Friday, September 4, 2009

1. CLIMATE CHANGE: HOTTEST ARCTIC SUMMER IN 2,000 YEARS.

A major study published in today's Science marks a seminal advance in climate change research. Sediments from Arctic lakes were used to compile proxy temperature records for the last 2000 years. Arctic summer temperature declined for thousands of years due to a shift in Earth's orbit. Although the orbital shift has been going on for 8000 years and will continue, an increase in greenhouse gases produced by the Industrial Revolution overpowered the cooling trend. The warming has been more rapid since about 1950. Moreover, thawing permafrost will release methane into the atmosphere, accelerating warming. The latest study comes just months after scientists at NOAA warned that within the next 30 years Arctic sea ice could vanish completely during the summer; that will further accelerate warming due to decline in reflective ice cover.

2. CLIMATE SOLUTIONS: IN THE LONG RUN, THERE IS ONLY ONE.

Even as the study on Arctic warming was making its way into print, a group at the controversial Copenhagen Consensus Center proposed a quick geo- engineered solution to global warming. The group is headed by statistician Bjorn Lomborg, a follower of the late Julian Simon, the libertarian economist at the University of Maryland, who believed there are no limits. Lomborg proposes puffing lots of white clouds into the atmosphere to reflect sunlight. It would be the perfect job for Lomborg, who has been puffing clouds of obscurantism since he wrote The Skeptical Environmentalist (Cambridge, 2001). Presumably we should just keep puffing out bigger white clouds to compensate for the ever growing population.

3. MAGNETIC FIELDS: THE PRECAUTIONARY PRINCIPLE IN ACTION.

According to Denis Le Bihan at the CEA-Saclay Centre, a European directive to prevent workers from being exposed to high magnetic fields could severely impact research into Ultrahigh-Field MRI which shows great promise particularly in neurological applications. It is particularly frustrating that limits on static magnetic fields resulted from the paranoia surrounding EMF, which was associated with everything from power lines to cell phones, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and other wireless devices. As I pointed out in an editorial in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute eight years ago, "there will always be some who will argue that the issue has not been completely settled. In science, few things ever are."

4. LOW-EARTH ORBIT: TWO PIECES OF SPACE JUNK PASS IN THE NIGHT.

A portion of a European Arianne 5 rocket passed within a mile of the ISS and the shuttle Discovery. There are about 19,000 objects larger than 10 cm that are known to be in low-Earth orbit. This piece was much larger, but even a 10 cm piece of junk is big enough to bring down the ISS. As serious as the space junk problem is, the ISS is far more likely to be brought down by a piece of paper bearing the report of the Augustine panel. The panel has presumably delivered its report to the White House. Norm Augustine is scheduled to testify on the group’s findings in back-to-back hearings before the House and Senate on Sep 15-16.

Bob Park can be reached via email at whatsnew@bobpark.org
THE UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND
Opinions are the author's and are not necessarily shared by the University, but they should be.