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Entering unknown territory

Thu, 16 May 2013 21:45:40 +0000

Imagine there are no people. Imagine a planet where the sea level is about five to 40 meters (16 to 131 feet) higher than normal. Imagine a planet that is hotter and wetter. Imagine, worldwide, it’s roughly 3 to 4 degrees Celsius (5.4 to 7.2 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than today. And the North and South poles are even warmer still – as much as 10 degrees Celsius (18 degrees Fahrenheit) hotter than today.

Welcome to the Pliocene. That was the Earth about three to five million years ago, very different to the Earth we inhabit now. But in at least one respect it was rather similar. This is the last time that carbon dioxide (CO₂) levels were as high as they are today.

On May 9, 2013, CO₂ levels in the air reached the level of 400 parts per million (ppm). This is the first time in human history that this milestone has been passed. A preliminary daily average reading of 400.03 ppm was reported by the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which operates the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii where these measurements are made. While 400 sounds like just another number whose meaning is hard to grasp – similar to, say, world population recently hitting seven billion – these things do resonate, says Dr. Gavin Schimdt of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies. “People respond to anniversaries – why is 10 years after 9/11 more worthy of note than nine or 11 years? The importance of crossing 400 ppm is simply that it allows us to mark the occasion, and to demonstrate to the future that we knew where we were headed."

CO₂ is the most important man-made greenhouse gas, which means (in a simple sense) that it acts like a blanket trapping heat near the surface of the Earth. It comes from the burning of fossil fuels such as coal, oil and natural gas, as well as deforestation. The level of CO₂ in the atmosphere has risen from around 317 ppm in 1958 (when Charles David Keeling began making his historical measurements at Mauna Loa) to 400 ppm today. It’s projected to reach 450 ppm by the year 2040.

One of the problems is that CO₂ lingers, both in the atmosphere and in the oceans (where it is being absorbed and acidifying the waters, with potentially big impacts on marine life). More than half of the CO₂ is removed from the atmosphere within a century, but about 20 percent remains in the air for many thousands of years. Because of slow removal processes, even if we massively reduced our emissions of CO₂ right now, atmospheric CO₂ would continue to increase in the long-term. The CO₂ we emit today, and that we have emitted since the advent of the Industrial Revolution, has long-term consequences that future generations will have to live with.

Some scientists, like NASA’s James Hansen, argue that CO₂ must be limited to around 350 ppm in order to prevent “dangerous” climate change. As Hansen wrote in a 2008 paper, “If humanity wishes to preserve a planet similar to that on which civilization developed and to which life on Earth is adapted, paleoclimate evidence and ongoing climate change suggest that CO₂ will need to be reduced … to at most 350 ppm.”

To some, crossing the threshold of 400 ppm is a signal that we are now firmly seated in the “Anthropocene,” a human epoch where people are having major and lasting impacts on the planet. Because of the long lifetime of CO₂, to others it means we are marching inexorably towards a “point of no return,” into territory that is unknown for the human race.

To hear what NASA scientists are saying about this milestone, click here.

Ask the expert

Tue, 30 Apr 2013 18:59:21 +0000

In this series on "Big Fat Planet," we answer reader-submitted questions about Earth's climate. The following is from Dr. Duane Waliser, who specializes in climate dynamics and modeling. He is the chief scientist of JPL's Earth Science and Technology Directorate and an adjunct professor in the Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences Department at UCLA.

Question: How is climate change shaping the type of space exploration NASA does?

As global climate change becomes more evident, NASA’s satellite program for studying and monitoring our home planet becomes increasingly important. There are two key areas toward which NASA satellite measurements can contribute:

1. Monitoring changes in the Earth’s climate. Global climate change occurs slowly relative to weather and even to the change of seasons throughout the year. Changes known to be related to global climate change--increased atmospheric carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases (including water vapor), sea level rise, and the melting of Arctic sea ice and the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets--are so gradual that it takes many years, even decades, to characterize and quantify them.

Given that satellite missions typically last on the order of three to 10 years, NASA often needs to consider launching copies of some instruments, as current versions age and fail. Continuity in our satellite observations is important for maintaining long records of key climate indicators, such as those listed above. Having long and continuous records of these is critical for monitoring the effects of climate change, helping determine how we can best adapt to them, and assessing whether measures to limit its effects are working as expected.

2. Improving our understanding of global climate change key processes. Simply monitoring some of the climate change indicators listed above doesn’t provide enough information for scientists to fully understand and characterize the problem and consequences.

For example, only observing sea level rise doesn’t illuminate all the key processes that might be involved in determining the rate at which it is rising; these include sea level rise, the melting of ice sheets and glaciers, warming of the ocean, the continents’ and shorelines’ slow response to ice sheet melting and sea level rise, etc. Similarly, it is critical to understand how water vapor and clouds respond to climate change, as these help determine the amount of future temperature warming that might be expected to result from increasing the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

Knowing "how the Earth’s climate works" is vital to making projections of future warming and the associated impacts using very sophisticated computer models of the Earth’s climate. For such projections to be useful, they have to accurately represent the Earth’s climate system.

Thus, some of NASA's satellite program focuses on developing new observations to illuminate how the Earth's climate system works and to reduce uncertainties in global models used for climate projection.

Getting past 'I’m smart, you’re stupid'

Thu, 25 Apr 2013 16:03:06 +0000

Laura Faye Tenenbaum is a science communicator at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and teaches oceanography at Glendale Community College.

