THIS POST IS A STUDY OF A SOIL SCIENCE REVOLUTION THAT HAS CLIMATE CHANGE IMPLICATIONS

LINK TO SOURCE: https://www.quantamagazine.org/a-soil-science-revolution-upends-plans-to-fight-climate-change-20210727/

PART-1: WHAT THE SOURCE DOCUMENT SAYS

A Soil-Science Revolution Upends Plans to Fight Climate Change

A centuries-old concept in soil science has recently been thrown out. Yet it remains a key ingredient in everything from climate models to advanced carbon-capture projects. One teaspoon of healthy soil contains more bacteria, fungi and other microbes than there are humans on Earth. Those hungry organisms can make soil a difficult place to store carbon over long periods of time. The hope was that the soil might save us with civilization pumping ever-increasing amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Plants are nature’s carbon scrubbers and we had hoped that they would remove the excess carbon and bury it underground. Researchers at the Salk Institute had hoped to bioengineer plants whose roots would capture carbon from the atmosphere and convert them to suberin. Even after the plant dies, the carbon in the suberin stays buried for centuries. This Harnessing Plants Initiative is the brightest star in a crowded firmament of climate change solutions based on the brown stuff beneath our feet. Such plans depend critically on the existence of large, stable, carbon-rich molecules that can last hundreds or thousands of years underground. Such molecules, collectively called humus, have long been a keystone of soil science; major agricultural practices and sophisticated climate models are built on them. But over the past 10 years or so, soil science has undergone a quiet revolution, akin to what would happen if, in physics, relativity or quantum mechanics were overthrown. Except in this case, almost nobody has heard about it including many who hope soils can rescue the climate. “There are a lot of people who are interested in sequestration who haven’t caught up yet. A new generation of soil studies powered by modern microscopes and imaging technologies has revealed that whatever humus is, it is not the long-lasting substance scientists believed it to be. Soil researchers have concluded that even the largest, most complex molecules can be quickly devoured by soil’s abundant and voracious microbes. The magic molecule you can just stick in the soil and expect to stay there may not exist. The consequences go far beyond carbon sequestration strategies. Major climate models such as those produced by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change are based on this outdated understanding of soil. Several recent studies indicate that those models are underestimating the total amount of carbon that will be released from soil in a warming climate. Computer models that predict the greenhouse gas impacts of farming practices are probably overly optimistic about soil’s ability to trap and hold on to carbon.

PART-2: CRITICAL COMMENTARY

IN A RELATED POST: LINK: https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/06/19/vegandiet/ WE PRESENT THE CASE THAT THE THEORY OF ANTHROPOGENIC GLOBAL WARMING BY WAY OF THE INDUSTRIAL ECONOMY THAT GOT STARTED ONLY WHEN THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION HAD STARTED IS VERY SPECIFICALLY A FOSSIL FUEL ISSUE. IT IS NOT A CARBON CYCLE ISSUE. THE ONLY PART OF THE PAPER ABOVE THAT IS RELEVANT TO THIS UNDERSTANDING OF AGW THEORY IS THAT FUTURE WARMING AT A SUFFICIENTLY HIGH TEMPERATURE MAY CAUSE FEEDBACK CO2 EMISSIONS FROM THE SOIL; BUT THIS PAPER IS IRRELEVANT IN THE CONTEXT OF CLIMATE ACTION. REGARDLESS OF THE BEHAVIOR OF CARBON DIOXIDE IN SOILS, WE CAN MEASURE FOSSIL FUEL EMISSIONS AND WE CAN MEASURE INCREASES IN ATMOSPHERIC CO2 CONCENTRATION AND WE FIND THAT THE DATA ARE CONSISTENT WITH THE CLIMATE SCIENCE ASSUMPTION THAT THE AIRBORNE FRACTION IS 50% OF EMISSIONS. THERE ARE SOME UNCERTAINTIES IN THIS ISSUE WHERE THE AIRBORNE FRACTION VARIES SLIGHTLY YEAR TO YEAR AND THE CO2 SEQUESTRATION DYNAMICS OF THE SOIL MAY PLAY A ROLE IN THAT VARIANCE, BUT THE ABILITY OF THE SOIL TO SEQUESTER CO2 IS NOT A GLOBAL WARMING ISSUE.

IN OTHER WORDS, THE CARBON SEQUESTRATION FUNCTION OF THE SOIL IS A CARBON CYCLE ISSUE. IT IS NEITHER A GLOBAL WARMING ISSUE NOR A CLIMATE ACTION ISSUE.

THIS POST IS A CRITICAL REVIEW OF THE INTERPRETATION OF A RESEARCH PAPER IN TERMS OF THE USE OF FORESTRY AS CLIMATE ACTION

PART-1: WHAT THE RESEARCH PAPER SAYS

Forestry contributed to warming of forest ecosystems in northern Germany during the extreme summers of 2018 and 2019: Jeanette S. Blumröder, Felix May, Werner Härdtle, Pierre L. Ibisch. 13 July 2021 https://doi.org/10.1002/2688-8319.12087: ABSTRACT: Forest management influences a variety of ecosystem structures and processes relevant to meso- and microclimatic regulation, but little research has been done on how forest management can mitigate the negative effects of climate change on forest ecosystems.We studied the temperature regulation capacity during the two Central European extreme summers in 2018 and 2019 in Scots pine plantations and European beech forests with different management-related structural characteristics. We found that the maximum temperature was higher when more trees were cut and canopy was more open. Logging 100 trees per hectare increased maximum temperature by 0.21–0.34 K at ground level and by 0.09–0.17 K in 1.3 m above ground. Opening the forest canopy by 10% significantly increased Tmax, measured 1.3 m above ground by 0.46 K (including pine and beech stands) and 0.35 K (only pine stands). At ground level, Tmax increased by 0.53 K for the model including pine and beech stands and by 0.41 K in pure pine stands. Relative temperature cooling capacity decreased with increasing wood harvest activities, with below average values in 2018 (and 2019) when more than 656 (and 867) trees per hectare were felled. In the pine forests studied, the relative temperature buffering capacity 1.3 m above ground was lower than average values for all sample plots when canopy cover was below 82%. In both study years, mean maximum temperature measured at ground level and in 1.3 m was highest in a pine-dominated sample plots with relatively low stand volume (177 m3 ha−1) and 9 K lower in a sample plot with relatively high stock volumes of Fagus sylvatica (>565 m3 ha−1). During the hottest day in 2019, the difference in temperature peaks was more than 13 K for pine-dominated sample plots with relatively dense (72%) and low (46%) canopy cover. Structural forest characteristics influenced by forest management significantly affect microclimatic conditions and therefore ecosystem vulnerability to climate change. We advocate keeping the canopy as dense as possible (at least 80%) by maintaining sufficient overgrowth and by supporting deciduous trees that provide effective shade.

INTRODUCTION: In Central Europe, the weather extremes of the past years, in combination with insect outbreaks and other calamities, have already contributed to large-scale tree dieback (Schuldt et al., 2020; Seidl et al., 2017). Heat and drought stress, forest fires, storms and late frost events, as well as associated pests and diseases, often occur in complex interaction with each other and cause impacts with unpredictable outcomes (Allen et al., 2010; Carnicer et al., 2011). Extreme temperatures, for example, can cause physiological damage and have an impact on the vitality, growth and mortality of trees (Buras et al., 2018). This can trigger a decline in productivity, carbon sequestration and woody biomass (Smith et al., 2020; Vieira et al., 2020). Warmer temperatures can directly impair organisms, but also drive a nonlinear rise in water vapour deficit and contribute to the desiccation of plants (Hatfield & Prueger, 2015). Higher temperatures can increase the production of seeds by trees but compromise their establishment and survival due to increased water stress (Ibáñez et al., 2017). Although species have different mechanisms to cope with drought (Volaire, 2018), tree vitality and productivity already declined in response to recent drought events (Rohner et al., 2021; Senf et al., 2020).The extreme drought in 2018 severely affected forest stands in Germany (Ionita et al., 2021), and, as a consequence, about twice as many trees died in 2019 compared to 2018 and about 80% of all living trees showed poor vitality (BMEL, 2020). Climate conditions, which are currently perceived as extreme (Büntgen et al., 2021), could represent the new ‘normal’ in the near future (Hari et al., 2020; Scharnweber et al., 2020). It is, therefore, of high interest that which practices of forest management such as thinning or keeping close canopies have the potential to attenuate the adverse effects of heat waves within forest stands. Recent studies conclude that thinning can reduce drought impacts (Ameztegui et al., 2017; D’Amato et al., 2013; Del Río et al., 2017; Gebhardt et al., 2014; Giuggiola et al, 2013, 2016; Ma et al., 2010; Primicia et al., 2013; Simonin et al., 2007; Sohn, Hartig, et al., 2016). However, a critical challenge for forest management is to support the ecosystem capacity for microclimate regulation, especially in times of frequently recurring dry and hot years, when precipitation is absent for longer periods of drought. Here, microclimate regulation implies the attenuation of summer peak temperatures, moderation of mean temperatures and the buffering of temperature fluctuations in the forest interior. An important outcome of microclimatic regulation is the stabilization of habitat conditions for species affected by shifting microclimatic conditions (De Frenne et al., 2013; Milling et al., 2018; Suggitt et al., 2011; Tuff et al., 2016; Varner & Dearing, 2014; Zellweger et al., 2020). With growth and development of a forest, the canopy structure changes, water uptake potential improves and transpiration reduces extreme temperatures (Holdaway et al., 2010). The canopy structure of a forest stand resulting from forest management directly influences temperature and vapour pressure deficit in the forest interior (Jucker et al., 2018), where the release of water vapour by plants is often the only source of humidity, particularly in seasons with deficient precipitation (Moreira et al., 1997). As a consequence, the forest canopy cools soil and air during warm days and buffers temperature fluctuations (Jin et al., 2019). In this way, forest interior temperatures are moderated across seasons (Zellweger et al., 2019), and temperature differences inside and outside forests are higher when macroclimatic conditions become more extreme (De Frenne et al., 2019). Structural characteristics that determine a within stand’s microclimate include the predominant tree species (De Abreu-Harbich et al., 2015), tree vitality (Sanusi & Livesley, 2020), biomass volume (Norris et al., 2012) as well as elevation and canopy cover (Ma et al., 2010). Microclimatic regulation is an important ecosystem service facilitated especially by trees, woodlands or forests, which is increasingly appreciated and taken into account in urban development and planning (Fung & Jim, 2019). In the context of urban adaptations to climate change, microclimate regulation for the mitigation of heat island effects by green infrastructure has been investigated much more intensively (Kong et al., 2014; Lindén et al., 2016; Shashua-Bar et al., 2009; Wang et al., 2018) than in open landscapes and within forest ecosystems. Despite the fact that forest management influences a variety of forest ecosystem structures and processes relevant to meso- and microclimatic regulation, so far, there is a knowledge gap of how forest management could contribute to a reduction of temperature extremes, mean temperatures and temperature fluctuations within forest stands and could thus improve climate change adaption at the stand or even at the landscape level. There is plenty of evidence and several conceptual frameworks have been suggested that may encourage forest managers to reflect about temperature management in forests for stabilising the within-stand microclimate during extreme summer heat as contribution to preserving tree vitality and productivity under climate change. An open question is to what extent forest characteristics that are directly shaped by forest management operations (such as thinning, harvesting intensity and nature conservation) influence within-stand temperatures under extreme climatic conditions in exceptionally hot periods in a temperate region. This study aims at analysing the effects of forest management on the microclimatic regulation of forest stands during the two extremely hot and dry summers in 2018 and 2019 (see, e.g. Buras et al., 2020; Kornhuber et al., 2019; Vogel et al., 2019) by comparing forests in northern Germany across a gradient of different structural characteristics resulting from silvicultural treatments such as thinning and wood harvest. We conducted on-site microclimatic measurements in stands dominated by Pinus sylvestris and Fagus sylvatica with a high temporal and spatial resolution in order to quantify the temperature regulation of forest stands in relation to stand structural characteristics. We hypothesized that forest management activities, such as tree harvesting, would affect microclimate regulation negatively by causing higher within-stand temperatures.

PART-2: CRITICAL COMMENTARY

THE RESEARCH QUESTION IN THIS PAPER AND THE ESSENTIAL FINDING OF THIS WORK IS THAT AT A TIME OF GLOBAL WARMING FOREST MANAGEMENT MUST CONSIDER THE IMPACT OF FOREST MICROCLIMATE ON FOREST HEALTH. SPECIFICALLY WHAT THE RESEARCHERS FOUND IS THAT FOREST HEALTH CAN BE ENHANCED IF THE MICROCLIMATE OF THE FOREST IS CONTROLLED AND THE TEMPERATURE KEPT LOW WITH PROPER FOREST MANAGEMENT TO ENSURE THAT THE COOLING EFFECT OF THICK CANOPIES IS NOT COMPROMISED WITH EXCESSIVE THINNING OF FORESTS.

