Originally Posted by Bad Dog

... The need for network admins to have PC's "wake-on-LAN" for updates means that not even holiday periods have reductions in baseload for PC's, monitors, peripherals, etc. Can't shut the UPS's down. The server farms and data centers have to stay up. So do the switches and routers and wireless access points.

And to what purpose, exactly? If memory serves, is the "killer app" on the internet not still pornography?

My wife is a techno-geek. She has an android phone, an I-pad, an I-pod, and a fairly new Apple computer, along with Netflix, Apple TV, and god-only-knows what else that runs 24/7.

This morning she gleefully showed me how her Apple computer can hold SIXTEEN simultaneous screens at hand! WTF!

And I imagine ... how much obsolete, and/or useless, and/or never-or-seldom visited old websites, blogs and other crap is being stored on server farms wherever?

And I notice, my techno-geek spouse doesn't really DO anything with all this stuff. She's mostly just fascinated with watching her plethora of "apps" do their tricks. When she buys a new piece of gear, she will frequently spend weeks making it jump through ALL of its hoops, do ALL of its tricks, demonstrate that ALL of its features actually work. Then? Nothing. She simply moves on to the next device.

The more complex the better. Her new Apple computer, which replaced a 7 y/o HP PC, has almost endless complexity. So, a couple months later, she is still exploring "features" that it has. In this case she might never get finished I suppose.

Amazing. By comparison, yesterday I marveled at a scene of the backcountry of the Gila Wilderness in western New Mexico. I was not connected to Verizon. I didn't have a computer with me. I needed no electricity to run my operation. The joy I felt at experiencing the scene and the environment had taken place as a result of being lucky enough to be able to hike the miles necessary to reveal the scenario.

So what am I saying? I'm not sure. It's just that I enjoy actually doing something, not just watching something run ...

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

A single hospital may use as much as 500kW of power on an ongong basis. Medical center hospitals use much more than that. Multiply that by the number of hospitals ... and realize that hospitals are only a small part of the baseload need that cannot be postponed for even a few minutes.

Eric, you are outside your knowledge space here. This cannot be overcome with batteries. Someday, a technology may exist. It doesn't now.

We may have to learn, as our ancestors did, how to exist without immediate, guaranteed energy all the time. I do know that we waste enormous resources keeping people alive artificially that have no hope of recovery.

I think you are not up to date. The only thing that does not exist in sufficient voltage is political will. Have you read my links I have posted for years here? Batteries exist at any solar power plant and any solar roof system. You need not discount what I posted because of your conception of what my "knowledge base" is. Maybe that's your problem with you hearing what I say. But it is simple fact, available to anyone. Grids and batteries exist. They store the energy that is needed. We have to switch to solar and wind as fast as we can. There is no other alternative. We must go renewable now; even now may be too late.

You mean these links, the ones that say they aren't talking about grid-scale storage?

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

We may have to learn, as our ancestors did, how to exist without immediate, guaranteed energy all the time. I do know that we waste enormous resources keeping people alive artificially that have no hope of recovery.

I think you are not up to date. The only thing that does not exist in sufficient voltage is political will. Have you read my links I have posted for years here? Batteries exist at any solar power plant and any solar roof system. You need not discount what I posted because of your conception of what my "knowledge base" is. Maybe that's your problem with you hearing what I say. But it is simple fact, available to anyone. Grids and batteries exist. They store the energy that is needed. We have to switch to solar and wind as fast as we can. There is no other alternative. We must go renewable now; even now may be too late.

Farms used to run water pumps, farm machinery, and even household current on wind power. Maybe people in places with copious wind power (Dallas is a good example due to high average winds) might as well build windmills for household current. Dallas is also very sunny, so just think what solar panels could do there. I can imagine cities prohibiting windmills for 'esthetic' reasons and enforcing such prohibitions with building codes... inspiration for such prohibitions coming from Big Oil.

Big Climate Report: Warming Is Big Risk for People
Monday, 24 Mar 2014 06:15 AM


If you think of climate change as a hazard for some far-off polar bears years from now, you're mistaken. That's the message from top climate scientists gathering in Japan this week to assess the impact of global warming.

In fact, they will say, the dangers of a warming Earth are immediate and very human.

