William Gray is in the news this week predicting a fairly active hurricane season along with blasting Al Gore as an alarmist, according to the Irish News. From the article, "A top hurricane forecaster has called former US vice president Al Gore 'a gross alarmist' for making his Oscar-winning documentary about global warming, 'An Inconvenient Truth'. 'He's one of these guys that preaches the end-of-the-world type of things. I think he's doing a great disservice and he doesn't know what he's talking about,' Dr William Gray said. His comments came in an interview with The Associated Press at the National Hurricane Conference in New Orleans, where he delivered the closing speech..."
"Gray, an emeritus professor at the atmospheric science department at Colorado State University, has long disputed the theory that heat-trapping gases generated by human activity are causing the world to warm. Over the past 24 years, Gray, 77, has become known as America's most reliable hurricane forecaster. Recently Philip Klotzbach, whom Gray mentored, has begun doing the bulk of the forecasting work...
"Rather than global warming, Gray believes a recent uptick in strong hurricanes is part of a multi-decade trend of alternating busy and slow periods related to ocean circulation patterns. Contrary to mainstream thinking, Gray believes ocean temperatures are going to drop in the next five to 10 years."
Here's a look at yesterday's IPCC report from the Rocky Mountain News. They write, "The Front Range could see more air pollution, more cases of West Nile virus and an increased risk of wildfires and reservoir-clogging sediment as global temperatures rise. The forecasts were based on the latest international assessment of the impacts of climate change released Friday in Brussels, Belgium, and discussed via teleconference by a team of five researchers with the Boulder-based National Center for Atmospheric Research who contributed to the report. Scientists repeated warnings that the Rocky Mountains are likely to see a drop in snowpack and earlier snowmelt as temperatures increase. But they also raised newer concerns about smog, disease threats and wildfire risks, all applicable to Colorado and the Denver region. The metro area, struggling with unhealthy smog levels, could see the problem get worse, since ground-level ozone, a major component of smog, is formed when certain pollutants bake in clear, hot, stagnant skies. Scientists cited research predicting a 68 percent rise in unhealthy smog days in the eastern United States by 2050, but they noted the problem applied in any urban areas with elevated ozone levels. Prevalence of the mosquito-borne West Nile virus, which hit Colorado hard in 2003, could increase with warming weather, said Jonathan Patz, an NCAR affiliate based at the University of Wisconsin-Madison...
"The latest report, released Friday, focused more on global warming's regional impacts on people, species and water. In Colorado, warming is likely to deplete snowpack and lead to earlier melt-off in spring, creating a ripple effect in the forest by drying up soil moisture, leaving trees more susceptible to insect damage and wildfires. 'The melting snowpack is also going to increase wildfire activity, and Denver is probably the poster child for that,' said Kathleen Miller, an NCAR scientist who wrote a chapter on global warming's impact on fresh water. Miller said that earlier melt- off and more fires expose reservoirs to more dirt and debris that flow off the landscape when rainstorms hit fire- scarred land. She noted that Denver Water is still recovering from sediment flows that poured into Cheesman Reservoir after the massive Hayman Fire in 2002. Colorado and the southwestern U.S. may suffer the same fate that threatens other heavily populated arid and semi-arid regions. Such locales, including the Mediterranean basin, northeast Brazil and southern Africa, are likely to see water supplies decline 10 percent to 30 percent by mid-century, Miller said. Stephen Saunders, president of the Rocky Mountain Climate Organization, called the latest report "the most authoritative statement possible that climate disruption is already showing up in the American West as less snow, less water, more drought and more wildfire.'"
Environment Colorado weighs in on the IPCC report. They write, "Approximately 20-30 percent of plant and animal species are at increasing risk of extinction if the global average temperature increases by another 2.2 to 4 degrees Fahrenheit, according to a major consensus report released today by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The IPCC is a United Nations body charged with assessing the scientific record on global warming. The panel concludes 'with high confidence' that human-caused warming over the last three decades 'has had a discernible influence on many physical and biological systems.' While the report warns of increasing droughts, floods, heat waves, water stress, forest fires, and coastal flooding in the U.S., it finds that 'many impacts can be avoided, reduced, or delayed' by quickly and significantly reducing global warming pollution. 'This report challenges our leaders in Colorado to take decisive action on global warming,' continued Baker. 'We need to listen to the science, and set goals for reducing global warming pollution in Colorado and nationally.' The good news is we have the know-how to tackle global warming. Through increasing energy efficiency, expanding renewable energy, and capping and cutting carbon pollution, we can avoid the worse effects of global warming. Cars and power plants are the largest sources of U.S. global warming pollution, but the U.S. could reduce its emissions immediately using on-the-shelf technologies to improve energy efficiency and shift to renewable energy sources...
"Baker also noted that the report is inherently conservative because it reflects the consensus of hundreds of parties, including industry groups and governments opposed to taking action to reduce global warming pollution."
"2008 pres"
7:41:36 AM 
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