THIS RESEARCH IS A CLIMATE CHANGE ADAPTATION STUDY ON THE MATTER OF HOW TO ENHANCE FOREST HEALTH IN CENTRAL EUROPE DURING A TIME OF GLOBAL WARMING. IT IS NOT A CLIMATE ACTION PROPOSAL. IT IS A CLIMATE ADAPTATION PROPOSAL. THIS PAPER DOES NOT SAY THAT PROPER FOREST MANAGEMENT WILL SLOW DOWN GLOBAL WARMING. IT SAYS THAT PROPER FOREST MANAGEMENT WILL ENHANCE FOREST HEALTH DURING A TIME OF GLOBAL WARMING.

AN ADDITIONAL ISSUE IN THE INTERPRETATION OF THIS STUDY AS A CLIMATE ACTION PROPOSAL IS THE ISSUE OF INTERNAL CLIMATE VARIABILITY DESCRIBED IN A RELATED POST ON THIS SITE (LINK BELOW). THE INTERNAL CLIMATE VARIABILITY ISSUE IMPLIES THAT THE TEMPERATURE OF FORESTS IN CENTRAL EUROPE CAN ONLY BE UNDERSTOOD AS INTERNAL CLIMATE VARIABILITY AND NOT IN TERMS OF GLOBAL WARMING. THE THEORY OF ANTHROPOGENIC GLOBAL WARMING REFERS TO A LONG TERM RISING TREND IN GLOBAL MEAN SURFACE TEMERATURE.

LINK: https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/07/16/the-internal-variability-issue/

WE PROPOSE ON THIS BASIS THAT THE WIDESPREAD INTERPRETATION OF THIS WORK AS CLIMATE ACTION WITH FOREST MANAGEMENT IS NOT SUPPORTED BY THE CONTENT OF THE CITED RESEARECH PAPER PRESENTED ABOVE.

BELOW WE PROVIDE A TYPICAL CITATION OF THIS WORK WITH THE CLAIM THAT THE PAPER PROPOSES FOREST MANAGEMENT IN CENTRAL EUROPE AS CLIMATE ACTION ALTERNATIVE TO CUTTING FOSSIL FUEL EMISSIONS.

Browse: Home / 2021 / July / 30 / Forest Degradation A Major Climatic Warming Driver, Study Finds. CO2-Induced Tree Growth Cools?

Forest Degradation A Major Climatic Warming Driver, Study Finds. CO2-Induced Tree Growth Cools?

By P Gosselin on 30. July 2021Share this…

A new study published in the journal Ecological Solutions and Evidence shows that forestry management has a significant influence on the cooling capacity of forests.

Our cooling forests. Photo: Copyright P. Gosselin

Also the study’s findings suggest that the added growth tree growth 

The study shows why burning trees in “sustainable” biomass plants using wood chips imported from around the world and deforestation to make way for wind parks are really bad ideas. Deforestation leads to warming.

And then imagine the effect trees have in sprawling megalopolises. One could easily argue that poor urban planning has been one of the main drivers of warming over the past 100 years. See cities with the most trees here, and here.

Forest ecosystems influence climate on global and local scales, the scientists say in the new study. One important feature of forests is the regulation of ecosystem microclimate.

The original press release for the study is here.

Canopy degradation leads to warming

Shading by trees, evaporation of water, storage of heat in biomass, and energy conversion through photosynthesis cause forests to cool themselves and their surroundings during hot weather. This can prevent damaging maximum temperatures, especially during prolonged heat waves, say scientists from Eberswalde (EUSD) in the study.

The scientist responsible for the study, Jeanette Blumröder, of the University for Sustainable Development, EUSD, states, “Increased logging and a correspondingly greater opening of the canopy drive up the maximum temperatures in the forest.”

0.5°C warmer with 10% less trees

An extensive series of measurements in beech forests and pine forests in northern Germany from the heat summers of 2018 and 2019 confirm that whenever the canopy is opened by 10%, the “average maximum temperatures increase by about half a degree Celsius”.

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THE WIDESPREAD ACCEPTANCE OF THIS FLAWED INTERPRETATION BY THE SKEPTIC COMMUNITY IS DISTURBING AS IT MAKES US LOOK NO DIFFERENT FROM THE “CONSENSUS SCIENCE” CABAL OF CLIMATE SCIENCE.

IN RELATED POSTS ON THIS SITE WE SHOW THAT THE POPULARLY HELD THEORY THAT PLANTING TREES IS A FORM OF CLIMATE ACTION HAS NO BASIS

RELATED POST#1: https://tambonthongchai.com/2021/05/20/the-power-of-trees/

RELATED POST#2: https://tambonthongchai.com/2021/05/04/planting-trees-for-the-climate-2/

QED

THE HUMAN OBSESSION WITH THINGS LIKE GLOBAL WARMING AND THE POPULATION BOMB INCLUDES OUR FEAR THAT OUR ECONOMIC GOOD TIMES AND THE SUCCESS OF CAPITALISM CAN’T JUST GO ON FOREVER AND THAT THERE HAS TO BE A CATCH SOMEWHERE THAT WILL BRING IT ALL CRASHING DOWN. THE BOOK ON “LIMITS TO GROWTH” PUBLISHED IN THE 1970S BY THE CLUB OF ROME WAS JUST SUCH AN EXPRESSION SAYING THAT THE RAW MATERIALS THAT SUSTAIN THE GOOD TIMES CAN’T LAST FOREVER AND THEY JUST HAVE TO RUN OUT AND BRING THE GOOD TIMES CRASHING DOWN.

ALTHOUGH THE LIMITS TO GROWTH BOOK IS WELL KNOWN, LESS WELL KNOWN IS THE PARTICIPATION OF THE MASSACHUSETS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY (MIT) IN THIS CLUB OF ROME ENTERPRISE. MIT SCIENTISTS AND ECONOMISTS HAD CARRIED OUT RESEARCH ON ECONOMIC GROWTH WITH THE HYPOTHESIS THAT IT IS THE NATURE OF ECONOMIC GROWTH THAT IT CAN’T CONTINUE FOR EVER. THIS KIND OF UNEASINESS WITH THE GOOD LIFE IS PART OF THE THE HUMAN OBSESSION WITH THE COLLAPSE OF CIVILIZATION. THE MIT SCIENTISTS AND ECONOMISTS CARRIED OUT RESEARCH ON THE ISSUE OF “CONTINUED ECONOMIC GROWTH” ASSUMED TO BE AN IMPOSSIBILITY AND FOUND THAT OUR CIVILIZATION WAS ALREADY ON THE ROAD TO COLLAPSE DRIVEN THERE BY CONTINUED ECONOMIC GROWTH. THESE RESEARCHERS MADE A CLEAR DISTINCTION BETWEEN ECONOMIC GROWTH WHICH IS A GOOD THING, AND CONTINUED ECONOMIC GROWTH WHICH IS A HARBINGER OF ECONOMIC COLLAPSE. THEIR FINDINGS WERE PUBLISHED IN “LIMITS TO GROWTH”.

OBLIVIOUS TO THE COMPLETE FAILURE OF THE CLUB OF ROME FORECASTS, THIS STATE OF MIND THAT CREATES A FEAR OF CONTINUED ECONOMIC GROWTH HAS FOUND A NEW BOOST IN THE CLIMATE CHANGE ERA WHERE THE PHRASE “CONTINUED ECONOMIC GROWTH” IS PHRASED IN TERMS OF THE SUPPOSED EVILS OF CAPITALISM THAT CREATES THE CONDITIONS FOR THINGS LIKE CLIMATE CHANGE. THE CLIMATE CHANGE MOVEMENT HAS ADOPTED THIS SLOGAN AND THE PHRASE “PERPETUAL ECONOMIC GROWTH” POPULARIZED BY GEORGE MONBIOT AND FAIRY TALES OF ETERNAL ECONOMIC GROWTH POPULARIZED BY GRETA THUNBERG, AS AN EVIL THAT CAN’T BE ALLOWED TO CONTINUE FOR THE SAKE OF THE CLIMATE AND THE PLANET.

WE ARE TOLD THAT THE UNDERLYING EVIL AND SIN OF MANKIND THAT HAS BROUGHT US THE CLIMATE CATASTROPHE IS THE 1972 FEAR EXPRESSED IN “LIMITS TO GROWTH” BY THE CLUB OF ROME AND MIT THAT UNCHECKED, PERPETUAL ECONOMIC GROWTH WILL DESTROY CIVILIZATION IF NOT THE PLANET.

Evidence of a Flash-flood During the LITTLE ICE AGE in Asturias, NW Spain, and its Social Consequences Jesús Fernández ORCID Icon,Gabriel Moshenska ORCID Icon &Eneko Iriarte ORCID Icon Pages 38-48 | Received 17 May 2017, Accepted 14 Nov 2017, Published online: 28 Nov 2017:
ABSTRACT: This paper presents the results of a multidisciplinary study of the impact of climate change during the Little Ice Age on a medieval village in Asturias, Spain. The research focused on tracing evidence for a flash flood that buried the village beneath a thick layer of debris, including examining the remains of structures and agricultural land sealed beneath the debris, and considering the social and economic implications of the event in the subsequent history of the area. First, a series of test pits was excavated within the area of the modern village to map the full extent of the damage. Following this, analysis of the stratigraphy, architectural remains, datable artefacts and radiocarbon dating contributed further details, while historical evidence revealed the privatisation of the agricultural land following the catastrophe. The findings offer a snapshot of climate change and its social contexts in a specific, under-studied area with possible implications for the study of risk behaviour and disaster response in currently inhabited areas.

Flash flood events in Transylvania during the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age: Abstract: We present here the first record of past flooding activity from the Carpathian Mountains, Eastern Europe, based on documentary evidence and sedimentary records along one of the main rivers draining this region (Someșul Mic River). Three periods of increased flood activity have occurred in Transylvania during the last millennium: the first at the beginning of the 10th century (the end of the Dark Ages Cold Period and beginning of the Medieval Warm Period (MWP)); the second at the end of the 16th and beginning of 17th century, during the cold Little Ice Age (LIA) and the third at the end of the 19th century. During the early MWP, generally wet summers resulted in a high incidence of floods and/or high discharges, while the cluster of floods at the end of 16th and beginning of the 17th centuries occurred mostly at flash floods generated during heavy summer thunderstorms. Increasing winter temperatures and spring precipitations probably caused the high incidence of floods at the end of the 19th century. The predominantly wet conditions during the MWP are likely to have resulted from northward penetration of Mediterranean cyclones during a (mostly) positive phase of the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO), while wet conditions during the LIA arose as a combination of increases in local storminess and moisture transport from the North Atlantic along more southerly positioned westerlies associated with a negative phase of the NAO.

Evidence for extreme flash floods in arid subtropical northwest Australia during the Little Ice Age

ABSTRACT: Here we report a ∼2000-year sediment sequence from the Fortescue Marsh (Martuyitha) in the eastern Pilbara region, which we have used to investigate changing hydroclimatic conditions in the arid subtropics of northwest Australia. The Pilbara is located at the intersection of the tropical Indian and Pacific Oceans and its modern rainfall regime is strongly influenced by tropical cyclones, the Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) and the Indo-Pacific Warm Pool. We identified four distinct periods within the record. The most recent period (P1: CE ∼1990–present) reveals hydroclimatic conditions over recent decades that are the most persistently wet of potentially the last ∼2000 years. During the previous centuries (P2: ∼CE 1600–1990), the Fortescue Marsh was overall drier but likely punctuated by a number of extreme floods, which are defined here as extraordinary, strongly episodic floods in drylands generated by rainfall events of high volume and intensity. The occurrence of extreme floods during this period, which encompasses the Little Ice Age (LIA; CE 1400–1850), is coherent with other southern tropical datasets along the ITCZ over the last 2000 years, suggesting synchronous hydroclimatic changes across the region. This extreme flood period was preceded by several hundred years (P3: ∼CE 700–1600) of less vigorous but more regular flows. The earliest period of the sediment record (P4: ∼CE 100–700) was the most arid, with sedimentary and preservation processes driven by prolonged drought. Our results highlight the importance of developing paleoclimate records from the tropical and sub-tropical arid zone, providing a long-term baseline of hydrological conditions in areas with limited historical observations.

