EXTREME ARCTIC FEAR

SUMMARY: Abrupt warming in Arctic could lead to catastrophic consequences says top scientist Dr. Peter Gleick, ICCI Director Pam Pearson, and the founder of Paleoceanography, Dr. James Kennett. Three must-listen interviews.

"What is happening in the Arctic now is unprecedented & possibly catastrophic."

That's the Tweet heard around the world at the end of February. It was picked up by the Independent newspaper in the UK, and many other places in the alternative and climate-savy media. Robert Hunziker did a strong piece about it in CounterPunch called "The Arctic Turns Ugly".

The Tweeter is a world-known scientist. Dr. Peter Gleick is a member of the US National Academy of Science, he's a MacArthur Fellow, and President of the Pacific Institute. He was a guest on Radio Ecoshock in March 2014 (find the blog and links for that audio here).

Download or listen to this Radio Ecoshock show in CD Quality (56 MB) or Lo-Fi (14 MB)

Or listen on Soundcloud right now.



DR. PETER GLEICK WARNS OF POSSIBLE ARCTIC CATASTROPHE

Why is it warming so much - is it just "El Nino" or is it really climate change? Generally, scientists say El Nino affects the Pacific, but not the Arctic. Most of the strange warming in the Arctic this past winter (with record low sea ice) is due to our heating the atmosphere, and not El Nino.

I ask Peter Gleick, why he is alarmed about this, and is that concern shared by other scientists?

Dr. Peter Gleick

The United Kingdom has practically been buried by storm after record-breaking storm this winter. Peter Gleick thinks abnormal weather is directly connected to big changes in the Arctic. That's the new understanding, led by scientists like Dr. Jennifer Francis of Rutgers University. The Jet Stream has been altered by the fact that there is less temperature difference between the poles and the equatorial zones. The oceans are hotter. The land is hotter, and in some places drier. All these things change the weather.

I worry an abrupt shift in climate could happen, and the corporate media would still bury us in Donald Trump and the Kardashians. Do you think climate silence is a conspiracy by a few major media corporations - or is it possible that all of us are so addicted to fossil fuels, we really don't want to know?

To be honest, I can barely bring myself to read the latest news. Maybe the problems in the Arctic are just too big to comprehend, or just too scary to face? Is it worthwhile to keep fighting, if all we can do is slow down the loss - and the damage, for the next generation?

There is, says Gleick, a big difference between a civilization facing severe challenges as the Earth warms, and a planet where climate changes so far and so fast that civilization cannot cope or adapt. We'll have to make major efforts to adapt to what we have already done. We can't continue to make it worse. So "yes" it is worth keeping up the fight.

Let's say Greenland ice loss doubles or triples, and the Arctic sea ice disappears for most of the year. Gleick agrees nobody knows what would happen. When we change the greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, we are running a giant experiment on the Earth. It's already out of control.

Gleick is a senior scientist, recognized around the world. When he suggests a "catastrophe" might be developing, is that language too extreme? He tells us that again, no one can say for sure, but our current path is taking us to climate changes so extreme it could easily become a catatastrophe.

Find out more about Dr. Peter Gleick, at the Pacific Institute. The web site is pacinst.org. Peter is author of many scientific papers and nine books, many of them reporting on world freshwater resources.

Download or listen to this 13 minute Radio Ecoshock interview with Peter Gleick in CD Quality or Lo-Fi.

You can Tweet out this interview with Peter Gleik using this tiny url: http://tinyurl.com/h53exrb

PAM PEARSON - CROSSING THRESHOLDS OF THE CRYOSPHERE

A surprising amount of Planet Earth is frozen. It's been that way for millions of years, all during our life and evolution. Last December, the world's leading experts on this frozen land and sea - warned Earth is heading into irreversible loss in the cryosphere. Nothing short of an ice age can avoid incredible changes that will re-arrange sea levels, cities, and life as we know it. Practically nobody heard them.

Scientists and civil servants who know this danger gathered into a largely volunteer group called the International Cryosphere Climate Initiative, known as ICCI. They've issued a report called "Thresholds and Closing Windows, Risks of Irreversible Cryosphere Climate Change". We are joined by one of the co-ordinators of that report, Pam Pearson, the Director of ICCI. In fact, she founded this network of ice science specialists just as the 2009 Copenhagen climate talks failed.

Pam Pearson

Get an overview and link to download report "Thresholds and Closing Windows" here.

Here is what the ICCI says in a summary about this report:

"Policy makers and the general public alike now largely accept that the Arctic, Antarctica and many mountain regions already have warmed two-three times faster than the rest of the planet. What is less understood, outside the scientific community, is that the very nature of the cryosphere – regions of snow and ice – carries dynamics that once triggered, in some cases cannot be reversed, even with a return to lower temperatures or CO2 levels."

The Cryosphere breaks down into 4 important components, all acting differently on different time scales:

1. Ice sheets (polar land-based ice)

2. Mountain glaciers (retreating everywhere around the world)

3. Permafrost (up to 20% of the Earth's land mass is "permanently" frozen, except it's not. It's thawing.)

4. Arctic and Antarctic sea ice (floating on ice surface, does not add to rising seas, but does increase warming when melting back and exposing darker ocean water to sunlight.)

The report also covers Polar Ocean acidification.

I think the first thing to grasp is that politics and propaganda can't change a simple fact of physics: once the temperature goes over 0 degrees C, or 32 Fahrenheit, water changes state from ice or snow to a liquid. We can't talk our way out of that. The report says:

"Cryosphere climate change is not like air or water pollution, where the impacts remain local and when addressed, allow ecosystems largely to recover. Cryosphere climate change, driven by the physical laws of water’s response to the freezing point, is different. Slow to manifest itself, once triggered it inevitably forces the Earth’s climate system into a new state, one that most scientists believe has not existed for 35–50 million years."

The Arctic has been unbelievably hot this past winter. It rained in the dark of December, and I just read the Arctic February was more like the temperature expected in June.

But the ice-world is not just thawing at the Poles. I remember years ago the famous nature TV star Steve Irwin lamenting that tropical glaciers were disappearing. Now this report says that even if the Paris climate deal is carried out, we can still expect: "Complete loss of most mountain glaciers."

IRREVERSIBLE LOSS OF ICE

The Fifth Assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the IPCC, DID say that many aspects of climate change are "largely irreversible on human time scales." But they buried that on page one thousand and thirty three of a fat report that hardly anyone reads!

About two dozen scientists published an open letter in the Guardian newspaper last December, urging more action to protect the cryosphere, at the Paris climate talks.

I found it fascinating that this ICCI report devoted a chapter to acidification of the polar seas. We know oceans become more acidic due to a chemical reaction with the carbon dioxide we keep adding to the atmosphere. But I haven't seen much about this at the Poles. It's happening even worse there, as colder water can absorb more carbon, which becomes carbolic acid. Northern fisheries and all marine life are threatened by this change.

THAWING PERMAFROST

I've done several shows on thawing permafrost. Scientists in Canada, Scandinavia, Russia and Alaska are most interested, but so are the people who live in those lands full-time. Is there a tipping point where once permafrost starts to go, it can fuel it's own further thawing? Apparently so.

The ICCI report says of permafrost thaw: "any carbon release [is] not reversible even with [a] new Ice Age, except on geologic time scales." I found that in a couple of places in the report. Even a new Ice Age may not be able to return Earth to the state known for millions of years! Most scientists say that the next possible date for an ice age, based on the tilt of the Earth's axis, - that ice age will not happen due to the warming gases we have already added to the atmosphere. So count that out.

You can find out more about melting permafrost as a driver to global climate change here.

WHAT ABOUT THE FROZEN METHANE - THE CLATHRATES?

One thing I found missing in this report is the threat of melting of frozen methane on the sea-bed, known as clathrates. Other scientists see clathrates as a likely driver in past extinction events. Why isn't it in this ICCI report? Pam tells us the science about clathrate melting is not yet sure. Some scientists say that for now, the methane released in Arctic waters is likely to be absorbed in the water column, before it reaches the surface and the atmosphere. Others, like Dr. Shahkova, say their research shows methane is already being released in the Arctic, more and more.

The authors of the ICCI report already had four irreversible certainties to report. They didn't want to add the clathrate problem until more finished science is in. Some of their scientists disagreed. It's not settled. See what our next guest, Dr. James Kennett has to say!

ABANDONING OUR COASTAL CITIES - IS THAT "ADAPTING"?

Here is one more paragraph from the stunning introduction to this report "Thresholds and Closing Windows":

"Adaptation to the levels of projected climate-related disruption, particularly sea-level rise that cannot be halted and accelerates over the centuries, simply will not be possible without massive migration and other changes to human centers of population and infrastructure, that will carry enormous economic and not least, historic and cultural costs."

Basically: humans will have to leave their coastal cities behind, and the some of the most fertile near-ocean river estuaries that now support many millions of people.

According to this ICCI report: "The only way fully to avoid these risks is never to let temperatures rise into these risk zones at all." After the climate is broken, and the cryosphere starts it's unstoppable melt, there is no way to "fix" it.

Find out more about the International Cryosphere Climate Initiative at iccinet.org.

Download or listen to this 27 minute Radio Ecoshock interview with Pam Pearson in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

You can Tweet out this interview using this tiny url: http://tinyurl.com/hauvzt6

DR. JAMES KENNETT - ABRUPT CLIMATE CHANGE FOUND IN THE PAST

Just 10 years ago, scientists told me melting the world's ice system would take thousands of years. Since then, with the shocking ice loss at both poles, we're not so sure. Abrupt climate change is possible. We're about to explore what can happen within one lifetime - that has already happened in the ancient past.

