Earth’s deep oceans may absorb enough heat at times to flatten the rate of global warming for periods of as long as a decade–even in the midst of longer-term warming. This according to a [...]]]> Posted by: Saving Water SA (Cape Town, South Africa) – partnered with Water Rhapsody conservation systems – 20 Sep 2011

Earth’s deep oceans may absorb enough heat at times to flatten the rate of global warming for periods of as long as a decade–even in the midst of longer-term warming. This according to a new analysis led by scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR).

Excess energy entering the climate system due to greenhouse gas increases may not be immediately realized as warmer surface temperatures, as it can go into the deep ocean instead

The study, based on computer simulations of global climate, points to ocean layers deeper than 1,000 feet as the main location of the “missing heat” during periods such as the past decade when global air temperatures showed little trend.

The findings also suggest that several more intervals like this can be expected over the next century, even as the trend toward overall warming continues.

“We will see global warming go through hiatus periods in the future,” says NCAR’s Gerald Meehl, lead author of the study.

“However, these periods would likely last only about a decade or so, and warming would then resume. This study illustrates one reason why global temperatures do not simply rise in a straight line.”

The research, by scientists at NCAR and the Bureau of Meteorology in Australia, was published online Sunday in Nature Climate Change.

Funding for the study came from the National Science Foundation (NSF), NCAR’s sponsor.

“The research shows that the natural variability of the climate system can produce periods of a decade or more in which Earth’s temperature does not rise, despite an increase in greenhouse gas concentrations,” says Eric DeWeaver, program director in NSF’s Division of Atmospheric and Geospace Sciences.

“These scientists make a compelling case that the excess energy entering the climate system due to greenhouse gas increases may not be immediately realized as warmer surface temperatures, as it can go into the deep ocean instead.”

The 2000s were Earth’s warmest decade in more than a century of weather records.

However, the single-year mark for warmest global temperature, which had been set in 1998, remained unmatched until 2010.

Yet emissions of greenhouse gases continued to climb during this period, and satellite measurements showed that the discrepancy between incoming sunshine and outgoing radiation from Earth actually increased.

This implied that heat was building up somewhere on Earth, according to a 2010 study by NCAR researchers Kevin Trenberth and John Fasullo.

The two scientists, who are both co-authors on the new study, suggested that the oceans might be storing some of the heat that would otherwise go toward other processes, such as warming the atmosphere or land, or melting more ice and snow.

Observations from a global network of buoys showed some warming in the upper ocean, but not enough to account for the global build-up of heat.

Although scientists suspected the deep oceans were playing a role, few measurements were available to confirm that hypothesis.

To track where the heat was going, Meehl and colleagues used a powerful software tool known as the Community Climate System Model, which was developed by scientists at NCAR and the Department of Energy with colleagues at other organizations.

Using the model’s ability to portray complex interactions between the atmosphere, land, oceans and sea ice, they performed five simulations of global temperatures.

The simulations, which were based on projections of future greenhouse gas emissions from human activities, indicated that temperatures would rise by several degrees during this century.

But each simulation also showed periods in which temperatures would stabilize for about a decade before climbing again.

For example, one simulation showed the global average rising by about 2.5 degrees Fahrenheit (1.4 degrees Celsius) between 2000 and 2100, but with two decade-long hiatus periods during the century.

During these hiatus periods, simulations showed that extra energy entered the oceans, with deeper layers absorbing a disproportionate amount of heat due to changes in oceanic circulation.

The vast area of ocean below about 1,000 feet (300 meters) warmed by 18 percent to 19 percent more during hiatus periods than at other times.

In contrast, the shallower global ocean above 1,000 feet warmed by 60 percent less than during non-hiatus periods in the simulation.

“This study suggests the missing energy has indeed been buried in the ocean,” Trenberth says. “The heat has not disappeared and so it cannot be ignored. It must have consequences.”

The simulations also indicated that the oceanic warming during hiatus periods has a regional signature.

During a hiatus, average sea-surface temperatures decrease across the tropical Pacific, while they tend to increase at higher latitudes, especially in the Atlantic, where surface waters converge to push heat into deeper oceanic layers.