1. FRACTAL STRUCTURE OF CAPITAL MARKETS: https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/08/05/wbm2001-fractal-structure-of-capital-markets/
2. AGENCY THEORY OF SECURITIES REGULATION: https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/05/24/wbm1989-economic-growth/
3. JAMES TOBIN LIQUIDITY PREFRENCE THEORY: https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/05/24/wbm1991-james-tobin-liquidity-preference/
4. CONFUSING RESULTS OF EMPIRICAL RESEARCH IN FINANCE: https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/05/24/wbm2001-confusing-results-of-empirical-studies-in-finance/
5. MONTE CARLO SIMULATION IN FINANCIAL ANALYSIS: https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/05/24/wbm1994-monte-carlo-simulation-in-financial-analysis/
6. INVESTMENT RISK AND RETURN: https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/05/24/wbm1998-investment-risk-return/
7. BANK MANAGEMENT: https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/05/24/wbm1998-bank-management/
8. DATABASE NORMALIZATION: https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/05/24/wbm1993-database-normalization/
9. SQLDS ON IBM MAINFRAMES: https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/05/24/wbm1988-sqlds-in-mvs-cms-cobol/
10. WINERY DATABASE DESIGN: https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/05/24/wbm1999-winery-database-design/
11. ENTERPRISE REFORM IN CHINA 1981-2001: https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/06/04/wbm2001enterprise-reform-in-china/
12. THE PRIVATE SECTOR IN CHINA IN 2001: https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/05/30/wbm2001-the-private-sector-in-china/
13. THE 2008 FINANCIAL CRISIS: https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/02/21/brianwesbury/

THE OLD WBT PAGE FROM 1990-2000: http://chaamjamal.blogspot.com/2019/12/a-version-of-old-wbt-page-preserved-by.html

EXCERPT#1: THE PARASITIC WASP

Nature’s Hackers: The larva that hatches from the egg that the parasitic wasp attached to her body a week ago reprograms the spider to weave a hammock where the larva may cocoon and pupate. The larva can tell when the hammock is ready and it is only then that it administers a lethal injection and eats its hammock weaver, nutrition being her only remaining utility. (william eberhard, university of costa rica, nov 2000, link)

EXCERPT#2: IT’S ALL IN THE MIND

It’s all in the mind: If you are right handed and your left-handed penmanship is gibberish it will also be gibberish if you close your eyes and simply imagine yourself writing with your left hand. Practice in your head until you get it right with your left, then write. Voila! You can. But why? Misty Hyman, the gold medalist in the 100-meter breaststroke at Sidney, practiced for the event by lying in bed with a stop watch and swimming the race in her mind stroke for stroke until she got her time down to where she wanted it. The next day she repeated her performance in water – exactly. (October 2000).

EXCERPT#3: SLEEP ON IT

When you sleep, the electrical activity of your brain does not decrease, it increases. according to robert stickgold, we don’t sleep to rest but to figure out stuff that our conscious awake-mind could not. to work smarter, take more naps. 

EXCERPT#4: DOGGIE SCIENCE

In Rohnert Park, California, around 3:30pm on wed 9/22/99 A german shepherd ran full speed from the yard into the glass panel of the sliding door – something he had never done before. When allowed in, he hid under the bed. About 2 minutes later, the earth shook, buildings shuddered and groaned, and their surprised and terrified occupants ran out to safety. Scientific earthquake prediction of the humans has been a complete failure. Doggie science is better than human science in that respect..

EXCERPT#5: Dictyostelium Discoideumthese

Dictyostelium Discoideumthese normally single celled creatures can gather together and form a multicelled creature when the going gets tough. and the new creature is a creature in every way complete with cell specialization, a reproductive system, and even self-awareness. apply this concept to yourself; and to bee hives, schools of fish, flocks of birds, mobs, society, and the stock market. and what do you make of those textbook theories that it took millions of years for single celled organisms to evolve into multicelled organisms? (uc san diego, 1999)

MORE HERE: http://chaamjamal.blogspot.com/2019/12/a-version-of-old-wbt-page-preserved-by.html

LUCKY FOR US, THERE ARE CONCERNED SCIENTISTS WHO HAVE DEDICATED THEIR CAREERS TO SAVING THE PLANET

A MESSAGE FROM THE UNION OF CONCERNED SCIENTISTS.

Working outside in the blazing sun when temperatures are in the 90s, 100s, and 110s isn’t just uncomfortable—it can be deadly. With global warming still largely unchecked, record high temperatures and heat waves are only going to get worse and more common. With them, we’re sure to see an increase in heat related illness and deaths, especially if policymakers fail to protect those most vulnerable to extreme heat, including farmworkers who grow and harvest the food we eat. Fight for policies that address the impacts of climate change we’re already facing. Renew your support to keep our research and advocacy campaigns going strong. While we have to keep fighting to cut carbon emissions and protect our future, we can’t ignore the very real, very harmful effects of climate change we’re already living with. And let’s be clear: while climate change affects us all, near-term impacts like extreme heat waves are disproportionately hurting people of color and people with low incomes, while a small group of mostly white men profit off our reliance on fossil fuels. That injustice is unacceptable. That’s why UCS, with the help of members like you, is working to pass the Asunción Valdivia Heat Illness and Fatality Prevention Act, named for Asunción Valdivia. Mr. Valdivia died of heat stroke after picking grapes for ten hours straight in 105-degree heat. If this bill becomes law, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) will have to establish an enforceable standard to protect workers in high-heat environments and train workers on risk factors of heat illness and how to prevent and treat them. This legislation, coupled with policies to reduce heat-trapping emissions, will fill a wide gap in workplace safety that has existed for far too long and affected the health and lives of far too many workers. What happened to Asunción Valdivia shouldn’t happen to anyone, but sadly there are many stories like his. Renew your support now to power science-backed campaigns to protect people from the deadly impacts of climate change that are already here. We’re seeing the consequences of climate change more and more each year. At UCS, we don’t just let the science speak for itself—our scientists conduct the research, our media team makes sure journalists cover it, our advocates leverage it in policy fights, and YOU help power it all with your gifts.

It can be harrowing to work on climate change. There’s rarely good news to balance out all the bad. But focusing on this existential threat is one of the most powerful, meaningful things you can do as a thinking, caring person.

SO YOU DON’T FORGET, SEND IN YOUR DONATION BEFORE MIDNIGHT TONIGHT SO WE CAN SAVE THE PLANET FROM CLIMATE CHANGE AND SAVE YOUR ASS FROM KILLER HEAT.

THE ESSENTIAL ARGUMENT THAT GOVERNMENTS CAN CREATE JOBS BY FIGHTING CLIMATE CHANGE OVERLOOKS THE FACT THT FIGHTING CLIMATE CHANGE IS NOT AN ECONOMIC ENTERPRISE THAT CREATES WEALTH BUT AN EXPENSE AND THAT GOVERNMENTS DON’T CREATE ECONOMIC WEALTH BUT TAX THE ECONOMIC AGENTS OF THE ECONOMY. THEREFORE, ALTHOUGH IT MAY BE ARGUED THAT FIGHTING CLIMATE CHANGE WILL EVENTUALLY CREATE A BETTER WORLD AND BETTER ECONOMIC CONDITIONS DOWN THE LINE, AS IN “THERE ARE NO JOBS ON A DEAD PLANET”, IT IS NOT POSSIBLE FOR GOVERNMENT TO CREATE JOBS AND ECONOMIC WEALTH IN THE PROCESS OF TAKING CLIMATE ACTION MEASURES. DETAILS BELOW IN TWO ARTICLES BY THE FRASER INSTITUTE AND THE CATO INSTITUTE.

THE MYTH OF GOVERNMENT JOB CREATION. Brennan Sorge, THE FRASER INSTITUTE.

When the government promises to “stimulate” the economy in order to create jobs through government
spending, can it deliver? It cannot, simply due to the reality of the way government funds must be raised, which includes taxes on privately employed citizens and private enterprises that pay for all government spending, including government jobs or employees. The taxes paid by public employees do not raise government revenue per se, but rather reduce government costs, including the government employee’s wage. This is because the government is taxing the very wages that it is paying. In other words, the government uses funds that are not raised through the private production and sale of goods or services. Governments don’t create an asset which is to be sold in order to raise revenue, and are, primarily tasked with supplying necessary services that cannot be provided and financed privately. This includes, for example, a functional military to maintain national security. In some cases the government is better placed to provide certain services than the private sector. But in the framework of “government job creation”, government suffers from both bureaucratic displacement (when unnecessary bureaucracy grows over time, and decreases the efficiency of the affected institution), and the fact that it is moving resources from where the market has determined them to be most efficient, to where the government has decided they would be better used. Government suffers most from bureaucratic displacement as government programs are not held to the same income constraints as private organizations. Government programs can afford to be inefficient as they are publicly funded and face no competition. Because government raises revenue by taking money out of the private economy, it necessarily imposes a tax cost on the very people that will also generate future government revenue. By turning a potential private sector employee into a public one, the government has imposed a cost on itself (the wage it pays), while simultaneously eliminating the potential additional income of a private taxpayer. Government job creation imposes costs on the economy and these costs often take the form of lost jobs in the private sector. If, in creating government jobs, private jobs are lost, then “government job creation” is really just a transfer of jobs from the private to the public sector. Here is the sticking point: by turning a potential private employee into a public one, the government has imposed a cost on itself while at the same time weakening the tax base which is the government’s only source of funds. The government is not an economic enterprise and it does not create economic wealth from which to create jobs. All it can do is to create the right kind of economic policy to create the environment where the private sector can create economic wealth and the jobs that are thus created. The government is tax funded by the income of the citizens and is not a creater of economic wealth or of jobs.

The Myth of Government Job Creation. THE CATO INSTITUTE, 1984 By Thomas J. DiLorenzo

A perennial and admittedly partial “answer” to the poverty problem offered by the Washington establishment is government jobs programs. Such programs are a principal objective of many proponents of an interventionist industrial policy who fear that an alleged decline in the manufacturing sector of the economy will deprive citizens of many well‐​paying jobs, leaving only “dead‐​end” employment opportunities.[2] Expanding the government payroll, so it is said, is a way of avoiding this “problem.” Other advocates of government jobs programs claim that they can not only alleviate the problem of poverty, but also provide such additional benefits as improved environmental and energy conservation, the rebuilding of the nation’s “infrastructure” (i.e. roads and bridges), a stronger national defense, and so on, if only “targeted” correctly by the federal bureaucracy.[3] And the U.S. House of Representatives, just a few days before adjourning in October 1984, voted to appropriate funds to revitalize one of the first government jobs programs, the depression‐​era Civilian Conservation Corps. Throughout 1985 the topic of government jobs programs will be widely and thoroughly discussed in the nation’s high schools, as the issue of poverty has been chosen to be the focus of the 1984–85 annual high school debate competition. One of the main resolutions to be debated is “whether the federal government should provide employment for all employable United States citizens living in poverty.” If the students and others involved in the debates take advantage of the exceptional opportunity thereby provided to learn some basic economic principles, they will discover that it is inherently impossible for government to create jobs; only economic growth in the private sector of the economy can create employment opportunities. Government taxing and spending programs only redistribute existing jobs: taxation reduces the economic vitality of the private economy, destroying jobs there, even though jobs may be “created” elsewhere by government spending on jobs programs. Moreover, the question of whether government should “provide employment for all employable United States citizens living in poverty” revolves around another question, whether it is legitimate for government to benefit one group of citizens at the expense of another. If one believes that government owes its citizens justice and equality of treatment, then it is clear that government has no role in trying to “create jobs” through government jobs programs. But jobs programs are politically appealing. When people are put to work through such programs the jobs are highly visible: workers know their temporary jobs have been doled out by certain politicians for whom they will therefore be more likely to vote. By contrast, the private sector jobs destroyed through taxation (to finance the jobs programs) are much less visible: the unemployed are not likely to realize that it is the higher level of taxation that has placed them on the unemployment rolls. Thus, referring to government jobs programs as a means of “creating jobs” is misleading at best, and dishonest and deceitful at worst. This is not to minimize the problem of poverty, but to suggest that government jobs programs are not the solution and in fact very often make things even worse. The present paper will discuss the economic logic of why governments cannot create jobs and will offer evidence to support this analysis. Special attention will be paid to arguments that are likely to be encountered in the high school debates and to appropriate responses.

WHAT THE LYING BASTARDS IN THE MEDIA SAY

HEADLINE: JAPAN FACES HEAT OVER BANGLADESH COAL POWER

IN THIS REPORT, THE MEDIA STORY IS THAT JAPAN HAS VIOLATED ITS DECLARED CLIMATE ACTION PLAN BY PROVIDING THE FUNDING FOR THE MATARBARI COAL FIRED POWER PLANT IN BANGLADESH.