I spend a lot of time asking students, audiences at speaking engagements, and other members of the public about their thoughts on science and I’ve noticed a theme that runs across all education levels, from deans and education administrators to lawyers and college students. “Sure, I like science,” people sigh, or “I used to like science when I was a kid.”

Often I hear positive descriptions of science: “It’s creative, fun, open, and interesting,” muddled with tired, old stereotypes: “Science is sterile, movies portray scientists as loners lacking social skills, it’s too complicated, I’m just not good at science.”

In the last few years, there has been an upsurge of websites, outreach opportunities, new media products and treatises about ways to improve public perception and public engagement in science. Nevertheless, the relationship between the public and the scientific community remains estranged. Scientific and academic communities have the habit of focusing inward, seeking engagement from those who are already engaged, while overlooking a portion of the public that feels cut off.

Professors are still in the outdated habit of failing half the class as a protocol to promote rigor, and our scientific community is made up of those who found a way to conform in this atmosphere. Failed students don’t merely vanish: they become our neighbors, our fellow citizens. They influence society. As a community of scientists and science educators, are they failing us or are we the ones who are failing them? Are we closing the door to people who may bring something creative, are we locking ourselves in?

Science-themed videos land in my inbox daily, tagged with notes like “this is great” on products that are boring or unmemorable and have few clicks. It’s not enough for us to pat ourselves on the back for our excellent work; it’s the public that ultimately judges the quality of our products. If you’re presenting a talk and you look at the faces of your audience and their eyes are glazed or they’re texting, then your talk is boring. If your online product isn’t getting thousands of hits then you need to re-evaluate and make changes. You will know if your message resonates in a meaningful way if you get invited back, referred, liked, shared, and remembered.

We need to maintain the rigorous content of scientific principles while at the same time engage a broader audience so that the scientific message resonates in a more meaningful way for more people. Having a Ph.D. and doing research is one way to participate in science, but not the only way. Yes, our students and our public must raise the bar on their intellectual capacity, and who wouldn’t want to participate in expanding their brainpower? But it’s us—the scientists, communicators, and educators—who also need to raise our own standards and expand our own capacity to find a way to connect.

Simple wisdom

Wed, 17 Apr 2013 15:28:17 +0000

Guest blogger Holly Shaftel is climate.nasa.gov's editorial assistant and social media specialist. She is pursuing a master's degree in public administration at USC.

“As I get a little bit older and wiser, I realize that I’m less and less of a machine.”

In case you couldn’t guess, those words came from “The Governator,” or the former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who hosted a public comment forum that I attended last week at the University of Southern California (USC) for the recently drafted National Climate Assessment Report. The report focuses on climate change’s projected impacts on the U.S., and this forum brought attention to the Southwest (our country's hottest and driest region).

As I sat amongst a suit-wearing, predominantly male audience, the atmosphere felt somewhat stiff. But the Governator’s quip seemed to put us at ease before we began to absorb the findings on this serious, life-threatening matter.

The chairman of the USC Schwarzenegger Institute (in partnership with the USC Center for Sustainable Cities) likened the report to a doctor’s yearly physical—only the doctors, in this case, are climate researchers.

“The National Climate Assessment is our physical,” he said, underscoring the need to listen to expert diagnoses before the country has its own “heart attack.”

The “doctors” at the April 8 forum covered many critical issues. The quantity of information was overwhelming at times, but here were a few predictions that stood out. For example, if we continue at the current emissions rate:

“Megafires,” which burned between 40,000 and 60,000 acres in Arizona and New Mexico in 2011, will likely occur more frequently and rampantly.
The bark beetle epidemic, for which drought and high temperatures create favorable conditions, will kill off more trees (“forest thinning”) of all breeds and elevations.
Aggravated urban irrigation water shortages, which could shift Southwest crop demands northward, will likely “displace growers and impact communities.”¹
Average temperatures will climb in the Southwest as much as 9.5 degrees Fahrenheit by 2100 (based on 1971 and 1999 data).²

Furthermore, I’m guessing prospects for the land of golden opportunities (or, as The Governator calls it, “Cah-lee-for-nee-uh”) were particularly interesting to the room, not only because it’s our home, but also because of our state's gargantuan economy. Here are two examples of what could happen to California:

Winter flooding, erosion, and sea level rise will impact the coast. “All these tech giants are vulnerable,” a Bay Area-based co-author remarked, referring to Silicon Valley organizations, like Apple and Google, whose communication products many rely on every day.
High surface temperatures will likely increase mortality rates, particularly for children up to 5 years old and for people of color in impoverished communities.

These are just some examples of the probable forthcoming damage. By the end of the talk, a part of me wanted to bury my head in sand to cease listening to these grueling findings. But on the flip side, I knew that wouldn’t do me—or anyone on this majestic planet—any good.

I listened to the commentators from political, private, scientific, and academic (students and professors) backgrounds, and their views often aligned with what The Governator implied: If we don’t take care of ourselves and our planet by following expert advice, we could end up in an irreversible situation. It’s simple wisdom, and I got the vibe that many were willing to move forward to help avoid those worst-case scenarios.