These patterns are similar to those observed during a La Niña event, according to Meehl.

He adds that El Niño and La Niña events can be overlaid on top of a hiatus-related pattern.

Global temperatures tend to drop slightly during La Niña, as cooler waters reach the surface of the tropical Pacific, and they rise slightly during El Niño, when those waters are warmer.

“The main hiatus in observed warming has corresponded with La Niña conditions, which is consistent with the simulations,” Trenberth says.

The simulations were part of NCAR’s contribution to the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5.

They were run on supercomputers at NCAR’s NSF-supported Climate Simulation Laboratory and on supercomputers at Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility and the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center, both supported by the U.S. Department of Energy.

Source: NSF

The severe drought in the Horn of Africa, which has caused the death of at least 30 000 children and is affecting some 12 million people, especially in Somalia, is a direct consequence of [...]]]> Posted by: Saving Water SA (Cape Town, South Africa) – partnered with Water Rhapsody conservation systems – 29 Aug 2011

The severe drought in the Horn of Africa, which has caused the death of at least 30 000 children and is affecting some 12 million people, especially in Somalia, is a direct consequence of weather phenomena associated with climate change and global warming, environmental scientists say.

The intensification of La Niña will see growing desertification in Africa. Photo UNCCD.

“The present drought in the Horn of Africa has been provoked by El Niño and La Niña phenomena in the Pacific Ocean, which unsettle the normal circulation of warm and cold water and air, and dislocate the humidity conditions across the southern hemisphere,” Friedrich-Wilhelm Gerstengarbe, senior scientist at the German Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK, after its German name), told IPS.

Both phenomena are a part of the southern oscillation climate pattern that occurs across the tropical Pacific Ocean every five to seven years. It is characterised by variations in the temperature of the surface of the tropical eastern Pacific – warming or cooling known as El Niño and La Niña respectively – and a changing air surface pressure in the western Pacific.

Both phenomena are coupled – the warm oceanic phase, El Niño, accompanies high air surface pressure in the western Pacific, while the cold phase, La Niña, accompanies low air surface pressure in the western Pacific.

Such conditions can particularly affect regions north of the Equator, such as the Horn of Africa. Some 12 million people are facing starvation across the region, Djibouti, Sudan, South Sudan and parts of Uganda, besides Somalia. So far, famine has only been declared in Somalia, a state without a functioning government.

“El Niño and La Niña exacerbate the weather conditions across the southern hemisphere, escalating the rainy season in some areas, especially in Asia and Australia, and droughts in others, especially in Africa,” Gerstengarbe said.

He said climate change and the rising global temperatures caused by it had intensified both El Niño and La Niña, leading to severe floods in Pakistan and Australia, and drought in the Horn of Africa.

Both phenomena had led during the last two years to particularly dry rainy seasons and to extreme hot temperatures over east Africa.

According to the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), La Niña has since 2008 caused a strong drop in water temperatures in the Pacific Ocean, leading to a “below-average precipitation over the central equatorial Pacific”.

These cold episodes (referred to as La Niña episodes), the NOAA adds, are characterised by lower than normal pressure over Indonesia and northern Australia and higher than normal pressure over the eastern tropical Pacific.

During cold episodes the normal patterns of tropical precipitation and atmospheric air circulation become disrupted. The abnormally cold waters in the equatorial central Pacific Ocean suppress cloudiness and rainfall, especially between November and April, that is, precisely during the regional rainy season.

The phenomenon leads to hotter temperatures in east Africa. Both the suppression of rain and the higher temperatures this year have caused the worst drought in the Horn of Africa for 60 years.

“Unfortunately, due to the intensification of La Niña, we must reckon with growing desertification in Africa, and with more droughts in the region around the Horn of Africa,” Gerstengarbe added.

Jean-Cyril Dagorn, in charge of environment and economic justice for the French branch of the humanitarian organisation Oxfam, concurred that climate change and global warming were exacerbating extreme weather conditions in Africa.

“For two years, rain precipitation has been below average in east Africa, due to La Niña,” Dagorn told IPS. “But this year, the drought has been extreme, provoking the present humanitarian catastrophe in Somalia and other adjacent regions.”