HERE IS JAPAN’S CLIMATE ACTION DECLARATION THAT THE MEDIA SAYS WAS VIOLATED BY THE FUNDING PROVIDED TO BANGLADESH FOR THE MATARBARI COAL FIRED POWER PLANT.

PRIME MINISTER YOSHIHIDE SUGA SAID JAPAN WILL STRIVE TO CUT ITS EMISSIONS BY 46% FROM ITS 2013 LEVELS BY THE YEAR 2030.

THERE IS NOTHING IN THE PLEDGE THAT REFERS TO JAPAN’S LONG TIME COMMITMENT TO PROVIDING DEVELOPMENT ASSISTANCE TO ITS ASIAN NEIGHBORS TO THE SOUTH. BANGLADESH IS A POOR DEVELOPING COUNTRY PREVIOUSLY AND REPEATEDLY USED AS A PITIFUL VICTIM OF CLIMATE CHANGE BY THE WEST USING ALLIGATOR TEARS FOR THE POOR THIRD WORLD STATUS OF BANGLADESH TO SELL ITS CLIMATE CHANGE AGENDA AND AT THE SAME TIME, WHAT WE SEE HERE IS THAT THE SAME PEOPLE ARE NOW COMPLAINING THAT JAPAN IS PROVIDING DEVELOPMENT ASSISTANCE TO THIS PITIFUL AND POOR THIRD WORLD COUNTRY WITH THE LIE THAT IT VIOLATES THE ANNOUNCED YOSHIDA PLAN TO CUT JAPAN’S FOSSIL FUEL EMISSIONS 46% FROM 2013 LEVELS BY 2030.

IT SHOULD BE MENTIONED THAT THERE WAS NO CLEAN ENERGY ALTERNATIVE FUNDING OFFER FROM THE WEST. THE ONLY ALTERNATIVE FOR BANGLADESH WAS TO FUND THE MATARBARI WITH ASSISTANCE FROM CHINA THAT NORMALLY INVOLVES CHINESE MANAGEMENT OF THE PROJECT.

RELATED POST ON CLIMATE CHANGE RACISM: LINK: https://tambonthongchai.com/2021/07/12/postbag/

HOW FAR THE RACIST TERMITES HAVE SPREAD AND HOW LONG AND WELL THEY HAVE DINED.

QUESTION:

WHY ARE SO MANY PEOPLE NOT AWARE OF HOW VULNERABLE HUMANS ARE TO EXTINCTION IF THEY CONTINUE TO IGNORE OR NOT UNDERSTAND CLIMATE CHANGE FACTS AND DATA?

ANSWER:

GOOD POINT. ONE MUST NOT IGNORE OR FAIL TO UNDERSTAND CLIMATE CHANGE FACTS AND DATA. HERE ARE SOME OF THE FACTS AND DATA THAT CANNOT BE IGNORED AND MUST NOT BE IGNORED.

THIS POST IS A PRESENTATION OF HOLOCENE CLIMATE CHANGE EVENTS AS A CONTEXT FOR THE STUDY OF THE CURRENT WARMING CYCLE.

LINKS TO RELATED POSTS

POST#1 ON DATA SELECTION BIAS: https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/10/09/a-data-selection-bias/

POST#2 ON DATA SELECTION BIAS: https://tambonthongchai.com/2021/06/15/data-selection-bias/

POST ON HOLOCENE TEMPERATURE DYNAMICS: https://tambonthongchai.com/2019/06/11/chaoticholocene/

In the Quaternary Ice Age in which we live, the earth is mostly {80% to 90% of the time} in a Glaciation state exhibiting glacial growth in the earlier portion and glacial retreat in the latter portion but with both processes exhibiting chaotic behavior such that glaciation is not a steady cooling period and deglaciation is not a steady warming period. Instead, both temperature trends of the glaciation cycle contain chaotic cycles of warming and cooling at centennial and millennial time scales with the difference being that there is a slight edge for cooling during glaciation and a slight edge for warming in deglaciation.

In between glaciation periods are brief deglaciated warm periods we call Interglacials. We are currently in the Holocene Interglacial. The previous Interglacial was the Eemian. In the Eemian interglacial we see that the chaotic back and forth cyclical and chaotic progress of the glaciation phase is also seen in the interglacial phase. Thus, in the Eemian interglacial we find a similarly violent state of cyclical climate oscillation between cold and hot periods. Thus the cyclical and violent changes of warming and and cooling seen in glaciation periods are also found in Interglacials. These  changes within Interglacials also occur at centennial and millennial time scales.

Similar cycles of cooling and warming are also found in the Holocene from its violent inception in the Younger Dryas event to the present. The Younger Dryas Event (YDE) shows that as soon as the Last Glacial Period had apparently ended, a series of brief but violent cycles of glaciation and deglaciation at centennial and millennial time scales intervened. The cooling period drove temperatures in Greenland down by 15C over a period of 300 years. Following that, a strong warming trend at a centennial time scale caused a warming of 17C and it seemed that the Holocene Interglacial warmth had finally arrived but the Holocene temperature chaos was not over yet.

About 9,000 years ago a strong cooling trend set in and persisted for 800 years. It is called the 8.2K cooling event because it ended 8,200 years ago. The Holocene interglacial recovered from the 8.2K cooling event and warmed to what is called “Holocene Climate Optimum” (HCO) or the “Mid Holocene Warming” (MHW) about 7000Y ago. The significance of this warming for us humans is that it is credited with the Neolithic Revolution that is thought to have created human civilization. It brought hunter gatherer humans out of the forests and caves and into a settled agricultural economy with farms and permanent homes, human society, and nation states, human innovations, and technology. 

Four other Holocene temperature events since the HCO are considered important in the climate history of the Holocene interglacial. These are the Bronze Age warm period ≈3000YBP, (also called the Minoan Warm Period (BAWP), the Roman warm period (RWP)≈2000YBP, the Medieval warm period (MWP) ≈1100YBP, and the Little Ice Age (LIA) ≈500YBP-100YBP.

The current warm period that followed the LIA is described as Anthropogenic {human caused} Global Warming (AGW) because it coincides with the Industrial Revolution when humans began to burn fossil fuels and therefore not a natural recovery from the LIA. This interpretation may derive from the other unique feature of the current warming cycle. The current temperature cycle of the Holocene is the first temperature excursion of the Holocene where we find a unique new feature of the surface of the earth called “climate scientists” armed with a world view called “environmentalism”.

In this world view, everything bad is assumed to be a human impact that can and must be undone by identifying the human activity that COULD be causing the bad thing and then for humans to cease and desist from that anti nature activity. The key to understanding the logic of such environmentalism is the PRECAUTIONARY PRINCIPLE which says in essence that we can’t prove we are right but you can’t take the chance that we are right. The precautionary principle is described in a related post: LINK: https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/12/27/superstitious-humans/

This new world view of a human controlled planet, called the Anthropocene, implies that the warming cycles of the Holocene prior to the Anthropocene were natural but any temperature excursion in the Anthropocene must have been human caused and that therefore it is human controlled by definition and that therefore it can and must be moderated by humans to save the planet in the Anthropocene.

Yet, those who profess to understand interglacial temperature cycles as cause and effect phenomena should explain all of them in that way. That they picked just one of them to explain implies a BIAS in their methodology. That kind of science suffers from a fatal methodological error in the form of DATA SELECTION BIAS and CONFIRMATION BIAS.

THE ENDING 50,000 YEARS OF THE LAST GLACIATION CYCLE

RELATED POSTS ON THE ANTHROPOCENE

LINK#1: https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/12/07/the-holocene-is-the-anthropocene/