To find the clues, we dig into the sea bed with a founding expert in the field. Our guest is recognized as the father of that science, called Paleoceanography. He started publishing in the 1960's. He wrote the standard college textbook "Marine Geology", and founded a journal on this subject.

Dr. James Kennett

Dr. James Kennett is Emeritus Professor of Marine Geology and Paleocoeanography, in the Earth Science Department of the University of California, Santa Barbara.

For me, the startling results of this study, published October 2015 in the Journal Paleoceanography, is what could happen in just 50 years, easily within a single lifetime.

The paper name sounds very technical, but don't let that scare you off this interview. Kennett explains things very clearly, and it's one of the most important interviews I've done recently. The title is: "Abrupt termination of Marine Isotope Stage 16 (Termination VII) at 631.5?ka in Santa Barbara Basin, California".

You can read about this Santa Barbara Basin research in this helpful AGU article by Julie Cohen.

We learn in this paper that about 630,000 years ago, there was a relatively rapid shift out of a cold glacier period, to an interglacial period that was a lot warmer. The whole process took about 700 years - BUT it started with an abrupt temperature rise in only 50 years! Kennett tells Julie Cohen:

“Of the 13 degree Fahrenheit total change, a shift of 7 to 9 degrees occurred almost immediately right at the beginning.”

WHEN YELLOWSTONE BLEW UP

What do catastrophic events in Yellowstone Park have to do with all this? Well first of all, Kennett has studied and written papers on the Yellowstone Caldera, the giant hole in the ground blown out in an ancient explosion. He told science journalist Julie Cohen:

“Our tests showed that this particular ash was ejected from the Yellowstone volcanic caldera in Wyoming, which has exactly the same fingerprint. This huge caldera formed about 630,000 years ago, with most of the enormous volume of ash blown to the east. However, this eruption was so explosive that the ash reached the Santa Barbara Basin, forming a layer one to two inches thick. The discovery of this ash helped with dating the core.”

Kennett tells Radio Ecoshock listeners there were in fact two gigantic blasts at Yellowstone, about 200 years apart. The first was followed by a cloud that rolled around the Northern Hemisphere, blocking out the summer sun, and creating an instant cooling, similar to a "nuclear winter". The second created an even longer constant winter.

ANOTHER SCIENTIST WORRIED ABOUT CLATHRATES AND ABRUPT CLIMATE CHANGE

Some of our listeners are deeply worried about much more global warming methane being released in our current climate shift. This paper talks about: "repeated discharges of methane from methane hydrates associated with both ocean warming and low sea level." Did that methane erupt from the West Coast of North America, or from the Arctic? Kennett says more methane has been measured all down the Canadian and American West Coast in recent years, bubbling up from the sea floor. Hotter oceans are already starting the first signs of clathrate melting. It's happening off the U.S. East Coast too.

This seasoned scientist is deeply concerned about the potential super warming effect of methane releases, as the oceans warm. He's not shy to tell us that, and you should listen. Dr. Kennett suggests that melting clathrates likely triggered the rapid 50 year warming found about 630,000 years ago. But we do not know for certain yet.

This paper did not speculate on a comparison of this 50-year shift a few hundred thousand years ago, and human-induced warming today. But personally, I wonder if we will see a similar deglaciation within a single human lifetime. Have we already entered this process?

I wonder what climate modellers like David Archer will think, after his book "The Long Thaw". Is there disagreement about how fast deglaciation can take place? Yes and no, says Kennett. Everyone who studies ice knows it can take hundreds to thousands of years for a giant glacier like the one covering Greenland to melt. On the other hand, he tells us, there is a big scientific consensus that quite rapid temperature changes have taken place many times in the past. It's both.

After the call, Jim told me that their research team wants to return to the Santa Barbara Basin to drill even deeper cores. These would tell us a lot about the history of Earth's climate and life, including methane releases, going back 1.2 million years. However, there is a lot of oil and gas drilling in that same basin, plus a very environmentally concerned community in California. So far, the scientists have not received permission to go back and open up this critical chapter in Earth's records.

Dr. James Kennett has published hundreds of papers, starting in 1962 right up to the present.

Download or listen to this 21 minute interview with Dr. James Kennett in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

You can Tweet out this Kennett interview using this tiny url: http://tinyurl.com/zd9mwrk

Here is a You tube video on abrupt climate change: "Expecting the Unexpected" with senior scientists like Richard Alley warning us all.

EARTH NOW WARMING FIFTY TIME FASTER

Here's an important article in the UK Guardian newspaper "Earth now warming 50X faster than coming out of last ice age".

That article says:

"What humans are in the process of doing to the climate makes the transition out of the last ice age look like a casual stroll through the park. We’re already warming the Earth about 20 times faster than during the ice age transition, and over the next century that rate could increase to 50 times faster or more. We’re in the process of destabilizing the global climate far more quickly than happens even in some of the most severe natural climate change events."

This paper, led by R.E. Kopp, is covered here in the Real Climate blog here.

The full citiation for the new science is:

R.E. Kopp, A.C. Kemp, K. Bittermann, B.P. Horton, J.P. Donnelly, W.R. Gehrels, C.C. Hay, J.X. Mitrovica, E.D. Morrow, and S. Rahmstorf, "Temperature-driven global sea-level variability in the Common Era", Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, pp. 201517056, 2016. http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1517056113

The actual paper abstract is here.

That was one fully loaded Ecoshock show. I hope you found it useful. You can download all our past programs as free .mp3 files from our web site at http://www.ecoshock.org/ You can also listen to our more recent programs, for free, using the player at our soundcloud page.

Alex Smith, your host and producer at Radio Ecoshock.

Abrupt Climate Change - Yes

Scientist Paul Beckwith speaks out on Arctic methane and abrupt climate change - and ways to stave it off. Scientist Douglas McCauley, University of California: industrializing the ocean could lead to mass extinction of marine animals. Radio Ecoshock 150128

Download or listen to this Radio Ecoshock show in CD Quality (56 MB) or Lo-Fi (14 MB)

Or listen on Soundcloud right now!



It's a long blog this week. There are so many big stories to cover. You may have to take it in pieces. Anyone who followed all the links, and watched the videos on offer, would likely get the equivalent of a week or two of a college course on climate change.

If you came for the big story on extinction in the oceans, scroll down a couple of page/screens to my interview with Dr. Douglas McCauley.

INTO THE RED ZONE

According to one climate scientist, "We are at the extreme weather stage and rapidly heading into the red zone." That is when "all hell breaks loose". Who else says so? Your insurance company. Both Lloyd's of London and Zurich Insurance in Switzerland just warned of extreme weather events coming this year of 2015.

The climate scientist is Paul Beckwith from the University of Ottawa. He has two Masters Degrees, and is working on his PHD in climate science. Paul lives out the late Steven Schneider's call for scientists that communicate. I follow Paul's Tweets, Facebook page, and You tube videos to see what's new and what's hot.

Paul is this week's feature guest on Radio Ecoshock.

We've tons to talk about, after the hottest year on record, climate talks in Lima, Peru - Paul was there - and still more alarming news coming out of the Arctic.

SHOULD YOU FEAR A 50 GIGATON METHANE BURST IN THE ARCTIC?

Before we get to that important stuff, I ask for Paul's help in a little fact-checking. A couple of people seem to have misunderstandings about the possible 50 gigaton burst of methane suggested by Dr. Natalia Shahkova from the University of Alaska, and her Russian colleagues.

One You tube speaker says this 50 gig burst has already begun. As Paul tells us, that is not correct. Yes methane emissions from the Arctic are increasing due to melting of frozen methane ("clathrates") on the sea bed, and from melting permafrost. But the increased methane is in the order of millions of tons, not billions of tons (also known as gigatons.)

Another scientist on You tube says the Shakhova's 50 gigaton release could happen "any day now". Yes, that's technically true. But the eruption depends on more than just melting sea ice. It also requires some sort of undersea event, whether an earthquake, or a land-slide under the sea, for example. That would release the methane held many meters below the sediment.

I give the example of Vancouver, where seismologists say an earthquake is over-due, based on past records. They've been saying it could happen any time for the past 35 years or more. The great West Coast quake could happen tomorrow, or it could happen 200 years from now, or 500 years.

I'm not a scientist, but I think I heard the last major release of methane from under the sea is thought to be over 8,000 years ago. [See more on this from P. Beckwith below.] So don't sell your house and move to Alaska or the Yukon based solely on fear of a methane burst.

That doesn't mean I'm saying it won't happen, or that I'm not seriously concerned about rising methane levels in the Arctic. It is a mega-threat, as some Arctic scientists say. There will come a point, and we don't yet know when, that methane from the Arctic could overwhelm our own carbon dioxide emissions. We may already have crossed an unseen tipping point where this is unstoppable.

I'll have more about unseen tipping points in my coming interview with Dr. James White. Meanwhile, Paul Beckwith and other scientists in the Arctic Methane Emergency Group say we should try extreme means to restore the reflective cover of white ice on the top of the world. Paul says we could cool ocean currents going in the Arctic, while mimicking the impact of volcanoes, which can cool the Earth, or parts of it, for a few years.

