Category Archives: Science

Message from communications research: Climate change is real. Repeat. Repeat again.

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There is an ongoing feud about value in communicating the scientific consensus on climate change to the public. One side argues that we need to talk about the consensus in order to raise public awareness about climate change. A new review article by John Cook and Peter Jacobs (also described in the Guardian) reviews the evidence for “consensus messaging”.  The counterargument, proposed by Dan Kahan and others, is that talking about consensus will increase political polarization about climate change.

A recent paper by Kahan called “Climate Science Communication and the Measurement Problem” suggests the disagreement among communications researchers is related to the “contamination of education and politics with forms of cultural status competition”. It is a fascinating paper with a lot of important findings. But I wonder if, deep in the data, there may be evidence that the drumbeat of climate change news and outreach campaigns has actually been effective.

The core result of the paper is described by the following figure:

Kahan 2014 - Fig 7 - no legendIf people were rationally assessing scientific information, higher science comprehension would translate into higher perceived risk from climate change (left panel). Kahan’s experiments find the opposite for people on the right of the political spectrum (red, right panel). That’s been the headline: for conservatives, better knowledge of climate science might mean less concern about climate change.

In other words, when people go beyond the basics, opinions become polarized. That is not very surprising, given that someone on the right of the political spectrum with greater interest and/or ability in science who looks for information about climate change may head to right-wing media and blogs, which often house an alternate universe of “facts” about climate change.

What is more surprising are the results for people with low “science comprehension”.

Why are people with low science comprehension on both the left and the right of the political spectrum perceiving moderate to high risk from climate change? If people’s views on climate change are defined more by their cultural identity than by the facts of the case, why would people on the right of the spectrum with low science comprehension have even moderate concern about climate change?

This opinion about the risk from climate change must derive from something. It isn’t a detailed knowledge of the science, or the problem. Otherwise, the people would fall elsewhere on the graph. It also isn’t their community. Their community, if defined correctly, generally believes the risk from climate change to be low.

What’s happening? Perhaps there has been enough mention of climate change in the public domain, whether on the news, in private conversations, etc., that even those who pay scant little attention to science have been able to develop some level of concern about climate change.

It may be that, current polarization aside, the much-maligned information deficit model has actually worked, at least with very basic information, and in the way political messaging works. Years of repeating the general facts of the case – climate change is real, caused by humans, and poses a risk to the future – appears to have created a basic public consciousness about climate change.

The climate, coral reefs, and energy policy must learn to cope with commitment

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Bleached corals, Fiji, April 2014

This week, the U.S. government announced it would be listing 20 coral species found in American waters as “threatened” under the Endangered Species Act. Part of the rationale is the threat posed by climate change and ocean acidification, a potentially groundbreaking policy move. What may be missed in this announcement is that the original proposal included a longer list of 66 coral species.

The decision begs a broad question. If we are considering the research on climate change and ocean acidification in the decision, then why not list all coral species as threatened?

The Coral Specialist Group of the IUCN, of which I’ve been a part, submitted a detailed comment to the U.S. proceedings. My meager contribution to the group’s terrific dissection of coral ecology and physiology was the argument that committed climate warming may alone be sufficient evidence for all coral species to be listed as threatened. Here is the excerpt, with wording vastly improved by my colleagues:

The projected increase in sea surface temperatures due to the physical commitment from the present accumulation of greenhouse gases due to anthropogenic activity, as well as the socioeconomic commitment (i.e. it is logistically impossible to instantly eliminate anthropogenic emissions, regardless of policy decisions, because of inertia to the existing energy system), is sufficient to cause frequent and higher magnitude heat stress for the majority of the world’s coral reefs by 2050 (Donner, 2009). The primary source of uncertainty in this forecast is the ability of the coral holobiont to acclimate and/or adapt to heat stress. The fact that the future abundance of coral species depends on a rate of adjustment to heat stress that is unprecedented in geological history should be sufficient to warrant a minimum status of threatened for all coral species.

The problem of coping with commitment, the title of that cited 2009 paper, was highlighted by a terrific new paper that happened to be released almost simultaneously with the U.S. coral decision. In “Commitment Accounting of CO2 emissions”, Stephen Davis and Rob Socolow calculate the committed emissions from the operation of new energy investments, like coal plants, over the expected lifetime of those investments (see Dot Earth for a lengthy discussion). They conclude that it would  be sensible to use committed emissions, rather than the annual emissions, to inform public policy.

The socioeconomic commitment or capital “lock-in” to future emissions has implications for everything from these species listings to oil pipeline decisions. We can’t perfectly project the future of each coral species, but we can say that the oceans are committed to physical and chemical changes which may be dangerous or fatal to corals. These changes do not guarantee widespread extinction or endangerment, given potential adaptability of many species and the potential refuges in the ocean, but certainly could classify as threatening.

Concerns about global warming… since the 1930s

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1101390102_400“Gaffers who claim that winters were harder when they were boys are quite right—except that the change is too small to be detected except by instruments and statistics in the hands of professional meteorologists. Weather men have no doubt that the world at least for the time being is growing warmer.”

– “Warmer World“, Time Magazine, January 2, 1939

Yes, that’s with a 1, 9, 3 and another 9. The suspicions of weather “men” of the time were correct. The world was warming, and it would eventually continue to do so.

