CLIMATE - The Salt Lake Tribune

Hot and getting hotter

Sat, 18 May 2013 01:01:06 MDT

Hot and getting hotter

By mark reynolds

Updated May 18, 2013 01:01AM MDT

In the rarefied air of Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii, 11,141 feet above sea level, scientists have charted the passing of a milestone that, if ignored, heralds a future for civilization both tragic and chaotic. I’m referring to the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, which Charles David Keeling began monitoring in 1958. At that time, CO2 concentration was 313 parts per million. We are now at 400 ppm and that is not good news. Why is this number so important? For hundreds of thou...

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An ominous milestone

Fri, 17 May 2013 01:01:05 MDT

An ominous milestone

By XXXXXX The Salt Lake Tribune

Updated May 17, 2013 01:01AM MDT

Milestones are usually to be cheered, but not the one the world reached at 8 p.m. on Thursday, May 9. For the first time in millions of years the level of carbon dioxide in the Earth’s atmosphere reached above 400 parts per million. So what, you say? It’s just a bunch of scientific numbers. Not really. What these numbers tell us is that within 25 years, if we continue to produce CO2 at our present rate, we can expect significant alterations in our climate. Our seas will rise as the Earth heats ...

Copyright 2013 The Salt Lake Tribune. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Drought, other climate cycles settling into Utah

Fri, 10 May 2013 22:43:58 MDT

Drought, other climate cycles settling into Utah

By Judy Fahys The Salt Lake Tribune

Updated May 10, 2013 10:43PM MDT

Drought will probably dog the state for a few more years, thanks to broad climate patterns being tracked by the Utah Climate Center. Rob Gillies, director of the climate center and speaker Friday at the latest Utah State University Sunrise Session, pointed to scientific research his team has done in recent years on global patterns of precipitation and temperature — cycles that play out over thousands of miles and reverberate in Utah. He likened the climate system to a symphony, with rhythms or ...

Our lost civilization

Tue, 07 May 2013 17:05:02 MDT

Our lost civilization

Updated May 7, 2013 05:05PM MDT

If, 10,000 years from now, visiting archeologists wonder just what it was that caused the residents of the soaring culture of the Wasatch Front to suddenly abandon their homes just when the community seemed to be thriving, a simple look around won’t do much to explain the riddle. But if they excavate the archives of the Utah Division of Air Quality, those future explorers of the past will find that the technological success of our region was so incompatible with the natural lay of the land that...