The atmosphere does not pick and choose the chemical constituents we put in it. Climate “accounting” cannot fool the climate. We neglect “biogeochemical feedbacks” at our peril. This paper points to CO₂ release from warmer soils, and “the emission of CO₂ and methane from wetlands, nitrous oxides from soils, volatile organic compounds from forests, and trace gases and soot from fires.” Changes in lower-atmosphere ozone and nitrogen cycling can have an insufficiently-understood effect on carbon uptake by plants.
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/07/100725142610.htm
Source: Science Daily / University of Helsinki

The Arctic Biodiversity Trends 2010 Report lists a multiplicity of climate change impacts on Arctic habitat and, consequently, on flora and fauna. For example: A predicted northward shift of tree line by 2100 would result in “loss of 51% of tundra habitat”.
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/06/100609094134.htm
Source: Science Daily / International Polar Year – Oslo Science Conference

In the face of climate change, especially in vulnerable areas upon which a billion people currently depend, shifts of whole biomes, or “suites” of plants, reduces human survivability and increases risk of wildfires and loss of wildlife habitat.
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/06/100607092143.htm
Source: Science Daily / University of California – Berkeley

An ice-free summer Arctic Ocean in 30 years is a chilling prospect, due to loss of reflectivity of incoming solar radiation. This study argues against a possible benefit of uncovering open water that could then absorb atmospheric CO₂. Although CO₂ does dissolve better in the colder water, it also acidifies more quickly, rapidly inhibiting the formation of CO₂-absorbing calcium-carbonate shelled organisms, which are generally what absorb a large proportion of the CO₂ in warmer waters.
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/08/100802173736.htm
Source: Science Daily / University of Georgia

Reforestation and afforestation in the form of plantations “substantially reduce carbon stock in ecosystems in comparison with natural forests.” intelligent forest management practices may partially compensate.
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/05/100528211152.htm
Source: Science Daily / University of Oklahoma

Many researchers argue there is urgent need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions immediately, to mitigate numerous feedback or “tipping point” processes. In this study, “[t]he researchers use, for the first time, a suite of climate chemistry models to consider the climate effects of all long- and short-lived gases, aerosols and cloud effects, not just carbon dioxide, resulting from transport worldwide.” While all motorised transport contributes long-lived CO₂ to the atmosphere, due to the high altitude of emissions, “in the first years after the journey, air travel increases global temperatures four times more than car travel.”
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/08/100804103648.htm
Source: Science Daily / Centre for International Climate and Environmental Research (CICERO)

Climate modeling improves with the quality of the data inputted. This report illustrates one example of the painstaking work required to understand the thawing of permafrost, predicted to be an increasing source of greenhouse gases. “For permafrost temperatures, you have to be there. You have to establish boreholes.” The result: Not all permafrost thaws at the same rate.
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/08/100803101924.htm
Source: Science Daily / University of Alaska Fairbanks

Diesel motors and cooking fires are controllable contributers to particulate pollution. This study looks at the “black carbon” which is formed from incomplete combustion of fossil fuels (mainly diesel exhaust but also from coal cooking fires). The presence of a higher ratio of black carbon to sulphate (derived from industrial processes) in the atmosphere correlates with increased absorption of solar radiation and hence global warming. Black carbon plumes from burning fossil fuel contribute twice as much warming as plumes from burning biomass .
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/07/100729144225.htm
Source: Science Daily / University of Iowa – Health Science

Soot ( a component of which is black carbon) is bad for lungs, but has been neglected in climate change modeling as an absorber of solar radiation in clouds, air, and snow and ice. This study suggests that soot from fossil fuel and biomass burning is the second greatest contributor to global warming behind CO₂, but, because it is cleared much more quickly, rapid reduction may offer the best chance to slow the whole process. “The most immediate, effective and low-cost way to reduce soot emissions is to put particle traps on vehicles, diesel trucks, buses, and construction equipment.”
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/07/100728092617.htm
Source: Science Daily / Stanford University

A Swedish study suggests climate models include carbon release from sediment in inland lakes. “The annual rate at which bound carbon is deposited as sediment in the lakes of the boreal zone will fall by 4-27 per cent, depending on which climate forecasts are borne out, over the next hundred years. The production of carbon dioxide by lake sediment will increase correspondingly, resulting in higher levels of emissions to the atmosphere.”
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/07/100721132625.htm
Source: Science Daily / Uppsala University

Many concerns have been raised about the detrimental effects on food security of a shift to biofuels. Here, agricultural economists from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, in the heart of corn ethanol country, argue that, to have a fair comparison of the impacts on both climate and taxpayer of biofuels and gasoline, the accounting of the indirect costs of gasoline must include costs of military and security. Thus, as a byproduct of an energy economics controversy, light is shed on the military as a significant contributer of greenhouse gases otherwise frequently neglected.
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/07/100721121657.htm
Source: Science Daily / University of Nebraska-Lincoln

Air traffic predicted to increase 7-fold by 2100, and hence to become a significant source of greenhouse gases. Note that this is a prediction only, but it is rare for attention to be given to this source, and it was not even included in the Kyoto protocol.
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/05/100526124715.htm
Source: Science Daily / American Chemical Society

Contrary to the claims of “global cooling” following the wintry weather in the Northeastern U.S., the increased cold and snow actually appears to stem from arctic warming that exceeds predictions.
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/06/100611093710.htm
Source: Science Daily / International Polar Year – Oslo Science Conference

