“Low Flows, Hot Trout"
Report Details Climate Change in Clark Fork Watershed
By Robert Struckman, 7-17-08
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A new report by the Missoula-based nonprofit Clark Fork Coalition provides a comprehensive view of how global climate change has affected - and will likely affect - western Montana and north Idaho.
“We view this as a starting point for discussion and a motivator for action,” said Clark Fork Coalition director Karen Knudsen. Temperatures in the report’s coverage area increased, on average by 1.4 degrees Fahrenheit over the past 50 years and may well continue to warm, over the next 100 years, by another 5.4 degrees.
The 36-page report, entitled “Low Flows, Hot Trout” (opens PDF), lays out its information on the Clark Fork River’s watershed in a business-like way. It starts with temperatures and precipitation and then goes into the water with stream flows and snow and extends into the backcountry with wildfires and wildlife.
Almost everyone has anecdotes about how climate change plays out - whether it’s the wildfires or the warm autumns or the longer gardening season. This report uses a broad array of data, and then puts those anecdotes into context. The rivers are getting warmer. The glaciers are receding. The growing season is getting longer.
“It turns out that we’re undergoing a big shift,” Knudsen said. The data strongly suggests the warming trend will have a significant impact on the region. It’ll punish those things - wolverines and arctic graylings among them - that rely on a colder world. It could also prompt more conflicts between humans and wildlife.
For instance, as the whitebark pines continue to suffer from beetle infestations, its oil-rich pine nut will not be available for grizzlies in the fall. Those grizzlies will need to search elsewhere for food, perhaps in apple orchards or other places close to people.
But warmer weather will be kinder to other species. Whitetail deer and elk are able to forage more easily on bushes that get buried by snow during long, cold winters. And wolves may flourish, too.
The fully sourced report, which cost about $30,000 to produce, also provides a general blueprint for mitigating the impacts of the warming trend by getting a handle on development, protecting vital areas for wildlife and conserving water, so more can remain in the rivers.
“We want to lead a discussion about investing in restoration dollars, about healthy and resilient rivers and land-use decisions, and where we want to build and develop,” Knudsen said.
The report forms the basis of a campaign which Knudsen said will take her and others of her 1,500-member organization to 12 communities over the next six weeks throughout the region, from Deer Lodge to Sandpoint and beyond.
“At this point, we’re looking to fill the community dialogue gap,” Knudsen said. “There’s no reason why we have to stand on the sidelines.”
On July 29, from noon to 1:15 p.m., the Clark Fork Coalition will launch the publication with a free luncheon, open to the public, at its offices at 104 S. 4th St. W. The Coalition is also planning a summit on this subject in the fall.
The Clark Fork Coalition is a 1,500-member organization with a staff of seven and an annual budget of about $540,000. Its money comes, in roughly equal parts, from charitable foundations and members. Its mission is to protect and restore the Clark Fork watershed.
[End of article]Dr. Roger Pielke, Sr. has a perspective on studies like this one: http://climatesci.org/2008/07/17/publication-of-hypotheses-an-example-of-the-misuse-of-science/
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The conclusion of the paper even recognizes the serious limitation of this paper.
“There are worryingly large biases in the simulation of present-day extremes, which imply
that the modeled future values may be biased. To improve estimates of the probability of extremely high temperatures in the coming decades, good observational data sets and investigations into the reasons for model biases affecting extreme temperatures are needed. However, even with these uncertainties, a 10% chance of exceeding 48±C every decade at any point in the red regions of Fig. 3b is a risk that should be taken seriously.”
Yet the article was still accepted by the journal! Having served as Chief Editor of two major professional journals (the Monthly Weather Review and the Journal of Atmospheric Sciences), I am aware of what constitutes a valid scientific contribution. This paper, however, is an embarrassment to the science community. There is no way to test their conclusions, yet it will be used by some policymakers to promote their particular perspective on the climate change subject.
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and this: http://climatesci.org/2008/07/16/earth-system-governanace-report-on-a-new-ihdp-initiative/
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The article writes
“Earth System Governance entails decision-making about human and environmental interaction from the smallest to the biggest scales: in grass-roots, non-profit, and non-governmental organisations, and city, country, and world-wide governments.”
The article includes the text
“…we understand earth system governance as a political project that engages more and more actors who seek to strengthen the current architecture of institutions and networks at local and global levels. And, in both meanings, we see earth system governance as a demanding and vital subject of research for the social sciences.
