplifying loop, meaning danger when both are high at the same time.
The mixing of water in the oceans are complicated as described in this introduction.

A weakening of the Gulf Stream may moderate the warming in North-West Europe  -  and return less cold deep sea
water to the south Atlantic, where a slight increase in water temperature around Antarctica can start a chain reaction
as melting from the bottom is a key element.
More moisture in warmer air may add more snow on top of lower altitude parts of the Antarctic Ice Sheet delaying
the rise in sea level a few years as well as adding more snow/Ice on top of the sea ice around Antarctica. However
Antarctica has already begun to melt from the bottom and from the edge.
Westerly wind circling around the south pole will probably keep the center at high altitude very cold and very dry
for many years, but 35 M years back in time there were no ice on Antarctica.

Disintegration of ice is what rises sea level fast when the process gain momentum.
Tunnels in the large part of ice below sea level may be the most dangerous, if salty seawater enters like rivers
with high melting capacity as well as high transportation capacity.    
The tidal/gravity motions of the moon might lift thick ice off the bedrock, make cracks and act as a primitive
pump/hart for sucking in saltwater starting to melt ice from the warm end close to the seafloor.
Passages under the ice may open up, as the deep salty sea has a huge uplift on ice and room for floating icebergs
a mile or more below sea level.
Central west Antarctica may turn into a new deep sea waterway across/under Antarctica.
It may break holes in "the fortress of ice" opening new passages for flow of ice from East Antarctica and drain
sub glacial lakes.
Initially the rise in sea level may not look big as more water is kept on land by e.g. dams.  Ice fixed below sea level
leaves free space when it melts, and so do huge amounts of  "ice look-alike" methane hydrates in the seafloor.
Evaporating methane hydrate in the artic tundra my also leave space to be filled with water.

        Wilkins Ice Shelf in Antarctica breaks up.   Arctic Ice Shelf breaks up.

If no action is taken, excess heat from the present unbalance in the earth's energy budget will have to go somewhere.
The heat capacity of the atmosphere is insignificant - the energy has to go somewhere else.
First it will heat surface water, put more water vapor in the air, melt permafrost and melt ice at a slow speed.
Then the melting will accelerate and the oceans will start to heat up slowly accumulating energy
and fueling more extreme weather.
More rain falling on ice will speedup the melting.
If the excess heat grows exponentially, things will happen faster and faster.
When the ice is gone, and there is no white snow to reflect sunlight,  the energy unbalance will heat up the oceans
at a higher speed, what expand water and rises the sea level further.
Arctic relocation is limited by an expanding "ozone hole" hurting animals and plants.
By upwelling, the huge amount of cold water in the deep oceans can for years delay the rise in sea temperature
and make the energy unbalance look smaller than it is  -   until just a little higher temperature turns the growth
curves into  "an exponential runaway growth"  -  very different from small linear steps each year.
The man made CO2 may "only" be the trigger or igniter to release the huge forces of nature.

It does not matter if that extra CO2 is man made or is from e.g. large volcanoes.  Instead we should discuss how
to balance the climate in the small comfort zone between "hot house" and "ice house" - and act in time.
The very small climatic variation during the last 10 000 years is not "normal" in the history of earth - humans were lucky.
A small amount of extra CO2 and CH4 did probably stop a new ice age - very lucky.
It is not truth, when some tells that "climate change is not dangerous as it is a natural phenomenon that has affected humanity
through the ages".    No - only Homo Sapiens made it to our time and evolved especially during the latest 10 000 years.
Our complex way of life is sensitive to a "runaway climate change" and the temperature approaches the "runaway trigger level".

Following the ordinary lifecycle of stars, our Sun has very slowly grown a little brighter, probably half of a percent more
than 55 million years ago, making it easier for humans to trigger or to ignite a "runaway climate change" - a flip back
to the old hot "greenhouse earth" - not experienced before by "homo sapiens".
Further rise in temperature combined with the release of huge amounts of methane will remove oxygen and might
end up with a poisonous hydrogen sulfide eruption  -  Take a look at the consequences from earths history.

History has told that  cooling will follow such a hot period, but chemical  weathering of silicate rocks is a very slow process. 

    The  "Great Ocean Conveyor Belt" or "Atlantic Thermohaline Current (ATC)" may stop
    completely, as it has done before.  It will probably only moderate the heating for some time in northern
    Europe, as we have the high effect from greenhouse gasses and human activities.
       A later temperature drop to a new ice age can always be avoided just by adding a little greenhouse gas.
       However a stop in pumping CO2 saturated surface water down in the oceans by the "ATC-pump" is critical.
    Driven by northwards wind the warm Gulf surface current will probably remain - and so
    will the most important transporter of heat - the wind.
    Local changes in sea current do not switch off the surplus heat - it is only stored somewhere else.
    We need cold surface water to take up CO2 as shown by the blue arrows on the first graph on this page.

El Nino/La Nina fluctuations (Sea surface temperatures near the Galapagos Islands) do make substantial change in the climate
from year to year.  However upwelling cold water from the deep ocean can only continue as long as the supply last.
So far the formation of sea ice (thinner than last century) generates some cold heavy water to partly refill the very huge
deep ocean supply of cold water.
At present we are in a cooling La Nina phase, but the temperature of the upwelling is turning up.
 -  The temperature curve shows oscillations. Further historical data and forecasts are provided by noaa.
     If the upwelling stops permanently, we will be in deep trouble very soon. Loss of cooling and loss of food for phytoplankton.
    The effect of a permanent El Nino is comparable to one million power plants each producing 1000 mega watt - more warming.

