[...]... of A. J Sangster, Energy for a Warming World, © Springer 2 010 1 2 1 The Context and Corollaries global warming, although this awareness seems to be tinged with a worrying absence of concern Extreme weather events are increasingly being reported in the media, and of course, hurricane Katrina which created havoc in the Caribbean and in the southern states of the USA in 2005, was perhaps the first really... 1. 1 Weather Warnings 3 was, at that time, causing this forcing was, of course, ‘natural’ and due to methane and CO2 leeching from the ground and the oceans because of enhanced solar warming, probably triggered by violent and protracted volcanic activity, at the Permian–Triassic extinction some 250 million years ago or a massive asteroid strike at the Cretaceous–Tertiary extinction 65 million years ago... extensively and trenchantly reviewed by A A Bartlett in the Physics Teacher [12 ] In the first article, A Climate Repair Manual’, global warming is acknowledged to be a major problem The article concedes that: ‘Preventing the transformation of the Earth’s atmosphere from greenhouse to unconstrained hothouse represents arguably the most imposing scientific and technical challenge that humanity has ever faced’... lack of awareness: World energy use is expected to surge 50% from 2005 to 2030, largely due to an expanding population and rapid economic growth, according to a government report Without any new laws restricting greenhouse gases, carbon dioxide emissions will see a similar jump, the Energy Information Administration [10 ] said in its annual report on global energy markets’ It is sad to relate that a. .. if atmospheric CO2 rises four-fold It is a change which dwarfs anything that we have seen in the last millennium Conservative estimates suggest that the Greenland ice sheet is lost at about 2.7°C of local warming while the West Antarctica ice sheet could begin to disappear at 4°C Consequently for largely coastal dwelling mankind, a quadrupling of CO2 could be utterly devastating, with a possible total... since, at this point in history, the political and business classes in Western society and increasingly in China and India, continue to be irrationally fixated on the ‘market’ and ‘globalisation’, although events in 2008 may be changing this Our ‘leaders’ give no indication that they see global warming as a ‘red light’ to growth Monetarism [5], introduced to the financial community by Friedman and others,... climatic ‘prongs’ to hopefully prod awake the slumbering masses to at least consider the possibility that global warming is already here, and it could be potentially devastating! Climatologists talk about a process of ‘forcing’ when quantifying the influence of atmospheric carbon on global warming The Earth is naturally warmed by radiation from the sun If you were to try to gather this solar heat over... 12 5 12 5 13 0 13 8 14 4 Glossary 14 7 References and Notes Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 15 1 15 1 15 3 15 6 15 8 16 3 Index 16 5 Chapter 1 The Context and Corollaries A billion could live off the Earth; 6 billion living as we do is far too many, and you run out of planet in no time James... a table-spoon full of water What this means is that a small fraction of radiation from the planet, which would normally propagate back out into space, is not permitted to do so by the enhanced CO2 ‘blanket’, and adds 0.7% to atmospheric and surface warming This undoubtedly seems to be rather insignificant in relative terms, and consequently it is difficult not to ask: ‘What is the problem?’ The answer... Earth’s orbit around the sun changes periodically from circular to elliptical in shape on about a 10 0,000 year cycle At present the orbit is almost circular (eccentricity = 1) but it can have a value in the range 1. 25 1. 3 In this case the Earth can be carried much closer to the sun and it is additionally warmed during these excursions The ice records of CO2 and temperature faithfully echo these planetary . Supply and Demand 12 5 5.2 The Transport Crunch 13 0 5.3 Towards a Wired World 13 8 5.4 The Unknowable 14 4 Glossary 14 7 References and Notes 15 1 Chapter 1 1 51 Chapter 2 15 3 Chapter 3 15 6 Chapter. 18 6 5-3 529 e-ISSN 18 6 5-3 537 ISBN 97 8 -1 -8 488 2-8 3 3-9 e-ISBN 97 8 -1 -8 488 2-8 3 4-6 DOI 10 .10 07/97 8 -1 -8 488 2-8 3 4-6 Springer Dordrecht Heidelberg London New York British Library Cataloguing in Publication. Thermal Storage 93 4.6 Batteries 96 4.7 Hydrogen 10 2 4.8 Capacitors 10 7 4.9 Superconducting Magnets 11 1 4 .10 Nuclear Back-up 11 5 4 .11 The Ecogrid 11 8 5 Known Knowns and the Unknown 12 5 5.1