Dagorn said that the coming rainy season, scheduled to start in October, might intensify the crisis. “Torrential rain falling on extreme dry earth will wash away the most fertile soil, making the food crisis even more dramatic,” Dagorn warned.

Dagorn said droughts had so far occurred every five to seven years in the Horn of Africa, but almost never with the extreme conditions of today.

“We estimate that due to climate change and the droughts it causes, agricultural productivity in the region will fall by up to 20% in the coming decades, especially in the maize and bean plantations,” Dagorn said.

Besides, he said, the region’s cattle breeders and shepherds had lost between 30% and 60% of their livestock due to extreme weather conditions, aggravating the food crisis.

Dagorn said that both the agricultural policies of the countries affected by the droughts, and international cooperation had failed to address the issue.

The UN has said €1.6bn (about R16.6bn) would be needed to address the crisis. “But France, for instance, has only allocated less than €10m,” Dagorn said. “It announced urgent meetings of donors – which never took place.”

Dagorn said humanitarian organisations were buying cattle in poor condition to distribute the meat among the communities most affected by the famine.

Gerstengarbe said climate change and associated phenomena, and bad agricultural practices such as overgrazing, were leading to increasing desertification across Africa.

“Deserts are growing worldwide by some 150km² a day, but especially across Africa.”

In July, the head of the US agency for international development, Rajiv Shah, said that climate change had contributed to the severity of the crisis.

“There’s no question that hotter and drier growing conditions in sub-Saharan Africa have reduced the resiliency of these communities,” Shah told US media. “The change in climate has contributed to this problem, without question.”

Source: IPS

The once-vibrant coral reef shielding these sun-soaked beaches from the wrath of the sea is withering away under the stress of pollution and warmer water.

Coral bleaching - a “hideous” sight for veteran [...]]]> Posted by: Saving Water SA (Cape Town, South Africa) – partnered with Water Rhapsody conservation systems – 08 December 2010

The once-vibrant coral reef shielding these sun-soaked beaches from the wrath of the sea is withering away under the stress of pollution and warmer water.

Coral bleaching - a “hideous” sight for veteran scuba divers

It’s not likely to get much help from world governments meeting in Cancun for talks on a new climate pact. Their so-far elusive goal to limit global warming to 2 degrees C (3.6 F) is too little too late, says coral expert Roberto Iglesias.

“That represents the end of the coral reefs in the world,” says the Mexican scientist, who works at a marine research station in Puerto Morelos, about 20 kilometres south of the beach resort hosting the annual UN climate conference.

Coral reefs are like underwater jungles that host 25 percent of marine species and provide food and income to hundreds of millions of people, mostly in the developing world. They also serve as shock absorbers to storm surges whipped up by hurricanes.

But many reefs, including the one off this hotel-packed coastline, have been damaged by water pollution and overfishing, leaving them vulnerable to a warming ocean that “bleaches” corals and sometimes kills them, Iglesias said.

This year, preliminary reports show global coral bleaching reached its worst level since 1998, when 16 percent of the world’s reefs were killed off, said Mark Eakin, a coral reef specialist at the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

“Clearly, we are on track for this to be the second worst (bleaching) on record,” he said. “All we’re waiting on now is the body count.”

The 1 100-kilometre Mesoamerican reef that runs along Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula – suffering under other stresses – was spared the bleaching this year, but other parts of the Caribbean were hit hard, including Tobago, Curacao, Panama and islands north of Venezuela.

Some of the biggest impacts were in Southeast Asia. In Indonesia’s Aceh province, surveys showed some 80 percent of the bleached corals died. In July, Malaysia closed several popular dive sites after virtually all the corals in those areas were damaged by bleaching.

Bleaching occurs when warmer temperatures disturb the symbiotic relationship between the corals and tiny algae that live inside them. When the algae are spit out, rainbow-coloured reefs are turned into pale and lifeless skeletons – a “hideous” sight for veteran scuba divers like 52-year-old Eakin.

“You can’t imagine what it’s like to jump in the water and expect beautiful vibrant colours and all the corals are white,” he said.