One final fact check, before we head off into the real science. One scientist who needs to check his facts says in a You tube video that the British Parliament predicted all the Arctic sea ice could be gone by 2015. I thought this was really a presentation made by John Nissan of AMEG, and that the Parliamentary Committee rejected his prediction. Certainly the whole UK Parliament never met and agreed on a 2015 date for the disappearance of Arctic sea ice.

Anway, Paul writes:

"The undersea landslide idea that Shakhova is talking about is well covered in th[is] book by [James] Kennett: "Methane hydrates in Quaternary Climate change: The Clathrate Gun Hypothesis" [published in 2003].

[online book listing here. See also this free online paper by Kennett "Role of Methane Hydrates in Climate Change: Compellling evidence and debate."]

Beckwith continues:

"In particular, there were 3 "Storegga Slides" (see it in Wikipedia) that were amongst the largest known landslides. The latest was around 8200 years ago, and they may have released large amounts of methane.

Interestingly, rapid sea level change either up or down can trigger landslides. Down, since the pressure on the seafloor decreases that could trigger a methane release and cause a landslide, and up, since glaciated continents rebound from rapid ice loss."

Here is a key passage from Natalia Shakova, taken an interview by John Mason, in the Sceptical Science blog:

John Mason, Skeptical Science:

"With respect to future events, in your EGU 2008 abstract it is stated that "we consider release of up to 50Gt of predicted amount of hydrate storage as highly possible for abrupt release at any time". This represents a colossal quantity of gas. How quickly could such a release occur and what would be the most likely mechanism?"

Shakova:

"There could be several different triggers for massive releases: a seismic or tectonic event, endogenous seismicity caused by sediments subsiding pursuant to hydrate decay, or sediment sliding on the shelf break; the shelf slope is very steep, and the sedimentation rates are among the highest in the ESAS."

In our interview, Paul Beckwith also references an influential paper by another member of the AMEG group, Dr. Peter Wadhams, head of the Polar Institute at Cambridge. Here is the listing for the paper "Climate science: Vast cost of Arctic change" in the Journal Nature. Below the title are a number of blog articles you can use to follow up.

This article from the University of Cambridge hits the bleak note: "Cost of Arctic methane release could 'size of the global economy' warn experts."

The UK newspaper the Guardian has a good article on it too. "Ice-free Arctic in two years heralds methane catastrophe - scientist."

Do keep in mind that there is a whole school of scientists, including NASA's Gavin Schmidt and David Archer from the University of Chicago who either disagree that Arctic methane is a threat, or disagree that it warrants our attention. They suggest we keep our focus on man-made carbon dioxide, which we can control, and which will determine the fate of the earth for tens of thousands of years. Find my interview with Dr. David Archer on Arctic methane here.

METHANE COMING UP IN THE KARA SEA

Some new science out bears on what we've been talking about. Sub-sea permafrost is melting in the Kara Sea, unexpectedly releasing methane in shallow seas. This isn't the East Siberian shelf other scientists studied. How could those frozen balls of methane, the clathrates exist in such shallow water in the Kara Sea? Paul explains this well.

People who want to follow up on this story can search for the paper title: "Offshore permafrost decay and massive seabed methane escape in water depths less than 20 meteres at the South Kara Sea shelf" The lead author is Alexey Portnov.

Here is a good article about this Portnov paper.

The full paper, published in Geophysical Research Letters, is available free here

Paul Beckwith adds this comment on the Kara Sea research:

"The Kara Sea info adds more support to what I have said in the past to David Archer, and goes against the mainstream view that it will take 100s of years for heat to move downward in the permafrost to cause significant thawing."

Speaking of scary, Paul pointed me to a press release from NASA about increased solar radiation in the Arctic. We talk about that. Since 1970, the amount of heat being absorbed from the sun, in the Arctic with less sea ice cover, has gone up almost 5%. That doesn't sound like much, but it's a huge bump in solar heating of the Earth, because we are talking about a gigantic area. Read about it from the American Academy for the Advancement of Science here.

OH YEAH, AND ABRUPT CLIMATE CHANGE IS UNDERWAY!

Here is a link to Paul's video on abrupt climate change.

The cats in this video seem distracting but (a) you can't get anything to go viral on the Net these days without cats and (b) I think it's symbolic of how distracted we all are as we discuss these amazing threats. Even while you watch, you may also be thinking of your job, a TV series you like, the next Facebook post, and some trip you'd like to takes. And oh yeah, the climate may shift so Montreal Canada feels like Miami, and crops don't grow anymore.

In our interview, Beckwith says:

"...and the probability is very high, and increasing all the time, that we will have an abrupt change. I think it's going on myself, and that's the hypothesis of my whole research."

We talk about abrupt climate changes that have happened in the past. In times 40,000 to 70,000 years ago, the Greenland ice cores show a warming of 5 to 6 degrees C within one decade. (Imagine that today!). It has gone as high as 16 degree C change in one decade or two. (Unimaginable.)

"The planet is capable of very large, rapid swings in temperature. We've changed the chemistry of the atmosphere and CO2 and temperature and things, they are increasing at least an order of magniture, at least 10 or maybe 20 times faster than anything in the geological record."

"I think there's no question that we will have abrupt warming again on this planet. The only question is 'what is the time scale?' Is it going to be 10 years? Is it going to be a hundred years? Is it going to be a thousand years?

The system does change quickly. It goes from one state to another state. I mean it's not a linear thing. There's so many non-linear feed-backs at play that the system is quite capable of switching and switching very quickly."

I strongly suggest you listen to the interview.

Download/listen to this 33 minute interview with Paul Beckwith in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

GLOBAL RISK EXPERTS WARN OF TURBULENT DECADE AHEAD

The world's biggest insurance companies agree. Check out this report from Lloyd's.

"Risks to the environment outnumbered economic threats in the report this year, with experts negatively assessing the preparations in place to cope with extreme weather and climate change."

That report was prepared for the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland January 2015.

And then we have Zurich, another of the world's biggest insurance companies. Here are the five biggest risks rated by impact, according to a new report from Zurich:

1. Water crisis

2. Spread of infectious diseases

3. Weapons of mass destruction

4. Interstate conflict

5. Failure of climate change adaption.

I would say four out of the top five risks in terms of impact are climate-related. See if you can pick which ones. Strangely, Zurich lists biodiversity loss and ecosystem collapse at only number 10 in terms of impacts!!! If we experience "ecosystem collapse" it's all over, in my opinion.

Zurich also predicts extreme weather events are likely to occur this year.

Regarding an abrupt climate change, whether stimulated by methane or not, it's a doubled-edged sword. If we could experience just a little abrupt warming, and then plateau for a while, maybe humanity would be forced to act. On the other hand, if we just slowly and gradually warm, we may experience the boiling frog phenomenon, where we go over the climate cliff bit by bit, decade by decade, without reacting.

GOOD VIDEO SERIES ON GREENLAND MELTING

During our Radio Ecoshock interview, Paul recommends You tube videos of scientist Eric Rignot talking about the rapid and unexpected melting of ice on Greenland (which will eventually flood our coastal cities). Here are the links: ERIC RIGNOT You tube videos at the AGU, on Greenland melting:

Part 1 (4 min)

Part 2 (2 min)

Part 3 (4 min)

THE LIMA CLIMATE TALKS - PAUL'S REPORT

We also discuss the results, or lack of them, at the recent Climate Conference in Lima Peru. Paul was there, giving a series of press conferences. Here are the links to several of those You tube videos.

1ST PRESS BRIEFING:

COP20: Global Arctic Methane Emergency #1 (12-4-2014 in Lima Peru)

2ND PRESS BRIEFING:

COP20: Global Arctic Methane Emergency #2 (12-5-2014 in Lima Peru) (Paul Beckwith briefing)

3RD PRESS BRIEFING:

COP20: Global Arctic Methane Emergency #3 (12-6-2014 in Lima Peru)

Paul's presentation (in the 2nd Press Briefing) is the best, but I also highly recommend this briefing by Stuart Scott on "Ecology Vs. Economy in the Age of Climate Change".

Paul and I get into some wild discussions about science and climate change, as we always do. This is one of my favorite interviews. I hope you think so too.

INDUSTRIALIZING THE OCEAN CAN LEAD TO A MASS EXTINCTION - Dr. Douglas McCauley

We all fear there is something terribly wrong at sea. Call it extinction, or call it something else, stories of dwindling ocean life are daily washing ashore. A new paper published in the journal "Science" says we are at a cross-roads for marine life. The lead author, and our second guest this week, is Dr. Douglas J. McCauley, head of the McCauley Lab at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

For once this was a science story that did get out to the world. The New York Times and the BBC covered the new science on mass extinction in the ocean. But did they get it right?

The paper is "Marine defaunation: Animal loss in the global ocean." It was published in the journal "Science" on January 16th, 2015.

First of all, note the term "defaunation" rather than extinction. Basically defaunation means removing animals (the paper is about animals, not plants) from their essential services in the ocean. For example, suppose there are still sharks hiding out in some faraway reef (so they are not extinct) - but not enough sharks left to clean up weakness in the food system.

McCauley gives the example of garbage workers. Suppose there are only 100 left in the world. Technically, they are not "extinct". But mountains of garbage pile up everywhere, because there aren't anywhere near enough workers to carry out their function.

This defaunation is happening at sea. It's very hard to say for sure that a species is extinct, everywhere in the hard-to-reach ocean. But we can say they are not where we expect them to be, doing the things we expect them to do.