References

National Climate Assessment Report, Chapter 20, p. 702
Ibid., Chapter 20, p. 689

Ask the expert

Mon, 18 Feb 2013 23:07:56 +0000

In this new series on "Big Fat Planet," we will answer selected questions about Earth's climate submitted by readers. Recently, a reader asked: "Is there still time to reduce climate change, or is it too late?" The following answer is from Dr. Chip Miller, a researcher specializing in remote sensing of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. He is principal investigator of the Carbon in Arctic Reservoirs Vulnerability Experiment (CARVE) and was deputy principal investigator for NASA's Orbiting Carbon Observatory satellite mission, which was designed to measure atmospheric carbon dioxide from space.

Question: Is it too late to reduce climate change?

This is a question that has been asked many times and many studies have investigated similar questions: What level of climate change is "acceptable"? What constitutes "dangerous interference" in the climate system?

The short answer is that it's not too late to act, but our past actions may have already locked in certain outcomes and action is needed to avoid more substantial impacts in the future.

In the 1990s and early 2000s it was generally felt that a doubling of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere compared to pre-industrial levels – that is, CO2 concentrations increasing to about 500 parts per million (ppm) – was "acceptable." However, the series of studies from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has found that as climate models improve, average worldwide surface temperature is projected to increase well beyond the "acceptable" level of 2.0 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2100. (See the IPCC website for the reports and most recent information.)

Jim Hansen (head of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies) has been one of the more outspoken advocates of curtailing CO2 emissions immediately to return atmospheric CO2 levels to about 350 ppm (the level of carbon dioxide that was in the air in the late 1980s). The challenge here is that even if human emissions of CO2 were cut to zero today, there is an inertia in the climate system that would continue for hundreds to thousands of years as the system attempts to re-equilibrate. (See Hansen's Royal Society paper, “Climate change and trace gases,” for more details.)

Michael Oppenheimer [Professor of Geosciences and International Affairs at Princeton University] and colleagues have taken a different approach to assessing climate change risk – they define the likelihood of certain environmental outcomes for different levels of atmospheric CO2 accumulation. (See their 2002 Science paper, "Dangerous climate impacts and the Kyoto Protocol," for a look at three potential outcomes at different CO2 levels.)

Further reading:

“Perception of climate change,” J. Hansen, M. Sato & R. Ruedy, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (6 August 2012); doi: 10.1073/pnas.1205276109.

Rising seas

Tue, 15 Jan 2013 17:57:55 +0000

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Dr. Josh Willis, ocean guru at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, spoke to TV channel KCET recently about what sea level rise will mean for California and our coasts. Here's the interview.

In essence: Science boiled down

Tue, 08 Jan 2013 22:11:54 +0000

An interesting recent paper from Dr. Son Nghiem at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and colleagues finds that the bottom of the Arctic Ocean controls the pattern of sea ice thousands of feet above on the water’s surface. The seafloor topography exerts its control not only locally, in the Bering, Chukchi, Beaufort, Barents and Greenland Seas, but also spanning hundreds to thousands of miles across the Arctic Ocean.

How? The seafloor influences the distribution of cold and warm waters in the Arctic Ocean where sea ice can preferentially grow or melt. Geological features on the ocean bottom also guide how the sea ice moves, along with influence from surface winds.

Interestingly, the study also links the bottom of the Arctic Ocean with cloud patterns up in the sky. The ocean bottom affects sea ice cover, which affects the amount of vapor coming from the surface of the ocean out into the air, which in turn influences cloud cover.

The researchers, who also come from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, the Applied Physics Laboratory and the National/Naval Ice Center in the U.S., use sea ice maps taken from space with NASA’s QuickSCAT satellite, as well as measurements from drifting buoys in the Arctic Ocean. They compare the sea ice and seafloor topography patterns to identify the connection between the two.

Bottom line:

Since the seafloor does not change significantly over many years, sea ice patterns can form repeatedly and persist around certain underwater geological features. So computer models need to incorporate these features in order to improve their forecasts of how ice cover will change over the short- and long-term. This ‘memory’ of the underwater topography could help refine our predictions of what will happen to ice in the Arctic as the climate changes.

Source:

“Seafloor Control on Sea Ice,” S. V. Nghiem, P. Clemente-Colon, I.G. Rigor, D.K. Hall & G. Neumann, Deep Sea Research Part II: Topical Studies in Oceanography, Volumes 77-80, pp 52-61 (2012).

Pick of the pics

Mon, 07 Jan 2013 18:41:59 +0000

This is a new image of our planet at night, as taken by a new NASA and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) satellite orbiting above us. Scientists recently unveiled this global composite image (and the one below), constructed using cloud-free nighttime images. They show the glow of natural and man-made phenomena across the planet in greater detail than ever seen before. City lights can tell us about how humans have spread across the globe.

Many satellites are equipped to look at Earth during the day, when they can observe our planet fully illuminated by the sun. But with a new sensor onboard the NASA-NOAA Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership (NPP) satellite launched last year, scientists now can observe Earth's atmosphere and surface during nighttime hours.

For more Earth at night images, see this article.

