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DrDeeg
Mountain climber
Mammoth Lakes, CA
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Topic Author's Original Post - Jul 18, 2010 - 12:45pm PT
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I thought about posting this in the Climate Change skeptics? section, but decided it is on-topic. David Breashears (the original Kloberdanz Kid, distinguished filmmaker, and with 5 ascents of Everest) has been taking photos to document changing Himalayan glaciers. David has retraced the steps of renowned mountain photographers of the past century to recapture images of these mountains and their glaciers from exactly the same vantage points. The methods allow him to use terrestrial photogrammetry to estimate volumetric changes, instead of just changes in glaciers' termini.
Multi-decadal records of glacier variations are key indicators of climate in mountainous areas around the world, with winter growth recording snow accumulation and summer wastage recording summer melt. Most often these records are based on observations of a few specific glaciers, yet we know that it is difficult to characterize regional climate based on a small sample of glaciers. Nowhere is this understanding needed more than in mid-latitudes where meltw#ter from the glaciers supports human consumption, agriculture, and hydropower, especially during dry seasons. From satellite data (some of them old declassified spy satellite images), we can identify advances and retreats in the terminus of a glacier and thus derive an index to its mass balance, but these analyses do not provide a quantitative measure of changes in mass balance that Breashears’ photos do.
The photos are currently on display in New York City (July 13 – August 15, Asia Society, 725 Park Ave). The web site (Rivers of Ice) is superb; click on their Comparative Photography link for example. Also see today’s column by Nicholas Kristof in the New York Times.
If I can get to New York before mid-August, I plan to tour the exhibit.
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elcap-pics
Big Wall climber
Crestline CA
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Jul 18, 2010 - 01:58pm PT
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Thanks for the post.... very interesting stuff....
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TYeary
Social climber
State of decay
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Jul 18, 2010 - 02:03pm PT
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Glacial retreat is even more apparent in the tropical mountain ranges of the world, for example, the Cordillera Blanca. Dramatic melt back and down(thining) has created some dangerous situations, sometimes resulting in catstrophic flooding and loss of life and property in the Peruvian highlands. The real question is how much has mans activities on the planet contributed to these changes.
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Jan
Mountain climber
Okinawa, Japan
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Jul 18, 2010 - 02:07pm PT
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Thanks!
This is a topic dear to my heart as the valley of Sherpas I have been studying since 1974 is home to the world's largest and deepest glacial lake which has expanded alarmingly in the intervening years as the glaciers melted. A massive engineering project has taken place to begin draining the lake before it bursts and creates a devastating flood, as have many other glacial lakes in the Himalaya.
http://www.reynolds-international.co.uk/mountain_hazards_group/pdf/proj_summ_02_tshorolpa.pdf
http://raonline.ch/pages/np/nat/np_glacier01c.html
The even bigger problem is that all the major rivers of Asia begin in the Himalayas and the disappearance of the glaciers means the disappearances of the water sources on which over 2 billion people are dependent.
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the kid
Trad climber
fayetteville, wv
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Jul 19, 2010 - 01:42pm PT
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but wait, i thought this was a hoax brought on by science?
nope its true, we are warming up and melting fast.
fattrad, care to chime in?
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Toker Villain
Big Wall climber
Toquerville, Utah
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Jul 19, 2010 - 02:37pm PT
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Rox is right about something.
Water wars are coming.
Over a billion people rely on the water that flows from the roof of the world.
That can't last.
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Jerry Dodrill
climber
Sebastopol, CA
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Jul 19, 2010 - 03:09pm PT
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Thanks for the link.
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corniss chopper
Mountain climber
san jose, ca
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Jul 19, 2010 - 04:02pm PT
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As individuals nothing we do will make any difference to the climate, let
alone the weather.
So might as well enjoy the show while fighting the carbon tax scammers.
.. a fun alarmist site that knows how to crank the fear factor.
http://feww.wordpress.com/2010-disasters/
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HighTraverse
Trad climber
Bay Area
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Oct 11, 2011 - 12:33pm PT
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Alpinist 32, October 2010
http://www.alpinist.com/doc/_print/web10f/wfeature-ventura-glaciers
The Alpinist photos are really good. Dig out your #32.