Yet such research is no easy undertaking. It must bring together a variety of disciplines in the social sciences— including political science, sociology, policy studies, geography, and law. It must span the entire globe because only integrated global solutions can ensure a sustainable co-evolution of natural and socio-economic systems. But it must also draw on local experiences and insights and offer solutions to local governance problems. In other words, research on institutions and governance in times of earth system transformation must be about people who are drivers of global environmental change and at the same time part of any solution. It must be about places in all their variety and diversity, yet seek to integrate place-based research in a global understanding of the overall challenge to steer human interaction vis-à-vis earth system transformation. Eventually, this research will need to be about our planet. It is the task of developing integrated systems of governance, from the local to the global level, that ensure the sustainable development of the coupled socio-ecological system that the Earth has become.”
This article and position of the IHDP illustrates that the subject of “global warming” (and climate change more generally) is not what the debate is about. The concept of global warming is being used to promote a fundamental reconfiguration of society. This explains, at least in part, why the climate findings and recommendations that have been raised in such assessments as the 2005 National Research Council report on the climate system have been ignored.
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Nay sayers like Craigie seem to abound simply for the purpose of preventing any pro-active thinking--or reducing its impact on the negative influences which accompany prolifereation of homo sapiens...
Comment By Milton, 7-18-08I sometimes find it useful to take global warming out of the references. They imply man made change. I personally believe in the concept of global warming. However,if we just understand that there is warming and do the simplest things to mitigate it's effects like water catchments to hold back runoff. The we can move ahead early,quicker with less argument. Eventually I think ever more of the nay sayers will come around,but it might be easier to go forward with more neutral rhetoric.
Comment By steve kelly, 7-18-08Applied science is never perfect. Nay sayers always seem to have all the answers, while never accomplishing much before the horses are all out of the barn. The Coalition is providing a much-needed public service that we're not getting from government. I thank them for taking the lead.
Comment By Craig Moore, 7-18-08Milton, I agree we need to do things that make sense like addressing drought and mitigating its effects through catchments. Same is true with floods. Do what makes sense.
Comment By Craig Moore, 7-18-08I love how the catch-all labels are tossed around: nay sayers, denialists and the like. Personally, I have never denied climate change, and, in fact, have stated that the climate is always in a state of flux. I have commented here at NW for over 2 years regarding climate change.
The catchall excuse that lays blame for everything on global warming is long and useless. Perhaps unfairly I see the Clark Fork global wariming study just one more on the pile like jellyfish falling from the sky. See: http://www.numberwatch.co.uk/warmlist.htm
By way of Australia we have this as to what is happening now: http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/files/080718opedboltglobalcooling.pdf
By way of India we have this from The Hindu: http://www.hindu.com/2008/07/10/stories/2008071055521000.htm
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Challenging the basis of Kyoto Protocol
Vladimir Radyuhin
Russian scientists deny that the Kyoto Protocol reflects a consensus view of the world scientific community.
As western nations step up pressure on India and China to curb the emission of greenhouse gases, Russian scientists reject the very idea that carbon dioxide may be responsible for global warming.
Russian critics of the Kyoto Protocol, which calls for cuts in CO2 emissions, say that the theory underlying the pact lacks scientific basis. Under the Theory of Anthropogenic Global Warming, it is human-generated greenhouse gases, and mainly CO2, that cause climate change. “The Kyoto theorists have put the cart before the horse,” says renowned Russian geographer Andrei Kapitsa. “It is global warming that triggers higher levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, not the other way round.”
Russian researchers made this discovery while studying ice cores recovered from the depth of 3.5 kilometres in Antarctica. Analysis of ancient ice and air bubbles trapped inside revealed the composition of the atmosphere and air temperature going back as far as 400,000 years.
“We found that the level of CO2 had fluctuated greatly over the period but at any given time increases in air temperature preceded higher concentrations of CO2,” says academician Kapitsa, who worked in Antarctica for many years. Russian studies showed that throughout history, CO2 levels in the air rose 500 to 600 years after the climate warmed up. Therefore, higher concentrations of greenhouse gases registered today are the result, not the cause, of global warming.
Critics of the CO2 role in climate change point out that water vapours are a far more potent factor in creating the greenhouse effect as their concentration in the atmosphere is five to 10 times higher than that of CO2. “Even if all CO2 were removed from the earth atmosphere, global climate would not become any cooler,” says solar physicist Vladimir Bashkirtsev.
The hypothesis of anthropogenic greenhouse gases was born out of computer modelling of climate changes. Russian scientists say climate models are inaccurate since scientific understanding of many natural climate factors is still poor and cannot be properly modelled. Oleg Sorokhtin of the Russian Academy of Sciences Institute of Ocean Studies, and many other Russian scientists maintain that global climate depends predominantly on natural factors, such as solar activity, precession (wobbling) of the Earth’s axis, changes in ocean currents, fluctuations in saltiness of ocean surface water, and some other factors, whereas industrial emissions do not play any significant role. Moreover, greater concentrations of CO2 are good for life on Earth, Dr. Sorokhtin argues, as they make for higher crop yields and faster regeneration of forests.