LINK#2: https://tambonthongchai.com/2018/07/13/the-anthropocene-fallacy/

HOLOCENE TEMPERATURE CYCLES: A BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Denton, George H., and Wibjörn Karlén. “Holocene climatic variations—their pattern and possible cause.” Quaternary Research 3.2 (1973): 155-205. In the northeastern St. Elias Mountains in southern Yukon Territory and Alaska, C14-dated fluctuations of 14 glacier termini show two major intervals of Holocene glacier expansion, the older dating from 3300-2400 calendar yr BP and the younger corresponding to the Little Ice Age of the last several centuries. Both were about equivalent in magnitude. In addition, a less-extensive and short-lived advance occurred about 1250-1050 calendar yr BP (A.D. 700–900). Conversely, glacier recession, commonly accompanied by rise in altitude of spruce tree line, occurred 5975–6175, 4030-3300, 2400-1250, and 1050-460 calendar yr BP, and from A.D. 1920 to the present. Examination of worldwide Holocene glacier fluctuations reinforces this scheme and points to a third major interval of glacier advances about 5800-4900 calendar yrs BP; this interval generally was less intense than the two younger major intervals. Finally, detailed mapping and dating of Holocene moraines fronting 40 glaciers in the Kebnekaise and Sarek Mountains in Swedish Lapland reveals again that the Holocene was punctuated by repeated intervals of glacier expansion that correspond to those found in the St. Elias Mountains and elsewhere. The two youngest intervals, which occurred during the Little Ice Age and again about 2300–3000 calendar yrs BP, were approximately equal in intensity. Advances of the two older intervals, which occurred approximately 5000 and 8000 calendar yr BP, were generally less extensive. Minor glacier fluctuations were superimposed on all four broad expansion intervals; glacial expansions of the Little Ice Age culminated about A.D. 1500–1640, 1710, 1780, 1850, 1890, and 1916. In the mountains of Swedish Lapland, Holocene mean summer temperature rarely, if ever, was lower than 1°C below the 1931–1960 summer mean. Summer temperatures varied by less than 3.5°C over the last two broad intervals of Holocene glacial expansion and contraction. Viewed as a whole, therefore, the Holocene experienced alternating intervals of glacier expansion and contraction that probably were superimposed on the broad climatic trends recognized in pollen profiles and deep-sea cores. Expansion intervals lasted up to 900 yr and contraction intervals up to 1750 yr. Dates of glacial maxima indicate that the major Holocene intervals of expansion peaked at about 200–330, 2800, and 5300 calendar yr BP, suggesting a recurrence of major glacier activity about each 2500 yr. If projected further into the past, this Holocene pattern predicts that alternating glacier expansion-contraction intervals should have been superimposed on the Late-Wisconsin glaciation, with glacier readvances peaking about 7800, 10,300, 12,800, and 15,300 calendar yr BP. These major readvances should have been separated by intervals of general recession, some of which might have been punctuated by short-lived advances. Furthermore, the time scales of Holocene events and their Late-Wisconsin analogues should be comparable. Considering possible errors in C14 dating, this extended Holocene scheme agrees reasonably well with the chronology and magnitude of such Late-Wisconsin events as the Cochrane-Cockburn readvance (8000–8200 C14 yr BP), the Pre-Boreal interstadial, the Fennoscandian readvances during the Younger Dryas stadial (10,850-10,050 varve yr BP), the Alleröd interstadial (11,800-10,900 C14 yr BP), the Port Huron readvance (12,700–13,000 C14 yr BP), the Cary/Port Huron interstadial (centered about 13,300 C14 yr BP), and the Cary stadial (14,000–15,000 C14 yr BP). Moreover, comparison of presumed analogues such as the Little Ice Age and the Younger Dryas, or the Alleröd and the Roman Empire-Middle Ages warm interval, show marked similarities. These results suggest that a recurring pattern of minor climatic variations, with a dominant overprint of cold intervals peaking about each 2500 yr, was superimposed on long-term Holocene and Late-Wisconsin climatic trends. Should this pattern continue to repeat itself, the Little Ice Age will be succeeded within the next few centuries by a long interval of milder climates similar to those of the Roman Empire and Middle Ages. Short-term atmospheric C14 variations measured from tree rings correlate closely with Holocene glacier and tree-line fluctuations during the last 7000 yr. Such a correspondence, firstly, suggests that the record of short-term C14 variations may be an empirical indicator of paleoclimates and, secondly, points to a possible cause of Holocene climatic variations. The most prominent explanation of short-term C14 variations involves modulation of the galactic cosmic-ray flux by varying solar corpuscular activity. If this explanation proves valid and if the solar constant can be shown to vary with corpuscular output, it would suggest that Holocene glacier and climatic fluctuations, because of their close correlation with short-term C14 variations, were caused by varying solar activity. By extension, this would imply a similar cause for Late-Wisconsin climatic fluctuations such as the Alleröd and Younger Dryas.
2. Hammer, Claus U., Henrik B. Clausen, and Willi Dansgaard. “Greenland ice sheet evidence of post-glacial volcanism and its climatic impact.” Nature 288.5788 (1980): 230. Acidity profiles along well dated Greenland ice cores reveal large volcanic eruptions in the Northern Hemisphere during the past 10,000 yr. Comparison with a temperature index shows that clustered eruptions have a considerable cooling effect on climate, which further complicates climatic predictions.
3. O’Brien, S. R., (Mayewski). “Complexity of Holocene climate as reconstructed from a Greenland ice core.” Science 270.5244 (1995): 1962-1964.  Glaciochemical time series developed from Summit, Greenland, indicate that the chemical composition of the atmosphere was dynamic during the Holocene epoch. Concentrations of sea salt and terrestrial dusts increased in Summit snow during the periods 0 to 600, 2400 to 3100, 5000 to 6100, 7800 to 8800, and more than 11,300 years ago. The most recent increase, and also the most abrupt, coincides with the Little Ice Age. These changes imply that either the north polar vortex expanded or the meridional air flow intensified during these periods, and that temperatures in the mid to high northern latitudes were potentially the coldest since the Younger Dryas event.
4. Angelakis, Andreas N., and Stylianos V. Spyridakis. “The status of water resources in Minoan times: A preliminary study.” Diachronic Climatic Impacts on Water Resources. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg, 1996. 161-191.A well-known passage in Homer’s Odyssey, probably based on an ancient ritual myth, tells the story of Demeter, the Greek corn-goddess and Iasion, the son of Zeus by Electra, daughter of Atlas. The latter was the guardian of the pillars of heaven (Odyssey, 1.53), the Titan who holds the sky up (Hesiod, Theogony, 517) and is, thereby, identified with water and rainfall. [FULL TEXT DOWNLOAD .
5. Alley, Richard B., (Mayewski)  “Holocene climatic instability: A prominent, widespread event 8200 yr ago.” Geology 25.6 (1997): 483-486.  The most prominent Holocene climatic event in Greenland ice-core proxies, with approximately half the amplitude of the Younger Dryas, occurred ∼8000 to 8400 yr ago. This Holocene event affected regions well beyond the North Atlantic basin, as shown by synchronous increases in windblown chemical indicators together with a significant decrease in methane. Widespread proxy records from the tropics to the north polar regions show a short-lived cool, dry, or windy event of similar age. The spatial pattern of terrestrial and marine changes is similar to that of the Younger Dryas event, suggesting a role for North Atlantic thermohaline circulation. Possible forcings identified thus far for this Holocene event are small, consistent with recent model results indicating high sensitivity and strong linkages in the climatic system.
6. Bond, Gerard, et al. “A pervasive millennial-scale cycle in North Atlantic Holocene and glacial climates.” science278.5341 (1997): 1257-1266.  Evidence from North Atlantic deep sea cores reveals that abrupt shifts punctuated what is conventionally thought to have been a relatively stable Holocene climate. During each of these episodes, cool, ice-bearing waters from north of Iceland were advected as far south as the latitude of Britain. At about the same times, the atmospheric circulation above Greenland changed abruptly. Pacings of the Holocene events and of abrupt climate shifts during the last glaciation are statistically the same; together, they make up a series of climate shifts with a cyclicity close to 1470 ± 500 years. The Holocene events, therefore, appear to be the most recent manifestation of a pervasive millennial-scale climate cycle operating independently of the glacial-interglacial climate state. Amplification of the cycle during the last glaciation may have been linked to the North Atlantic’s thermohaline circulation.
7. Roberts, Neil, et al. “The age and causes of Mid-Late Holocene environmental change in southwest Turkey.” Third Millennium BC climate change and old world collapse. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg, 1997. 409-429.  Proxy records such as lake sediment sequences provide important data on abrupt environmental changes in the past, but establishing their specific causes from the palaeoenvironmental record can be problematic. Pollen diagrams from southwest Turkey show a mid-late Holocene pollen assemblage zone, designated as the Beyşehir Occupation phase, the onset of which has been 14C dated to ca. 3000 BP (ca. 1250 BC). A second millennium BC date for the start of the Beyşehir Occupation phase can now be confirmed as a result of the discovery of volcanic tephra from the Minoan eruption of Santorini (Thera) in lake sediment cores from the region. Palaeoecological analyses on sediment cores from Gölhisar gölü, a shallow montane lake, indicate that tephra deposition was followed by a sustained response in the aquatic ecosystem, in the form of increased algal productivity. The onset of pollen changes marking the beginning of the Beyşehir Occupation phase was not, on the other hand, precisely coincident with the tephra layer, but rather occurred at least a century later at this site. Despite the paucity of archaeological evidence for Late Bronze Age settlement in the Oro-Mediterranean region of southwest Turkey, it would appear that the second millennium BC saw the start of a period of major human impact on the landscape which continued until the late first millennium AD. The Santorini ash represents an important time-synchronous, stratigraphic marker horizon, but does not appear to have been the immediate cause of the onset of the Beyş ehir Occupation phase.
8. Bond, Gerard, et al. “Persistent solar influence on North Atlantic climate during the Holocene.” science 294.5549 (2001): 2130-2136.  Surface winds and surface ocean hydrography in the subpolar North Atlantic appear to have been influenced by variations in solar output through the entire Holocene. The evidence comes from a close correlation between inferred changes in production rates of the cosmogenic nuclides carbon-14 and beryllium-10 and centennial to millennial time scale changes in proxies of drift ice measured in deep-sea sediment cores. A solar forcing mechanism therefore may underlie at least the Holocene segment of the North Atlantic’s “1500-year” cycle. The surface hydrographic changes may have affected production of North Atlantic Deep Water, potentially providing an additional mechanism for amplifying the solar signals and transmitting them globally.
9. Stenni, Barbara, et al. “Eight centuries of volcanic signal and climate change at Talos Dome (East Antarctica).” Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres 107.D9 (2002): ACL-3.  During the 1996 Programma Nazionale di Ricerche in Antartide‐International Trans‐Antarctic Scientific Expedition traverse, two firn cores were retrieved from the Talos Dome area (East Antarctica) at elevations of 2316 m (TD, 89 m long) and 2246 m (ST556, 19 m long). Cores were dated by using seasonal variations in non‐sea‐salt (nss) SO42− concentrations coupled with the recognition of tritium marker level (1965–1966) and nss SO42− spikes due to the most important volcanic events in the past (Pinatubo 1991, Agung 1963, Krakatoa 1883, Tambora 1815, Kuwae 1452, Unknown 1259). The number of annual layers recognized in the TD and ST556 cores was 779 and 97, respectively. The δD record obtained from the TD core has been compared with other East Antarctic isotope ice core records (Dome C EPICA, South Pole, Taylor Dome). These records suggest cooler climate conditions between the middle of 16th and the beginning of 19th centuries, which might be related to the Little Ice Age (LIA) cold period. Because of the high degree of geographical variability, the strongest LIA cooling was not temporally synchronous over East Antarctica, and the analyzed records do not provide a coherent picture for East Antarctica. The accumulation rate record presented for the TD core shows a decrease during part of the LIA followed by an increment of about 11% in accumulation during the 20th century. At the ST556 site, the accumulation rate observed during the 20th century was quite stable.
10. Mayewski, Paul A. (aka Ice Man). “Holocene climate variability.” Quaternary research 62.3 (2004): 243-255. Although the dramatic climate disruptions of the last glacial period have received considerable attention, relatively little has been directed toward climate variability in the Holocene (11,500 cal yr B.P. to the present). Examination of 50 globally distributed paleoclimate records reveals as many as six periods of significant rapid climate change during the time periods 9000″8000, 6000″5000, 4200″3800, 3500″2500, 1200″1000, and 600″150 cal yr B.P. Most of the climate change events in these globally distributed records are characterized by polar cooling, tropical aridity, and major atmospheric circulation changes, although in the most recent interval (600″150 cal yr B.P.), polar cooling was accompanied by increased moisture in some parts of the tropics. Several intervals coincide with major disruptions of civilization, illustrating the human significance of Holocene climate variability.