What's the deal here? Brashears and Fabio Ventura cooperating but Fabio not getting credit from Brashears? Or are they competing? or what?
Anyway the more the public gets to see photos like these with their own eyes the better off we'll all be.
Many of us have bought into the semantic trap of calling it "Climate Change". Sure, climate change is the main effect we'll see from Global Warming. Climate change effects are currently very hard to predict so what to do about it is difficult to determine.
However, the chain of causality is hydrocarbon emissions causing global warming causing climate change.
The chain of causality is irrefutable. The long term solution is inescapable: reduce global hydrocarbon emissions.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming
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apogee
climber
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Oct 11, 2011 - 12:37pm PT
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"As individuals nothing we do will make any difference to the climate, let
alone the weather."
That might very well be true to some extent, but using that as a rationale to do nothing to minimize our environmental impacts is just incredibly lame.
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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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Oct 11, 2011 - 12:40pm PT
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Vanishing glaciers are nothing new, I remember that the crux of my first El Cap route was getting across the schrund from the remnant glacier at the base of El Cap to the rock. That glacier, as you know, has completely disappeared.
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Toker Villain
Big Wall climber
Toquerville, Utah
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Oct 11, 2011 - 12:43pm PT
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Was that the schrund you bridged with the wooly mammoth femur?
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donini
Trad climber
Ouray, Colorado
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Oct 11, 2011 - 12:45pm PT
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Wasn't that big, we got by with the tibula.
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Dolomite
climber
Anchorage
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Oct 11, 2011 - 12:46pm PT
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Up on the Byron Glacier a couple weeks ago. Pretty shocking--I had last been there in July 2009. And, true we had a weak (500 inches) snowfall last winter. Nonetheless, didn't look like the same place.[photoid=220728]
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HighTraverse
Trad climber
Bay Area
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Oct 11, 2011 - 12:48pm PT
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DMT
You make my point. "climate change" can be a controversial word. However the data is here to establish long term global warming. If you consider the mean temperature of the earth's oceans and land to be one component of climate, climate is certainly changing.
Either by short term data:
Or 2000 year data:
Or glacial mass data:
Just in case you think it's sunspots
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Dolomite
climber
Anchorage
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Oct 11, 2011 - 12:48pm PT
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HighTraverse
Trad climber
Bay Area
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Oct 11, 2011 - 12:59pm PT
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Tami
Global greenhouse emissions per capita are pretty much the same for US and Canada.
So get yer Sh** together up there, get out of your cars and stop mining tar sands!
Making liquid fuels from oil sands requires energy for steam injection and refining. This process generates two to four times the amount of greenhouse gases per barrel of final product as the "production" of conventional oil.[3] If combustion of the final products is included, the so-called "Well to Wheels" approach, oil sands extraction, upgrade and use emits 10 to 45% more greenhouse gases than conventional crude. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tar_sands
Now back to your regularly scheduled programming
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nature
climber
back in Tuscon Aridzona....
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Oct 11, 2011 - 01:06pm PT
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I believe the tibia of a woolly is longer than the femur.
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corniss chopper
climber
breaking the speed of gravity
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Oct 11, 2011 - 01:25pm PT
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However, the chain of causality is hydrocarbon emissions causing global warming causing climate change.
The chain of causality is irrefutable.
HT - That chain of causality is easily refutable: accelerated glacier melting is due to the snow/ice albedo change from the Himalayan Brown Haze. Not any mythical temperature rise.
Andes Haze, Rocky Mtn Haze, CA Sierra Haze, etc. Darken ice and it melts faster.
So simple even a Canadian can do it.
An urban heat dome over a city cannot melt glaciers many miles away
but the soot from cooking fires (re: industry) blowing into the mountains is and will melt the glaciers faster.
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Carrots under snow. How Japanese farmers spread charcoal
on snow covered fields to melt the snow and harvest carrots.