INDUSTRIALIZING THE SEA

That's point one. The second warning, and this is really new from the paper by McCauley and his colleagues at Stanford and Rugers. Their overview of a huge collection of papers on threats to sea life finds that we are on the verge of industrialization of the ocean.

There are under-sea mines, and many more planned. Mass feeding lots, similar to cattle feed lots, already exist for Tuna. We plan to harvest tidal energy with underwater propellers looking like undersea wind mills. Some countries cramped for land have already built things like airports (Japan) into the sea. We are stripping away protective mangrove swamps to build suburbs in Asia.

The fishing industry is already heavily industrialized. Masses of trawlers are essentially bull-dozing the bottom of the sea flat. It's wrecked the Baltic and parts of the North Sea. Chinese fisheries are flattening all around that country. The Canadian Grand Banks were wiped clean of cod with trawling. That's an industrial fishery. Add in the ability to use sonar, and even satellite guidance, to find fish at any depth.

So McCauley and his co-authors discovered that we are at a knowable point in the history of marine life. Essentially, we are about 200 years behind where humans are on land with the industrial revolution that began in the late 1700's. We know what happened, and is still happening to the species on land as we industrialize.

Image courtesy of University of California

About 500 land animals have gone extinct in the last 100 years or so. Marine scientists think only about 15 animals have gone extinct in the ocean, although, as I said above, it's harder to tell.

I ask McCauley point blank if we are entering the 6th Great Extinction in the sea. The answer is "not yet". But we are headed there.

Creating giant marine parks (sea animals need more space than land animals) is one solution. We've begun to do that, but not yet on a scale to prevent more extinctions.

Marine protected areas also face the challenge of climate change. As ocean waters warm (and that's where most of our excess heating is going) - some marine species can move toward the poles to find cooler water. Sadly, they can't take the estuaries, shallow seas or other breeding places with them. We just don't know what will happen with the hotter seas.

There are other very desperate reasons to hope, not mentioned in this paper. For example, the large scale industrialization of the ocean may not happen. Maybe we run out of fossil fuels, or this civilization has to retreat, due to economic or climatic failures.

We also talk about another study about mass die-offs just came out in mid-January, led by scientists at the University of California Berkeley, and published in the Proceedings of the National Academy. They found increasing mass-die offs in the past 75 years. Fish and marine invertebrates are among the hardest hit.

And then we have another study released last November, this time led by scientists from the Smithsonian Institute. They warn dead zones are increasing, and will greatly expand as the climate warms. Are these dead zones tiny, or are they signficant in the big picture of threats to ocean life?

The paper by McCauley et. al. doesn't attempt to catalog every threat to sea life. I'm alarmed by the huge masses of plastic particles in the sea, and by radiation leaking out of Fukushima, but those aren't in this work. Instead, the point of this new science is to ask "where are we" on the timeline of industrialization and extinction, when it comes to marine animals.

The answer seems to be that we are on a precipice. The optimists (including McCauley) say we can see what happened on land, and so wisely avoid the same slaughter of species in the oceans. The pessimists will say we will fall off the cliff, because we are too blind to change. Is the ocean cup of life half empty, or half full?

PERMACULTURE IN BELIZE

I got a message from our friend Albert Bates, at the Farm. They still need another half dozen students to pull off the planned permaculture workshop in Belize. Personally, I think the carbon from flying to Central America might overcome the carbon saved by permculture. But maybe not. This is not just any course. It features biochar, and knowledge from Latin America, plus Mr. Bates himself. Albert is at the center of a flurry of activity teaching how to restore carbon to the soil.

If those who attend eventually become soil-masters and permaculture leaders themselves, then the carbon savings could snowball. It's your call, if you want to get the in-depth grip on permaculture and soil/climate management.

Albert writes:

"We offset everyone's air travel with the trees we will plant and biochar we will make in Belize, no worries. My guarantee."

Here is the blurb, with some powerful guests:

============================================

"come to Belize...

Travel far south; to the back of beyond; to a remote valley accessible only by dugout canoe. Study permaculture surrounded by a lush, productive forest of edibles, medicinals and tropical hardwoods. Eat organic food, sleep in dorms powered by renewable energy, bathe in a sparkling pure river....

Teachers/speakers:

ALBERT BATES STARHAWK MARISHA AUERBACH CHRISTOPHER NESBITT

Permaculture Design Certificate Course Dates Feb 21 to Mar 6 2015 Place: Maya Mountain Research Farm San Pedro Columbia, Belize

To register, please see http://www.mmrfbz.org or contact Christopher at info(a)mmrfbz.org.

===============================================

There you go, my first classified ad in the Radio Ecoshock blog. Now Albert owes us, perhaps he'll show up as a guest after the course. We have lots to talk about, especially if restoring carbon to the soil is basically humanity's greatest hope.

Next week we'll talk more science, about abrupt climate change, and those invisible tipping points.

Thanks for all your encouraging emails and tips! Feedback from listeners enriches my life, and this program. Find a handy "Contact Me" form at my web site, http://www.ecoshock.org/contact/

I'm Alex Smith. Thanks for listening, and for caring about our world.

Why Is The Weather So Crazy?

Climate scientist Paul Beckwith explains weather distortion & spurt of Arctic methane. NOAA's Dr. Richard Feely on the threat of ocean acidification.

Download or listen to this Radio Ecoshock show in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

PAUL BECKWITH EXPLAINS THE BIG PICTURE BEHIND OUR STRANGE WEATHER

Download or listen to my 38 minute feature interview with Paul Beckwith in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

It takes a lot of nerve to talk about global warming just after a blast of Arctic weather in the Northern Hemisphere. But all our furnaces, cars, and factories churn out even more warming gases day in and day out. It's going to catch up to us. Scientists report big changes are already occuring, well ahead of previous predictions.

We're back with one of our go-to guys on the cutting edge. Paul Beckwith has two Masters Degrees and is working on his Doctorate in climate science at the University of Ottawa.

Download or listen to this Radio Ecoshock show in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

We start with the big methane debate going on among scientists right now. As part of the Arctic Methane Emergency Group, AMEG, Paul is tuned in to alarming developments around the polar sea, which could jolt global climate.

But already, we see the slower Jet Stream allowing Arctic cold and storms into the Northern Hemisphere. Beckwith explains the science of how that works. The interview is very revealing. Get even more in this Beckwith video.

The team of Natalia Shakhova, from the University of Alaska, and Russian scientists including Igor Semiletov, just released a paper on November 24th about methane emissions in the sea off East Siberia. We can also see increased blooms of methane, even in deep winter, on satellite tracking maps.

One thing puzzled me in the maps provided by Sam Carana of methanetracker.org, as published in the Arctic-News blog. Maps showed ribbons of methane rising right across what must be frozen seas in the winter. How can methane come up through the ice cover? Paul says the Arctic ice is not a fixed block, but has cracks and holes all through it.

A group of scientists led by David Archer and Gavin Schmidt at realclimate.org say Arctic methane is still a small part of global methane emissions. They say it doesn't matter yet compared to carbon dioxide emissions from industrial society, and may be a distraction from what really could drive us to extinction.

Read that methane discussion on their realclimate blog here - and take time to read the comments section as well.

Here is a link to my interview of David Archer in December 2012 on the relative importance of methane.

On the other side, here is my Radio Ecoshock interview with renowned polar ice scientist Dr. Peter Wadhams in the same program.

Beckwith replies it's almost a battle between climate modelers, like David Archer, and researchers with observations on the ground, like Shakhova and here Russian counterparts. While it's true methane is not YET tipping us toward a sudden change of climate - it has more than enough potential to do so. Some members of the Arctic Methane Emergency Group critize the IPCC for missing the methane boat, and want an emergency alert issued.

Meanwhile, Archer and others say we can't take our eye off the ball of our own carbon dioxide production. That's something that is known to be changing the climate right now, and something we can allegedly control. Once the methane bomb goes off in the Arctic, both undersea and from melting permafrost, nature takes over. It will be beyond our control. I think both groups are right.

TO IPCC OR NOT TO IPCC

Paul Beckwith is one of the few people I know, with a trained scientific eye, to plow through all 2016 pages of the latest Working Group One report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the IPCC. I can already feel some listeners becoming impatient, ready to tune out, and that tells you a lot about how far public perception has fallen about these reports. Is the IPCC still relevant to the developing climate crisis?

We talk over what those limitations are, what the IPCC got right, and where they probably missed out, including the methane threat. Paul notes that ever edition of the IPCC reports keeps raising the global warming potential of methane.

Critics of the IPCC say they use out-dated science, and always low-ball the possibilities, to get approval from all those governments, including oil producing countries. Paul thinks we need more real-time analysis and a faster turn around from a massively funded team, versus today's tiny IPCC staff and guest volunteer editors.

TWO DEGREES - NOT SAFE AT ALL

Dr. James Hansen, recently retired NASA scientist, has just released another paper saying the warming limit assumed by all the climate negotiations and governments is far too dangerous. He says that 2 degrees Centigrade, I guess that's about 3.5 degrees Fahrenheit, is already beyond tipping points that will wreck the world as we know it. Paul and I discuss what that means.

We already have scientific conferences called "4 degrees and beyond". Various business pundits assume carbon levels above 550 parts per million by 2100 as though that's just something our kids will adapt to. Let's be real. Is it likely we can hold warming to even 2 degrees mean global warming, the way things are going?

