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CO2 emissions 
Fri Nov 04, 2011 at 12:44:32 PM MST
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I wanted to share just a few brief words on an article I saw in the Denver Post (from the AP) today: Greenhouse gas levels rise. Somewhat surprisingly, a reference to the article appeared on the top of the front page of the print edition of the paper. The story, at the back on 11A, was a little too filled with various quotes from experts in the field for my taste, with no real context for readers to grasp why the news is so important.
This graph encapsulates the importance of this news item: 
What this graph shows is the observations of emissions (as calculated by the IEA) represented by the black curve and 5 of the 6 emissions scenarios used by the IPCC AR4 in colored lines. The SRES begin in 2000, which was the starting year used for future simulations in the AR4. You can clearly see the effects of the partial collapse of the global economy in 2009 emissions: they went from higher than the worst-case scenario to the middle of the pack.
In 2010, however, emissions jumped back up to the top of the pack, almost as if 2009 never even happened. I would be willing to bet the 2011 numbers will demonstrate a further increase.
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Tue Feb 22, 2011 at 12:34:05 PM MST
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I've written about Arctic sea ice conditions for a couple of years now. As I've written new posts, I've tried to include information regarding the science behind the conditions being written. 2010 was a particularly bad year for Arctic ice, as conditions were recorded to be well below average conditions for months at a time. Arctic ice in September 2010 challenged the record low minimum extent observed in the modern era in 2007. My summary conclusion after paying attention to Arctic sea ice is this: the Arctic has entered into a new climatic regime. Conditions are now regularly quite different than those observed in the past couple hundred years. I'm going to provide a broader look at this topic in this post.
When I have written about climatic changes, especially in the context of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's 4th Assessment Report Physical Science Basis (IPCC 4AR WG1), I have increasingly mentioned the disturbing fact that the IPCC's projections were far too conservative to be of real use to policy makers. The reason is both simple and complex. Simply put, the IPCC focused on moderate greenhouse pollution scenarios that were better researched. The biggest problem with that is the globe's actual emissions path is following the worst-case scenario (A1FI) considered by the IPCC 4AR (courtesy of Hansen and Sato; data through 2010):
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