Finding the plot

Tue, 27 Nov 2012 22:57:57 +0000

Climate change makes headlines, but not so much box office or TV hits. In an effort to inject more realistic climate-related story arcs into the silver screen, NASA climate experts and Hollywood entertainment writers and producers came together last month to chat. A bus of writers and producers (from TV series such as Grimm and Curious George) dropped in on NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory to hear about topics ranging from the impact of global warming on the Amazon rainforest to potentially new sources of sustainable energy involving microbes living inside termites. And in an “Entertaining Climate Change” event held in Los Angeles, producers, writers, filmmakers and artists came to listen to Dr. Jim Hansen, one of NASA’s best-known climatologists, talk about how real people are being affected by climate change now. They also learned how NASA’s suite of satellites monitors climate change around the planet and how we [[LINK||http://eyes.nasa.gov/earth/||visualize that information]]. [[IMAGE||19-11-12-Sassan-Saatchi_530.jpg||left||520||Sassan Saatchi||Writers John Vorhaus (left) and Cindy Lichtman listen to Dr. Sassan Saatchi of NASA JPL discuss the effects of climate change on forest ecosystems. Photo by Howard Pasamanick.||0||0]] [[IMAGE||19-11-12-Spiro-Skentzos_300.jpg||left||300||Spiros Skentzos||Writer Spiro Skentzos listens to a presentation.||0||0]] The tour was organized by [[LINK||http://hollywoodhealthandsociety.org/||Hollywood, Health and Society]] (HH&S), a program of the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism based in Los Angeles. The tour was part of a new collaboration between climate.nasa.gov and the Annenberg School. HH&S hooks up entertainment industry professionals with [[LINK|| http://hollywoodhealthandsociety.org/for-writers/climate-change-storytelling-initiative||accurate, timely information]] that can be used in health- and climate-related plotlines — information that is unusual, compelling and dramatic, but based on real stories about real people and places. [[LINK|| http://hollywoodhealthandsociety.org/sites/default/files/for-writers/climate_change/climate_change_onesheet.pdf||Global instability, infectious diseases and drought]] are all examples of real-life storylines that are linked to climate change and that could make for thought-provoking entertainment. [[IMAGE||19-11-12-Hollywood-group_525.jpg||left||520||The Hollywood, Health and Society group poses with a model of the Mars Rover Curiosity.||The Hollywood, Health and Society group poses with a model of the Mars Rover Curiosity.||0||0]] At present, TV storylines about climate change are “close to zero”, explained HH&S Director Sandra de Castro Buffington. An [[LINK|| http://hollywoodhealthandsociety.org/events/storybus-tours-close-encounters-nasa-jpl ||HH&S TV monitoring project]] earlier this year looked at more than 3,000 storylines used in the top 28 scripted TV shows, and found that only 24 of them — less than one percent — dealt with climate change, and most of them only peripherally. This effort is trying to change that. While you may not see “CSI Climate”, “Attack of the Frankenstorms” or “Extreme Weather Makeover” anytime soon, hopefully TV programs and movies will soon begin to reflect the reality of climate change.

Intuition, creativity and science

Wed, 17 Oct 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Jason Tackett is an analyst/programmer for the NASA satellite mission [[LINK||http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/calipso/main/||CALIPSO]] at NASA Langley Research Center. He is a proud member of a team of scientists who develop algorithms for this unique instrument that probes Earth’s atmosphere using pulses of laser light. I was a musician working at a Pizza Hut before beginning college which, in my case, was synonymous with poor. Looking for a brighter future (i.e., more money), I enrolled at Kansas State University as a computer systems major. The alluring thing about this major for me was that it required creative problem solving and had the promise of big bucks. During my time there I learned about programming and computer hardware. However, the most important thing to happen to me was a course I took in calculus. Before I started college I assumed that math wasn’t for me. As it turned out, I found mathematics very intuitive. I enjoyed the creativity and elegance that came with problem solving, much like the creativity I enjoyed playing music. My original childhood passion was astronomy, and if I enjoyed mathematics then I reasoned that I could do well studying astronomy or physics. With this in mind, I wrapped up my associates degree in computer systems and changed majors to physics in which I earned my bachelor’s degree. I became interested in the physics of light and lasers, so I did research as an undergraduate in a high-intensity ultrafast laser facility at the James R. Macdonald Laboratory at Kansas State University. I wrote computer code for graduate researchers that helped with their experiments and also spent six months assembling a laser system. In graduate school, atmospheric science was an attractive path because I could apply the physics I learned to important problems such as climate and climate change. When I sent out my application to graduate schools, my soon-to-be advisor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign saw that I had experience with lasers and thought that I could work with data from the new (at the time) CALIPSO satellite which uses lasers to study the atmosphere. I hadn’t thought about working with satellites before I met him, but because it sounded interesting and involved lasers and the physics of the atmosphere, I jumped on board. I spent the next two years studying CALIPSO measurements to learn how aerosol properties change near clouds – a topic of significant uncertainty in climate science. Eventually, I was ready to look for a job and, as it happened, an opportunity opened up for an analyst with the CALIPSO science team at NASA Langley Research Center. Since I had been working with CALIPSO data for two years and my interest in optics and aerosols fit in well with the team, I was offered the job, which I eagerly accepted – and every day since I have been glad that I did. Working for the CALIPSO satellite mission is very exciting. I get to find creative solutions to complicated problems and work with scientists to understand what data from CALIPSO is telling us about Earth’s atmosphere. In April 2010, I worked with colleagues to examine the distribution and optical properties of volcanic ash that had erupted from the Icelandic volcano Eyjafjallajökull and disrupted air traffic in Europe. NASA Headquarters asked several Earth observing satellite groups, including ours, to help identify plume location and provide guidance to air traffic controllers. Since I have been with the CALIPSO team, my colleagues and I have also developed products for near-real time air quality monitoring and for climate modelers. I feel immense satisfaction that I work with a team that provides the high quality data that climate researchers need to solve the important issue of climate change. It hasn’t been a straight path to get where I am today, but I am very happy with where I’ve landed. Learn more about Earth Science Week and NASA’s Earth Explorers: [[LINK||http://climate.nasa.gov/esw2012/||http://climate.nasa.gov/esw2012/]]