"The polar bear is us," says Patricia Romero Lankao of the federally financed National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo., referring to the first species to be listed as threatened by global warming due to melting sea ice.

She will be among the more than 60 scientists in Japan to finish writing a massive and authoritative report on the impacts of global warming. With representatives from about 100 governments at this week's meeting of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, they'll wrap up a summary that tells world leaders how bad the problem is.

The key message from leaked drafts and interviews with the authors and other scientists: The big risks and overall effects of global warming are far more immediate and local than scientists once thought. It's not just about melting ice, threatened animals and plants. It's about the human problems of hunger, disease, drought, flooding, refugees and war, becoming worse.

The report says scientists have already observed many changes from warming, such as an increase in heat waves in North America, Europe, Africa and Asia. Severe floods, such as the one that displaced 90,000 people in Mozambique in 2008, are now more common in Africa and Australia. Europe and North America are getting more intense downpours that can be damaging. Melting ice in the Arctic is not only affecting the polar bear, but already changing the culture and livelihoods of indigenous people in northern Canada.

Past panel reports have been ignored because global warming's effects seemed too distant in time and location, says Pennsylvania State University scientist Michael Mann.

This report finds "It's not far-off in the future and it's not exotic creatures — it's us and now," says Mann, who didn't work on this latest report.

The United Nations established the climate change panel in 1988 and its work is done by three groups. One looks at the science behind global warming. The group meeting in Japan beginning Tuesday studies its impacts. And a third looks at ways to slow warming.

Its reports have reiterated what nearly every major scientific organization has said: The burning of coal, oil and gas is producing an increasing amount of heat-trapping greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide. Those gases change Earth's climate, bringing warmer temperatures and more extreme weather, and the problem is worsening.

The panel won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007, months after it issued its last report.

Since then, the impact group has been reviewing the latest research and writing 30 chapters on warming's effects and regional impacts. Those chapters haven't been officially released but were posted on a skeptical website.

The key message can be summed up in one word that the overall report uses more than 5,000 times: risk.

"Climate change really is a challenge in managing risks," says the report's chief author, Chris Field of the Carnegie Institution of Science in California. "It's very clear that we are not prepared for the kind of events we're seeing."

Already the effects of global warming are "widespread and consequential," says one part of the larger report, noting that science has compiled more evidence and done much more research since the last report in 2007.

If climate change continues, the panel's larger report predicts these harms:

— VIOLENCE: For the first time, the panel is emphasizing the nuanced link between conflict and warming temperatures. Participating scientists say warming won't cause wars, but it will add a destabilizing factor that will make existing threats worse.

— FOOD: Global food prices will rise between 3 and 84 percent by 2050 because of warmer temperatures and changes in rain patterns. Hotspots of hunger may emerge in cities.

— WATER: About one-third of the world's population will see groundwater supplies drop by more than 10 percent by 2080, when compared with 1980 levels. For every degree of warming, more of the world will have significantly less water available.

— HEALTH: Major increases in health problems are likely, with more illnesses and injury from heat waves and fires and more food and water-borne diseases. But the report also notes that warming's effects on health is relatively small compared with other problems, like poverty.

— WEALTH: Many of the poor will get poorer. Economic growth and poverty reduction will slow down. If temperatures rise high enough, the world's overall income may start to go down, by as much as 2 percent, but that's difficult to forecast.

According to the report, risks from warming-related extreme weather, now at a moderate level, are likely to get worse with just a bit more warming. While it doesn't say climate change caused the events, the report cites droughts in northern Mexico and the south-central United States, and hurricanes such as 2012's Sandy, as illustrations of how vulnerable people are to weather extremes. It does say the deadly European heat wave in 2003 was made more likely because of global warming.

Texas Tech University climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe, who was not part of this report team, says the important nuance is how climate change interacts with other human problems: "It's interacting and exacerbating problems we already have today."

University of Colorado science policy professor Roger Pielke Jr., a past critic of the panel's impact reports, said after reading the draft summary, "it's a lot of important work ... They made vast improvements to the quality of their assessments."

Another critic, University of Alabama Huntsville professor John Christy, accepts man-made global warming but thinks its risks are overblown when compared with something like poverty. Climate change is not among the developing world's main problems, he says.