The IPCC must hate they guys.
http://www.carrotjuice.jp/snow/
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HighTraverse
Trad climber
Bay Area
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Oct 11, 2011 - 02:05pm PT
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HT ? Your point with regard to mine? Tami, just tweaking you. Didn't mean to offend you.
cc
yeah.........and what causes the haze and soot? But that's just a diversion.
Go ahead, deny the extensive body of scientific evidence and the physics and chemistry that explain how it all works. History is full of people who deny the conclusions of science.
The earth is flat; gravity pulls harder on more massive objects so they must fall faster; the sun and planets revolve around the earth; god made the earth in 6 days, rested on the 7th and we're here 6000 years later as proof; time doesn't slow down if you move really fast.
Perhaps someday you'll accept the science, probably not.
The scientific explanations will certainly become more refined therefore they must be erroneous now so we can't act on them.
reductio ad absurdum
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Oct 11, 2011 - 04:41pm PT
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CC's objections are predictable, but he hasn't provided any more evidence than previously, and when you look at the references he/she cites, you find that the carbon black, aerosol, etc... is a factor, but only a factor. See for instance the post:
http://www.supertopo.com/climbing/thread.php?topic_id=970221&msg=1553986#msg1553986
and posts up thread of that.
In general, scientists are studying the effects of these aerosols where there had been previously large uncertainties in their contribution. In many of the studies, the effects are much more complex than have been represented by CC... and do not explain the rapid decline of the glaciers.
I remember that people used to say: "a stream clears itself in 100 feet" while pissing in the same stream... problem is when you have hundreds of thousands to millions of pissers, you might not have 100 feet to clear it in... so now it costs to piss, because you actually have to pay your municipality to treat the water before dumping it in the stream.
My guess is that you pay a lot more for that than any proposed carbon tax... which just recognizes the same obvious fact... we can't continue to "piss" into the atmosphere, it's not going to clear itself.
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corniss chopper
climber
breaking the speed of gravity
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Oct 11, 2011 - 05:57pm PT
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Ed - The billions of poor who daily cook food over open wood fires are not going to change over to some non polluting alternative that is more expensive.
Any climate scheme that does not accept this reality is an exercise in fantasy.
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cliffhanger
Trad climber
California
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Oct 11, 2011 - 06:12pm PT
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CC - "The billions of poor who daily cook food over open wood fires are not going to change over to some non polluting alternative that is more expensive."
This shows how little CC understands. The burning of biomass carbon, like wood, makes no contribution to increased atmospheric CO2 levels because it is just part of the carbon that's already contained in the active carbon cycle. Burn it or let it rot, the carbon in wood or any biomass is going to return to the atmosphere as CO2. To keep wood or biomass from returning as CO2 to the atmosphere one would have to go to extraordinary effort and expense to prevent fungus, termites, or other decomposers (including fire) from breaking it down into CO2.
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corniss chopper
climber
breaking the speed of gravity
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Oct 11, 2011 - 06:42pm PT
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war - you're a racist. Go away. Get help.
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corniss chopper
climber
breaking the speed of gravity
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Oct 11, 2011 - 06:43pm PT
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cliffhanger - shows you're not following the thread very closely.(surprise!)
To bring you up to speed: I think the aerosols from billions of cooking fires
are the main forcing vector causing the glaciers to melt faster.
Albedo change - particles falling onto the glaciers, solar heating, etc.
Warmist's think the near undetectable world temperature change is responsible which they think is caused by increasing CO2 levels while
denying solar variability could be a factor.
Embarrassingly they have no monitored air temperature data at the glaciers to prove their case while there is a lot of dirty ice to prove mine.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Oct 11, 2011 - 07:56pm PT
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Embarrassingly they have no monitored air temperature data at the glaciers to prove their case while there is a lot of dirty ice to prove mine.
obviously you haven't read your own citations, which conclude that "dirty ice" is not sufficient to account for the changes... but including the increases in global mean temperature are required to explain the totality of the phenomena.