California dreamin'

Mon, 15 Oct 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Guest blogger Bill Patzert, a climatologist at JPL, tells about the personal journey that led him toward a career in Earth science. I mostly grew up in Gary, Indiana on the shores of Lake Michigan (a smallish ocean) surrounded by great Pleistocene sand dunes. Meteorologically, we had blizzards, sweltering summers and even tornadoes. My dad was a sea captain and taught me celestial navigation, shooting the stars and the sun with a sextant. At night he would point out the North Star and the many constellations and tell me about the mythology of each. This was heady stuff and fascinating for a budding geek. For my generation, Sputnik was huge. We became the first space-nut generation. Sputnik and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory's (JPL**) Explorer 1 gave many of my classmates and me the 'space bug.' The opportunity for adventure presented itself in an unusual manner. I'd blown out my knee playing basketball and dropped out of college my freshman year and ran away to sea. I hitchhiked to New York and worked for a seaman's union in Brooklyn. Friends of my dad put me to work on a tramp freighter. I went around the world. I spent a week in Bali surfing and diving, then back across the Pacific through two great big typhoons. Eventually, I went back to school and double-majored in physics and math at Purdue. I also double-minored in American literature and geology. One winter, I saw this book on surfing in Hawaii. Soon I was headed to Hawaii for graduate school. I got up at five in the morning, went surfing, then off to class and studied in the evening. A few years later, I had earned a doctorate in oceanography and meteorology. [[IMAGE||BillPatzert2_536px1.jpg||left||536||Bill Patzert|| ||0||0]] After I graduated, I was off to a position at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, California - a fantastic research institute and another surfing mecca. In the 1970s, the vast oceans and the global atmosphere were poorly sampled. Those years were filled with travel for research to Tahiti, islands in the Pacific, Australia, Indonesia, South America, Southeast Asia and many other places I had dreamed of as a boy. I saw much of the world, had great adventures and gained a deep appreciation about the great forces of nature. In the early 1980s, oceanography was about to enter the space age. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) was flying satellites that were revolutionizing weather forecasting and NASA was planning for a suite of ocean-observing spacecraft. Remembering the excitement of Sputnik and witnessing the birth of America's new space program, I hung up my sea boots and cast my future and fortune with NASA and JPL. That gamble has been wildly successful. The TOPEX/Poseidon, Jason-1 and Jason-2 ocean satellites have been flying for 20 years. These height-measuring observatories have revolutionized oceanography and climate research. Although I miss hearing the surf and donning the wetsuit every few days, I really enjoy being at JPL. I love to speak with students, civic and environmental groups, and, even, politicians. After speaking all over Southern California for almost three decades, I'm still surprised and delighted with the people I meet. Today, there are great issues that must be addressed - climate change, our economy, human rights, poverty and many others. The problems the global community is dealing with now - the deficit, war and poverty - will be dwarfed by climate change, sea-level rise, a warming world, and change in agricultural and rainfall patterns. What happens when you have nearly sixty million people in California and no water? In the old days, the Anasazi just dispersed throughout the Southwest. Now we're 95% urban. So we're definitely not going to put L.A. in a backpack and move to British Columbia. Climate change is the real deal. I want to contribute to the dialogue and, hopefully, a better future. Yep, still dreaming here at JPL. Post by Bill Patzert, Climatologist, Jet Propulsion Laboratory ([[LINK||http://science.jpl.nasa.gov/people/Patzert/)||http://science.jpl.nasa.gov/people/Patzert/]]) Learn more about Earth Science Week and NASA’s Earth Explorers: [[LINK||http://climate.nasa.gov/esw2012/||http://climate.nasa.gov/esw2012/]]

To the ends of the Earth

Thu, 11 Oct 2012 00:00:00 +0000

If somebody had told me that 2012 would bring with it a deployment to Greenland, Chile, and possibly Antarctica, I never would have believed them. But here I am reflecting back on my three weeks in Kangerlussuaq, Greenland, as I pack for Punta Arenas, Chile. These experiences have been made possible by my new assignment as the project manager of a NASA airborne geophysical project called Operation IceBridge (OIB). I started full-time work with OIB this past March. What I truly enjoy about this project is the remarkably talented and extensive team I work with. As the project manager, I must coordinate and help lead a vast team of experts spread out across the country. This team includes polar scientists, instrument engineers, educational/outreach teams, logistics teams, data centers, and aircraft offices. I have to utilize good leadership and communications skills to help my integrated team work together smoothly to achieve a common goal and meet all of our science objectives. [[IMAGE||Christy-P-3B-WFF_5361.jpg||left||536||Christy Hansen stands in front of an airplane at Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. This plane took her to Greenland this past April. Credit: Matt Linkswiler||Christy Hansen stands in front of an airplane at Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. This plane took her to Greenland this past April. Credit: Matt Linkswiler||0||0]]