But other scientists say Christy is misguided. Earlier this month, the world's largest scientific organization, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, published a new fact sheet on global warming.

It said: "Climate change is already happening. More heat waves, greater sea level rise and other changes with consequences for human health, natural ecosystems and agriculture are already occurring in the United States and worldwide. These problems are very likely to become worse over the next 10 to 20 years and beyond."

Texas Tech's Hayhoe says scientists in the past may have created the impression that the main reason to care about climate change was its impact on the environment.

"We care about it because it's going to affect nearly every aspect of human life on this planet," she says.


© Copyright 2014 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Read Latest Breaking News from Newsmax.com http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/UN-...#ixzz2wvpjB3HN

This is another link summarizing the same conference Eric posted about before... Little time left to turn down the world's heat, U.N. says

UN Panel: Climate Change Is Real, Getting Worse

Global warming is affecting the oceans and every continent, including North America, a U.N. climate panel said in a report issued Monday, The New York Times reported.

The U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change urged governments and the private sector to prepare for the near-term effects of climate change, while working to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases, The Washington Post reported.

Looking at the risks, authorities expressed "very high confidence" that rising sea levels would endanger the U.S. East Coast, and noted that much of the mountain snowpack in the American West is waning. With snow melting earlier in the year, less water is on hand during the arid summers. In Alaska, sea ice collapse is permitting enormous waves to chip away at the coast, the Times reported.

Worldwide, scientists pointed to melting ice caps, intensifying weather conditions, coastal waters that are becoming more acidic, and sea life migration as some of the effects of present climate change.

"We live in an era of man-made climate change," Vicente Barros, co-chairman of the panel, said in a statement.

The report, a 48-page executive summary, is the second part of a four-part appraisal. It was the product of input from hundreds of scientists, as well as considerable political wrangling. The version approved left out mention of the billions of dollars less-developed countries wanted wealthier nations to spend in offsetting the impact of global warming, the Times reported.

The report said scientists had "very high confidence" that heat waves would become more intense as a result of global warming leading to a steady rise in sea levels, the Post reported.

The panel said that the worst is yet to come with food supplies coming under increased strain, according to the Times.

The panel is an outgrowth of the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environment Program and operates out of Geneva with a dozen full-time staffers. Scientific contributors volunteer their expertise, the BBC reported.


Read Latest Breaking News from Newsmax.com http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/Uni...#ixzz2xanbi3Dn
Urgent: Should Obamacare Be Repealed? Vote Here Now!

The Koch brothers will really dislike this idea.

Published on Monday, April 7, 2014 by Common Dreams
Solartopia! Winning the Green Energy Revolution


by Harvey Wasserman

Robber Baron resistance to renewable energy has never been more fierce.

The prime reason is that the Solartopian Revolution embodies the ultimate threat to the corporate utility industry and the hundreds of billions of dollars it has invested in the obsolete monopolies that define King CONG (Coal, Oil, Nukes & Gas).

Hemp as the way to a greener future?

Along with on*going breakthroughs in other feedstocks (especially algae) hemp will be a major player in the Solartopian future. As pot inches its way toward full legalization, we can reasonably expect to see a revolution in bio*-fuels within a very few years.

Likewise wind and solar. Windmills have been with us for at least five centuries. Coming from the plains of Asia, they covered our own Great Plains in the Great Depression and have rapidly advanced in power and efficiency. Newly installed turbine capacity is far cheaper than nukes and has recently surpassed all but the dirtiest of fossil fuels. As at Bowling Green, installation can be quick and efficient. Actual output often exceeds expectation, as do profits and job *creation.


But the real revolution is coming in photo*voltaics (PV). These technologies ***and there’s a very wide range of them ***convert sunlight to electricity. Within the next few decades, they will comprise the largest industry in human history. Every home, office, factory, window, parking lot, highway, vehicle, machine, device and much more

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2014/04/07-4

This was written last year.

The Koch Brothers Are Still Trying to Break Wind (Op-Ed)

Americans for Prosperity’s anti-solar campaign in Georgia is just one of many Koch-backed efforts across the country working to deny the existence of global warming, stop the regulation of pollution from coal-fired power plants, and dismantle successful state renewable energy legislation.