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east side underground
Trad climber
Hilton crk,ca
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Oct 11, 2011 - 08:06pm PT
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Thanks Jeff, Hey cc Dr Deeg is a REAL SCIENTIST, how about you? He's one of the poineers in satalite imagery, Dean of the center for environmental optics at UCSB . What are your qualifications?
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corniss chopper
climber
breaking the speed of gravity
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Oct 11, 2011 - 08:37pm PT
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Ed - The power of the CO2 clans at this time makes it mandatory that this harmless gas is blamed in all possible publications as the main GW culprit, lest other ideas gain traction with the public ie black carbon + ice = melting glaciers.
Just the price of getting alternate ideas out.
Remember the carrot farmers. Interesting that it works for them but you think it can't on glaciers.
http://www.carrotjuice.jp/snow/
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Oct 11, 2011 - 11:43pm PT
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The power of the CO2 clans at this time makes it mandatory that this harmless gas is blamed in all possible publications
starting back in 1896 with the first explanation of the Greenhouse effect in the atmosphere, a result of the CO2 there...
...a paper which you have, no doubt, avoided reading too. With it's prediction of rising temperatures due to coal burning.
You have little or no understanding of physics at all CC and so you view this all as superstition... funny you haven't even the level of understanding that's been around for more than a century. What has been happening since has been a wonderful expansion of our knowledge of climate. And that includes measuring the warming, which is none trivial, but real and understandable in terms of our science.
What we should do about it is completely separate from the fact it is happening, but because we're making it happen, we actually can do something about it... and not let it slip onto future generations to deal with... don't you think?
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rottingjohnny
Sport climber
mammoth lakes ca
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Oct 12, 2011 - 12:12am PT
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CornSquat...Stop reading the exxon comic books and move on up to adult periodicals....RJ
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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Oct 12, 2011 - 12:24am PT
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mythical temperature rise
i dont like this avatar either.
dude, honestly, how many do you need? do you really have this much free time?
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August West
Trad climber
Where the wind blows strange
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Oct 12, 2011 - 12:26pm PT
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Perhaps 'contributing to' or 'accelerating' but I think the climate is always changing, myself. There is no steady state and never has been, illusory.
Sure the climate has always changed. But compared to a geological time scale, the climate in the past 10,000 or so years has been surprisingly stable. It is perhaps not coincidence that this is also when civilization happened to develop.
Human induced changes are going to push the climate out of the relatively stable niche it has been in. We (or at least our descendents) will find out how well civilization will cope.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Oct 12, 2011 - 01:01pm PT
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Corniss' only hope is that Tambora will blow again and plunge us into another
"Year without a summer", or two. Actually, it has been showing signs. There's still hope, Corniss!
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corniss chopper
climber
breaking the speed of gravity
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Oct 12, 2011 - 01:41pm PT
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You Warmists obviously are suffering from some sort of
climate driven mental retardation.
Such menacing epidemics of climate stupidity regularly lead to extinction
events for weaklings who are less able to survive in a constantly changing climate.
Researchers want to remind Warmists afflicted with
Catastrophic Climate Stupidity -CCS-
to please try to remain calm and not run around outside like berserk chicken little's without dressing properly for the outdoors.
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neebee
Social climber
calif/texas
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Oct 12, 2011 - 09:41pm PT
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hey there say, all, thanks for the shares, and link...
serious stuff....
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HighTraverse
Trad climber
Bay Area
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Oct 12, 2011 - 11:03pm PT
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Bruce
That's an excellent reference.
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Captain...or Skully
climber
Where are you bound?
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Oct 12, 2011 - 11:27pm PT
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And this, too, will change. Change is the constant.
WE are variable.
Good luck.
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corniss chopper
climber
breaking the speed of gravity
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Oct 12, 2011 - 11:52pm PT
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Bruce Kay - the fact that you are permanently limp is not evidence
of a pending ice age climate change. See your MD for stronger viagra dude.
good luck on your problem.
cc
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HighTraverse
Trad climber
Bay Area
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Oct 13, 2011 - 01:15pm PT
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Bruce
You've already got your answer. See "Why We Resist The Truth About Climate Change" which you posted before. These are not climate change "skeptics" they're Deniers, willfully. Their earth is flat and is the center of the universe.