Whatever our prospects, I keep making radio programs, and Paul keeps studying and communicating about climate change. There must be some hope and will to survive at the bottom of that.

Keep in touch with Paul Beckwith's lively climate Facebook feed here.

ACID OCEANS: RICHARD FEELY

Download or listen to this 15 minute interview with Dr. Richard Feely in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

No doubt you've heard that fossil fuel emissions are turning the world's oceans more acidic. Scientists are scrambling to find out what that means for our future.

There is a new report out, based on a meeting of 540 experts from 37 countries held in Monterey California in September 2012. It was the Third Symposium on the Ocean in a High-CO2 World.

"Ocean Acidification Summary for Policy-makers – Third Symposium on the Ocean in a High-CO2 World."

Radio Ecoshock is pleased to welcome one of America's top ocean scientists, Dr. Richard Feely. He's from NOAA's Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory.

Reading through this report, I became alarmed for our own future, as much as small sea life. The Symposium agreed the oceans have been soaking up 24 million tonnes of CO2 a day - but that buffer, protecting us from worse climate change, may not keep working as well.

A couple of years ago, I interviewed David Archer about his book "The Long Thaw". He made it clear even if we stopped burning fossil fuels today, our impact will continue for centuries. It that true in the oceans as well? Dr. Feely says our oceans are reaching acidification levels not seen for many millions of years - and will stay in this changed state likely for at least hundreds of thousands of years, if not longer. We are changing the oceans for all coming ages.

I'll add this: during some times when the oceans became more acidic because of high carbon in the atmosphere - there was a huge mass extinction event.

When scientists talk about the rate of acidification, the numbers seem rather small. Why does a point 1 change in PH reflect a big change in chemistry? Richard Feely explains that one for us. Due to the logarithmic scale used, just like for earthquakes, a small-sounding change reflects a giant change in the sea.

We can't consider ocean acidification in a vacuum. How does a more acid ocean interact with things like warmer seas, or human encroachment such as overfishing or land-based run-off? It turns out all these impacts feed on one another.

You know ocean dead zones are popping up all over the world. Some people on the Internet are afraid the ocean is dying. Dr. Feely says that is not what there reports says at all. Yes some species important to feeding humans and other large sea mammals are in trouble, or may even die off. But other species, including squid and jellyfish, will thrive on more acidic seas. The ocean is not dying.

I've interviewed scientists who believe human geoengineering is needed to save the Arctic ice, say by spraying sulphur aerosols. How would that affect the problem of ocean acidification? Feely says geoengineering does not stop the uptake of carbon and acidification of the seas. In some cases, and he mentions seeding the oceans as Russ George and the Haida did, may even make acidification worse.

I worry humanity is not taking this issue seriously enough, because we don't live in the ocean, and can't visibly see the change. That's why I took the trouble to highlight this new report, and talk with Dr. Feely.

NEW SHOWS COMING UP

Coming up next week: I couldn't bare delivering more doom and gloom news during the holiday season. Instead, we're bringing it on in song. It's the annual Radio Ecoshock Green Music Festival - a full hour of environmental songs played in full.

You'll get some humor, so bleakness, lots of bounce, in some songs I guarantee you've never heard before, from artists all over the world. I'll publish a playlist in next week's blog.

We kick of the new year of 2014 with more nuclear scandals. I'm not talking about Japan this time. Even if there is no major nuclear disaster, both Britain and the United States are piling up radioactive wastes with no good answer in sight. Wait until you hear the zany things they are doing with it. Heaven help the generations that come after us.

STILL TIME TO HELP RADIO ECOSHOCK STAY ON THE AIR

I appreciate all the listeners who included Radio Ecoshock in our Christmas gift list. Some donations have come in and they all help. I've improved the studio (no more echo) and added some software tools to make the audio sound better. My mixer also had to be replaced, as the old cheapie was starting to leak sound between the channels. That was a big purchase.

If you can help me pay for the costs of producing and distributing Radio Ecoshock, that means so much. I can't afford to bear all the costs myself. Please consider either a one-time donation, or become one of our elite group of supporting members, donating just $10 a month.

The rules of non-profit radio stations mean I can't pitch for fund on air. (And besides, those stations need the money too). So I'm really counting on blog readers and podcast subscribers to help keep Radio Ecoshock on the air. Do it from this page.

Enjoy your holidays - but don't forget, the all-new Radio Ecoshock shows just keep on coming.

Alex Smith

Ugly Times for Ugly Mines

Welcome to Radio Ecoshock. I'm your reporter, Alex Smith. Later in this program we will tackle a serious world-wide problem seldom discussed: the toxic and harsh environmental impacts of mining. We have a case study from the United States, the Polymet mine proposed for Northern Minnesota.

Our environmental correspondent Gerri Williams has been on the job, with original interviews from activists - local people really - trying to protect nature from yet another hack-job.

This isn't a story about Minnesota or even America. Giant mines are operating or being developed all over the world, to feed our consumer desires. They spew pollution, carve into wilderness, and leave behind heavy metal leaching into rivers and lakes for hundreds of years. It's Canada, Australia, Africa, Asia, and all the European companies carving giant holes into the crust of the Earth.

Before we get there, I need to alert you to yet another disgusting development coming from the world nuclear Mafia. It's a general go-ahead to dump hundreds of thousands of tons of radioactive water into the Pacific Ocean. Incredibly, everyone from the American head of the NRC, to the International Energy Agency, and Japanese authorities are giving a green light to empty those thousands of radioactive tanks at Fukushima right into the Pacific ocean.

Download/listen to this Radio Ecoshock program in CD Quality (56 MB) or Lo-Fi (14 MB)

DUMPING FUKUSHIMA RAD WATER INTO THE PACIFIC

Who gives anyone permission to make the seas more radioactive? Why can't the country that used dangerous nuclear power keep the inevitable mess to themselves? Let's dig in deeper to recent developments at the triple-melt down that is the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear catastrophe.

It's hardly worth mentioning this site has set a new all-time record for radioactive pollution.

From Arirang Korea TV News, December 2nd, 2013:

"Now media in Japan on this Tuesday are reporting that the level of radiation detected in an observation at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant has soared to an all-time high. Prime operator TEPCO said that 1.1 million becquerels of Beta ray emitting radioactive had been detected per litre in water samples taken on November 28th.

The figure is 36,000 times higher than the normal level of 30 becquerels per litre, and is more than the previous record high 910,000 becquerels per litre detected on November 26th."

And people try to tell you this accident is over.

According to the nuclear industry, 1 million becquerels of radiation is equal to 1 kilogram of what they call low-level radioactive waste - here found in every single litre of water.

RADIOACTIVE WATER TANKS AT FUKUSHIMA CANNOT LAST

Water is now a huge issue at Fukushima Daiichi. Estimates of the amount of highly radioactive water being pumped each day are hard to get, or vary widely. The consensus seems to be about 600 tons a day needs to be stored, perhaps 300 tons being pumped into the ground buildings trying to cool the escaped hot reactor cores, and another 300 tons of ground water flowing down that hill into the site, and mixing with those cores. See these estimates in the Guardian newspaper for example.

Those numbers are too round and neat to be real, but they give you an idea.

All that is being pumped through a maze of make-shift hoses into over 1,000 tanks on the site. These tanks, we know from mainstream news reports, were shoddily made, bolted together without welding, by inexperienced workers dragged in from all over Japan.

On December 5th, Reuters reported the workers were brought in illegally, at time recruited by the Japanese gangs. Workers admit they assembled tanks in weather that did not permit proper sealing. There have been regular leaks of highly radioactive water from these tanks. The Japanese admit up to 300 tons a day of water is escaping already into the Pacific, a continual source of serious radioactivity.

The tanks were a make-do solution. They are only designed to last until 2016. A new report from the Japanese Ministry of Industry says the Fukushima site will run out of room to store radioactive water within two years.

What to do? Just dump it in the ocean! Here is the alarming news: a chorus of nuclear authorities inside and outside Japan are preparing you to accept this horrible plan. Here is a short list of "dump it all" boosters, as reported in Washington's blog:

"Juan Carlos Lentijo, head of IAEA’s mission to Fukushima Daiichi, Dec. 4, 2013:

'Controlled discharge is a regular practice in all the nuclear facilities in the world. And what we are trying to say here is to consider this as one of the options to contribute to a good balance of risks and to stabilize the facility for the long term.'

Shunichi Tanaka, chairman of Japan’s Nuclear Regulation Authority, Dec. 4, 2013:

'You cannot keep storing the water forever. We have to make choice comparing all risks involved.'"

The chair of the American Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Allison MacFarlane was in Japan on December 6th, when she said, at a press conference at the American Embassy, that the International Agency for Atomic Energy's recommendation to dump radioactive water into the Pacific was "appropriate".

Still not convinced they are all in on this? Listen to this brief clip from ABC Australia back on November 20th, under the headline "TEPCO clean-up boss says Fukushima's radioactive water will be dumped into Pacific Ocean" as reported by ABC's North Asia correspondent Mark Willacy.

Willacy: "He's the former chief watchdog in the United States. Now Dale Klein is overseeing TEPCO's efforts to stabilize and clean up the shattering Fukushima nuclear plant.

Klein: 'I think the best word to use with Fukushima is challenging.'

Willacy: Challenging on many fronts, but particularly when it comes to dealing with the growing volume of contaminated water stored at the plant. Dale Klein believes that after the water is treated and stripped of most radioactive elements, it's be safe to dump into the Pacific.