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/07/09/2267051/koch-brothers-fund-effort-to-undermine-tea-party-support-of-solar-energy-in-georgia/

Originally Posted by Deb C

This was written last year.

The Koch Brothers Are Still Trying to Break Wind (Op-Ed)




http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/07/09/2267051/koch-brothers-fund-effort-to-undermine-tea-party-support-of-solar-energy-in-georgia/

The Koch Brothers are deeply involved in petroleum and want any competition to it or any effort to reduce its consumption defeated. They represent homo oeconomicus at nearly its extreme. More extreme? Try the international drug lords.

A good article explaining the latest developments, or perhaps lack thereof. All of the article should be read, but I'm going to post item #3 in here just for Eric. The part I bolded was highlighted in big letters aside the section.

http://www.vox.com/2014/4/13/5610356...imate-disaster

3) Cutting emissions will require a huge technological push

So how do we cut emissions so drastically? First, the IPCC says that the world would have to triple or quadruple the amount of clean energy it uses. Second, we'd have to get dramatically more efficient at using energy in our homes, buildings, and cars.


Right now, about 17 percent of the world's energy is "low-carbon" — a little bit of wind and solar power, some nuclear power plants, a bunch of hydroelectric dams. Countries would have to ramp those technologies up dramatically — tripling or quadrupling that share.


That means two things. First, it's tough to rule out any particular technologies. For instance, plenty of environmentalists are opposed to nuclear power. But the IPCC estimates that the task of cutting emissions becomes 7 percent more costly if we shutter all our nuclear plants. Likewise, the technology to capture carbon emissions from coal plants and bury it underground is still in its infancy. If that technology fails, then cutting emissions becomes twice as expensive.

if we rule out technologies like nuclear power, the task becomes much harder


Second, the IPCC notes that investment in fossil fuels — coal, oil, and natural gas — will have to decrease by 20 percent in the next few decades. After all, if we ramp up solar power, but coal expands even faster, that does no good for climate purposes. So the fossil-fuel industry has to take a hit.


Is this all doable? The IPCC thinks it's at least technologically feasible. Whether it's politically realistic is another matter. The report suggests that countries could start taxing carbon emissions as way of pushing private companies to redirect their investments. So far, however, those policies have been slow to catch on — in the United States, a carbon tax is a non-starter in Congress.

A Conversation about Climate Change: Crisis, Opportunity and a Call for Action was held today at a local UCC (United Church of Christ) where I went to Sunday School when I was about 8 years old. It is located on the street I live on. There were 7 panelists, representing different current generations. Here are some approximate quotes from 4 of them, one from each generation (or at least I thought so; the first one is younger than I thought), and some references about them and their work. The different perspectives and interests among them are interesting in the light of our generation theory.


Will Travis (early Boomer, b 1943; consultant, writer and teacher, he helped "save the Bay" and worked with Bay Conservation and Development Commission).



"I've really taken joy at making the system work," said Travis, 68, who was hired as an urban designer by the then-new commission in 1970, returning as deputy director in 1985. "It's so easy to carry out the rules so that nothing changes. I like making stuff happen."

http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/articl...ay-3115347.php

"It's time for older folks to step aside; the kids will save us"

"2 actions are needed to respond to climate change. We will need to switch to renewable energy, and to prepare for the effects of climate change."

"Wetland restoration would help prevent flooding of high-tech companies as well as public infrastructure. Investors may shy away from the Bay Area if it is vulnerable to floods."


Marianna Grossman (Boomer, she appeared to be in her 50s) Executive Director, Sustainable Silicon Valley, a consortium that works for a more sustainable region and world.

Marianna Grossman on you tube:
http://youtu.be/6wrGHaDi1AQ



Marianna Grossman interview:
http://blip.tv/michael-killen-on-cre...ossman-4843934

"It is not just young people who need to make the change; all of us still breathing are responsible."

"There's a spiritual need to appreciate Creation, and the healing it brings. We need to be aware of the interconnection of the impacts of pollution."