Twice a year, the OIB team travels to Earth’s polar regions to collect data on the changing ice sheets, glaciers, and sea ice. For the Arctic campaign, we use the P-3B 4-engine turbo-prop airplane at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center's Wallops Flight Facility. It has been modified to carry nine different science instruments, including laser altimeters, which measure the different heights of the terrain from aircraft, and various types of radar systems that can actually penetrate the thick ice sheets. [[IMAGE||DSCN0728_5361.jpg||left||536||A view of sea ice with open leads of water. Credit: Christy Hansen||A view of sea ice with open leads of water. Credit: Christy Hansen||0||0]] [[IMAGE||DSCN0778_536px1.jpg||left||536||An image of a glacier’s calving front, where it flows and loses ice to the sea. Credit: Christy Hansen||An image of a glacier’s calving front, where it flows and loses ice to the sea. Credit: Christy Hansen||0||0]]

Just four weeks after I started as project manager, I found myself landing in a small Southwestern Greenlandic town called Kangerlussuaq. There was snow on the runway and everyone was bundled in coats. The majority of the buildings looked like military barracks. Most of the OIB team was already there, and they greeted me at the plane. At the time, I knew only one person, the project scientist, and we had only spoken a few times! What an adventure awaited me!

[[IMAGE||DSCN0470_5361.jpg||left||536||The plane flies over sea ice. The P-3B propeller can be seen out the window of the plane. Credit: Christy Hansen||The plane flies over sea ice. The P-3B propeller can be seen out the window of the plane. Credit: Christy Hansen||0||0]] [[IMAGE||DSCN0648_5361.jpg||left||536||Christy sitting on a toolbox working on the plane during flight surrounded by various instrumentation. Credit: Christy Hansen||Christy sitting on a toolbox working on the plane during flight surrounded by various instrumentation. Credit: Christy Hansen||0||0]]

Each day, we flew at 1500 feet, seemingly scraping the surface of the massive Greenland ice sheet. I felt as though I could have touched it with my fingers if I had just stretched out my hand. It was beautiful. Watching the team work together like a well-oiled machine, for almost 8 hours at a time, was simply awesome. The pilots, the aircraft maintenance team, and the instrument experts, who collect gigabytes and terabytes of data per flight, collect the invaluable data that tells us what is happening at our poles, and how much the ice is changing each year.

My second trip to collect data with the OIB team began last September. For the Antarctic campaign, we use NASA Dryden Flight Research Center’s DC-8 aircraft and operate out of Punta Arenas, Chile. During this Chilean campaign, we will actually fly from Chile, over specific science target regions in Antarctica, and then land back in Chile! That’s an 11-hour round trip flight almost every day!

[[IMAGE||DSCN0560_5361.jpg||left||536||Christy Hansen hugs the Russell glacier, part of the Greenland Ice Sheet. Credit: Christy Hansen||Christy Hansen hugs the Russell glacier, part of the Greenland Ice Sheet. Credit: Christy Hansen||0||0]]

Isn’t this exciting? If you want to learn more about what I do and Operation IceBridge’s current Antarctic campaign, join my Google+ Hangout on Wednesday, October 17th from 1-2pm EST. I look forward to talking to you from Chile. More information: Google+ Hangout with Christy Hansen [[LINK||http://climate.nasa.gov/eswSite/eswEvents/HansenEvent/||http://climate.nasa.gov/eswSite/eswEvents/HansenEvent/]] Career Spotlight: Christy Hansen [[LINK||http://climate.nasa.gov/eswSite/eswVideos/ChristyHansen/||http://climate.nasa.gov/eswSite/eswVideos/ChristyHansen/]] NASA Earth Science Week Website [[LINK||http://climate.nasa.gov/esw2012/||http://climate.nasa.gov/esw2012/]] Operation IceBridge [[LINK||http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/icebridge/index.html||http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/icebridge/index.html]]

Feeling the heat

Fri, 14 Sep 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Guest blogger Holly Shaftel was an intern for the Earth Science Communications Team in the summer of 2010 and now works as an editorial assistant for the Global Climate Change website. Over the summer I went on three vacations: a Mediterranean cruise (it was hot), a Vegas weekend (it was pretty darn hot) and a Lake Mohave getaway (you couldn’t get me out of the water). While I enjoyed these trips, the heat just seemed unreal. My brain began to function at about a quarter capacity, and most of the time I was tired enough to sleep 15 hours a day (which happened). I’m a healthy 23-year-old female, but it seemed being outdoors was enervating me. I began craving a Russian November. But high summertime temperatures are normal, so why am I fussing? Climate scientists, like NASA's James Hansen, link this extreme weather to climate change. Using a standard bell curve to compare temperatures from 1981 to present with those from 1951 to 1980, they discovered that 75 percent of Earth’s land had been beset with heat waves (compared to 33 percent from 1951 to 1980). They labeled some unique cases with a new term: “extremely hot.” Moreover, NOAA describes the summer of 2012 as the third hottest summer on record, and the cause of drought in 63 percent of the contiguous U.S. The organization associates these conditions with the record-setting wildfires that burned up a chunk of the West. Obviously there’s a still a big problem with our planet, and that’s why I’ve returned to JPL—this time as a graduate student. While many people of my generation seem more focused on jobs and the economy (valid concerns), I still argue that global climate change is not something we should ignore, especially after the recent news on the new Arctic low. That was a landmark moment, one of many signs that our planet is changing significantly. But despite climate change’s irrevocable features, I think humanity can still make positive changes to deal with what’s coming for our ecosystems and health. That optimism—along with those obnoxious heat waves and the record ice melt—prompts me to continue representing my age group as steps are taken toward long-term adaptation.

