Global Warming: "Three Times Faster than Worst Prediction"

As reported in yesterday's edition of The Independent, a series of stunning and worrisome studies has just shown that global warming is accelerating three times more rapidly than initially feared. The rate of increase of greenhouse gas emissions has tripled since the 1990s, the Arctic ice caps are melting three times as fast, and the oceans are rising twice as fast as had been originally forecast.

Global warming, CO₂ in particular, is a positive feedback loop. As greenhouse gas increases, ice at the poles are melting faster which leads to less solar energy being reflected back to space, increasing the heat trapped in the atmosphere. As the sea temperature increases, less CO₂ is being absorbed by the seawater as well as less stored in the polar ice, again leading to higher concentration of CO₂.

While the politicians are still talking about reducing the rate of increase of greenhouse gas emission, we should be talking about reducing the TOTAL amount of CO₂ already in the atmosphere BEFORE it is too late! As shown by "The Inconvenient Truth", what is use of economy if the human civilization is going to be wiped away from Earth? Can they get the priority right?