Mike Mielke (Xer, about 40 years old) VP for Environment, Silicon Valley Leadership Group; Executive Director, California Climate Breakthrough Initiative. He builds partnerships that engage the public and influential people.


http://svlg.org/about-us/our-staff/mike-mielke

Menlo Park Mayor Kirsten Keith with Mike Mielke at BACC
http://youtu.be/8NHqg6J6nH4

"Philanthropy is needed for public education on climate change."
"These kinds of meetings need to happen every day."
"Climate change is underfunded; receives on 0.75% of all grant money."


Andreas Karelas (Millennial; I asked him his age; he's 30) Executive Director, RE-volv
Renewable energy advocate working with non-profits.



SF Bay Area Community Solar Confluence — Andreas Karelas, RE-volv
http://youtu.be/u2xEZBZX5_E

http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/...odel-for-solar

"The consciousness of interconnection and healing is great, but technology is saving us."
"If government fails, people like us can do it anyway."
"Here's some good news; renewable energy increased by 418% from 2010 through 2014."
"Solar energy doubled in 1 year in CA."

10 charts that will make you want to stop global warming.

http://ourfuture.org/20140506/10-new...ign=scherthing

From League of Conservation Voters:

Anti-science forces moved into the U.S. House of Representatives 4 years ago-- and they have been waging an all-out assault on our environment since day one. The anti-environment leadership in the House will continue to work to dismantle our nation's conservation policies in a way we've never seen before. And they've made the Environmental Protection Agency their #1 target. Since they came to power in 2010, riding a wave of corporate polluter money, anti-environment members of the House have worked to defund and weaken the EPA, attempted to block clean air standards, and tried to stop efforts to reduce mercury pollution in our air and water.

Join the fight against these anti-environment lawmakers:

Rep Mike Rogers (AL) (Republican, b.1963) Contributions from polluters: $407,618

"Who says the federal government has to have an EPA? Every state has their own environmental protection agency. Why does the federal government need to be doing that?

Rep Mike Pompeo (KS) (Republican, b.1963) Contributions from polluters: $627,110

When asked at a conference sponsored by the Koch-backed groups Americans for Prosperity what could be done to defund the EPA, Pompeo boasted, "We're trying. Indeed, I personally tried."

Rep Ted Poe (TX) (Republican, b.1948) Contributions from polluters: $329,600

"right now, someone is sitting at a large oak table in the EPA's marble palace in Washington DC, sipping a vanilla latte and dreaming up a new rule to impose. Without fail, the EPA continues to come up with ideas that leave you scratching your head in wonderment because of the questionable science used to justify these regulations."

Sen James Inhofe (OK) (Republican, b.1934) Contributions from polluters: $1787,696

"I can only say that what this country does not need is another Gestapo bureaucracy like the EPA..."

Rep Pete Olson (TX) (Republican, b.1962) Contributions from polluters: $490,050

Asked by a reporter if the EPA could be eliminated, Olson replied, "Oh yeah, we're going to fight like heck for it. It may not happen with a Democrat senate and a Democrat in the White House, but we're not going to stop fighting for it."

(unquote LCV)


If you have seen my posts of the environmental voting records of congress here, you know that Democrats vote over 90% for the environment, and Republicans less than 10%. The idea that there's no difference between the parties is false.

Americans need to make a decision this 4T. That decision is whether or not to give the Republicans the boot. The sooner we decide to do so, the easier our 4T and its consequences will be for us.

Originally Posted by Bronco80

A good article explaining the latest developments, or perhaps lack thereof. All of the article should be read, but I'm going to post item #3 in here just for Eric. The part I bolded was highlighted in big letters aside the section.

http://www.vox.com/2014/4/13/5610356...imate-disaster

Thank you. Yes, I fully support nuclear power as a "low carbon" addition. Eric is silly.

Birds adapting to Cherbobyl exclusion zone ionizing radiation

Brids. <Beavis, Butthead> heh, heh, he said birds </Beavis, Butthead>

* dodo award for Eric ["Also just for Eric"] Just another addition to your flock, there Eric. Enjoy.

I like nuclear power--- from the sun!

Without the sun, there would be no birds. But birds will do just fine without nucs. So will people.

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

I like nuclear power--- from the sun!

Without the sun, there would be no birds. But birds will do just fine without nucs. So will people.