11. Magny, Michel. “Holocene climate variability as reflected by mid-European lake-level fluctuations and its probable impact on prehistoric human settlements.” Quaternary international113.1 (2004): 65-79.  A data set of 180 radiocarbon, tree-ring and archaeological dates obtained from sediment sequences of 26 lakes in the Jura mountains, the northern French Pre-Alps and the Swiss Plateau was used to construct a Holocene mid-European lake-level record. The dates do not indicate a random distribution over the Holocene, but form clusters suggesting an alternation of lower and higher, climatically driven lake-level phases. They provide evidence of a rather unstable Holocene climate punctuated by 15 phases of higher lake-level: 11 250–11 050, 10 300–10 000, 9550–9150, 8300–8050, 7550–7250, 6350–5900, 5650–5200, 4850–4800, 4150–3950, 3500–3100, 2750–2350, 1800–1700, 1300–1100, 750–650 cal. BP and after 1394 AD. A comparison of this mid-European lake-level record with the GISP2-Polar Circulation Index (PCI) record, the North Atlantic ice-rafting debris (IRD) events and the ¹⁴C record suggests teleconnections in a complex cryosphere-ocean-atmosphere system. Correlations between the GISP2-PCI, the mid-European lake-level, the North Atlantic IRD, and the residual ¹⁴C records, suggest that changes in the solar activity played a major role in Holocene climate oscillations over the North Atlantic area.
12. Alley, Richard B., and Anna Maria Ágústsdóttir. “The 8k event: cause and consequences of a major Holocene abrupt climate change.” Quaternary Science Reviews 24.10-11 (2005): 1123-1149.  A prominent, abrupt climate event about 8200 years ago brought generally cold and dry conditions to broad northern-hemisphere regions especially in wintertime, in response to a very large outburst flood that freshened the North Atlantic. Changes were much larger than typical climate variability before and after the event, with anomalies up to many degrees contributing to major displacement of vegetative patterns. This “8k” event provides a clear case of cause and effect in the paleoclimatic realm, and so offers an excellent opportunity for model testing. The response to North Atlantic freshening has the same general anomaly pattern as observed for older events associated with abrupt climate changes following North Atlantic freshening, and so greatly strengthens the case that those older events also reflect North Atlantic changes. The North Atlantic involvement in the 8k event helps in estimating limits on climate anomalies that might result in the future if warming-caused ice-melt and hydrologic-cycle intensification at high latitudes lead to major changes in North Atlantic circulation. Few model experiments have directly addressed the 8k event, and most studies of proxy records across this event lack the time resolution to fully characterize the anomalies, so much work remains to be done.
13. Chew, Sing C. “From Harappa to Mesopotamia and Egypt to Mycenae: Dark Ages, Political-Economic Declines, and Environmental/Climatic Changes 2200 BC–700 BC.” The Historical Evolution of World-Systems. Palgrave Macmillan, New York, 2005. 52-74.  Considerations of hegemonic decline as a world historical process most often attempt to account for decline and collapse of complex institutions in terms of social, political, and economic processes (Gills and Frank 1992). As we increasingly question whether there are physical–environmental limits that would affect the reproduction of world-systems, political, economic, and social dimensions might not be sufficient to account for hegemonic declines. Consideration of environmental and climatological factors needs to be combined with socioeconomic relations in our understanding of hegemonic declines and shifts. This approach assumes that the humans seek to transform nature in an expansive manner, and ceaselessly amass surpluses. There are certain long periods in world history that exhibit large economic and social crises and hegemonic decline. Such long periods of economic and social distress are here termed dark ages.
14. Gorokhovich, Yuri. “Abandonment of Minoan palaces on Crete in relation to the earthquake induced changes in groundwater supply.” Journal of Archaeological Science 32.2 (2005): 217-222. Mysterious abandonment of palaces on Crete during the Late Minoan period was always a challenging problem for archeologists and geologists. Various hypotheses explained this event by effects of tsunamis, earthquakes or climatic changes that were caused by the volcanic eruption of the Santorini volcano. While each of them or their possible combination contributed to the abandonment of palaces and following Late Minoan crisis, there is another possible cause that appeared as a result of studies within the last 20–30 years. This cause is depletion of groundwater supply caused by persistent earthquake activity that took place during the Bronze Age. This explanation is supported by field observations and numerous studies of similar phenomena in other locations.
15. Wanner, Heinz, et al. “Mid-to Late Holocene climate change: an overview.” Quaternary Science Reviews 27.19-20 (2008): 1791-1828.  The last 6000 years are of particular interest to the understanding of the Earth System because the boundary conditions of the climate system did not change dramatically (in comparison to larger glacial–interglacial changes), and because abundant, detailed regional palaeoclimatic proxy records cover this period. We use selected proxy-based reconstructions of different climate variables, together with state-of-the-art time series of natural forcings (orbital variations, solar activity variations, large tropical volcanic eruptions, land cover and greenhouse gases), underpinned by results from General Circulation Models (GCMs) and Earth System Models of Intermediate Complexity (EMICs), to establish a comprehensive explanatory framework for climate changes from the Mid-Holocene (MH) to pre-industrial time. The redistribution of solar energy, due to orbital forcing on a millennial timescale, was the cause of a progressive southward shift of the Northern Hemisphere (NH) summer position of the Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ). This was accompanied by a pronounced weakening of the monsoon systems in Africa and Asia and increasing dryness and desertification on both continents. The associated summertime cooling of the NH, combined with changing temperature gradients in the world oceans, likely led to an increasing amplitude of the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and, possibly, increasingly negative North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) indices up to the beginning of the last millennium. On decadal to multi-century timescales, a worldwide coincidence between solar irradiance minima, tropical volcanic eruptions and decadal to multi-century scale cooling events was not found. However, reconstructions show that widespread decadal to multi-century scale cooling events, accompanied by advances of mountain glaciers, occurred in the NH (e.g., in Scandinavia and the European Alps). This occurred namely during the Little Ice Age (LIA) between AD ∼1350 and 1850, when the lower summer insolation in the NH, due to orbital forcing, coincided with solar activity minima and several strong tropical volcanic eruptions. The role of orbital forcing in the NH cooling, the southward ITCZ shift and the desertification of the Sahara are supported by numerous model simulations. Other simulations have suggested that the fingerprint of solar activity variations should be strongest in the tropics, but there is also evidence that changes in the ocean heat transport took place during the LIA at high northern latitudes, with possible additional implications for climates of the Southern Hemisphere (SH).
16. ? Scafetta, Nicola. “Empirical evidence for a celestial origin of the climate oscillations and its implications.” Journal of Atmospheric and Solar-Terrestrial Physics 72.13 (2010): 951-970.  We investigate whether or not the decadal and multi-decadal climate oscillations have an astronomical origin. Several global surface temperature records since 1850 and records deduced from the orbits of the planets present very similar power spectra. Eleven frequencies with period between 5 and 100 years closely correspond in the two records. Among them, large climate oscillations with peak-to-trough amplitude of about 0.1 and 0.25°C, and periods of about 20 and 60 years, respectively, are synchronized to the orbital periods of Jupiter and Saturn. Schwabe and Hale solar cycles are also visible in the temperature records. A 9.1-year cycle is synchronized to the Moon’s orbital cycles. A phenomenological model based on these astronomical cycles can be used to well reconstruct the temperature oscillations since 1850 and to make partial forecasts for the 21st century. It is found that at least 60% of the global warming observed since 1970 has been induced by the combined effect of the above natural climate oscillations. The partial forecast indicates that climate may stabilize or cool until 2030–2040. Possible physical mechanisms are qualitatively discussed with an emphasis on the phenomenon of collective synchronization of coupled oscillators.
17. Tsonis, A. A., et al. “Climate change and the demise of Minoan civilization.” Climate of the Past 6.4 (2010): 525-530.  Climate change has been implicated in the success and downfall of several ancient civilizations. Here we present a synthesis of historical, climatic, and geological evidence that supports the hypothesis that climate change may have been responsible for the slow demise of Minoan civilization. Using proxy ENSO and precipitation reconstruction data in the period 1650–1980 we present empirical and quantitative evidence that El Nino causes drier conditions in the area of Crete. This result is supported by modern data analysis as well as by model simulations. Though not very strong, the ENSO-Mediterranean drying signal appears to be robust, and its overall effect was accentuated by a series of unusually strong and long-lasting El Nino events during the time of the Minoan decline. Indeed, a change in the dynamics of the El Nino/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) system occurred around 3000 BC, which culminated in a series of strong and frequent El Nino events starting at about 1450 BC and lasting for several centuries. This stressful climatic trend, associated with the gradual demise of the Minoans, is argued to be an important force acting in the downfall of this classic and long-lived civilization.  FULL TEXT DOWNLOAD
18. Wanner, Heinz, et al. “Structure and origin of Holocene cold events.” Quaternary Science Reviews 30.21-22 (2011): 3109-3123. The present interglacial, the Holocene, spans the period of the last 11,700 years. It has sustained the growth and development of modern society. The millennial-scale decreasing solar insolation in the Northern Hemisphere summer lead to Northern Hemisphere cooling, a southern shift of the Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) and a weakening of the Northern Hemisphere summer monsoon systems. On the multidecadal to multicentury-scale, periods of more stable and warmer climate were interrupted by several cold relapses, at least in the Northern Hemisphere extra-tropical area. Based on carefully selected 10,000-year-long time series of temperature and humidity/precipitation, as well as reconstructions of glacier advances, the spatiotemporal pattern of six cold relapses during the last 10,000 years was analysed and presented in form of a Holocene Climate Atlas (HOCLAT; see http://www.oeschger.unibe.ch/research/projects/holocene_atlas/). A clear cyclicity was not found, and the spatiotemporal variability of temperature and humidity/precipitation during the six specific cold events (8200, 6300, 4700, 2700, 1550 and 550 years BP) was very high. Different dynamical processes such as meltwater flux into the North Atlantic, low solar activity, explosive volcanic eruptions, and fluctuations of the thermohaline circulation likely played a major role. In addition, internal dynamics in the North Atlantic and Pacific area (including their complex interaction) were likely involved. AUTHOR’S NOTES: {Based on temperature, humidity and glacier data, we analyze Holocene cold events. During the Holocene a clear cyclicity between warm and cold periods was not found.  Single cold relapses are subject to different dynamical processes. The six analyzed cold events show different spatial structures.}
19. Humlum, Ole, Jan-Erik Solheim, and Kjell Stordahl. “Identifying natural contributions to late Holocene climate change.” Global and Planetary Change 79.1-2 (2011): 145-156.  Analytic climate models have provided the means to predict potential impacts on future climate by anthropogenic changes in atmospheric composition. However, future climate development will not only be influenced by anthropogenic changes, but also by natural variations. The knowledge on such natural variations and their detailed character, however, still remains incomplete. Here we present a new technique to identify the character of natural climate variations, and from this, to produce testable forecast of future climate. By means of Fourier and wavelet analyses climate series are decomposed into time–frequency space, to extract information on periodic signals embedded in the data series and their amplitude and variation over time. We chose to exemplify the potential of this technique by analysing two climate series, the Svalbard (78°N) surface air temperature series 1912–2010, and the last 4000 years of the reconstructed GISP2 surface temperature series from central Greenland. By this we are able to identify several cyclic climate variations which appear persistent on the time scales investigated. Finally, we demonstrate how such persistent natural variations can be used for hindcasting and forecasting climate. Our main focus is on identifying the character (timing, period, amplitude) of such recurrent natural climate variations, but we also comment on the likely physical explanations for some of the identified cyclic climate variations. The causes of millennial climate changes remain poorly understood, and this issue remains important for understanding causes for natural climate variability over decadal- and decennial time scales. We argue that Fourier and wavelet approaches like ours may contribute towards improved understanding of the role of such recurrent natural climate variations in the future climate development.
20. Drake, Brandon L. “The influence of climatic change on the Late Bronze Age Collapse and the Greek Dark Ages.” Journal of Archaeological Science 39.6 (2012): 1862-1870.  Between the 13th and 11th centuries BCE, most Greek Bronze Age Palatial centers were destroyed and/or abandoned. The following centuries were typified by low population levels. Data from oxygen-isotope speleothems, stable carbon isotopes, alkenone-derived seasurface temperatures, and changes in warm-species dinocysts and formanifera in the Mediterranean indicate that the Early Iron Age was more arid than the preceding Bronze Age. A sharp increase in Northern Hemisphere temperatures preceded the collapse of Palatial centers, a sharp decrease occurred during their abandonment. Mediterranean Seasurface temperatures cooled rapidly during the Late Bronze Age, limiting freshwater flux into the atmosphere and thus reducing precipitation over land. These climatic changes could have affected Palatial centers that were dependent upon high levels of agricultural productivity. Declines in agricultural production would have made higher-density populations in Palatial centers unsustainable. The ‘Greek Dark Ages’ that followed occurred during prolonged arid conditions that lasted until the Roman Warm Period.

