World leaders have been going around in tiny and larger circles since 1979 when the First World Climate Conference was held in Geneva. Sure, there have been all kinds of agreements and promises, most countries seem committed, but the fact of the matter is they are actually not doing very much. 
What were you doing in 1979? I had joined the staff of U.S. Senator Spark Matsunaga in DC, and saw no political interest in global climate change. I don't recall even one major hearing on this subject during my three years there.
That First World Climate Change Conference eventually led to the formation of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in 1988. Who remembers that the Second Climate Conference occurred also in Geneva in 1990? Geneva also hosted #3 in 2009.
You might say, in parallel, the United Nations also held gatherings, beginning 1949 with the UN Scientific Conference on conservation and resources, in New York.
- Then in 1972, the First Earth Summit in Stockholm. Not much interest was shown about global warming in these early years, and this general attitude largely prevailed for another 20 years.
There was concerned interest in the ozone layer in 1979, that led to excellent policies.- Almost a decade later the IPCC was formed.
- The 1992 Earth Summit held in Rio de Janeiro setting the framework for agreement.
The first Conference of Parties, or COP 1, was held in Berlin in 1995, with an an annual gathering since then.- A particularly important one was COP 3 in 1997, when the Kyoto Protocol (I actually attended this session) was adopted.
- Then in 2015 (COP 21) came the Paris Agreement. 195 countries signed on.
- This year was COP 28 in Dubai, and COP 29 could be held in Australia, the Czech Republic or Bulgaria next year. COP 30 is scheduled for Belém, Brazil in 2025.
I've written too many times that the only way decision-makers would finally make necessary decisions to curtail global warming is if many millions die of heat and flood and hurricanes one hot summer. There is at least one more way...but it might then be too late.
Say the Gulf Stream from Florida to Europe stopped. While serious action will then be taken, there is nothing much you can do to re-start the current. Europe will thus, ironically suffer through a cold wave.
On the mega scale, the global conveyor belt, scientifically known as The Thermohaline Circulation (watch how these currents move), circulates the globe in 1000-year cycles.
- Warm surface current currents carrying less dense water away from the Equator toward the poles, and cold deep ocean currents carrying denser water away from the poles to the Equator.
- The volume of water transported would be equal to 100 Amazon Rivers, or 16 times the flow of all the world's rivers combined.
- This current travels though the Pacific, Atlantic, Indian, Southern and Arctic Oceans.
- Climate change could slow or even stop the flow.
- The last time this happened was 12,000 years ago.
- The Gulf Stream is a part of this conveyor belt.
Because the thermohaline circulation is mainly driven by differences in the water’s density, it depends upon the cold dense waters that sink into the deep oceans. Global warming can affect this by warming surface waters and melting ice that adds fresh water to the circulation, making the waters less saline; this freshening of the water can prevent the cold waters from sinking and thus alter ocean currents.
Did you see the film, The Day After Tomorrow? Then again, maybe you shouldn't, for Rotten Tomatoes bestowed 45/50 scores. Shutdown of Thermohaline Circulation was why the world went haywire.
This phenomena as a danger was highlighted in a 2021 paper, and seems particularly noteworthy, for Florida ocean waters reached 101F this week at a buoy in Manatee Bay 38 miles south of Miami. How hot was this? So hot that it broke the previous world record of 100 F in Kuwait Bay three years ago.
The Gulf Stream is part of the Atlantic Meridonal Overturning Circulation (AMOC--yes, they have names for the various portions), and in this study published in Nature Geoscience, the AMOC showed an unprecedented decline in the 20th century (1990s), which accelerated in the 1960s, briefly recovered in the 1990s, but declined again from the mid-2000s.
The AMOC is in its weakest state in more than a 1000 years.- If there is a collapse, European temperatures will drop by 6 degrees Fahrenheit, although it could be as much as 18 F. To quote:
The new analysis estimates a timescale for the collapse of between 2025 and 2095, with a central estimate of 2050 if global carbon emissions are not reduced. Evidence from past collapses indicates changes in temperature of 10 degree celsius in a few decades, although these occurred during ice ages.
Thus, this tipping point seems imminent, perhaps as soon as 2025. Mind you, the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change latest study indicated collapse was unlikely within the next 100 years. Read this paper from the latest Scientific American.
The photo today shows where Typhoon Khanum is today, As of 2:30PM on Wednesday, Khanun (name of a Thai jackfruit) was already 60 miles west of Naha. The storm has significantly weakened today, from 140 MPH yesterday, down to 115 MPH. Interestingly enough, Khanum will make an oblique turn to the right, skip China, and head for Kyushu.
Hurricane Dora formed, and is expected to strengthen into a Category 3 or 4 as she moves west. The current projection is that the eye will probably move past the Big Island of Hawaii several hundreds of miles to the south.
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