One or 2 degrees C (1.8-3.6 degrees F) above normal can be enough to cause bleaching. Corals may recover if the water cools and the algae return, but they’re still significantly weaker and more vulnerable to disease. If the warmer temperatures persist, the corals die.

Bleaching occurs due to natural variability; both the 1998 and 2010 events were linked to the El Nino weather phenomenon. But the gradual rise of ocean temperatures means “it doesn’t take much to push them over the edge,” Eakin said.

The World Meteorological Organisation says most tropical waters already have seen surface temperatures rise by up to 0,5 C (1 F) in the past 50 years. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the UN climate-science network, projects an increasing frequency of bleaching episodes that “is very likely to further reduce both coral cover and diversity on reefs over the next few decades.”

Many reefs have already been degraded by disease and the impact of human activities, including discharges of fertilisers and waste as well as overfishing of parrotfish and other species that help keep the corals clean and healthy.

The global area covered by coral reefs has shrunk by 20 percent since 1950 and another 35 percent could disappear in the next 40 years, even without the impact of climate change, according to a report released in October by the World Meteorological Organisation and the Convention on Biological Diversity.

Off the Riviera Maya coast south of Cancun, where large swaths of mangrove forests have been cut down to make room for an endless row of beachfront resorts, only 15 percent of the coral reefs are alive, down from about 45 percent in 1995, said Fernando Secaira, who coordinates a Mesoamerican Reef program for the US-based environmental group Nature Conservancy.

The biggest problem, he said, is the rapid development, with tens of thousands of hotel rooms added only in the past decade. Fertilisers from lawns and golf courses and sewage from the developments filters through the limestone rock and is washed out onto the reef by underground rivers, altering the balance of the sensitive ecosystem.

Secaira said such unhealthy reefs will find it difficult to adjust to warming waters, raising the risk they will be destroyed by bleaching or diseases. The priority for conservationists is identifying the most resilient reefs, and protecting them as climate change sets in with full force, raising temperatures and acidifying the ocean, which limits the carbonate minerals that help corals grow.

Scientists say no emissions cuts being considered by world governments will suffice to prevent that from happening.

“We’re going to lose more corals and more reefs before this is all over,” said Eakin, of NOAA. “The question at this point is how many can we save.”

- Sapa -AP

What could be the worst drought on record has hit the Amazon region, and is the third extreme drought in the last 12 years.

The Rio Negro reached an all time low in [...]]]> Posted by: Saving Water SA (Cape Town, South Africa) – partnered with Water Rhapsody conservation systems – 24 November 2010

What could be the worst drought on record has hit the Amazon region, and is the third extreme drought in the last 12 years.

The Rio Negro reached an all time low in October 2010

Recent research findings suggest rising atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases will rapidly increase the frequency and severity of droughts in the region, with ominous implications for nearly 8.7 million people, including the biodiversity and climate.

In 2005 the Amazon experienced an extreme drought that prompted the government of Brazil to declare a state of emergency in most of the region. This drought was notable for its impacts on the global carbon cycle.

According to the University College London (UCL) Global Drought Monitor, exceptional droughts should not occur more than a couple of times in a century, yet large areas of the Amazon experienced exceptional drought in October this year.

Most of the Amazon region received less than 75% of normal rainfall between 1 July and 30 September, with many large areas receiving less than 25% of normal.

Among the consequences of the drought are extremely low flows on many of the region’s rivers. On 24 October 2010, the Rio Negro, a major tributary of the Amazon, reached an all time low of 13.63m at Manaus.

Just like the 2005 drought, the 2010 drought was preceded by an El Niño.

The possibility of increasingly arid conditions along with more frequent extreme droughts in the Amazon is a matter of growing and grave concern.

Source: WWF

The arid soil of the Karoo bursts into life after the first rains

The soils in large areas of the Southern Hemisphere, including major portions of Australia, Africa and South America, have been [...]]]> Posted by: Saving Water SA (Cape Town, South Africa) – partnered with Water Rhapsody conservation systems – 12 October 2010

The arid soil of the Karoo bursts into life after the first rains

The soils in large areas of the Southern Hemisphere, including major portions of Australia, Africa and South America, have been drying up in the past decade, a group of researchers conclude in the first major study to ever examine “evapo-transpiration” on a global basis.

