Loading...
Loading...

One of the things I fear most about collapse is that there's so much we don't understand, and that inevitably means there will be consequences we can't predict. Today I go through a couple of recent findings that weren't necessarily expected by the scientific community, and therefore not accounted for in climate models.
Antarctic warming is altering atmospheric stability: New evidence from the 1950s to the present
Please join us on Patreon for weekly bonus content and to join our Discord community.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Hey, Corey here.
We've had an influx of new listeners, and so I just want to make sure that if you are
new to the podcast, you don't just jump in and start listening to these daily episodes
which we've been doing.
Please go back and listen to the first at least eight episodes.
So you have an idea of what collapses, what it is that Corey is talking about.
Also if you've been with us for a while and you're enjoying the content, please join
us on Patreon.
We would love to see you there.
There's a link, as always, in the description.
Every day on this podcast, we talk about a new piece of research or news or event or
whatever it might be that's come out regarding collapse.
And it's interesting to note that there are so many areas to pay attention to and to watch.
So many things that are constantly changing on a daily or weekly basis that I never run
out of material.
I've never once sat down to record an episode and just been like, you know what, there's
nothing to talk about today.
And I'm sure that will be the way for the foreseeable future.
One thing that's interesting about that to me is that the things that we typically
talk about when we're looking at research, they are things that are expected to happen.
And therefore we are doing the research about them.
They are elements and parts of climate models, for example, expectations that we have that
may be changing or increasing faster and the research is giving us more information on
those items.
But one piece that is frightening to me is that there are going to be elements of climate
change and other aspects of collapse that we aren't expecting.
There will likely be many reactions to a failing, you know, ecosystem biodiversity, things
that really can't be accounted for in the models.
And today I want to highlight a couple of articles that talk about surprising results or unexpected
things that have popped up in research recently that may have a massive effect on the future
that is not accounted for.
So one example of those, there was an article in Fizz.org, which is titled Antarctic Warming
is Altering Atmospheric Stability.
New evidence from the 1950s to the present.
It says a new study published in the Journal of Climate Reveals House Surface Warming in
Antarctica, particularly over the Antarctic Peninsula, is significantly altering the stability
of the lowest layers of the atmosphere by analyzing changes from the 1950s to the present.
Researchers observed a progressive decrease in near-surface atmospheric stability.
This reduced stability favors the generation of atmospheric gravity waves from the Antarctic
Peninsula, one of the main natural factories of these waves which play a crucial role in
the dynamics of Earth's climate system.
So that's a lot of words, but it's basically saying that warming in Antarctica makes changes
in the atmosphere, and those changes in the atmosphere can make changes to weather patterns
all over the world.
It says the study provides a physical explanation for this increase, identified in a shift in
atmospheric flow regimes that makes the Antarctic Peninsula even more efficient at producing
waves.
The results are based on a comprehensive set of data from meteorological stations, reanalysis
products, satellite observations, and model simulations, all which show a coherent increase
in gravity wave activity.
As gravity waves influence the strength of the polar vortex, contribute to processes linked
to ozone depletion, and affect mid-latitude weather patterns.
Changes in their frequency and intensity can therefore have far-reaching consequences
for atmospheric circulation on a global scale.
Gravity waves play a key role in shaping atmospheric circulation, and increase in their
activity may contribute to profound changes in the dynamics of Earth's climate system.
It ends by saying the study highlights that surface warming does not remain confined to
the ground.
It generates signals that propagate upward into the stratosphere and beyond, reshaping
global atmospheric circulation.
It also shows how localized changes such as warming over the Antarctic Peninsula can
trigger a chain of effects capable of propagating on a planetary scale, once again underscoring
the vulnerability and interconnectedness of Earth's climate system.
So applying this to what I kind of mentioned at the beginning of the episode, there's
this interconnectedness which means that things are going to happen that we're not expecting.
Nobody is really talking about how warming in the Antarctic would increase gravity waves,
which would change the temperature, mid-latitudes.
I don't know that people were talking about warming in the Antarctic, being expected
to increase ozone depletion, for example.
Like I mentioned in yesterday's episode, that's partially because we weren't expecting
warming in the Antarctic, excuse me, to happen this quickly.
This is a relatively recent development over the last several years, and so it's no
surprise that this research is just coming out now, and more research will have to be
done to really determine, you know, put this into the models and see how is this going
to affect things like weather.
I think this goes without saying, but I'll mention it anyway.
Obviously, the more of these types of things that happen and that upset the normal weather
patterns, I think this is just going to create a continued, wild swinging and chaos back
and forth between weather types through much of what we now consider, you know, stable
weather patterns and climate patterns throughout the world.
If a place which is, you know, used to a stable climate and able to grow agriculture and
specific crops because temperatures stay relatively the same are now having wild swings
in those temperatures, or even if it just means that winters are lasting longer, or not
as long, or starting sooner, or hail storms are more frequent, or rain is less frequent.
Whatever it might be, it disrupts those agricultural patterns.
We're already witnessing those disruptions happening for many different reasons due to climate
change, and these discoveries just enhance and support that it's going to get that much
more extreme, unexpected, and have those adverse effects.
This one I find very interesting, despite the fact that it's not necessarily caused by
climate change, but it does cause climate changes.
