Summary And Transition: Past, Present And Future Climates

Western Interior Paleontological Society

Paul E. Belanger, Ph.D.

WIPS 1ST VP

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTSBob Raynolds

Jonathan Bujak

Dag Nummedal

Ian Miller

Peggy LeMone

Caspar Ammann …et al. that I did not mean to omit

Global Warming/Climate Change – Resource Issues – Alternatives Study Group:

FTP SITE: https://sslaccess.elkresources.net/files/

THE PRESENT IS THE KEY TO THE PAST (LYELL) IS also

THE KEY TO THE FUTURE

THE PAST

FROM CSI TO GSI:GEOLOGICAL SAMPLE

INVESTIGATION

LET THE EVIDENCE SPEAK

FOR ITSELF

WE CALL THIS EVIDENCE

“PROXY” DATA

• Strandlines/shorelines• Moraines• Till• Kettle lakes, etc.

SOME OF THE EARLIEST PROXY DATA

WAS FROM TERRESTRIAL DEPOSITS

We may know what caused these today, but imagine back then?

IT’S THE INTERPRETATION THAT’S NOT ALWAYS CORRECT

Darwin observed ancient Alpine shorelines:

interpreted as ocean shoreline

Agassiz – later correctly interpreted as ice-dammed lake-shore strandlines/shoreline

• Jean Louis R. Agassiz

• “Father” of Glaciology

• 1807-1873

• Paleontologist

• Glaciologist

Photographic proxy data/evidence

Ruddiman, 2008

EARLY PROXY DATA:

TREE RINGS

Pollen & Lake core data

Ruddiman, 2008

PROXY DATA:

POLLEN DATA

PROXY DATA:

LEAVES

Tree rings, corals, ice cores

Ruddiman, 2008

PROXY DATA:

ICE CORES

TERRESTRIAL DATA

North American:

Wisconsin

Illinoian

Kansan

Nebraskan

European:

Wurm

Riss

Mindel

Gunz

LATER EVIDENCE CAME FROM

THE MARINE RECORD

NOT WITHOUT IT’S PROBLEMS,

BUT MORE COMPLETE

CesareEmilani:

Paleontologist,Chemist

Father of Paleoceanography

Other Paleoceanographers

Wally Broecker

Thermal-haline

“conveyor” belt of circulation

Bill Ruddiman

Nick Shackleton

Other Paleoceanographers

Other Paleoceanographers

John Imbrie:

CLIMAP

PROXY DATA:

CORE DATA

PROXY DATA:

BENTHIC

FORAMS

PROXY DATA:

PLANKTONIC

FORAMS

Deep Sea Coring

Ruddiman, 2008

Wikipedia

Proxy data: stable isotopes

- SO – WHAT CONTROLS

CLIMATE

Gerhard et al., 2001

OF HUGE IMPORTANCE:

•DISTRIBUTION OF CONTINENTS WITH RESPECT TO LATITUDE

•OCEAN CIRCULATION

•OPENING OF THE DRAKE PASSAGE:

ISOLATING ANTARCTICA

•BARRIERS TO EQUATORIAL CIRCULATION:

CLOSING OF ISTHMUS OF PANAMA 3-5 Ma

bipolar glaciation

geologically rare

possibly unique

we think of this as ‘normal’…but

Icehouse Earth

Milankovitchcycles

(forcing factors)

MILANKOVITCH CYCLES ARE

REFLECTED IN THE GEOLOGIC RECORD

Wikipedia

Cenozoic Climate Record

Wikipedia

Climate Changes from Ocean Sediment Cores, since 5 Ma. Milankovitch Cycles

Brook, 2008 Nature

The Ice Record: MilankovitchEmpirical

Interpreted

Gerhard et al., 2001

BUT IS THIS CORRECT?

Does CO2 always have a lesser role in controlling climate?

HERE’S THE LONG TERM RECORD

Shellito

Fricke

Jacobs

Snowball Earth

~650 Ma

WHAT CONTROLS THE LONG-TERM RECORD?

IS IT STRICTLY CONTINENTAL POSITIONS

AND OCEANIC CIRCULATION?

TODAY WE SAW EOCENE EVIDENCE

OF A WARMER CLIMATE

BallantyneShellito

Fricke

Jacobs

In particular we saw a VERY DRAMATIC increase in temperature in an

environment of already HIGH CO2 VALUES when there was an additional

spike of Methane and CO2

Wikipedia

Proxy data: stable isotopes

Fossil Lotus

Courtesy K. Johnson

Living LotusCourtesy K. Johnson

BUT MARY KRAUS DIDN’T TELL US ABOUT THIS GUY!