CHAOS THEORY IN CLIMATE SCIENCE: A BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Zeng, Xubin, Roger A. Pielke, and R. Eykholt. “Chaos theory and its applications to the atmosphere.” Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 74.4 (1993): 631-644.  A brief overview of chaos theory is presented, including bifurcations, routes to turbulence, and methods for characterizing chaos. The paper divides chaos applications in atmospheric sciences into three categories: new ideas and insights inspired by chaos, analysis of observational data, and analysis of output from numerical models. Based on the review of chaos theory and the classification of chaos applications, suggestions for future work are given.
2. Marotzke, Jochem. “Abrupt climate change and thermohaline circulation: Mechanisms and predictability.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 97.4 (2000): 1347-1350.  The ocean’s thermohaline circulation has long been recognized as potentially unstable and has consequently been invoked as a potential cause of abrupt climate change on all timescales of decades and longer. However, fundamental aspects of thermohaline circulation changes remain poorly understood. [LINK TO FULL TEXT PDF]
3. Rial, Jose A., and C. A. Anaclerio. “Understanding nonlinear responses of the climate system to orbital forcing.” Quaternary Science Reviews 19.17-18 (2000): 1709-1722.  Frequency modulation (FM) of the orbital eccentricity forcing may be one important source of the nonlinearities observed in δ¹⁸O time series from deep-sea sediment cores (J.H. Rial (1999a) Pacemaking the lce Ages by frequency modulation of Earth’s orbital eccentricity. Science 285, 564–568). Here we present further evidence of frequency modulation found in data from the Vostok ice core. Analyses of the 430,000-year long, orbitally untuned, time series of CO₂, deuterium, aerosol and methane, suggest frequency modulation of the 41 kyr (0.0244 kyr⁻¹) obliquity forcing by the 413 kyr-eccentricity signal and its harmonics. Conventional and higher-order spectral analyses show that two distinct spectral peaks at ∼29 kyr (0.034 kyr⁻¹) and ∼69 kyr (0.014 kyr⁻¹) and other, smaller peaks surrounding the 41 kyr obliquity peak are harmonically (nonlinearly) related and likely to be FM-generated sidebands of the obliquity signal. All peaks can be closely matched by the spectrum of an appropriately built theoretical FM signal. A preliminary model, based on the classic logistic growth delay differential equation, reproduces the longer period FM effect and the familiar multiply peaked spectra of the eccentricity band. Since the FM effect appears to be a common feature in climate response, finding out its cause may help understand climate dynamics and global climate change.
4. Ashkenazy, Yosef, et al. “Nonlinearity and multifractality of climate change in the past 420,000 years.” Geophysical research letters 30.22 (2003).  Evidence of past climate variations are stored in polar ice caps and indicate glacial‐interglacial cycles of ∼100 kyr. Using advanced scaling techniques we study the long‐range correlation properties of temperature proxy records of four ice cores from Antarctica and Greenland. These series are long‐range correlated in the time scales of 1–100 kyr. We show that these time series are nonlinear for time scales of 1–100 kyr as expressed by temporal long‐range correlations of magnitudes of temperature increments and by a broad multifractal spectrum. Our results suggest that temperature increments appear in clusters of big and small increments—a big (positive or negative) climate change is most likely followed by a big (positive or negative) climate change and a small climate change is most likely followed by a small climate change.
5. Rial, Jose A. “Abrupt climate change: chaos and order at orbital and millennial scales.” Global and Planetary Change 41.2 (2004): 95-109.  Successful prediction of future global climate is critically dependent on understanding its complex history, some of which is displayed in paleoclimate time series extracted from deep-sea sediment and ice cores. These recordings exhibit frequent episodes of abrupt climate change believed to be the result of nonlinear response of the climate system to internal or external forcing, yet, neither the physical mechanisms nor the nature of the nonlinearities involved are well understood. At the orbital (10⁴–10⁵ years) and millennial scales, abrupt climate change appears as sudden, rapid warming events, each followed by periods of slow cooling. The sequence often forms a distinctive saw-tooth shaped time series, epitomized by the deep-sea records of the last million years and the Dansgaard–Oeschger (D/O) oscillations of the last glacial. Here I introduce a simplified mathematical model consisting of a novel arrangement of coupled nonlinear differential equations that appears to capture some important physics of climate change at Milankovitch and millennial scales, closely reproducing the saw-tooth shape of the deep-sea sediment and ice core time series, the relatively abrupt mid-Pleistocene climate switch, and the intriguing D/O oscillations. Named LODE for its use of the logistic-delayed differential equation, the model combines simplicity in the formulation (two equations, small number of adjustable parameters) and sufficient complexity in the dynamics (infinite-dimensional nonlinear delay differential equation) to accurately simulate details of climate change other simplified models cannot. Close agreement with available data suggests that the D/O oscillations are frequency modulated by the third harmonic of the precession forcing, and by the precession itself, but the entrained response is intermittent, mixed with intervals of noise, which corresponds well with the idea that the climate operates at the edge between chaos and order. LODE also predicts a persistent ∼1.5 ky oscillation that results from the frequency modulated regional climate oscillation.
6. Huybers, Peter, and Carl Wunsch. “Obliquity pacing of the late Pleistocene glacial terminations.” Nature 434.7032 (2005): 491.  The 100,000-year timescale in the glacial/interglacial cycles of the late Pleistocene epoch (the past ∼700,000 years) is commonly attributed to control by variations in the Earth’s orbit¹. This hypothesis has inspired models that depend on the Earth’s obliquity (∼ 40,000 yr; ∼40 kyr), orbital eccentricity (∼ 100 kyr) and precessional (∼ 20 kyr) fluctuations^2,3,4,5, with the emphasis usually on eccentricity and precessional forcing. According to a contrasting hypothesis, the glacial cycles arise primarily because of random internal climate variability^6,7,8. Taking these two perspectives together, there are currently more than thirty different models of the seven late-Pleistocene glacial cycles⁹. Here we present a statistical test of the orbital forcing hypothesis, focusing on the rapid deglaciation events known as terminations^10,11. According to our analysis, the null hypothesis that glacial terminations are independent of obliquity can be rejected at the 5% significance level, whereas the corresponding null hypotheses for eccentricity and precession cannot be rejected. The simplest inference consistent with the test results is that the ice sheets terminated every second or third obliquity cycle at times of high obliquity, similar to the original proposal by Milankovitch¹². We also present simple stochastic and deterministic models that describe the timing of the late-Pleistocene glacial terminations purely in terms of obliquity forcing.
7. Tziperman, Eli, Carl Wunsch. “Consequences of pacing the Pleistocene 100 kyr ice ages by nonlinear phase locking to Milankovitch forcing.” Paleoceanography 21.4 (2006).:    The consequences of the hypothesis that Milankovitch forcing affects the phase (e.g., termination times) of the 100 kyr glacial cycles via a mechanism known as “nonlinear phase locking” are examined. Phase locking provides a mechanism by which Milankovitch forcing can act as the “pacemaker” of the glacial cycles. Nonlinear phase locking can determine the timing of the major deglaciations, nearly independently of the specific mechanism or model that is responsible for these cycles as long as this mechanism is suitably nonlinear. A consequence of this is that the fit of a certain model output to the observed ice volume record cannot be used as an indication that the glacial mechanism in this model is necessarily correct. Phase locking to obliquity and possibly precession variations is distinct from mechanisms relying on a linear or nonlinear amplification of the eccentricity forcing. Nonlinear phase locking may determine the phase of the glacial cycles even in the presence of noise in the climate system and can be effective at setting glacial termination times even when the precession and obliquity bands account only for a small portion of the total power of an ice volume record. Nonlinear phase locking can also result in the observed “quantization” of the glacial period into multiples of the obliquity or precession periods.
8. Eisenman, Ian, Norbert Untersteiner, and J. S. Wettlaufer. “On the reliability of simulated Arctic sea ice in global climate models.” Geophysical Research Letters 34.10 (2007).  While most of the global climate models (GCMs) currently being evaluated for the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report simulate present‐day Arctic sea ice in reasonably good agreement with observations, the intermodel differences in simulated Arctic cloud cover are large and produce significant differences in downwelling longwave radiation. Using the standard thermodynamic models of sea ice, we find that the GCM‐generated spread in longwave radiation produces equilibrium ice thicknesses that range from 1 to more than 10 meters. However, equilibrium ice thickness is an extremely sensitive function of the ice albedo, allowing errors in simulated cloud cover to be compensated by tuning of the ice albedo. This analysis suggests that the results of current GCMs cannot be relied upon at face value for credible predictions of future Arctic sea ice.
9. Frank, Patrick, and John McCarthy. “A climate of belief.” Skeptic 14.1 (2008): 22-30. The claim that anthropogenic CO2 is responsible for the current warming of Earth climate is scientifically insupportable because climate models are unreliable by Patrick Frank “He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.” — John McCarthy “The latest scientific data confirm that the earth’s climate is rapidly changing. … The cause? A thickening layer of carbon dioxide pollution, mostly from power plants and automobiles, that traps heat in the atmosphere. … *A+verage U.S. temperatures could rise another 3 to 9 degrees by the end of the century … Sea levels will rise, *and h+eat waves will be more frequent and more intense. Droughts and wildfires will occur more often. Disease-carrying mosquitoes will expand their range. And species will be pushed to extinction.” So says the National Resources Defense Council,2 with agreement by the Sierra Club,3 Greenpeace,4 National Geographic,5 the US National Academy of Sciences,6 and the US Congressional House leadership.7 Concurrent views are widespread,8 as a visit to the internet or any good bookstore will verify. Since at least the 1995 Second Assessment Report, the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has been making increasingly assured statements that human-produced carbon dioxide (CO2) is influencing the climate, and is the chief cause of the global warming trend in evidence since about 1900. The current level of atmospheric CO2 is about 390 parts per million by volume (ppmv), or 0.039% by volume of the atmosphere, and in 1900 was about 295 ppmv. If the 20th century trend continues unabated, by about 2050 atmospheric CO2 will have doubled to about 600 ppmv. This is the basis for the usual “doubled CO2” scenario. Doubled CO2 is a bench-mark for climate scientists in evaluating greenhouse warming. Earth receives about 342 watts per square meter (W/m2 ) of incoming solar energy, and all of this energy eventually finds its way back out into space. However, CO2 and other greenhouse gasses, most notably water vapor, absorb some of the outgoing energy and warm the atmosphere. This is the greenhouse effect. Without it Earth’s average surface temperature would be a frigid -19°C (-2.2 F). With it, the surface warms to about +14°C (57 F) overall, making Earth habitable.9 With more CO2, more outgoing radiant energy is absorbed, changing the thermal dynamics of
   the atmosphere. All the extra greenhouse gasses that have entered the atmosphere since 1900, including CO2, equate to an extra 2.7 W/m2 of energy absorption by the atmosphere.10 This is the worrisome greenhouse effect. On February 2, 2007, the IPCC released the Working Group I (WGI) “Summary for Policymakers” (SPM) report on Earth climate,11 which is an executive summary of the science supporting the predictions quoted above. The full “Fourth Assessment Report” (4AR) came out in sections during 2007.  [LINK TO FULL TEXT PDF]
10. Huybers, Peter John. “Pleistocene glacial variability as a chaotic response to obliquity forcing.” (2009).  The mid-Pleistocene Transition from 40 ky to ~100 ky glacial cycles is generally characterized as a singular transition attributable to scouring of continental regolith or a long-term decrease in atmospheric CO2 concentrations. Here an alternative hypothesis is suggested, that Pleistocene glacial variability is chaotic and that transitions from 40 ky to ~100 ky modes of variability occur spontaneously. This alternate view is consistent with the presence of ~80 ky glacial cycles during the early Pleistocene and the lack of evidence for a change in climate forcing during the mid-Pleistocene. A simple model illustrates this chaotic scenario. When forced at a 40 ky period the model chaotically transitions between small 40 ky glacial cycles and larger 80 and 120 ky cycles which, on average, give the ~100 ky variability.
11. Dima, Mihai, and Gerrit Lohmann. “Conceptual model for millennial climate variability: a possible combined solar-thermohaline circulation origin for the~ 1,500-year cycle.” Climate Dynamics 32.2-3 (2009): 301-311.  Dansgaard-Oeschger and Heinrich events are the most pronounced climatic changes over the last 120,000 years. Although many of their properties were derived from climate reconstructions, the associated physical mechanisms are not yet fully understood. These events are paced by a ~1,500-year periodicity whose origin remains unclear. In a conceptual model approach, we show that this millennial variability can originate from rectification of an external (solar) forcing, and suggest that the thermohaline circulation, through a threshold response, could be the rectifier. We argue that internal threshold response of the thermohaline circulation (THC) to solar forcing is more likely to produce the observed DO cycles than amplification of weak direct ~1,500-year forcing of unknown origin, by THC. One consequence of our concept is that the millennial variability is viewed as a derived mode without physical processes on its characteristic time scale. Rather, the mode results from the linear representation in the Fourier space of nonlinearly transformed fundamental modes.
12. Dijkstra, Henk A. Nonlinear climate dynamics. Cambridge University Press, 2013.  

