Bits of Climate

2010 brought CO2 record – 450 Scenario does not allow any further growth

We really thought we had all the climate records for 2010 neatly piled, but had all forgotten about this one. Deforestation and other land use changes excluded, simply burning fossil fuels in 2010 we emitted 30,600,000,000 tonnes of CO2. That’s … Continue reading →

Indo-Pacific coral reefs die at pH < 7.7

And already suffer biodiversity losses during the decline from pH 8.1 (preindustrial) to 7.8. That latest number is the expected acidification for the end of this century according to IPCC 4AR, a theoretical scenario and a dangerously often quoted underestimation … Continue reading →

No evidence bacteria ate methane at end of Snowball Earth

Same story as yesterday, but now 635 million years earlier. This time again no evidence can be found that it were microbes that ate climate-disrupting amounts of methane, at the end of the Marinoan ice age, better known as ‘Snowball … Continue reading →

New infographic explains cloud geoengineering story

It first cost us thousands of words and various articles on cloud whitening geoengineering and presumed cloud climate feedbacks. But we feel these 8 Rembrandts might do a much better job at communicating some of the most confusing climate science:

Sulphur switch in algae new route to marine cloud geoengineering?

Marine bacteria produce two types of sulphur compounds as they eat dead algae biomass. The one, methanethiol, or MeSH, is cycled downwater into the food chain. The other forms a liquid aerosol, dimethylsulfide, or DMS. The latter plays an important … Continue reading →

If solar minimum caused Little Ice Age we would have big freeze now

It is often suggested that lower total solar irradiance (TSI) due to a decline in solar activity (less sunspots) was responsible for the Little Ice Age, a period of colder weather conditions from the end of the Middle Ages to … Continue reading →