The sun is fusion powered. Nuclear power here on Earth is fission based. They are nearly opposites of one another beyond the fact that they involve atomic nuclei and release large amounts of thermal energy from relatively small fuel masses.

Originally Posted by Vandal-72

The sun is fusion powered. Nuclear power here on Earth is fission based. They are nearly opposites of one another beyond the fact that they involve atomic nuclei and release large amounts of thermal energy from relatively small fuel masses.

Fission products are far more troublesome: cobalt-60, strontium-90, iodine-131, and cesium-137.

Bloomberg has two stories related to the economics of AGW.

The first covers the cost the world will have to pay to get where we need to be: $44 Trillion ... up from $36 Trillion just two years ago. Link HERE.

The other shows why it isn't going to happen, even though the evidence is overwhelming. Link HERE.

So you folks in the under-40 crowd are just screwed.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

Bloomberg has two stories related to the economics of AGW.

The first covers the cost the world will have to pay to get where we need to be: $44 Trillion ... up from $36 Trillion just two years ago. Link HERE.

The other shows why it isn't going to happen, even though the evidence is overwhelming. Link HERE.

So you folks in the under-40 crowd are just screwed.

Like Biloxi, it's only a matter of time. New Orleans was also *the* preview.

Silly humans. I bet they cash the FEMA checks, and vote Tea Party.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

Bloomberg has two stories related to the economics of AGW.

The first covers the cost the world will have to pay to get where we need to be: $44 Trillion ... up from $36 Trillion just two years ago. Link HERE.

The other shows why it isn't going to happen, even though the evidence is overwhelming. Link HERE.

So you folks in the under-40 crowd are just screwed.

Teh internets are quite remarkable. One of those links above showed the way to

Climate change is making birds shack up!

CNN reports that Ice melt in part of Antarctic appears unstoppable. Warmer sea temperatures have eroded the base of the glaciers allowing everything to flow down hill. Lots of ice involved. The guesstimate is 1 to 3 feet of world wide ocean level rise over several centuries.

Real Climate is reporting an El Nino is possible, disrupting weather patterns and allowing heat absorbed by the Pacific during La Nina years to flow back into the atmosphere. If it happens, the 'world is getting warmer' temperature charts will get a brief bump on top of the steady rise. Still, an over all trend to warmer doesn't imply that every location in the world gets warmer.

Originally Posted by B Butler

CNN reports that Ice melt in part of Antarctic appears unstoppable. Warmer sea temperatures have eroded the base of the glaciers allowing everything to flow down hill. Lots of ice involved. The guesstimate is 1 to 3 feet of world wide ocean level rise over several centuries.

I saw the same story elsewhere, and that version had the sea rise at 1 to 3 feet by 2100, and 10 feet after the melting completes. In other words, the coasts everywhere are in trouble.

Originally Posted by B Butler ...

Real Climate is reporting an El Nino is possible, disrupting weather patterns and allowing heat absorbed by the Pacific during La Nina years to flow back into the atmosphere. If it happens, the 'world is getting warmer' temperature charts will get a brief bump on top of the steady rise. Still, an over all trend to warmer doesn't imply that every location in the world gets warmer.

Maybe this will be a wake up call. I doubt it, but we can hope.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

I saw the same story elsewhere, and that version had the sea rise at 1 to 3 feet by 2100, and 10 feet after the melting completes. In other words, the coasts everywhere are in trouble.

Different outlets seem to be wording it a bit differently, but, yes, the coasts everywhere are in trouble.

Originally Posted by Boston Globe

Those six glaciers alone could cause the ocean to rise 4 feet as they disappear, Rignot said, possibly within a couple of centuries. He added that their disappearance will most likely destabilize other sectors of the ice sheet, so the ultimate rise could be triple that.

I've been looking at the temperature history for years. We're only a few degrees from the point where pre historically the entire antarctic traditionally melts.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

Maybe this will be a wake up call. I doubt it, but we can hope.

The last big el nino in 1998 happened near the hot peak of the last solar cycle. The global heat record set that year still stands. Some are still saying that global warming ended in 1998. It is possible that bogus claim at least will be put to rest.

It looks like we can say goodbye to our beaches, and all the cool beach cultures. The only beachboys and surfers left after all our beaches are submerged will be polar bears surfing on ice, as shown in the video below.