No surprise

Tue, 28 Aug 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Guest blogger Ron Kwok is a senior research scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Since I study sea ice and have traveled to the Arctic to do research, I've had a lot of people ask me what I think about this year's ice extent. People want to know if I'm surprised by the new record this year. The extent of the ice, a measurement of the area that the ice covers, has been trending downwards since the beginning of satellite measurements, so every few years we expect to hit a new record low. I'm not surprised at this new low because we scientists expect it due to warming. But also yes I am surprised because the interval between record lows seems to be getting shorter over the past decade. 2005, 2007, and then this summer were all years with record low sea ice extent.

My summer of curiosity and wonder

Fri, 03 Aug 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Guest blogger Alec Loorz is the 18-year-old founder of the iMatter Campaign and a climate change activist and public speaker. He just completed a summer internship with the Earth Science Public Engagement Team at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Just a few months ago my understanding of NASA wasn’t much more than “yeah they sent a man to the moon” and “that’s a pretty picture of the Earth.” Now, after four months of interning at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, I realize there is so much more. In an agency whose main driving force is an insatiable curiosity about Earth and the universe, I see the work of NASA and JPL as a perfect model of the sense of wonder a lot of us tend to lose track of. I’m 18 years old, and I’ve always been driven by an intense desire to be constantly learning, constantly discovering new things. And whether it’s about volcanoes, mushrooms, or the mysteries of space, I’ve always been completely and utterly in awe of the magnificence of the universe. But as I’m growing older I’m noticing this sense of amazement beginning to fade. Overwhelmed by the endless sea of expectations and cynicism imposed by our society, my sense of awe is being walled in and suppressed. In our culture, wonder is considered childish, being in awe of the world is seen as naïve, and inquisitiveness is threatening. Out in the world, we are constantly encouraged to “grow up” and “get over it.” But not at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. At JPL, wonder is the most important thing there is. Being in awe of the universe is the reason we are alive, the reason that 5,000 people are gathered together in this Disneyland-sized facility to send robots into space. Inquisitiveness is the expectation. Exploration is in our nature. This Sunday, JPL will operate the landing of the Mars Science Laboratory on Earth’s red neighbor. It’s one of the most advanced machines ever sent into space, and its goals are to determine whether Mars could have ever supported life, to study the climate and geology of the planet, and even to plan for human missions in the future. There’s a reason the rover is named Curiosity. And I’ve been working in the Earth Science division, where JPL operates a handful of satellites and instruments that measure things like CO2 and Earth’s gravitational field. In these missions, our sense of wonder becomes practical. Because in the data gathered by these satellites, there are some very obvious warning signs that something is not right. It’s become clear that human activities like fossil fuel burning and deforestation have knocked the delicate systems of Earth out of balance. And the research done here at the lab makes it much easier to understand the nature of these imbalances so that we can more intelligently deal with them. So here’s to curiosity. Here’s to wonder. Here’s to returning to the sense of awe we were all born with, and tearing down the walls of jaded apathy built by an unbalanced society. We have the privilege of living on Earth as human beings in one of the most exciting times in history. So let’s not waste it. Go out and learn something new. Do something today you’ve never done before. There’s a whole universe out there waiting to be explored. And it is truly awesome.

Lord of the rings

Wed, 06 Jun 2012 00:00:00 +0000

How do we know what Earth’s climate looked like in the past and how the climate change we’re witnessing today fits into the bigger picture? The instrumental climate record only dates back a couple of centuries or so. To go back further, climate scientists take proxy data — information gathered from natural records of climate variability. These ‘proxies’ include tree rings, ice cores, fossilized pollen, and ancient coral reefs. Even farmers’ logs and travelers diaries can be used to uncover historical climate clues. Take tree rings for example. Each year, trees add a new layer of growth between the older wood and the bark. The size of this layer, or tree ring as seen in cross-section, tells us about the speed of growth and reflects environmental conditions — such as temperature, moisture and even cloudiness — at the time of growth. Tree rings usually grow wider during warm periods and narrower during cold ones. Since some trees live for many centuries and, in some cases, for thousands of years, we can reconstruct temperature and other climate records dating back several hundred years, providing valuable information on how Earth’s climate looked in the past. Which takes me on a tangent: to an interesting tree ring project called “Years” by German artist Bartholomaus Traubeck, who has devised a record player that plays slices of wood. Using a modified turntable, the tree ring data is translated into piano “music”, which ends up rather cataclysmic-sounding. You can listen/read more [[LINK|| http://traubeck.com/years/||here]]. Of course, there is a lot of interpretation left to the programmer to make it sound “pretty.” As Traubeck [[LINK||http://www.loe.org/shows/segments.html?programID=12-P13-00005&segmentID=7||explains]]:

“The tree slice is turning like a disk and the tone arm is constantly being moved to the inside of the disk like on a regular record player. The difference is that basically it’s just a camera and this camera is a modified camera, a very fast one, and the camera has just moved in and it waits until there is a tree ring passing the camera's field of view and then it is translated into a sound. Sometimes it is a series of piano tones, sometimes it’s just one sound and the melody is defined, for instance, by the rate of growth. In essence, I play the tree’s year rings.”

In the same interview, Traubeck says fir trees produce dark C-minor-type music, ash trees are "compressed and complex" and walnut is really “stress-y and artsy”. Here’s a sample.