Food scarcity due to water scarcity lies ahead for up to a billion people in South and Southeast Asia, according to climate model predictions of melting of Himalayan glaciers (the “water tower” of the region). However, the predicted impacts due to rivers drying may be unevenly distributed geographically, and, of course, are subject to the uncertainty of the underlying assumptions.
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/06/100616090225.htm
Source: Science Daily / Utrecht University

How to communicate concerns about climate change to those who are skeptical or “disengaged”? A behavioural-attitudinal study suggests: “Re-defining climate change in public health terms should help people make connection to already familiar problems such as asthma, allergies and infectious diseases, while shifting the visualization of the issue away from remote Arctic regions and distant peoples and animals”. The study does not appear to address how to convince people that “distant peoples and animals” matter.
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/07/100719111957.htm
Source: Science Daily / George Mason University

Climate models predict significant increase in the “heat index”, which addresses the health effects of heat and humidity, in the river valleys and coastal regions of Mediterranean Europe. Based on previous experience, this will mean tens of thousands of premature deaths, droughts, and crop destruction.
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/06/100611145451.htm
Source: Science Daily / ETH Zurich

Climate-driven toxic algal blooms are threatening the health and livelihoods of millions in coastal India.
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/05/100531082607.htm
Source: Science Daily / University of Gothenburg

A Chinese news source attributes a litany of disruptive and destructive weather events to global warming.
Link: http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/china/2010-07/31/c_13423747.htm
Source: English.news.cn

Scientists hope findings will debunk some growing skepticism about climate change.
Link: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/technology/science/the-earth-is-hotter-than-ever-global-warming-is-real-researchers-warn/article1655436/
Source: Globe and Mail

“Global average surface and lower-troposphere temperatures during the last three decades have been progressively warmer than all earlier decades, and the 2000s
(2000–09) was the warmest decade in the instrumental record. This warming has been particularly apparent in the mid- and high-latitude regions of the Northern Hemisphere…” Numerous variables and phenomena are tracked and described.
Link: http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/bams-state-of-the-climate/2009.php
Source: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Climatic Data Center / Arndt, D. S., M. O. Baringer, and M. R. Johnson, Eds., 2010: State of the Climate in 2009. Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc., 91 (6), S1-S224.

The Copenhagen Climate Conference highlighted concerns about the willingness of major governments to tackle climate change urgently. In this news item, a report by the National Research Council requested by the U.S. Congress states: “Federal policies should not unnecessarily supersede measures already being taken regionally or locally…”. While calling for “reliable data coordinated through climate services and a greenhouse gas monitoring and management system to provide timely information tailored to decision makers at all levels” this report, subsumed under a program called America’s Climate Choices also calls for “urging federal agencies to support training for researchers on how to communicate complex climate change information and uncertainties to different audiences”.
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/07/100723095426.htm
Source: Science Daily / National Academy of Sciences

If we double the Earth’s greenhouse gases, how much will the temperature change? That’s what this number tells you.
Link: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2010/explained-climate-sensitivity.html
Source: MIT News Office
Note: For more articles for the educated layperson on climate topics: http://paoc.mit.edu/cmi/news.htm

A summary of a groundbreaking modeling effort from MIT in 2009, that incorporated economic factors into climate projections. “The new projections… indicate a median probability of surface warming of 5.2 degrees Celsius by 2100, with a 90 percent probability range of 3.5 to 7.4 degrees. This can be compared to a median projected increase in the 2003 study of just 2.4 degrees. The difference is caused by several factors rather than any single big change. Among these are improved economic modeling and newer economic data showing less chance of low emissions than had been projected in the earlier scenarios.”
Link: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/techtalk53-26.pdf
Source: MIT Tech Talk

An ice-free summer Arctic Ocean in 30 years is a chilling prospect, due to loss of reflectivity of incoming solar radiation. This study argues against a possible benefit of uncovering open water that could then absorb atmospheric CO₂. Although CO₂ does dissolve better in the colder water, it also acidifies more quickly, rapidly inhibiting the formation of CO₂-absorbing calcium-carbonate shelled organisms, which are generally what absorb a large proportion of the CO₂ in warmer waters.
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/08/100802173736.htm
Source: Science Daily / University of Georgia

A coauthor of this Dalhousie study states: “Phytoplankton are a critical part of our planetary life support system. They produce half of the oxygen we breathe, draw down surface CO₂, and ultimately support all of our fisheries.” Warming of ocean waters is leading to increased stratification and hence to reduced mixing of nutrients necessary for phytoplankton growth, likely contributing to phytoplankton levels decreasing by 1% per year over the past 40 years.
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/07/100728131705.htm
Source: Science Daily / Dalhousie University

A warming of 0.5 degrees Celsius of a large area of the Indian Ocean, primarily attributed to anthropogenic greenhouse gases, is said to be driving two perpendicular atmospheric wind patterns. The combined effect of these two patterns contributes to a widespread regional sea level rise (sea level changes are unevenly distributed globally) threatening islands and coastal areas.
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/07/100713101412.htm
Source: Science Daily / University of Colorado at Boulder

A real-time study of the breakup of a major Greenland glacier system points to local ocean warming (not just land warming) as a factor in glacial-melt-driven sea level rise.
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/07/100712154438.htm
Source: Science Daily / NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center