RECENT FIND IN COLUMBIA

HERE’S NEW COMPELLING DATA FROM THE EOCENE

Early Eocene supergreenhousewas followed immediately by abrupt global cooling

What forced this change?

Bujak, pers. Comm.

ACEX – ARCTIC CORING EXPEDITION

Expedition 302 - Arctic Coring Expedition

August-September 2004

Lomonosov Ridge

P/E World

No Polar Ice Caps

From Blakey (2007)

ARCTIC EVENTS PROXY DATA

Brinkhuis et al,, 2006

Moran et al., 2006

THE EVIDENCE DOCUMENTS AN

800,000 YEARS SEQUESTRATION

EVENT CALLED THE AZOLLA

EVENT

ACEX results

• 1400 ft (420m) cored section

• good Paleocene Eocene section recovered

• cored the “Azolla event”

• cored the PETM

Bujak, pers. Comm.

ACEX Azolla core

• >8 metre ACEX core with 90% Azolla

• Azolla occurs as laminated layers

• indicates Azolla deposited in situ

• bottom-water anoxia at ACEX site

Bujak, pers. Comm.

?

Azolla eventbase middle Eocene49 Ma

Bujak, pers. Comm.

the massive decrease in

atmospheric CO2?

Bujak, pers. Comm.

UNPRECEDENTED DROP IN CO2

the fastest growing plant on the planet!

it can double its biomass in 2 to 3

days

Bujak, pers. Comm.

the key is in Azolla’s leaf

structure

source: Carrapiço, 2002

Bujak, pers. Comm.

Not unlike the increase GHGs at Paleocene-Eocene causing a significant warming, there appears to be a strong suggestion that this Azolla sequestration of carbon GHGs for a period of about 800,000 years correlates to an ensuing cooling of the globe.

That is NOT to say tectonic events like the opening of the Drake Passage are not also of great significance – particularly in the isolation of Antarctica and its subsequent glaciation and contribution to global cooling.

HERE’S THE LONG TERM RECORD

Shellito

Fricke

Jacobs

FOR LONG-TERM CLIMATIC CHANGES

THE EVIDENCE SUGGESTS:

Royer et al., 2003

Geologic cycles: Climate through

the Phanero-

zoic—carbon is the culprit

IMAGINE THIS:

IT’S ALSO TRUE FOR OTHER PLANETS

No sinks: Runaway Greenhouse Effect

• 97% carbon dioxide• 3% nitrogen• Water & sulfuric acid

clouds• Temperature:

>800°F – more than twice as hot as Mercury

Venus

The Many Time Scales of Climate Change• Daily to several years: Weather – not Climate

1oUNDER THE INFLUENCE OF solar, El Ninos, volcanism, INCREASE IN GHGs, etc. •Century: the climate change the IPCC and people everywhere are worried about, because it affects the economy of society, and tracks man’s direct impact

• Centuries to millennia – Dansgaard-Oeschger cycles; Heinrich events

1oUNDER THE INFLUENCE OF MILANKOVITCH CYCLES, although abrupt & rapid changes in CO2 (as occurred at the PETM) can be influential

• 20Ka to 400 Ka years – Milankovitch cycles - insolation due to earth’s orbital changes

1oUNDER THE INFLUENCE OF CO2

• 1Ma to many millions (Ma) years – Pennsylvanian ‘ice house’ and Cretaceous ‘greenhouse’ due to plate tectonic cycles of continental assembly and break-up and vertical movements. Cycling of CO2 into and out of earth

The Many Time Scales of Climate Change(cont.)

Unique events: “Snowball earth” in late Proterozoic (and more?)Large volcanic eruptions (OAE-2 at C/T boundary)PETM – major heat spike release of methane clathrates

Message: Don’t confuse the causes of climate change at one time scale with the drivers of change at another.

The Long-term carbon cycle and Earths climate:

Carbon cycles:Long-term carbon cycle (millions of yrs)

• Driver of long-term climate changes along with continental and ocean-circulation changes

• Responsible for Icehouses/GreenhousesShort-term carbon cycle (~1,000s to 1,000,000 yrs)

• CO2 currently amplifies glacial-interglacial contrasts

Long-term carbon cycle and today:• Burning fossil fuels is like setting off volcanoes >100

times faster than present eruptions rates• Running a global experiment, which in not analogous

to glacial-interglacials – BUT MAY BE ANALOGOUS to the PETM.