This is from science advances, it's on science.org, it says, vulcanism induced collapse and recovery
of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation under glacial conditions.
And the abstract here basically is saying that volcanic eruptions have considerable impacts
on climate across various time scales, it remains uncertain if and how volcanic activity
could drive climate change over multiple millennia.
Here we incorporate realistic volcanic forcing into a large ensemble of glacial air coupled
atmosphere ocean model simulations.
Basically what they found was that very large and equatorial eruptions can induce large
changes in the AMOC, potentially pushing the climate system between persistent warm and
cold states lasting millennia.
They say that, quote, and this is a summary that I actually found in the last week in
collapse, a subreddit, a sub-sac that puts together different stories from the week, says,
they say that the role of large volcano eruptions may be understated in modifying global water
circulation patterns, potentially forcing changes that could last thousands of years.
And it makes me wonder, we know that as ice melts, for example, in Antarctica, it changes
the amount of weight because all of that ice and all of that water weighs down on the
land masses in those parts.
As that ice melts and that water is distributed evenly over the planet, it can disrupt plates,
it can disrupt tectonics.
I wouldn't be all that surprised to find that we have an increase in volcanic activity
in the coming decades.
And now showing that that can have a major impact on the AMOC and other weather patterns.
Another article in the ecologist.org talks about Brazil's growing water crisis.
Scientists warn Brazil is entering a hidden water crisis with global consequences.
I'm bringing this article up again because while we know, and it's not a surprise, that
Brazil is in a water crisis, as are many places around the world, they have found through
the research that the patterns in rivers have become less predictable.
And it is again, this lack of predictability that is what's frightening, says Brazil's
water system depends on a delicate partnership between the Amazon rainforest and the Serrato.
Together they form a vast hydrological network that moves moisture through the atmosphere,
stores groundwater and stabilizes river basins across much of South America.
Foreign security in Brazil isn't just about declining rainfall.
Researchers describe it as the weakening of natural climate regulation processes a gradual
shift with potentially far-reaching consequences.
Research from the University of Sao Paulo estimates that the Amazon's deforestation accounts
for roughly 74.5% of rainfall reduction and 16.5% temperature increased during the dry season.
The Amazon plays a central role in South America's water cycle, trees draw moisture from the
soil and release it into the atmosphere, generating currents of human air often described
as flying rivers, or atmospheric rivers.
These invisible air currents carry rainfall far beyond the forest, sustaining agricultural
regions, reservoirs, and major urban centers.
For many Brazilians, these atmospheric water currents are invisible, but they're effects
shape when crops grow, reservoirs refill, and weather rivers remain navigable.
According to Brazil's National Water and Basic Sanitation Agency, on the 30th of January,
the canter error system was reportedly to be operating at 22%.
As forests shrink, scientists warn that this moisture recycling process weakens.
Reduced tree cover means less moisture in the air.
Rainfall becomes more erratic, and river flows grow increasingly unstable.
Some regions face prolonged drought while others experience intense rainfall over shorter
periods.
Researchers say these extremes aren't isolated anomalies, but signs of mounting ecological
stress.
Water soil reduces groundwater recharge while rivers respond more sharply to both drought
and heavy rainfall.
Large-scale climate events such as El Nino, Leninia, and warm conditions in the North Tropical
Atlantic only add to the strain triggering floods or droughts that cascade through river
systems and aquifers.
So again, this increase in the pressure that comes from all of these different elements
is causing a worsening condition, which is increasing the unpredictability of river flows.
Those which pretty much all of Brazil depend on for their fresh water.
On that note, there was an article that talks about how some research was done in 2023
in the Amazon, and they actually discovered that during that year, the Amazon turned
from a carbon sink into a weak carbon source.
It officially flipped that year.
Don't know if that's continuing.
That was a drought year, but there's always been this worry about the Amazon switching
from a carbon sink to a carbon source.
As a sink, it was taking in net carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, therefore decreasing
global warming.
As a source, it is emitting more carbon dioxide than it is bringing in, of course, worsening
global warming.
This is a really long research paper.
I'll link to it so you can read through it, but I bring it up because it relates heavily
to what we just talked about with Brazil's rivers that are growing water crisis.
As the Amazon continues to be deforested, as drought plagues it, as fires continue to
burn it, as agriculture replaces natural forest areas, that is less and less water that
feeds into these atmospheric river streams, meaning that there is less rainfall.
The sub-enification of the Amazon forest is one of the, I think, worst tipping points
that we will experience in the coming decades, and it may be closer than we expect.
Do you have any other examples of things like this that you've thought of?
New research perhaps, or maybe it's just ideas that you've had about things that are
unexpected, or at least underappreciated, not talked about, but that we will experience
as the climate continues to change.
Feel free to reach out to me, let me know, submit articles, and things like that.
I'm happy to share them here.
All right.
Bye.
Hey, Corey here.
If you are listening to the back catalog of Breaking Down Collapse, thank you, those episodes
are so vital, they're so important, but I also wanted to let you know that I am now
doing daily episodes.
Yes, that's right.
Here on the podcast, daily episodes.
So if you are enjoying the back catalog, great, please also feel free to zoom forward to
the most recent episodes, catch us daily, they are quick little episodes, and I think
you'll enjoy them.
Thanks.