Most climate models have suggested that evapo-transpiration, which is the movement of water from the land to the atmosphere, would increase with global warming. The new research, published online in the journal Nature, found that’s exactly what was happening from 1982 to the late 1990s.

But in 1998, this significant increase in evapo-transpiration – which had been seven millimetres per year – slowed dramatically or stopped.

In large portions of the world, soils are now becoming drier than they used to be, releasing less water and offsetting some moisture increases elsewhere.

Due to the limited number of decades for which data are available, scientists say they can’t be sure whether this is a natural variability or part of a longer-lasting global change. But one possibility is that on a global level, a limit to the acceleration of the hydrological cycle on land has already been reached.

If that’s the case, the consequences could be serious. They could include reduced terrestrial vegetation growth, less carbon absorption, a loss of the natural cooling mechanism provided by evapo-transpiration, more heating of the land surface, more intense heat waves and a “feedback loop” that could intensify global warming.

“This is the first time we’ve ever been able to compile observations such as this for a global analysis,” said Beverly Law, a professor of global change forest science at Oregon State University. Law is co-author of the study and science director of the AmeriFlux network of 100 research sites, which is one major part of the FLUXNET synthesis that incorporates data from around the world.

“We didn’t expect to see this shift in evapo-transpiration over such a large area of the Southern Hemisphere,” Law said. “It is critical to continue such long-term observations, because until we monitor this for a longer period of time, we can’t be sure why this is occurring.”

Rain forests drying up

Some of the areas with the most severe drying include southeast Africa, much of Australia, central India, large parts of South America, and some of Indonesia. Most of these regions are historically dry, but some are actually tropical rain forests.

The rather abrupt change from increased global evapotranspiration to a near halt in this process coincided with a major El Nino event in 1998, the researchers note in their report, but they are not suggesting that is a causative mechanism for a phenomenon that has been going on for more than a decade now.

Greater evapotranspiration was expected with global warming, because of increased evaporation of water from the ocean and more precipitation overall. And data indeed show that some areas are wetter than they used to be.

However, other huge areas are now drying out, the study showed. This could lead to increased drought stress on vegetation and less overall productivity, Law said, and as a result less carbon absorbed, less cooling through evapotranspiration, and more frequent or extreme heat waves.

Long-term observations

Some of the sites used in this study are operated by Law’s research group in the central Oregon Cascade Range in the Metolius River watershed, and they are consistent with some of these concerns.

In the last decade there have been multiple years of drought, vegetative stress, and some significant forest fires in that area.

Evapo-transpiration returns about 60% of annual precipitation back to the atmosphere, in the process using more than half of the solar energy absorbed by land surfaces. This is a key component of the global climate system, linking the cycling of water with energy and carbon cycles.

Longer term observations will be needed to determine if these changes are part of decadal-scale variability or a longer-term shift in global climate, the researchers said.

Source: EurekAlert

Torrential rains caused by the El Niño weather phenomenon have swept across parts of southern China, toppling homes, destroying crops and killing at least 70 people, state media reported on Tuesday. More flooding was expected. [...]]]> Posted by: Saving Water SA (Cape Town, South Africa) - partnered with Water Rhapsody conservation systems – 11 May 2010

Torrential rains caused by the El Niño weather phenomenon have swept across parts of southern China, toppling homes, destroying crops and killing at least 70 people, state media reported on Tuesday. More flooding was expected.

Flooding caused by the heavy rains – which started a month earlier than normal – damaged more than 80 000 homes and damaging large swaths of cropland, affecting more than 10 million people across 13 provinces and cities, the State Flood Control and Disaster Relief Headquarters said on its website.

“South China has already entered its flood season, one month earlier than in past years. The biggest floods have yet to come,” Sun Jun of the National Meteorological Centre was cited as saying by the official Xinhua News Agency.

The areas include the provinces of Guangdong, Chongqing, Sichuan, Fujian, Jiangxi, Hunan and Zhejiang.

Sun said the extreme rains were caused by El Niño, which has linked hot, wet air from southern China with cooler air travelling south from northern China, according to Xinhua.