Air contain very little energy compared to water.
A year with cold air or warm air temperature tells very little about the direction of global warming.
Instead it reflects the temperature of upwelling water and the effect from "Brown Clouds".
Less heat is radiated to space during periods with a low surface temperature.
At present the 11 year sunspot cycle is in a cooling minimum.
A bit of unnatural cooling is also provided by the depleted ozone layer at the poles. It hurts the lower food chain
as more UV Light reduces the growth of Phytoplankton just like UV reduces the growth of plants on land.
Substantial unnatural cooling gained pace from 1945 to 1975 as dirt from especially coal were dumped into the air
forming "brown clouds".       After 1980 a lot has been done about cleaner air from power plants, what lowered the
cooling until the industrial revolution in Asia added "the big Asian brown cloud" - masking the present warming.
Oscillations from hot and cold water moving slowly around in the huge oceans can also clutter up the average rising trend
in the global temperature.
Cooler surface temperature is offset by increasing temperature in layers of seawater further down in the huge oceans
 - out of sight until it makes things worse later on.    The temperature of upwelling water will later be several degrees
    above average when the hot El Nino state comes back.
 - The rise in global surface temperature is only temporary stopped by upwelling cold water.
    A better indicator is the melting of ice shelves and glaziers from beneath by change in water temperature.

The fundamental basic problem remain as the incoming energy radiated to planet earth is still larger than the
total outgoing energy radiated from planet earth - the simple consequence is a rise in temperature.
The best present monitor is the upper 700m ocean heat content measured by instruments.

Another monitor is the actual concentration of a greenhouse gas in the air.
Updated status for greenhouse gasses - select the south pole for a smooth curve
or study the curves from important  weather stations on the map  -  e.g. Greenland and northern Canada.
     Some experts has calculated 350 ppm CO2 in the atmosphere to be a safe level.

Can We Save Our Oceans from CO2 ?
350 ppm CO2 in the atmosphere is again the best estimate for a safe limit.
The required CO2 cut, referring to page 25 in the pdf report, is a 25-40% CO2 cut below 1990 levels by 2020.
In addition we also have to pay for leaking CO2 and methane from melting permafrost.

Page 3 shows a very important figure of sea level versus temperature based on earths history.
It is very different from what the press normally tells the public.
Current predictions are short-term. Final equilibrium state may be as large as a 10–30 m sea-level rise per deg. C.
"Delivery" takes place with a delay, and we are sending new orders each year.  It all adds up when delivered takes place.

The heat content of the oceans is on the way up.
The curve shows where a substantial part of global warming is going.
It is probably most of the present unbalance measured to be 3.6 x 10²¹ Joules per year in the upper 700m.
Equivalent to the energy from 10¹¹ tons of coal per year. More than 10 tons coal per human being per year,
or each person on earth running a 10KW water heater full power non stop to heat up the oceans.
More detailed data will be available in the future. It will tell the exact speed of global warming.
Detailed information from the deep ocean is still missing. We need that to trace the total global
storage of surplus heat. That data is the key to track what is going on, so it is extreme important
for everybody to know those numbers without uncertainty.
Time is extremely expensive so more measurement equipment should be placed in every corner of
the oceans right away - why not publish the surplus heat in Joules every week without ambiguity.

The resent drop in artic sea ice cover can also be calculated like sun panels for heating a house.
The summer sea-ice cover has now dropped to 2 million square km below average.  It is extra heating
from a sun panel the size of 2 000 000 000 000 square meters.  The same magnitude as heating from CO2.

Do your own calculations before accepting a higher temperature to be "safe".
Methane is already starting to leak - it has to be added to the CO2 problem.
Where will the present path take us ?

Quarter of Species Gone by 2050 ?
Is the Earth's 6th Great Mass Extinction underway ?
We must learn from past experience 55 million and 251 million years ago.
A dramatic flip from "Ice House" to "Hot House" occurred 635 million years ago.
Methane Hydrates by Miriam Kastner: Natural Hazard or Natural Resource ?
Humans are now in charge of Climate Change - Other species depends on us.

A small rudder can keep a big ship on a safe path - so can the climate be balanced by humans.
 

Understand the tipping points.  Action is too late beyond the point of no return.
Grandchildren May Inherit 'Hot House' Planet  if we are past the point of no return.
"Hot House" is just old days in earths history.
More Infra Red Light is radiated from "Hot House Earth".  It will establish a new balance in the energy budget.
The "Overpopulation" problem is solved by natural regulation.  As before some species will survive.
Learn from History - we are in The 11th Hour

How can focus be switched from day to day news to the real problems such as extinction ?
[ Page 3 ]

Abrupt Climate Change Is Upon Us and other videos by the Royal Society.  -  From icehouse to hothouse.  Q&A   Target CO2    News
Enjoy life while you can.   Humans has Overpopulated the Earth.  However our brain may solve the climate problem in the last minute.
Feedback Dynamics and the Acceleration of Climate Change.  - video.  TAO - Temp  -  Map of Antarctica. Key Indicators.
Ice Shelves. - YouTube - Videos -  Links  -    Arctic summers ice-free 'by 2013' -  China  - Beautiful Antarctica
 2008     Sea Temp   Meltdown   Yesterday El Nino  -  MSL  -  Latest sea Temp. -  Arctic sea ice -  Sea Ice 3 -  Antarctic topographic map  - ENSO - Sunspot
 ICTP-Cource   - USA -   Daily Sea Temp.   -    Ice news   -   Links   -      Slides      -   Antarctica Glaciers in retreat 
Latest from James Hansen , Archer - How Can We Avert Dangerous Climate Change  -  Plan B.  
No Emergency EXITS.     
                                      [ The Daily Climate ]               [ Page 3 ]                                      

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