Weather, Water, Energy 8-08-06

Britain has a new Climate Ambassador (!), and he's speaking out. Global warming must be dealt with "whatever its costs," he says. Imagine: he says consensus and diplomacy need to be mobilized right now because "We need to treat climate change not as a long term threat to our environment, but as an immediate threat to our security and prosperity." He gives 10-15 years to get our acts together. I'm trying hard not to let the cynic out here. . . . Do we have 10-15 years? A Nature article details a study of permafrost belts in North Siberia which are thawing and releasing 40,000-year-old methane, a greenhouse gas 20 times the power of CO2. That is gas not counted in past models and actually initiates a positive feedback loop, which sounds nice but usually isn't. This is not good.