In some areas, such as Guangdong province, the thunderstorms have cut power lines, toppled homes and bridges, submerged roads and caused rivers to overflow, forcing the relocation of 145 000 people in less than a week, Xinhua said.

China’s huge land mass means severe storms can cause floods in one region, while other parts of the country experience droughts.

Earlier this year, farmers in Yunnan and Guizhou were hit by the worst drought in a century. The drought, which has begun to subside as the region enters its rainy season, affected 61 million people, leaving millions without drinking water and ruining more than four million hectares of crops.

- AP

The seasonal monsoon rains in Asia feed nearly half the world’s population, and when the rains fail to come, people can go hungry, or worse.

Scientists sampling the wood of 1000 year old hemlock. [...]]]> Posted by: Saving Water SA (Cape Town, South Africa) - partnered with Water Rhapsody conservation systems – 24 April 2010

The seasonal monsoon rains in Asia feed nearly half the world’s population, and when the rains fail to come, people can go hungry, or worse.

Scientists sampling the wood of 1000 year old hemlock. Credit: Brendan Buckley.

A new study of tree rings provides the most detailed record yet of at least four epic droughts that have shaken Asia over the last thousand years, from one that may have helped bring down China’s Ming Dynasty in 1644, to another that caused tens of millions of people to starve to death in the late 1870s.

The study, published this week in the journal Science, is expected not only to help historians understand how environment has affected the past, but to aid scientists trying to understand the potential for large-scale disruptions of weather in the face of changing climate.

For some tree species, rainfall determines the width of their annual growth rings, and these rings are what the scientists were able to read. The tree-ring records in the study reveal at least four great droughts that are linked to catastrophic events in history.

Read the full report: The Earth Institute, Columbia University

NASA reports that record high temperatures in the Southern Hemisphere persisted into March 2010, following the warmest summer (Dec-Feb) on record there - and its hottest year on record in 2009.  NASA data indicates that globally, surface [...]]]> Posted by: Saving Water SA (Cape Town, South Africa) - partnered with Water Rhapsody conservation systems – 15 April 2010

NASA reports that record high temperatures in the Southern Hemisphere persisted into March 2010, following the warmest summer (Dec-Feb) on record there - and its hottest year on record in 2009.  NASA data indicates that globally, surface temperatures were the second highest on record in March.

Global surface temperature anomalies, March 2010. Source: NASA GISS

The data, released by NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, shows that the land-ocean temperature index for the Southern Hemisphere was 0.62^oC above the 1951-1980 mean for March.  The previous March record, set in 2002, was 0.61^oC above the mean.  Globally, March surface temperatures were 0.84^oC above the global mean for 1951-1980 of 14^oC.  The warmest March on record globally, March 2002, was 0.85^oC.

These differences between March 2002 and March 2010 are very small both globally and for the Southern Hemisphere.  The bottom line: March 2002 and 2010 are the hottest on record for the globe overall and for the Southern Hemisphere.

The temperature anomalies were particularly large and positive in the Arctic and Antarctic, Canada and the northern U.S., Scandinavia, and in the area stretching roughly from Tibet to the Atlantic waters off the coast of West Africa (see figure above).

One of the few areas with large negative temperature anomalies was the Bering Sea, where sea-ice extent was above normal.

Among the notable positive temperature anomalies in March were in the eastern tropical Atlantic – the Main Development Region for Atlantic hurricanes.  Sea surface temperatures there were at record levels for March.  Should the anomalies persist into the hurricane season, there will be more energy available for the formation of hurricanes.  The high temperatures – along with an anticipated fading of the current El Nino in the tropical Pacific – is cited by experts who anticipate a relatively active hurricane season (1 June through 30 November) in 2010.

Source: WWF

Weather experts say they have a tip that could give up to 14 months’ warning before the onset of an El Nino, the weather anomaly that whacks countries around the Pacific and affects southern Africa [...]]]> Posted by: Saving Water SA (Cape Town, South Africa) - partnered with Water Rhapsody conservation systems – 22 February 2010

Weather experts say they have a tip that could give up to 14 months’ warning before the onset of an El Nino, the weather anomaly that whacks countries around the Pacific and affects southern Africa and even Europe.