THE PRESENT(and near future)

THE PRESENT

So what’s going on today?

What’s going to happen in the short-term?

Today’s Unique Event: Anthropogenic Global Warming

Today

CO2 for thepast 400 ky

Pliocene levelsof 385ppm

1946 – 1950

svs.gsfc.nasa.gov

2002 - 2006Temperature

svs.gsfc.nasa.gov

Arctic Sea Ice Extent

If sea-ice continues to contract rapidly over the next several years, Arctic land warming and permafrost thaw are likely to accelerate.David Lawrence, NCAR

Satellite imagery of sea ice extent in September1979, and at a record low in September 2007. Source: NASA

NOAA web site archives & Peter Tans

The State of Affairs

Wikipedia

Distribution of Warming: Polar/Cold Regions

HOWEVER: THE LATEST DATA THRU 2007

SUGGESTS GREEN HOUSE GASES ARE MATCHING AND OVERTAKING

TSI VARIATIONS

NCAR: Caspar Amman, 2007

LOWER VS. UPPER ATM.

WikipediaSolar irradiance: 342 W/m2

CHOICES• DO NOTHING and adapt (there WILL be a REAL cost here too)

• MITIGATE (or attempt to) and adapt:– Sequester– Alternate energy sources– Geo-Engineering options– Etc.

• Promote population control: “wear a condom at every ‘conceivable’ moment”

• THINK about it

• But ultimately: CHOOSE WHAT TO DO IN LIFE BEFORE LIFE CHOOSES WHAT YOU DO

THE FUTURE(Beyond the Anthropomorphic Period)

FUTURE CLIMATE?

Crowley & Hyde, 2008

PAST

FUTURE

FUTURE CLIMATE?

Crowley & Hyde, 2008

PAST

FUTURE

Higher

Lower

-

-

-

-Glacial

Interglacial

PAST

FUTURE

Higher

Lower

-

-

-

-Glacial

Interglacial

FUTURE CLIMATE?

Crowley & Hyde, 2008

PAST

FUTURE

Look at the Trend:Any reason to think it might not

continue?

Time, Ma

IN SUMMARY:THE PASTPRESENT

AND FUTURE

BallantyneShellito

Fricke

Jacobs

TOMORROW(AS IN 14 HOURS FROM NOW)

Western Interior Paleontological SocietyFounders Symposium

Sunday, March 15th 2009

NCAR/UCAR: NOAA:

NCAR/UCAR GUIDES(Coordinated by Peggy LeMone)

BE THERE AT 8:30 a.m. / 1:00 p.m.2 Groups

Kyle Ham• Current Position: Education Specialist and Bilingual

Educator• University Corporation for Atmospheric Research

(UCAR)• Office of Education and Outreach

Teri Eastburn,• Coordinator, Public Programs• University Corporation for Atmospheric Research

(UCAR)• Office of Education and Outreach

NOAA (National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration)

(Coordinated by Dan Winester) BE THERE AT 8:30 a.m. / 1:00 p.m.

Groups of 3

Don Mock, William Murtagh, George Sharman, & Sandy MacDonald:

NOAA; ESRL (Earth Systems Research Lab); SWPC (Space Weather Prediction Center); NGDC (National Geophysical Data Center)

NOAA (cont.)

SOS: Science on a Sphere.  This a 3D display of global (and astronomic) projected onto a large sphere.  The audience can view and walk around the sphere to bet a global view of data sets.  NOAA has over 200 data sets, including time-varying ones.  Such data sets as atmospheric processes, plate tectonics, topography, lights at night etc. (40 minutes)

ESRL and other NOAA (Earth Systems Research Lab): (40 minutes)Greenhouse gas lab weather forecast officeWind profilerHigh performance computing centerOzone chemistry

SWPC:  Space Weather Prediction Center (20 minutes)Effect of solar storms on electrical transmission, broadcasts, animal navigationGeomagnetic disturbances

NGDC:  National Geophysical Data Center (20 minutes)Large array storageNight time lightsPaleoclimatology (Tree rings, ice cores, geologic cores)

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTSBob Raynolds

Jonathan Bujak

Dag Nummedal

Ian Miller

Peggy LeMone

Caspar Ammann …et al. that I did not mean to omit

Global Warming/Climate Change – Resource Issues – Alternatives Study Group:

FTP SITE: https://sslaccess.elkresources.net/files/

Western Interior Paleontological Society

QUESTIONS?