Carbon Dioxide 420.

420.52 ppm. That's the current number, as of three days ago. When Charles David Keeling hired me as a post-doc in 1985 (my first job after college), the CO₂ concentration at Mauna Loa observatory was hovering around 345 ppm. That's an increase of more than 20% in a little over 35 years. Boy, do I feel old. It wasn't supposed to rise so quickly. Yes, it's a nice smooth curve that doesn't seem to be accelerating or decelerating, but what about everything we understood back in 1985. Didn't anybody read the National Academy of Sciences reports on global warming back in the 1970s? Didn't anybody notice that the rise in atmospheric CO₂ didn't really get started until we all started burning fossil fuels in the second half of the 19th century? By the way, the predominant product of the combustion of hydrocarbons in an oxygen atmosphere is carbon dioxide, and CO₂ is well known to be able to trap heat more effectively than most of the other gases in the atmosphere, like nitrogen, oxygen, and argon.

It was more than 100 years ago that Svante Arrhenius predicted global temperatures would rise as the CO₂ concentration rose. None of this deserved any dispute. It was just science. Predictions were easy. Exact forecasts, however, are never easy when it comes to complex phenomena with fuzzy boundaries, like the Earth's climate. So what? We knew enough back then to figure out how to ameliorate the problem. Burning less fuel would have been a good start. Our strategies toward the end of the 1970s seemed solid and hopeful. Decreasing speed limits to 55 mph, putting solar panels on the White House, to set an example for us all how we could avoid the national insecurity that resulted on our reliance on foreign oil. Didn't Reagan care about keeping our freedoms and national security intact?

It all seemed so simple back in 1985. The problems were solvable. Nobody expected the campaigns against common sense by the oil companies and their supporters. Nobody expected that the American people were stupid enough to buy into their anti-science agenda. It was as if all the flunkies who didn't pay attention in science class had gained a new champion: the selfish right wing politicians who couldn't see (or didn't want to see) past today's profits.

Argh. Enough for today. This is worth more writing, but who cares about this stuff nowadays? Everybody is distracted by the current event headlines of the day. It's too hard for most people to think about where we're heading, when life today doesn't seem fair or honest or hopeful or whatever. Is it supposed to be fair or honest? Maybe not. I'm always hopeful. Whatever...

Fires in NorCal

One of my former students, Austin, just told me about his summer. He studied abroad in Europe for the months of June and July. Austin's parents went over to visit him at the end of his stay there. They live in Redding, CA, and visited him in Europe for about a week. While they were there, their house in Redding burned down.

I didn't know what to say. What they must be going through... My student told me that the fire moved so fast that his neighbors weren't even evacuated and one house started catching fire as the residents were taking naps! The fire hopped over a river and blasted through their neighborhood. Austin said that he's glad his family wasn't there, because the fire was so dangerous and so fast-moving. He feels lucky that everyone is still alive.

The extra heat trapped in our atmosphere is causing more water to evaporate, causing stronger droughts and higher fire danger. With more evaporated water in the air being transferred eastward, the rainstorms downstream are stronger as well. I expect this subject will be addressed quite thoroughly in our Climate Reality training next week. This story is personal. We need people to see connections like this.

Carr fire in Redding

Rise 4 Climate RSVP

Just sent in my RSVP for next month's Rise for Climate march.
Come and join us.

Pre-Training Meeting

Scenes from the meeting of San Diego people who will attend the Climate Reality Leadership Training in Los Angeles next week. August 19 at Trilogy Sanctuary, La Jolla. The San Diego City Chapter and the San Diego North County chapters are just getting started and will meet once or twice a month or so. One goal is to create a coalition of climate groups in San Diego. Most of the attendees are already involved in one or more environmental organizations. Our first September gathering will be the Rise for Climate March in San Diego, September 8, 2018.

Climate Reality, Los Angeles 2018

I have been accepted to attend the Climate Reality Leadership Corps training in Los Angeles next month.  The training in Chicago, 2013, was excellent and I am looking forward to being re-energized in my efforts to help people understand what's happening as the Earth changes so rapidly.