Pick of the pics

Mon, 07 May 2012 00:00:00 +0000

This image shows the Arabian Peninsula’s Empty Quarter, known as "Rub’ al Khali", the world’s largest sand sea, which holds about half as much sand as the Sahara Desert. The Empty Quarter covers 583,000 square kilometers (225,000 square miles), and stretches over parts of Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Oman and the United Arab Emirates. The image was taken by the Enhanced Thematic Mapper on NASA’s Landsat 7 satellite on August 26, 2001. The area shown resides in southeastern Saudi Arabia, midway between the United Arab Emirates to the north and Oman in the south. Parallel rows of salmon-pink and white alternate to create a rippling pattern. White salt flats, known as sebkhas or sabkhas, separate the dunes. These salt-encrusted plains vary in hardness, in some places creating a surface strong enough to drive a vehicle over, in other places disappearing into sand. The sand dunes soar above the salt plains between them.

Party time in roach city

Thu, 19 Apr 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Click to enlarge image

[[IMAGE||Martin_headshot_1501.jpg||right||100||Martin Davidian||Martin Davidian||0||0]] Martin Davidian is a sophomore Art and Film major at Glendale Community College. The editors of NASA's Global Climate Change website asked Martin to provide a blog entry about his perceptions of climate change and global warming. Since Martin is a visual artist, he's chosen to express his ideas in visual form, along with a few sentences explaining his thoughts about the artwork. It is a weird combination to mix art with science, however that doesn't mean it isn't fun. Coming from an artistic background with no particular interest in science, becoming a cartoonist for climate change at JPL was a sudden turn. I'm surprised to find out that science can be fun if you look at it from your own perspective. I call this drawing "Climate Change Is Happening." The idea for this cartoon came during my oceanography class when we were joking about how climate change is bad for humans, but not necessarily for all life on Earth. Some species might benefit, such as roaches, which are a real nasty piece of work. For them, climate change might be one big party.

Disneyland, with scientists

Tue, 13 Mar 2012 00:00:00 +0000

[[IMAGE||Athenia_big_globe2.jpg||left||517||Athenia|| ||0||0]]

By guest blogger Athenia Barouni, Glendale Community College student With the place as large as Disneyland you would think NASA'S Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) would make enough parking for all the employees. Apparently all the scientists are early birds because the parking is horrendous by the time I get there. If I show up to work at 10 or even 9 in the morning I am forced to park in the dreaded East Lot. Then to get to my cubicle is no easy task. Hiking is a good way to describe the 10-minute power walk I endure while going over a few hills and making swift turns. When I go over the river and through the woods I come across the turnstiles. The cold metal bars prevent my entry and the only way to pass them is with my badge. Yes, Jet Propulsion Laboratory has very high security and yes, I do wonder from time to time what will happen if my badge suddenly doesn’t read. I would then be forced to answer to the officer behind the slightly tinted window, who seems to be watching my every move. I had this preconceived notion that people would be walking around in lab coats muttering under their breaths with their eyes glued to the floor. Imagine my surprise when I find out that JPL consists of a very casual work environment. People don’t even dress professionally. Some men wear shorts and Hawaiian shirts in the summer and the women don’t necessarily wear heels. When walking outside, it is not uncommon to see an occasional herd of deer just nonchalantly eating grass. When I first came here I was amazed and whipped out my phone to take pictures, when I realized that the people around me just walk right past them as if this is as normal as a bird singing in a tree. I’ve done so many memorable things here where I wonder how could one have so much fun and still call it work? We’ve had salsa contests where people bring in homemade salsa and we can be the judge and vote for our favorites (being a judge has obvious benefits). We’ve had parties honoring the tenth anniversary of the Jason satellite launch where we all sat around and ate cake and drank punch. [[IMAGE||Turnstile.jpg||right||250||Turnstile||The JPL turnstile—getting stuck is never fun!||0||0]] My internship allowed me to take part in a bunch of meetings with different scientists. One weekly meeting I would attend consisted of a large number of ocean scientists who got together in a room and discussed their latest research. During my time here, I've worked on NASA's climate change website, helping communicate science to the general public. I have posted [[LINK||http://climate.nasa.gov/EnergyInnovations/||Energy Innovation articles]] on our website and helped assist in the production of videos that are on our [[LINK||http://climate.nasa.gov/imagesVideo/climateReel/||Climate Reel]] page. Informing the public about all the (Earth) science that goes on at JPL is a very important task and can help improve our planet’s well-being. I have had just the best experiences at JPL and it is with a heavy heart that I bid adieu to my fellow JPL-ers. Change is always on the horizon and hopefully I can use the knowledge I gained here to make a difference in the world.
Guest blogger Athenia Barouni is a sophomore biology major at Glendale Community College. She has been an intern with the Earth Science Communications Team at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory since February 2011.

The streets

Wed, 07 Mar 2012 00:00:00 +0000

This image shows impressive cloud "streets" around southern Greenland. Cloud streets are bands of cumulus clouds that form parallel to the low-level wind direction under the right conditions. They usually form within the lower one to three kilometers of the atmosphere, known as the planetary "boundary layer," and are caused by convection. They can form over land or sea. Under the right conditions, cloud streets exhibit remarkable periodic patterns. Airplanes — or space satellites — can offer especially good views. Thanks to NASA's Earth Observatory [[LINK||https://twitter.com/#!/NASA_EO||twitter feed]] for the heads-up on this new image!