Again our local weather guru, Anthony Watts, confirms his inability to distinguish weather from climate (July 5 letter). It all has to do with time. I suggest he read “Timefulness” by Marcia Bjornerud.
She describes an isotopically documented increase of 9 to 14 degrees Fahrenheit in global temperature 55 million years ago due to the accumulated increase of atmospheric carbon dioxide and methane (rising magma induced burning of coal-peat and seafloor release of methane). This led to ecologic devastation.
It took over 10,000 years for this rise to happen, and this “heat wave” lasted 200,000 years. Yet our current rate of greenhouse gas and temperature rise is 10 times faster than what took place 55 million years ago; Anthony Watts’ time scale of 30 years just demonstrates his failure to grasp the time scale of climate change.
Please read about the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum of 55 million years ago at Wikipedia. Remember that 9 of the 10 warmest years have occurred since 2005 with the last 5 years being the hottest. I hope that Mr. Watts and other climate skeptics can pull their heads out of the sands of denial.
— Julian Zener, Chico
