So this week, we're taking a look at fascinating and compelling "executive dashboard" reports on the environment - earth intelligence instead of business intelligence. Today, we're kicking it off with charts from the National Climatic Data Center, NASA Earth Observatory, and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
First, we try to answer the question. How hot is it?
The answer seems to be: plenty hot.
Here in the United States, the average termperature has risen from 52 Farenheit to 54 Farenheit, a rise of roughly 4% since 1900 (or about 1.4 degrees Centigrade).
Taking a step back and looking at global temperatures, it appears that global temperatures are on the same trend. The chart below, from NASA, shows that temperature anomalies have also been getting higher (i.e., hotter) since the early 1900s. That's variation upwards of .5 degrees Centigrade from 1900 to 2000.
Source: NASA Earth Observatory
Is a rise of 0.5 degrees Centigrade a big deal?
Apparently so. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change took a look at average temperatures, starting with tens of thousands of years back. A depression in average temperature of less than 1 degree Centigrade was termed the "Little Ice Age" - this was around the 15th-18th centuries.
A really bad ice age is a downward variation of over 4 degrees Centigrade.
Source: International Panel on Climate Change
But we don't apparently need to worry about skinning mastodons for fur coats - we are going to be experiencing the opposite problem. The IPCC forecasts that in the next 100 years the temperature will rise by 3 degrees Centigrade.
How will that impact us?
It already is impacting us, apparently, in dramatic ways. In the summer of 2002, the Antarctic Peninsula lost 1,250 square miles (3,250 square kilometers) of ice shelf, in less than a month.
Collapse of the Larsen B ice shelf in 2002.
Blue rivulets indicate streams of water.
For the full time-sequence images from NASA Earth Observatory, click here.
Closer to home, Glacier National Park just lost two of its named glaciers to melting. In a decade, the remaining 25 named glaciers may also be gone. In order for a glacier to be big enough to qualify for a name, it has to be at least 25 acres large.
Source: Associated Press
Matthew Brown of the Associated Press tracked down Dan Fagre of the US Geological Survey, who has been having a difficult time measuring the glaciers at all, due to their rapid rate of change:"When we're measuring glacier margins, by the time we go home the glacier is already smaller than what we've measured," Fagre said.
The impact of fewer glaciers is reduced water flow for fish and a much greater risk of forest fires.
Stay tuned for more Earth Day postings this week.