Klein: 'If at the end of the day, when the water is discharged, it will be released in a way when it is diluted so there is no risk to the public health and safety. But it is an emotional issue.'

Willacy: But it's not just contaminated water causing problems at Fukushima. Hastily and shoddily built systems at the nuclear plant have also triggered some anxious moments."

So, TEPCO and/or the Japanese government will decide when it is "safe" to dump their giant cache of nuclear tainted water into the Pacific. The rest of us will have to take their word for that safety - from a government and utility now famous for either lying or withholding the truth for long periods of time.

It's easy to picture the site running out of storage, and a "necessary" decision being made unilaterally by Japan to start dumping the still-radioactive water into the Pacific. Will they even tell us when it starts? Has it started already? With the new Japanese law against revealing any "secrets" denominated by the state, we may never know.

In the interest of truth, all these authorities say the water must first be cleaned up of major radioactive particles like plutonium and uranium. They realize Cesium will still be dumped into the Pacific, plus large amounts of Tritium. They always say Tritium is perfectly natural, go ahead and brush your teeth with it, but that's not at all true.

Then they blatantly say that all operating nuclear plants leak Tritium daily, which you seldom hear. Now they tell you, - to bless dumping Fukushima's problem into our common ocean.

The authorities act as though the technology to "clean up" this water is working. The filter machine on site, known as ALPS breaks down often, including this past December 1st. It has seldom if ever run at its stated capacity. Even if it could, ALPS does not remove Tritium, and has a backlog in those tanks of several years worth. Remember, the tanks will be full by 2016, and weren't designed to last beyond that.

There is some resistance. On November 7th, a consortium of anti-nuclear groups presented a petition of more than 150,000 signatures to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, demanding a global takeover of the Fukushima disaster, for the protection of all. A Japanese group has another petition calling for a strict government policy against contaminating the Pacific with Fukushima radiation. Contact nukefree.org for more information on what you can do.

Bottom line: do you accept that hundreds of thousands of tons, perhaps soon to be millions of tons, of highly radioactive Fukushima water will be dumped into the Pacific Ocean? If that's not OK with you, time is limited.

Contact your government, reach out to your local public, let's stop this next nuclear disaster from happening. The Pacific Ocean is not anyone's nuclear dumping ground. Heaven help the species who live there, and all of the people of the world is we sleep-walk through this awful plan.

I'm Alex Smith. This is Radio Ecoshock.

POLLUTING AMERICA FOR CHINA'S COPPER

Environmental Lawyer Paula Maccabee

Next we turn to our guest host for this week's show. Gerri Williams. Our fearless D.C. Correspondent moved up near Lake Superior. Sure enough, she's right in the thick of it there, in the battle to help save that Northern wilderness from a really ugly mine by the Polymet Corporation.

In our first interview, Gerri interviews Paula Maccabee, representing waterlegacy.org. They are battling a copper-sulfide mine by the Polymet Corporation, proposed for an ecologically sensitive area in Northern Minnesota, USA.

We learn that this foreign-owned corporation will export all the Minnesota copper mine benefits to China, leaving the pollution for Americans. Tracing ownership of Polymet's parent Glencore/Xtrata, or it's many overseas subsidiaries is difficult. Parts of the merger of Xtrata and Glencore were negotiated with, and required the approval, of the government of China.

Officially, Glencore is listed as an Anglo-Swiss company trading on the London Metals Exchange. The largest single shareholder is reputedly Glencore Chief Executive Officer Ivan Glasenberg. But I don't really know whwho controls the company.

After the $30 billion dollar merger with Xtrata, the new company is the fourth largest mining corporation in the world. This combined company has sales larger than the budget of the whole state of Minnesota.

CLIMATE WRECKERS AT WORK

Glencore Xtrata are also climate-wreckers. Before the merger, Xtrata bought the Australian and South African coal mines previously owned by Glencore. In fact, Glencore/Xtrada is the single largest exporter of coal for power generation in the world. Number one climate wrecker! Ten percent of all coal shipped on the high seas comes from Glencore/Xtrata mines.

Glencorextrata also owns the giant copper-lead, zinc mine called Falconbridge in Sudbury Ontario, plus mines in Peru, the Dominican Republic. It has tentacles all over the world. During the first 8 years of mine operation in Minnesota, we are told all the copper will go to China.

Maccabee, an experienced public interest lawyer, tells us of a study that found despite environmental assurances, 9 out of 10 mining companies leave pollution behind them. In this case, unlike the desert environments where many copper mines operate, the tender wetlands of Minnesota will be polluted for centuries.

Coppper-sulfide mines have a history of leaving behind mercury contamination as well. Paula also tells us the Native American people, including their famous wild rice harvest, are at risk.

In reality, recycling copper uses 10% of the energy of new mining. We have lots of the stuff already above ground, but don't recapture enough of it.

BUSTING THE AMERICAN MINING INDUSTRY

Then it's Bill Carter, author of "Boom, Bust, Boom", the story of world copper mining. Bill is originally from California, and is an award-winning documentary film maker.

We start from the humble former copper town of Bisbee Arizona (where Radio Ecoshock is broadcast on KBRP!) through Alaska, and around the world. It all began when Bill tried to plant a garden in Bisbee, and found the soil had been wrecked for generations by a copper mine. There was no technology to fix soil poisoned by heavy metals.

Copper itself is poisonous to fish. And these mines, as Carter explains, leave behind other heavy metals that are toxic for thousands of years.

Bill and Gerri talk about the Pebble Mine in Alaska, about 300 miles West of Anchorage, in rugged country. It's right near Lake Iliamna, Alaska's largest lake, and the birthing grounds of half of the world's stock of sockeye salmon. Only 14 miles of soggy Tundra separate Pebble Mine from this lake.

Eventually the open pit holes can fill back up with water, like the Berkeley Pit mine near Butte Montana, which is now highly toxic.

Find out more about Bill Carter at his web site.

As I said at the start, there are mine battles all over. Here's shout out to my friends in British Columbia who have so far held off the Fish Lake Mine. And those in Australia trying to kill off the gigantic climate-wrecking Alpha coal mine.

OUT OF TIME

Out of time again, for another week. Keep listening to Radio Ecoshock at www.ecoshock.org. I'm Alex Smith.

Please support this program if you can. Thank you for listening, and let's check in again next week, when I talk over the violent and unusual weather, plus Arctic methane, with climate scientist Paul Beckwith. Dr. Richard Feely from NOAA will also be our guest, as we look into the alarming rise of ocean acidification.

We're heading out with more music from northern Minnesota, from a group of artists called the Arrowhead Story.

Rising Heat, Rising Seas

State of climate science notes (Richard Alley); feature on rising seas - Francesca Rheannon of "Writer's Voice" interviews Brian Fagan, author of "The Attacking Ocean." Plus Alison Martin from the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy on endangered farm animals. Radio Ecoshock 130717

IMPORTANT NOTE TO RADIO STATIONS GETTING RADIO ECOSHOCK FROM THIS BLOG!

Alex is going on vacation. You can download our "best of Radio Ecoshock" summer replays from our web site, on this page.

Hi there, welcome to another vacation show of Radio Ecoshock. After a few words about a video lecture update on the latest climate science by Richard Alley, you'll hear the awful truth about rising seas around the world. Francesca Rheannon, host of "Writer's Voice" interviews scientist Brian Fagan, author of "The Attacking Ocean". We'll wrap up with my own interview of Alison Martin from the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy. Yep, we'll talk about the Tennessee Fainting Goat and the need to keep up the biodiversity of your food chain.

Download/listen to this Radio Ecoshock Show in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

Listen to this Radio Ecoshock Show right now (courtesy of archive.org)



RICHARD ALLEY REPORTS ON THE STATE OF CLIMATE SCIENCE IN 2013

Dr. Richard Alley

Dr. Richard Alley is one of America's best known and most cited climate scientists. Actually he was trained as a geologist, and teaches at Pennsylvania State University. Alley chaired a U.S. government panel on abrupt climate change, has testified to Congress and written for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, specializing in melting ice at the poles.

Alley has given an update called "The State of the Climate System 2013" at a special conference of the American Geophysical Union held in Colorado at the beginning of June. It was called the Chapman Conference. I recommend you spend about 45 minutes of your valuable time watching the video of Alley's presentation. Find the link for this important video talk below - or just search for "State of the Climate System" and "Chapman".

I'll just squeeze in a couple of fast observations.

First, Alley does a simple job of explaining the complex relationship between heat in the atmosphere and heating of the ocean. Although our emissions have been increasing exponentially, most of the extra heat held in by the greenhouse gases have gone into the ocean. That is because during the last decade a period of cooler ocean water in the Pacific, called La Nina, has dominated. A cooler ocean surface will soak up more heat from the air. Expect different results when we get more of the hotter ocean in El Nino.

Check out Alley's charts on the heat tolerance of our major food crops, like corn, wheat and rice. We are already above the optimum growing conditions the major crops that feed the world. Actual production figures show that countries hit with just a few very hot days, at critical periods, suffered a loss in food production. That isn't a prediction, that's an observation now. The obvious conclusion: as the earth warms, and hot spells increase, world food production may drop - even as the number of mouths we need to feed increase dramatically.