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aspendougy
Trad climber
Los Angeles, CA
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Oct 14, 2011 - 03:07pm PT
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Data from 70's space probes vs the data from more recent ones shows dramatic climate change on other planets in our solar system as well, since the 70's/ Global climate change is real, but it is hard to say how much is due to man-made factors, and how much due to other things we don't fully understand. But we can all agree that man-made environmental degradation is very real.
I heard that Kilamenjaro's glacier has shrunk tremendously.
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Chiloe
Trad climber
Lee, NH
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Oct 14, 2011 - 04:16pm PT
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Aspen, the "climate change on other planets" line is an urban myth, stitched together out of fragments from actual science. Most people don't read the science, but here's a common-sense, skeptical question you could ask: If it's hard to detect climate change on Earth, how on earth do you think they could have detected it on other planets? The short answer is, they haven't, and can't. What they have detected turns out to be a lot less exciting, as run down in the note below from Skeptical Science (with links to research in the original).
This is a round-up of the planets said by sceptics to be experiencing climate change:
Mars: the notion that Mars is warming came from an unfortunate conflation of weather and climate. Based on two pictures taken 22 years apart, assumptions were made that have not proved to be reliable. There is currently no evidence to support claims that Mars is warming at all. More on Mars...
Jupiter: the notion that Jupiter is warming is actually based on predictions, since no warming has actually been observed. Climate models predict temperature increases along the equator and cooling at the poles. It is believed these changes will be catalysed by storms that merge into one super-storm, inhibiting the planet’s ability to mix heat. Sceptical arguments have ignored the fact this is not a phenomenon we have observed, and that the modelled forcing is storm and dust movements, not changes in solar radiation.
Neptune: observations of changes in luminosity on the surface of both Neptune and its largest moon, Triton, have been taken to indicate warming caused by increased solar activity. In fact, the brightening is due to the planet’s seasons changing, but very slowly. Summer is coming to Neptune’s southern hemisphere, bringing more sunlight, as it does every 164 years.
Pluto: the warming exhibited by Pluto is not really understood. Pluto’s seasons are the least understood of all: its existence has only been known for a third of its 248 -year orbit, and it has never been visited by a space probe. The ‘evidence’ for climate change consists of just two observations made in 1988 and 2002. That’s equivalent to observing the Earth’s weather for just three weeks out of the year. Various theories suggest its highly elliptical orbit may play a part, as could the large angle of its rotational axis. One recent paper suggests the length of Pluto’s orbit is a key factor, as with Neptune. Sunlight at Pluto is 900 times weaker than it is at the Earth.
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corniss chopper
climber
breaking the speed of gravity
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Oct 14, 2011 - 06:57pm PT
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You Warmists are so pathetic, getting your panties in a bunch over nothing.
All your climate scare mongering might be redefined as terrorist activity one of these days so be careful.
Why not? Sweet payback for redefining CO2 as pollution.
Anyway you build dams to catch the water if the glaciers melt - problem solved.
Btw: India and China are doing this big time already so no need to even mention the Himalaya again except for trip reports.
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dudesir
Mountain climber
Santa Monica, CA
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Oct 14, 2011 - 07:41pm PT
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I can't attest to the veracity of the science, but we are certainly enjoying working w/ David, providing post-production of the images and advising him on gigapixel techniques. He just launched his website, glacierworks.org, and we have finally put some of the interactive gigapixel panos up on our site at xrez.com. The images are terribly exciting to study from a climber's perspective, and may among be the most resolute taken of the Himalaya yet. At some point we'll have a large region in an interactive form similar to Google Earth, but much higher resolution.. Come take a look-
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cliffhanger
Trad climber
California
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Oct 15, 2011 - 01:56am PT
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Dudesir,
Thanks for the excellent links and the spectacular gigapixel pictures. Truly awesome.
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