“There were periods in the history of the Earth when CO2 levels were a million times higher than today, and life continued to evolve quite successfully,” agrees Vladimir Arutyunov of the Russian Academy of Sciences Institute of Chemical Physics.
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In my opinion, when the scholared PHD's disagree, that is even more reason just do what makes sense at the local level to address local issues.
Quoting Russians who live in a closed non democratic society that is also a major exporter of oil and the biggest user of oil per capita in the world does not tend to bolster one's argument. Yhe only thing keeping Putin's gang in office is the high price of oil. I have read quite a bit on the greenland and Antarctic ice profiles and never has the CO2 been anywhere near a million times higher than now. As a matter of fact most scientists believe that if it doubles where we are at now we are doomed. Global warming caused be people does also cause natural processes to speed up adding even more carbon to the atmosphere. The melting of the permafrost of the northern tundras may cause runnaway CO2 production in which case we are in big trouble. More warming causes more water vapor. We may have already gone too far as the earth is warming quite a bit faster than the scientists thought it would. We are already in some cases where they thought we would be in 20-30 years as far as Greenland melting and the acrtic ice breakup. Desalinating ocean water is a bad idea and causes yet more ecological problems. Over time irrigation causes long term problems. We need to get rid of grass lawns. Global warming aside we,America,needs to get away from importing oil. It is a major national security issue. Eventually electric cars will take up the slack and until then plug in hybrids may have to do the job. For the 3 trillion dollars we have spent in Iraq we could all already be driving plug-in hybrids. Eventually we will have to replace fossil fuels altogether. That bank account is starting to run dry and has been poisoning us all along anyway. Clean coal is an oxymoron. There is no such thing nor will there ever likely be any such thing. It is not even about CO2. It is about mercury,arsenic,uranium,selenium and a dozen or so other deadly things in the ash.
Comment By Craig Moore, 7-20-08Milton, thank you for the respectful discussion. First, the Russian scientists were not in support of Putin's position. Read the whole of the Hindu article. Second, I see your last comment as validating Dr. Pielke's opinion as to what the debate is about as I quoted above. As to Dr. Pielke, there is this: ecoworld.com/blog/2008/07/18/climatologist-roger-pielke-sr/
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Climatologist Roger Pielke Sr.
Posted on: July 18th, 2008 by Ed Ring
Despite the relentless media assault declaring debate is over, catastrophic climate change is just around the corner, and immediate and drastic curtailment of anthropogenic CO2 emissions are our only chance of survival, there remains significant debate in the scientific community. Rather than attempt to refrain what has become countless takes on this point (see links below), this post is to highlight the ongoing dialogue and findings on http://www.climatesci.org, operated by research scientist Roger Pielke Sr. at the University of Colorado, Boulder.
Our interest in Pielke’s work is based on two key factors: (1) His international reputation for integrity remains intact even among the alarmist community, and (2) his nuanced position on climate change which places a greater emphasis on the impact of land use changes than on anthropogenic CO2 emissions, as well as a greater emphasis on identifying and mitigating regional climate changes. Pielke’s Climate Science blog is written for scientists and researchers, but is sufficiently intelligible to a lay person to merit close attention. Typically Pielke will identify a peer reviewed study by a credible climate scientist that has been ignored by the IPCC, the “consensus” scientific community, the media, and policymakers. He will then summarize the findings and explain the significance of the study. If you follow Pielke’s blog, your perception of climate change alarm - and the attendant policies it is being used to justify - may radically shift...
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While i agree that all professional groups are capable of following fads. I think the basics of climate change are true. However,as an American, i think we need to be energy independent and we need to get away from fossil fuels because we don't have enough of our own oil and coal will poison us. That essentially leaves leaves most of the options available as the same as those for stopping global warming. Two roads to the same end.
Comment By Bryson D., 3-28-09The effect of Climate Change is now felt in every side of the world..However, we cannot solve the problem if we just vanish at one side doing nothing but to wait for the next episode wherein the fact there are lots of things that we can contribute in our own little ways..The World Water Forum just met for the fifth time in Istanbul (not Constantinople) to talk about the state of the world's water. The amount of water in the world seems to be receding. Before a shortage happens, most world governments agree that something needs to be done about it, even if it means taking out a payday loan or two to help out. Changes in the world water supply have been brought about by climate changes. The consensus among the political and scientific community is that we have to get every nation in on the <a >World Water Forum</a>. So why did Istanbul get the water works? That's nobody's business but the Turks.
This article was printed from www.newwest.net at the following URL: http://www.newwest.net/city/article/report_clark_fork_watershed_is_warming/C8/L8/