This article came before the upward trend in global temperatures actually slowed for two decades, thanks to a combination of air pollution, natural variability and land use change. Concern about the warming climate waned somewhat, but scientists continued to study the physical impact of adding carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. By the late 1970s, the consensus among scientists studying the climate was that a continued increase in atmospheric CO2 levels will continue to warm the planet.

The NHL may be on thin ice, due to climate change

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A new sustainability report from the NHL warns that climate change affects “opportunities for hockey players of all ages to learn and play the game outdoors”.

The report on sustainability initiatives may look like a bit of greenwashing from a sports league whose business can involve air-conditioning large stadiums to refrigerator levels in southern U.S. cities during June in order to play a winter activity. Nevertheless, the effect of climate change on outdoor ice, and the culture of Canadians and northern Americans is a real concern.

Liberty02The “ice season” on lakes and rivers all across the Northern Hemisphere has been shrinking. One of the longest records is from Lake Mendota, in Madison, Wisconsin, where I went to graduate school. The lake may be most famous for this Planet of the Apes stunt, first done by students back in 1979.

Welcome to the newest sequel, Melting of the Planet of the Apes.

The Mendota ice season averaged 122 days long back when observations began in the 1800s (1885-1875 average). Thanks to climate warming, the ice season is now more than a full month shorter! The average winter over the past twenty years featured only 85 days of ice.

mendota-durThis coarse metric of ice duration only tells part of the story. A lake that once froze in its entirety may now have portions that remain unfrozen all winter. During the record short 2001-2 ice season, enough of Mendota and other neighbouring lakes remained unfrozen that I considered taking my kayak out in mid-February, just for the sheer novelty of paddling in the middle of a Wisconsin winter.

A 2012 study in Environmental Research Letters suggested the shrinking ice trend extends even to artificial outdoor skating rinks. Using rink officials’ rules for deciding when the weather is safe enough to start the ice, scientists calculated that the skating season had shrunk over the past fifty years across Canada.

If the world continues on this greenhouse gas emissions trajectory, learning to skate on an outdoor rink may become a thing of the past, as will a number of key economic activities, like traveling safely by vehicle across the roadless, lake-dotted landscape of northern Canada. In a few more decades, when we’re on to the thirtieth Planet of the Apes sequel, the UW students may have to haul Miss Liberty out on pontoons.

The NHL is smart to be concerned about climate change. A favourable climate is foremost among the reasons that hockey – and watching hockey – is so fundamental to Canadians, and also Minnesotans and Wisconsinites. As the climate changes, culture may too, as we warn in this video. Kids may be less likely to get interested in skating and ice sports… or parents may be less likely to drag their crying kids to the indoor rink to practice.  Next thing you know, they may be playing and watching other sports.

Is El Niño on the way?

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Following on a study by my former student Sandra Banholzer and I about the influence of different types of El Niño on global temperatures, I sat down with UBC Public Affairs to answer some questions about the possible return of El Niño this winter.

When should we start to see El Niño develop and how will the average person notice it?

El Niño typically develops during our fall and reaches peak strength during our winter and early spring. Scientists are watching conditions in the Pacific Ocean to check early suspicions that a new figure4event is on the way.

El Niño itself begins far away in the equatorial Pacific. A reversal of winds and currents brings unusually warm waters to an area between the coast of South America and the International Date Line. This is like dropping a huge rock in a stream. The warm waters release so much energy into the atmosphere that the normal flow of air is diverted, affecting weather all over the planet.

If a strong event develops, people across Western and Central Canada should see an unusually mild, dry winter and spring. On the other hand, people across parts of the southern U.S. should see unusually wet conditions. 

Will climate change play a role in strengthening this El Niño?

Climate change affects everything that happens in the atmosphere and the ocean. The jury is still out on exactly how climate change affects the development of El Niño events.

One thing is certain: as the planet has warmed, El Niño events have also warmed. Our research shows that, all else being equal, an El Niño event today is warmer around the world than an identical event 100 years ago.

How could El Niño affect global agriculture and fishing?

El Niño is no joke. Regional heat and drought brought by a classic “Eastern Pacific” El Niño can be devastating to farmers in southern Africa, India, Southeast Asia, Australia, the Pacific Islands, and even the Canadian prairies. The warm El Niño waters also choke off the supply of nutrients to the great fisheries off the coast of South America. We’d all see the effect in global food prices.

One silver lining may be California. El Niño rains could offer a respite from the intense three-year drought that has crippled production in the Central Valley.

Will a potential El Niño affect global temperatures in the coming months?

In general, El Niño events are expected to cause a spike in global average temperature. But not all El Niño events are created equal. Research led by my former student Sandra Banholzer shows that only the classic events with the ocean warming in the eastern Pacific–as last happened in 1997/1998–definitely lead to an increase in global average temperature.

Since then, El Niño events have been more of the “Central Pacific” variety, which are not necessarily warm globally. The supposed “pause” in global warming over the past 15 years is nothing of the sort. The planet has been warming, but thanks to these naturally variable conditions in the Pacific, more heat than usual has gone into the ocean.

The overall global warming trend is so strong that even a weaker El Niño is enough to break global temperature records. This past May was already the warmest May in recorded history. If the overall Pacific  pattern flips in the coming months, bringing a strong classic El Niño, we’re likely to shatter global temperature records.