EARLY HOLOCENE SEA LEVEL RISE & 8.2K EVENT

1. Hori, Kazuaki, and Yoshiki Saito. “An early Holocene sea‐level jump and delta initiation.” Geophysical Research Letters 34.18 (2007).  Early Holocene sea‐level change controlled the evolution of classic coastal depositional systems. Radiocarbon‐dated borehole cores obtained from three incised‐valley‐fill systems in Asia (Changjiang, Song Hong, and Kiso River) record very similar depositional histories, especially between about 9000 and 8500 cal BP. Sedimentary facies changes from estuarine sand and mud to shelf or prodelta mud suggest that the marine influence in the incised valleys increased during this period. In addition, large decreases in sediment accumulation rates occurred. A sea‐level jump causes an estuarine system and its depocenter to move rapidly landward. It is possible that the final collapse of the Laurentide Ice Sheet, accompanied by catastrophic drainage of glacial lakes, at approximately 8500 cal BP caused such a jump. The jump was followed immediately by a period of decelerated sea‐level rise that promoted delta initiation.
2. Vink, Annemiek, et al. “Holocene relative sea-level change, isostatic subsidence and the radial viscosity structure of the mantle of northwest Europe (Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, southern North Sea).” Quaternary Science Reviews26.25-28 (2007): 3249-3275.  A comprehensive observational database of Holocene relative sea-level (RSL) index points from northwest Europe (Belgium, the Netherlands, northwest Germany, southern North Sea) has been compiled in order to compare and reassess the data collected from the different countries/regions and by different workers on a common time–depth scale. RSL rise varies in magnitude and form between these regions, revealing a complex pattern of differential crustal movement which cannot be solely attributed to tectonic activity. It clearly contains a non-linear, glacio- and/or hydro-isostatic subsidence component, which is only small on the Belgian coastal plain but increases significantly to a value of ca 7.5 m relative to Belgium since 8 cal. ka BP along the northwest German coast. The subsidence is at least in part related to the Post-Glacial collapse of the so-called peripheral forebulge which developed around the Fennoscandian centre of ice loading during the Last Glacial Maximum. The RSL data have been compared to geodynamic Earth models in order to infer the radial viscosity structure of the Earth’s mantle underneath NW Europe (lithosphere thickness, upper- and lower-mantle viscosity), and conversely to predict RSL in regions where we have only few observational data (e.g. in the southern North Sea). A very broad range of Earth parameters fit the Belgian RSL data, suggesting that glacial isostatic adjustment (GIA) only had a minor effect on Belgian crustal dynamics during and after the Last Ice Age. In contrast, a narrow range of Earth parameters define the southern North Sea region, reflecting the greater influence of GIA on these deeper/older samples. Modelled RSL data suggest that the zone of maximum forebulge subsidence runs in a relatively narrow, WNW–ESE trending band connecting the German federal state of Lower Saxony with the Dogger Bank area in the southern North Sea. Identification of the effects of local-scale factors such as past changes in tidal range or tectonic activity on the spatial and temporal variations of sea-level index points based on model-data comparisons is possible but is still complicated by the relatively large range of Earth model parameters fitting each RSL curve, emphasizing the need for more high-quality observational data.
3. Kendall, Roblyn A., et al. “The sea-level fingerprint of the 8.2 ka climate event.” Geology 36.5 (2008): 423-426.  The 8.2 ka cooling event was an abrupt, widespread climate instability. There is general consensus that the episode was likely initiated by a catastrophic outflow of proglacial Lakes Agassiz and Ojibway through the Hudson Strait, with subsequent disruption of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation. However, the total discharge and flux during the 8.2 ka event remain uncertain. We compute the sea-level signature, or “fingerprint,” associated with the drainage of Lakes Agassiz and Ojibway, as well as the expected sea-level signal over the same time period due to glacial isostatic adjustment (GIA) in response to the Late Pleistocene deglaciation. Our analysis demonstrates that sites relatively close to the lakes, including the West and Gulf Coasts of the United States, have small signals due to the lake release and potentially large GIA signals, and thus they may not be optimal field sites for constraining the outflow volume. Other sites, such as the east coast of South America and western Africa, have significantly larger signals associated with the lake release and are thus better choices in this regard.
4. Hijma, Marc P., and Kim M. Cohen. “Timing and magnitude of the sea-level jump preluding the 8200 yr event.” Geology 38.3 (2010): 275-278.  Evidence from terrestrial, glacial, and global climate model reconstructions suggests that a sea-level jump caused by meltwater release was associated with the triggering of the 8.2 ka cooling event. However, there has been no direct measurement of this jump using precise sea-level data. In addition, the chronology of the meltwater pulse is based on marine data with limited dating accuracy. The most plausible mechanism for triggering the cooling event is the sudden, possibly multistaged drainage of the Laurentide proglacial Lakes Agassiz and Ojibway through the Hudson Strait into the North Atlantic ca. 8470 ± 300 yr ago. Here we show with detailed sea-level data from Rotterdam, Netherlands, that the sea-level rise commenced 8450 ± 44 yr ago. Our timing considerably narrows the existing age of this drainage event and provides support for the hypothesis of a double-staged lake drainage. The jump in sea level reached a local magnitude of 2.11 ± 0.89 m within 200 yr, in addition to the ongoing background relative sea-level rise (1.95 ± 0.74 m). This magnitude, observed at considerable distance from the release site, points to a global-averaged eustatic sea-level jump that is double the size of previous estimates (3.0 ± 1.2 m versus 0.4–1.4 m). The discrepancy suggests either a coeval Antarctic contribution or, more likely, a previous underestimate of the total American lake drainage.
5. Bard, Edouard, Bruno Hamelin, and Doriane Delanghe-Sabatier. “Deglacial meltwater pulse 1B and Younger Dryas sea levels revisited with boreholes at Tahiti.” Science327.5970 (2010): 1235-1237.  Reconstructing sea-level changes during the last deglaciation provides a way of understanding the ice dynamics that can perturb large continental ice sheets. The resolution of the few sea-level records covering the critical time interval between 14,000 and 9,000 YBP calendar years before the present is still insufficient to draw conclusions about sea-level changes associated with the Younger Dryas cold event and the meltwater pulse 1B (MWP-1B). We used the uranium-thorium method to date shallow-living corals from three new cores drilled onshore in the Tahiti barrier reef. No significant discontinuity can be detected in the sea-level rise during the MWP-1B period. The new Tahiti sea-level record shows that the sea-level rise slowed down during the Younger Dryas before accelerating again during the Holocene.
6. Smith, D. E., et al. “The early Holocene sea level rise.” Quaternary Science Reviews 30.15-16 (2011): 1846-1860.  The causes, anatomy and consequences of the early Holocene sea level rise (EHSLR) are reviewed. The rise, of ca 60m, took place over most of the Earth as the volume of the oceans increased during deglaciation and is dated at 11,650–7000 cal. BP. The EHSLR was largely driven by meltwater release from decaying ice masses and the break up of coastal ice streams. The patterns of ice sheet decay and the evidence for meltwater pulses are reviewed, and it is argued that the EHSLR was a factor in the ca 8470 BP flood from Lake Agassiz-Ojibway. Patterns of relative sea level changes are examined and it is argued that in addition to regional variations, temporal changes are indicated. The impact of the EHSLR on climate is reviewed and it is maintained that the event was a factor in the 8200 BP cooling event, as well as in changes in ocean current patterns and their resultant effects. The EHSLR may also have enhanced volcanic activity, but no clear evidence of a causal link with submarine sliding on continental slopes and shelves can yet be demonstrated. The rise probably influenced rates and patterns of human migrations and cultural changes. It is concluded that the EHSLR was a major event of global significance, knowledge of which is relevant to an understanding of the impacts of global climate change in the future. Highlights:  1. Reviews the early Holocene sea level rise of 11650–7000 cal. BP. 2. Argues that the rise was involved in the discharge of Lake Agassiz-Ojibway and the 8200-year cooling event. 3. Shows that he rise influenced climate by increasing sea areas, in turn affecting human migration. 4. Suggests that the rise increased volcanic activity, but that its effects on submarine sliding are uncertain. 5. Argues that study of the rise helps throw light on the effects of future sea level changes in a global warming world.
7. Hijma, Marc P., and Kim M. Cohen. “Holocene transgression of the Rhine river mouth area, The Netherlands/Southern North Sea: palaeogeography and sequence stratigraphy.” Sedimentology 58.6 (2011): 1453-1485.  This study presents a detailed reconstruction of the palaeogeography of the Rhine valley (western Netherlands) during the Holocene transgression with systems tracts placed in a precise sea‐level context. This approach permits comparison of actual versus conceptual boundaries of the lowstand, transgressive and highstand systems tracts. The inland position of the highstand Rhine river mouth on a wide, low‐gradient continental shelf meant that base‐level changes were the dominant control on sedimentation for a relatively short period of the last glacial cycle. Systems in such inland positions predominantly record changes in the balance between river discharge and sediment load, and preserve excellent records of climatic changes or other catchment‐induced forcing. It is shown here that the transgressive systems tract‐part of the coastal prism formed in three stages: (i) the millennium before 8·45 ka bp, when the area was dominated by fluvial environments with extensive wetlands; (ii) the millennium after 8·45 ka, characterized by strong erosion, increasing tidal amplitudes and bay‐head delta development; and (iii) the period between 7·5 and 6·3 ka bp when the Rhine avulsed multiple times and the maximum flooding surface formed. The diachroneity of the transgressive surface is strongly suppressed because of a pulse of accelerated sea‐level rise at 8·45 ka bp. That event not only had a strong effect on preservation, but has circum‐oceanic stratigraphical relevance as it divides the early and middle Holocene parts of coastal successions worldwide. The palaeogeographical reconstruction offers a unique full spatial–temporal view on the coastal and fluvial dynamics of a major river mouth under brief rapid forced transgression. This reconstruction is of relevance for Holocene and ancient transgressive systems worldwide, and for next‐century natural coasts that are predicted to experience a 1 m sea‐level rise.
8. Hijma, Marc P., et al. “Pleistocene Rhine–Thames landscapes: geological background for hominin occupation of the southern North Sea region.” Journal of Quaternary Science 27.1 (2012): 17-39.  This paper links research questions in Quaternary geology with those in Palaeolithic archaeology. A detailed geological reconstruction of The Netherlands’ south‐west offshore area provides a stratigraphical context for archaeological and palaeontological finds. Progressive environmental developments have left a strong imprint on the area’s Palaeolithic record. We highlight aspects of landscape evolution and related taphonomical changes, visualized in maps for critical periods of the Pleistocene in the wider southern North Sea region. The Middle Pleistocene record is divided into two palaeogeographical stages: the pre‐Anglian/Elsterian stage, during which a wide land bridge existed between England and Belgium even during marine highstands; and the Anglian/Elsterian to Saalian interglacial, with a narrower land bridge, lowered by proglacial erosion but not yet fully eroded. The Late Pleistocene landscape was very different, with the land bridge fully dissected by an axial Rhine–Thames valley, eroded deep enough to fully connect the English Channel and the North Sea during periods of highstand. This tripartite staging implies great differences in (i) possible migration routes of herds of herbivores as well as hominins preying upon them, (ii) the erosion base of axial and tributary rivers causing an increase in the availability of flint raw materials and (iii) conditions for loess accumulation in northern France and Belgium and the resulting preservation of Middle Palaeolithic sites.
9. Törnqvist, Torbjörn E., and Marc P. Hijma. “Links between early Holocene ice-sheet decay, sea-level rise and abrupt climate change.” Nature Geoscience 5.9 (2012): 601.  The beginning of the current interglacial period, the Holocene epoch, was a critical part of the transition from glacial to interglacial climate conditions. This period, between about 12,000 and 7,000 years ago, was marked by the continued retreat of the ice sheets that had expanded through polar and temperate regions during the preceding glacial. This meltdown led to a dramatic rise in sea level, punctuated by short-lived jumps associated with catastrophic ice-sheet collapses. Tracking down which ice sheet produced specific sea-level jumps has been challenging, but two events between 8,500 and 8,200 years ago have been linked to the final drainage of glacial Lake Agassiz in north-central North America. The release of the water from this ice-dammed lake into the ocean is recorded by sea-level jumps in the Mississippi and Rhine-Meuse deltas of approximately 0.4 and 2.1 metres, respectively. These sea-level jumps can be related to an abrupt cooling in the Northern Hemisphere known as the 8.2 kyr event, and it has been suggested that the freshwater release from Lake Agassiz into the North Atlantic was sufficient to perturb the North Atlantic meridional overturning circulation. As sea-level rise on the order of decimetres to metres can now be detected with confidence and linked to climate records, it is becoming apparent that abrupt climate change during the early Holocene associated with perturbations in North Atlantic circulation required sustained freshwater release into the ocean.
10. Sturt, Fraser, Duncan Garrow, and Sarah Bradley. “New models of North West European Holocene palaeogeography and inundation.” Journal of Archaeological Science 40.11 (2013): 3963-3976. Highlights: New Palaeogeographic models of North West Europe from 11,000 BP to present day at 500 year intervals. Calculated rates for Holocene inundation across North West Europe. High rates of change do not necessarily mean catastrophic impacts. Understanding rates of change and their social implications requires a multi-scalar, multidisciplinary approach to the past.Abstract: This paper presents new 500 year interval palaeogeographic models for Britain, Ireland and the North West French coast from 11000 cal. BP to present. These models are used to calculate the varying rates of inundation for different geographical zones over the study period. This allows for consideration of the differential impact that Holocene sea-level rise had across space and time, and on past societies. In turn, consideration of the limitations of the models helps to foreground profitable areas for future research.

THIS POST IS A BRIEF HISTORY OF FLOODS AND STORMS THAT HAD SIGNIFICANT FATALITIES

(1): THE WORST FLOODS OF HISTORY BY DEATH TOLL FROM MOST TO LEAST

1. THE YELLOW RIVER FLOOD OF 1931 (CHINA)
2. THE YELLOW RIVER FLOOD OF 1887 (CHINA)
3. THE YELLOW RIVER FLOOD OF 1938 (CHINA)
4. THE YELLOW RIVER FLOOD OF 1642 (CHINA)
5. THE RU RIVER FLOOD OF 1975 (CHINA)
6. THE YANGTSE RIVER FLOOD OF 1932 (CHINA)
7. HOLLAND AND ENGLAND IN 1099
8. HOLLAND IN 1287
9. THE NAVA RIVER IN RUSSIA 1824
10. HOLLAND IN 1421
11. NORTHWESTERN EUROPE 1953
12. TEHRAN, IRAN 1954
13. SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA 1969
14. BANGLADESH 1970
15. HANOI, VIETNAM 1971
16. EASTERN SEABOARD OF THE USA 1972
17. YANGTSE RIVER CHINA 1975
18. LOVELAND COLORADO 1976
19. BANGLADESH HEAVIEST MONSOON IN 70 YEARS 1988
20. MISSISSIPPI RIVER FLOOD OF 1993
21. USA WEST COAST 1997
22. YANGTSE RIVER 1998 WORST FLOOD SINCE 1954
23. SOUTHEAST ASIA FLOOD OF 1999

(2): THE WORST TROPICAL CYCLONES

1. BENGAL 1970
2. BENGAL 1737
3. VIETNAM 1881
4. BENGAL 1876
5. BOMB AY 1882
6. BURMA 2008
7. BENGAL 1864
8. BENGAL 1965
9. BENGAL 1942
10. BENGAL 1967
11. CARIBBEAN 1780

HURRICANES OF THE NORTH ATLANTIC CYCLONE BASIN: STRONGEST TO LEAST STRONG

NOTE: ???? = FORGOT ITS NAME OR IT DID NOT HAVE A NAME

1. THE GREAT LABOR DAY HURRICANE OF 1935
2. HURRICANE KATRINA 2005
3. HURRICANE CAMILLE 1969
4. HURRICANE ANDREW 1992
5. HURRICANE ???? 1886
6. HURRICANE ???? 1919
7. HURRICANE ???? 1928
8. HURRICANE DONNA 1960
9. HURRICANE ???? 1915
10. HURRICANE CARLA 1961

RELATED POST ON TROPICAL CYCLONE HISTORY: https://tambonthongchai.com/2019/04/04/1737/