It's even possible that by the year 2100, according to other research, that parts of the planet may become too hot for unprotected humans and other large mammals to survive. It's also been shown that human productivity, that important economic indicator, drops as the weather becomes hotter. So we'll have less energy to deal with problems of the future.

Alley's speech shines when he enters his field of expertise, the melting polar ice. For once there is a little bit of good news. Those pundits and a few scientists who suggested Greenland's ice cap may quickly slide into the sea are mistaken, Alley says. Yes giant new lakes of melt water are forming in Greenland in Summer. Yes they can rather suddenly drain down to the depths of the glaciers. But the land under the glaciers is not a nice even slope toward the sea. There are mountains and ridges down there which he claims precludes a sudden slide-off of ice, which would jack up sea levels around the world. Dr. Alley suggests it will take at least hundreds, if not more than a thousand, years to melt the Greenland ice cap, almost no matter how hot the climate gets.

The same is not true of the ice sheets of Antarctica. Many of these have spread from the land-based ice-cap out over the sea. There are several unstable areas around the Antarctic peninsula which contain enough ice to add several meters or more to sea levels. The good news is they are melting slowly so far. But that could change, and scientists are monitoring them closely, with real concern.

Richard Alley seems almost optimistic about the next 30 years of so. He wonders if we haven't already seen the worst impacts of climate change for the first half of this century. After that, almost all climate science indicates a rapid deterioration with lots of heating after 2050. If we believe Richard Alley, our children and grandchildren will experience frightening changes, while we continue to coast along in our fossil-powered society.

With all due respect to Richard Alley, I'm not sure I do believe that. Pretty well every prediction that was supposed to happen by 2050, according to bodies like the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, are already surfacing now, way ahead of predictions. We seem to be on a worst-case scenario pathway. Various agencies in Europe, including the International Energy Agency, agree. Perhaps we can't account on a relatively easy ride, if you count extreme drought, fires, floods, and hurricanes as "easy" - for this generation. If the Arctic sea ice melts for example, I'd say all bets are off.

Richard Alley advises governments and the military. So he's less likely to bet on the apocalyptic side. And yet... if you listen closely to this speech at the American Geophysical Union, he describes "The Great Dying" 251 million years ago, and many quite frightening possibilities for the next generations of humanity. Don't miss it. Search for "State of the Climate System" and "Chapman" or find the link below.

June 7, 2013 Richard Alley, AGU Chapman Conference, Colorado

RISING SEAS: BRIAN FAGAN "The Attacking Ocean"

Let's dig deeper into the creeping destabilizer which at least one U.S. military authority thinks is the greatest threat of climate change. Rising seas will remove parts of the world, from Florida to Bangladesh, from the map. Most of the world's major cities, from Shanghai to New York will be flooded, bit by bit, storm by storm.

Francesca Rheannon interviewed Brian Fagan,. the author of a new book "The Attacking Ocean". She's agreed to this rebroadcast of her Writer's Voice program, first broadcast on Pacifica on June 26th, 2013.

My thanks to Francesca for this excellent interview. We all need to know about rising seas.

SEA LEVEL RISE IN THE NEWS

As this interview was broadcast, new science was released by the Potsdam Institute in Germany. It shows that for every degree rise in global average temperature, the sea level will rise more than two meters, or more than about six and a half feet. Just one degree more would take storm surges over large parts of Florida, New York City, Shanghai and most of the world's coastal cities. Some Pacific Ocean countries would cease to exist.

That sea level rise won't happen as fast as the warming. It might take one or two hundred years for the necessary amount of ice to melt. We don't know for sure. What we do know is the amount of sea level rise if we let the world warm even one degree. Now some mis-informed people, often with industry connections, say we can adapt to two or even three degress of global temperature rise. Not with the civilization we know now.

Here is a link to that new sea level science from the Potsdam Institute, and here a good layman's article from Climate News Network explaining the importance of this science to all of us.

SAVING ENDANGERED FARM ANIMALS

Now let's look at another aspect of the environmental scene you may not have considered. When the Irish potato famine struck in the 1800's, millions died. That is partly because the population depended on a single breed of potato, which caught a disease. It turns our we are putting ourselves in the same situation with farm animals. A single breed of milk cow is dominating the supply, for example, and those Holstein's are not reproducing well.

We need to protect our biodiversity of farm animals, exactly as we struggle to preverve the diversity of plant types, from apples to original corn varieties. Plus some of these breeds are engaging and useful animals developed over centuries. They too have a right to live on this Earth.

Alison Martin, ALBC

I caught up with Alison Martin at the Mother Earth News Fair in Puyallup Washington on June 1st, 2012. We talks about efforts in the United States to keep endangered domesticated animals alive. Alison is with the American Live Breeds Conservancy, the ALBC.

Don't miss Alison's description of the Tennessee Fainting Goat (who don't climb fences) and the Choctaw pig.

ALEX IS GOING ON VACATION

That's it for Radio Ecoshock this week. If you can, please support the production of this program. Get the details at our web site at Ecoshock.org.

For the next few weeks, I'll be doing some deeper research, while listening to the voice of my favorite river in the mountains. I've selected some of the most downloaded programs from the past season, to play for the next few weeks as the "best of Radio Ecoshock". Find those listed here at our web site, and load up your mp3 player or computer with lots of key summer listening you may have missed.

New programs will return at the start of September. I'm sure there will be lots to talk about - and I hope you'll be part of the program.

I'm Alex Smith. Thank you so much for listening.

Green Seas, Good Food, Bad Numbers

Serial climate hacker Russ George's office raided. Nick Saul takes food banks to a whole new level - feeding citizens during tough times. UC Berkeley political scientist Dr. Martha Campbell - how economists & women's advocates helped enable the next population explosion. Radio Ecoshock 130410 1 hour.

FREE MP3 DOWNLOADS FOR THIS SHOW

Listen to/download this Radio Ecoshock show 1 hour in CD Quality (56 MB) or Lo-Fi (14 MB)

Listen to/download the Nick Saul interview (26 min 30 sec) in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

Listen to/download download my Martha Campbell interview (25 min) in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

PROGRAM INTRO

In the summer of 2012, Russ George, formerly of Planktos Corporation, lead the West Coast Haida Nation into a plot to unilaterally dump 100 tons of iron dust into the Pacific Ocean off British Columbia, Canada.

Now the Haida Salmon Restoration Corp offices have been raided by the Canadian government. The raid happened just two days before the Canadian Broadcasting Corp aired a TV documentary about this ocean dumping, and the disappearing 2.5 million dollars from the Haida Nation. Radio Ecoshock was consulted during production.

Nick Saul is author of "The Stop: How The Fight for Good Food Transformed a Community and Inspired a Movement". He developed a template of food justice for the millions in the West being mal-fed by food banks instead of empowered to grow. Includes Nick's notes on how Brazil does better than North Americans feeding the poor.

UC Berkeley Professor Martha Campbell says UN population theory, and the economists, have it all wrong. We can't wait for "development" to rein in population growth. That never happens when the average family size is five kids or greater. How environmentalists and women's groups went off the rails.

Now Ethiopia is headed for 150 million, and Nigeria will have more than the current U.S. population. What could go wrong?

LISTEN TO THIS RADIO ECOSHOCK SHOW RIGHT NOW!





SUPPORT NEW RADIO ECOSHOCK OUTREACH

Please consider supporting Radio Ecoshock. I need to raise funds for two specific projects:

1. I'm booked to attend the Mother Earth News fair on June 1st and 2nd in Puyallup Washington. I hope to do a ton of interviews for you - but I could use some help for the gas money.

2. In a longer-term plot, I hope to reach still more people by doing regular You tube videos, including video postings of the Radio Ecoshock Show. That means an equipment upgrade for my studio, including a camera, some lighting, and video editing software.

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NICK SAUL: MOVING FROM CHARITY TO SELF REALIZATION

Nick Saul, CEO of Community Food Centres (Canada)

Finding good food has become a kind of second job for all of us now, as the agri-business and fast-food empire serve up deadly fare. The left-overs from that giant system go to our poorest people through the food-banks. At least that's the old model.

How did food banks move from a stop-gap measure to an acceptable solution? Can they evolve into a real self-sustaining food movement?

Our guest Nick Saul has gone a long way down that road with an innovative food community in Toronto, Canada. With his wife Andrea Curtis, Nick has just published the new book "The Stop: How the Fight for Good Food Transformed a Community and Inspired a Movement".

In a nutshell, Nick describes the sad state of the food bank system. The food is not very healthy, and the "clients" are too often kept in degrading lines, with no input into the system.

Nick Saul transformed one food bank called "The Stop" in Toronto Canada. They began a community garden, to supplement the food and involve poor people in their own food production. Eventually they took over a former transit building to found the "Green Barn" which involves both production and a Farmer's Market. Health services and community were built into the system, partly run by those who needed the help.

Every city can and should do this. That is why after 14 years Nick left The Stop to lead a new organization called Community Food Centres. They are establishing multi-facet food for citizens in a program popping up already in several cities in Canada. It could be a model for any city.

Nick also tells us of the incredible difference in government attitude and support in Brazil. He visited there and found out how a fully-functioning food support system can work. Very inspiring. The book is well worth it.

I also took away the idea that if our current economic system collapses, which is a strong possibility, all of us may have to organize in the ways Nick Saul describes. That makes this an interview for everyone.

Is there a way forward beyond food banks? Can we live without them?

Don't think of this as a Canadian story, though it is that. I found the book has essential ideas for anyone in the Western world, who wants to see food justice done.