When Dave Keeling hired me in 1985 soon after my move to San Diego, carbon dioxide was at about 345 ppm, and now it's over 400 ppm (0.04%).  Strange that a tiny bit more of this relatively harmless gas can make a difference, but the physics are solid and climate model predictions from my time at SIO are turning out to be correct.  I plan to post more about climate change here on this blog.  Stay tuned.

San Francisco

Had a great 4-day visit with Scott and Tammy last weekend.

Early Summer 2014

Not much writing on here lately from me.  Got a sunburn yesterday at Black's Beach.  Ouch.  Trying to use some moisturizer (topical) and ibuprofen (anti-inflammatory).  Probably should use more sunscreen.

Might be teaching a few courses at Palomar this summer.  Definitely will teach one Chem 100L lab.  Waiting to hear from the physics dept on whether or not I'll be teaching their Physical Science (PHSC 100) lecture and lab courses.  The PHSC course covers physics, chemistry, geology, and astronomy.  I don't remember much physics, so I've been reviewing a bit, probably not enough!  Summer courses start on the 16th of June.  My life of leisure is taking a turn toward more work; my aim is to keep the stress in check.  New courses can be daunting.  Who'dathunk I'd be teaching physics someday!

I got a course at Palomar for the fall too: Chem 100 lecture class T/Th mornings.  Will be nice to do the lecture part again.  Wish I could do both lecture and lab.  That would make more sense for everyone, I'd think.

Del Mar Fair starts on Saturday.  Might go a couple of times so I can see some good concerts, e.g., Huey Lewis and the News, the Spinners, and others.   Some good Humphrey's concerts coming up soon too.  Time to get out the kayaks.

Been walking a lot more lately.  Goal is 10,000 or more steps per day.  I've met the goal every day since May 15.  Turns out my iPhone can log steps.  That's fortunate because I put my FitBit One in the wash a few too many times.  It's sitting in some rice in an attempted resurrection, but I'm not holding my breath, nor do I care, because my iPhone counts the steps anyways.

Finnish Music

I've been looking to purchase the CD, Memento Mori by Mariska.  She's one of my favorite Finnish singers and I have two of her other CDs through http://www.recordshopx.com/finnish/, but this one appears to be very scarce on the Net.  Mariska is into her second decade of making music, but I just discovered her, and Finnish music in general, last year.  What spurred me to look into it, I don't remember, but I ended up watching Finnish music videos on YouTube and am now a fan of several artists, including Jenni Vartiainen, Chisu, Laura Närhi, Cheek, Samuli Edelmann, and several others.  Mariska's Toisen Sanoen CD has stayed in my car's CD player for months and I start it up whenever the radio gets annoying with too many commercials, repetitive news, or bad songs.  That's quite often, unfortunately.  Mariska is a singer-songwriter whose albums could be classified as rap or hip-hop, although more recently she has switched genres to music that she calls punk jazz.  Based on the reviews, people like her lyrics, but I don't understand Finnish yet, so I just enjoy the music.

So anyway, after failing in my search for the Memento Mori CD, came upon the whole album on Rdio.com (pronounced "ar'-dee-o).  Unfortunately, the songs were unavailable in the US, so I tried using TunnelBear to change my IP address to a different country and found that it's available in Australia.  After all that, I'm enjoying Memento Mori  on my iMac.  Evidently, Rdio.com works on mobile devices, so maybe I'll try that later on.  Meanwhile, I give this album a thumbs up.

Here are a few Finnish songs on YouTube that I've enjoyed.  Maybe you will too.

Laura Närhi's Hetken Tie on Kevyt https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZVIjrxDhO0

Mariska & Pahat Sudet's Liekki https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F6RBNnIseDE

Chisu's Sabotage https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jOsW6BHzrD8

Mariska's Murha https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OYjZX5AH-ZU

Breakfast

McDonald's has blueberries.