The big scare that the greenie alarmist movement, Hollywood and the MSM is always shouting about is the scare of accelerating and huge sea level increases. They speak of 3-foot increases by 2050, or 10, 20 and 80 foot increases by 2100.
Where did all these incredible sea increase predictions come from?
It turns out that all these frightening predictions share a couple things in common: one, they are based entirely on fantasy, with no scientific or empirical basis; and two, they have been fabricated by a minority of individuals seeking the limelight, which the MSM has gladly provided for them without a shred of fact-checking.
How do the over-the-top sea level increase predictions really compare to reality, though? Not well as the below chart reveals. (click on image to enlarge)
The blue bars of the chart represent both historical estimates of sea level increases and actual tide gauge and satellite measurements from recent periods. Scientists know there was a gigantic ice-sheet and glacier melt over thousands of years that raised the sea levels some 120 to 130 meters (390 to 425 feet). When averaged out over thousands of years, the sea level increase is estimated to have been about 5.0 to 7.5mm per year - with some years achieving an approximate 40mm increase.
How do more recent and current sea level increases compare to the historical record? First, it is widely recognized by all scientists that sea levels did not increase much over the 1,000 years prior to the mid-19th century. Around 1850, measurements reveal that sea levels started to increase, and interestingly, glaciers started to melt and recede, globally. Amazingly, this was decades before the modern influx of human CO2 emissions, yet it was just at the same time when natural global warming followed the frigid and freezing natural global cooling of the Little Ice Age. (For global warming alarmists, Hollywood and the MSM, this is just an "amazing" coincidence and certainly these natural cool/warm cycles could have nothing to do with modern sea levels increasing or glaciers melting.)
Regarding those current sea level measurements? Well, the remaining blue bars (starting with #6) from peer-reviewed, empirical evidence studies show increases for different time periods that range from less than 1mm/year to 3.1mm/year, with the single year of 1980 recording a 5.3mm increase. In summary, all of these studies are based in reality and one can extrapolate (predict) from the empirical evidence that sea levels are increasing at about a one-foot per century rate, which even the IPCC concurs with. A one-foot increase by 2100 is entirely manageable and entirely non-scary.
Climate alarmist scientists needing government funding for their global warming catastrophe research do not like this inconvenient empirical evidence; and, for that matter, nor does the MSM since it relies on doom and gloom stories for increased readership and viewers.
Unfortunately, for those that embrace and promote global warming fears and climate change ("disruption") catastrophes, the most current sea level evidence is especially disheartening. Indeed, the last several years of tide gauge/GPS/satellite measurements have recorded global sea level increases that are trending to zero (see bar #'s 18 and 19).
How do the predictions of scientists or climate models compare to reality based on current evidence? Some predictions are in the realm of reality and they are represented by the gold bars - reasonable, with most being higher than what recent measurement studies indicate.
The predictions with orange bars represent those that are starting to escape the world of reality, though. Typically, these are "worst" case scenarios with a very low likelihood of occurrence due to their extreme assumptions.The vast majority of scientists would not agree to climate model predictions that excessively exceed both historical estimates and current measurement studies of sea level increases.
Then there are the red-bar predictions from a distinct minority of alarmists and scientists that get all the attention of the MSM press and Hollywood. These "red-bar" predictions literally are fantasy designed exclusively to gain the attention of the feeble-minded, unable to critically think. Ultimately, these predictions can't even be considered science fiction since they are not based on a scintilla of scientific evidence.
Not surprisingly, the red-bar predictions raise some very important contradictions that global warming alarmists would prefer not to reveal (besides not comporting to recent evidence), including:
1. They claim that the predictions are based on ancient evidence over the last 20,000 years that the world was significantly warmer, which caused large sea level increases. Note, they are stating categorically that modern temperatures are not "unprecedented" and the world will return to those significantly warmer past temperatures in the near future (which is not actually looking so "hot" based on the actual evidence.)
2. The ancient warmer world happened when CO2 atmospheric levels were well below the modern, industrial levels - there were no human CO2 emissions that caused the world to warm and the ice to melt.
3. When the ancient world warmed, ice sheets and low elevation glaciers were spread all across the northern hemisphere, well into the non-polar areas. Those no longer exist, which means there is not enough ice to melt in the non-polar regions that will deliver sea level increases that would rival ancient increases.
4. The vast majority of today's ice sheets and glaciers are located in areas of extreme cold temperatures (high latitudes and/or high elevations) that minimize the potential of melting. For example, at the Greenland ice sheet Summit, current annual temperatures are -31.0°C, and for the Vostok-Antarctica station on the polar ice sheet the respective temperature is a -55.0°C. Both of these extremely cold areas hypothetically could suffer a 20° increase in temperatures and nothing is going to melt - and by the way, no sane scientist even hypothesizes a 20°C increase in these polar areas.
5. Recent studies of ice mass loss at both Greenland and Antarctica ice sheets show that the wild-ass, speculative predictions of climate alarmist scientists and their climate/ice sheet models are galactically over-estimating the losses.
To summarize Mr/Ms new Republican elected-official, the scary sea level predictions are pure fantasy, derived not from empirical, scientific evidence, but from the incessant, non-factual speculations of a minority of individuals seeking fame, power, control and fortune. These predictions are designed to pressure you to vote for more climate research funding, and also to vote for the increased taxation of consumers and small businesses to assure the subsidization of green-energy investments by wealthy investors and large corporations - it's as simple as that.
Sources for chart:
#1, #2, #3, #4, #5, #6, #7, #8, #9, #10, #11, #12, #13, #14, #15, #16, #17, #18, #19, #20, #21, #22, #23, #24, #25, #26, #27, #28, #29, #30, #31, #32, #33, and #34.
Other sea level graphs. Additional sea level postings and computer model failure postings.