El Niño is marked by warmer water in the central and eastern Pacific Ocean around the equator, shown in red and yellow on this false-color satellite image.

At present, scientists are unable to give little more than a few months’ notice that an El Nino is in the offing, which is often too late for farmers, fishermen and others to prepare for weather disruption.

El Nino occurs every two to seven years, when the trade winds that circulate surface water in the tropical Pacific start to weaken. A mass of warm water builds in the western Pacific and eventually rides over to the eastern side of the ocean.

The outcome is a major shift in rainfall, bringing floods and mudslides to usually arid countries in western south America and drought in the western Pacific, as well as a change in nutrient-rich ocean currents that lure fish. El Nino is ushered out by a cold phase, La Nina, which usually occurs the following year.

Meteorologists led by Takeshi Izumo of the Research Institute for Global Change in Yokohama, Japan, believe the world can gain a precious early warning from a similar event that occurs in the Indian Ocean. This oscillation, first identified in 1999, occurs roughly every two years.

Analysis of weather records from 1981 to 2009 found that when the so-called Indian Ocean Dipole was in a “negative” phase — with the waters warm in the west and cold in the east — an El Nino event in Pacific followed more than a year later. The driver for this pendulum appears to be a pattern in atmospheric circulation linking the two oceans, Izumo believes. The paper is published online on Sunday by the journal Nature Geoscience.

In a commentary, Peter Webster and Carlos Hoyos, earth scientists at the Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, said that work was needed to delve into the past. The 1981-2009 period did indeed show a “strong two-year rhythm” in which the Dipole swung along with El Nino.

Other research, based on sea temperatures from 1890-2008, suggests the Indian Ocean pendulum may vary from decade to decade, the pair cautioned.

Source: The Citizen

CARACAS, Venezuela: President Hugo Chavez signed a decree declaring an energy emergency in Venezuela to facilitate his government’s efforts to ease severe energy shortages. “We’ve been working on this because it’s a necessity. The truth [...]]]> Posted by: Saving Water SA (Cape Town, South Africa) - partnered with Water Rhapsody conservation systems – 09 February 2010

CARACAS, Venezuela: President Hugo Chavez signed a decree declaring an energy emergency in Venezuela to facilitate his government’s efforts to ease severe energy shortages. “We’ve been working on this because it’s a necessity. The truth is, it’s an emergency,” Chavez said on Monday.

Under the decree, Venezuelans who use more than 500 kilowatt-hours of electricity per month - an estimated 24 percent of all residential consumers - must reduce their consumption by 10 percent or be required to pay a 75 percent price increase. Those who increase consumption by 10 percent will be slapped with a 100 percent price increase. If they boost usage by 20 percent, the price hike rises to 200 percent.

The Guri Dam supplies most of Venezuela's electricity

Venezuela imposed electricity and water rationing in December to prevent a collapse of the electricity grid as water levels behind the Guri Dam fell to critical lows. The dam supplies most of Venezuela’s electricity.

Rolling blackouts lasting up to four hours are bring imposed throughout the country - except the capital of Caracas - as the country struggles with a severe drought.

Venezuelans who collaborate with the government to save energy will be rewarded, Chavez said. Consumers who reduce their electricity usage by 10 to 20 percent will receive a 25 percent discount on monthly bills. And those who decrease consumption by more than 20 percent will get a 50 percent discount.

Chavez said he’d set an example, vowing that energy consumption at the presidential palace would drop significantly.

The energy conservation plan also requires big businesses and industrial complexes to reduce consumption by 20 percent or face sanctions, including 24-hour to 48-hour shutdowns.

Venezuela is suffering from a drought as Pacific Ocean currents have changed weather patterns as part of the El Nino phenomenon, and Chavez has warned Venezuelans that the South American country’s power woes could worsen if rains don’t come as expected when the rainy season begins in May or June.

“This is the worst summer I’ve seen in my life,” Chavez said. “Everything is dry.” Critics counter that Chavez failed to invest enough in electrical projects to meet growing demand.

Energy Minister Ali Rodriguez announced last week that Chavez’s administration plans to spend $15 billion over the next five years to increase electricity production.

Source: China Daily