MARTHA CAMPBELL: BREAKING THE GREEN SILENCE ON OVER-POPULATION



Professor Martha Campbell, University of California, Berkeley

It is unthinkable that Ethiopia could double it's population to 185 million people by 2050. But what if that does happen? Can anyone prevent it?

We continue our series on population growth versus the fragile environment. Our guest is a political scientist who specializes in population. Dr. Martha Campbell lectures in the School of Public Health at the University of California Berkeley. She founded and runs the non-profit group Venture Strategies for Health and Development.

I found Martha in an essay in the new book "Life on the Brink, Environmentalists Confront Population". Reading her article "Why the Silence on Population?" my jaw dropped by the second paragraph, where she listed population projections for some of the poorest nations. For example, Pakistan, is just 20% larger than Texas. It is a desert-like country dependent on one major river for water.

Pakistan had 41 million people when I was born, and now 185 million. By 2050, Pakistan is projected to have more people than the United States does now.

The United Nations makes these projections. Of course they don't presume a pandemic or massive starvation will intervene. I ask Martha about all that.

But in just one example, a lot of people think HIV/AIDS has reduced the population in some African countries. Not at all. People have reproduced faster than that disease has killed, especially now that new treatment drugs are becoming available.

Martha says the United Nations and many economists have the population problem all wrong. They say get the economy and education going, and population will level off. In reality, says Campbell, no country with an average family size of five children manages to become developed. The ever increasing kids swamp efforts to build schools, there is very high unemployment of young people, and the economy stalls. Population control comes first!

To emphasize that point, Campbell has written an article "Do Economists Have Frequent Sex?" to show how unreal the various predictions by economists have been on population.

Her other main paper I recommend is "The Impact of Freedom on Fertility Decline".

Why have environmentalists, including Greenpeace, Friends of Earth, and the Sierra Club fallen silent on population, even though the U.N. says the additional people are a fundamental driver of climate change? (No! It's not just consumption in the West!) We have a politically incorrect talk about the reality on the ground in too many countries. How religion, including the new Pope, is preventing population sanity. Why we must criticize part of a culture of patriarchy and failure. It's hot stuff.

RUSS GEORGE AND HAIDA VILLAGE RAIDED IN CANADA



Russ George, American businessman

There are many big worries about geoengineering as an alleged "solution" to climate change. Since this program began, I've warned that a single individual, say a billionaire, or a small group of people could decide unilaterally to alter the climate for all of us.

Regular listeners know this happened in the summer of 2012, as the unstoppable Russ George, formerly of Planktos Corporation, lead the West Coast Haida Nation into a plot to unilaterally dump 100 tons of iron dust into the Pacific Ocean off British Columbia, Canada.

Now the Haida Salmon Restoration Corporation offices have been raided by the Canadian government. The raid happened just two days before the Canadian Broadcasting Corp aired a TV documentary about this ocean dumping, and the disappearing 2.5 million dollars from the Haida Nation.

Radio Ecoshock has been part of this story since 2006. The CBC program called me during production, and used some of my investigative journalism into this case of rogue climate hacking.

In 2007, I ran an hour-long interview with Russ, and another hour show with his critics. Along with George-watcher and investigative journalist Steve Krivit, we dug into the mysterious stock manipulation and promoters behind Planktos Corp. That company went bankrupt, a disaster for the investors who were promised fabulous returns on the carbon credits George promised would come from stimulating plankton with iron dust.

RADIO ECOSHOCK RESOURCES FOR RUSS GEORGE, PLANKTOS, HAIDA OCEAN DUMPING

PLANKTOS: ALGAE SEEDING FOR CARBON CREDITS Company plans to create plankton blooms to capture CO2. Who are they, and will it work? Part 1: Radio Ecoshock full-show interview with Planktos CEO Russell George (56 MB 1 hr); Transcript of that 2007 Russ George interview here.

Part 2: "The Intervention" 3 critics respond + Alex Smith's take. (Ecoshock show - 56 MB 1 hr) Greenpeace (9 min)Science Unit, ETC Group (9 min), and David Baines (16 min)(newspaper business columnist.)

A description of the end of the Planktos venture is in this December 21, 2007 Radio Ecoshock Show

The new Russ George adventure with the Haida Salmon Restoration Corp. is in this program:

GEOENGINEERING THE OCEAN: SERIAL CLIMATE HACKING Climate hacker Russ George with indigenous Haida villagers dumps iron into the sea - in a secret geoengineering project off Canada's west coast. Press conference by Haida Old Massett Village; interview Karen Wristen Living Oceans; Alex investigates with real scientists; Russ George with Guardian's Martin Lukacs.

Radio Ecoshock 121024 1 hour CD Quality 56 MB or Lo-Fi 14 MB. Blog with links & transcripts here.

I interviewed Jim Thomas of the ETC Group about the ocean experiment in the Radio Ecoshock Show for October 17, 2012.

Exellent wrap-up on Russ George, in both nuclear fusion and plankton credit activities, by investigative reporter Steven B. Krivit.

Watch the CBC TV program Fifth Estate documentary on Russ George here. It's titled "The Iron Man".

When I investigated all this in 2007, another Russ George turned up - this one claiming to be an expert and inventor in the controversial field of cold fusion. Once again, Russ George became CEO of a company which promised to revolutionize energy and heating, while saving the world of course, by doing what had never been proven possible scientifically. I'm looking at a photo of the cold fusion furnace the company D2Fusion promised to deliver to hunrgy stock investors. There was no furnace. That company went bankrupt. Are we seeing a pattern here?

The question of fraud is so hard to prove, partly because it assumes the perpetrator knew a lie was being used for profit. But what if that person sees themselves as a well-intentioned visionary trying to save the environment, using the capitalist system? What if he actually believes his own mythology?

RUSS GEORGE COMES BACK

I presumed the Russ George story was over with the double bankruptcy. But he rose again. This time George used a relationship he built with the aboriginal people of Haida Gwaii in the early 2000's, again in a plot to sell carbon credits, this time by planting trees.

That fell through, but Russ George apparently pursuaded tribal leaders they could sequester carbon, and make millions of dollars, by seeding ocean plankton with algae. The theory, unproven by at least a half dozen experiments done by real scientists aboard multi-governmental research ships, was that the algae bloom would sink to the bottom with it's carbon.

Somehow the leadership of a tiny place called the Village of Old Massett cashed in previous government settlement money to raise $2.5 million dollars for a new try in the Pacific. If the villagers were not sold on carbon credits, the story changed. Now they would save the dwindling salmon, returning the fishing industry to the many unemployed native people.

In my Radio Ecoshock show for October 24, 2012 I found a scientist who disputed the whole basis of the Russ George theory of plankton starving for iron dust. Russ George is not a scientist, or even a University graduate, despite being called the Chief Scientist on last summer's ocean dumping experiment.

Canadian scientists say there is no way to prove the latest claims. The Canadian Government says Environment Canada advised the Haida Salmon Restoration group not to try it. Now the government has raided the offices. Russ George complains in his blog:

"Just days before Easter our small village research office in Vancouver was swarmed by 11 officers dressed in all black combat gear, armed and imposing beyond belief (similar to those in the photo above.). In the largest assault/raid in Environment Canada’s history the RAID team rushed into the office of 7 people, counting the 2 grandfathers and 2 women present."

What did he expect? - after breaking the moritorium on such experiments, agreed by the London Dumping Convention, specifically after his previous attempts to capitalize on changing our oceans with the Planktos ship Weatherbird II?

Sadly, while George and the Haida may be charged with breaking environmental laws, I don't expect any justice for the highly unemployed people of the Village of Old Massett. Their 2.5 million dollars has disappeared courtesy of a serial dreamer and promoter named Russ George. Watch out if you see him coming again. It seems like nothing but prison could stop Russ George in his mission to save the world while making money.

But George is a small-time operator compared to the multi-billion dollar scams perpetrated on the rate-payers of Europe. They paid for carbon off sets under the World Bank Clean Development Mechanism, to stop climate damaging chemical plants that were never built, or built only to not produce a certain powerful greenhouse gas. Nobody stopped that rip-off for years, and no one was charged.

Even the Government of British Columbia has been making false claims that it offset it's own carbon. Despite a multi-million dollar fund, and many self-righteous green claims by the government, nothing has been offset. It's just like Russ George saying he made the Vatican the first carbon-neutral government in the world. It's all hot air, with nothing behind it.

Sorry, but the whole plan for carbon off-sets and carbon markets fell prey to human greed and self-delusion. We are carbon addicts who will say anything and believe it. The only true solution is to cut the drug off at it's source. Close down the tar sands. Divert military spending and oil subsidies into clean energy. Change our own lives, going carbon free. Anything else is human fraud on a massive scale, setting us up for mass extinction.

As the Arctic melt utterly, and the permafrost gives up it's long-held methane load, there will be more Russ George's to parade across the stage. Will we applaud?

In a coming show, we'll learn more about a call for geoengineering by real climate scientists. They are worried that if we lose the Arctic Ice cap, humans can never recover the climate they need to survive. Stay tuned to Radio Ecoshock.

Please consider supporting Radio Ecoshock. Find out more at our web site, ecoshock.org. Write me any time. The address is radio at ecoshock.org.

That's it for this week. Find all our past programs as free mp3 downloads at ecoshock.org. I'm Alex Smith. Thank you for listening, and please join us again next week.