There are a body of scientists and researchers that have been warning that we have crossed a multitude of tipping points and have slipped into runaway abrupt climate change.
Myself and Robin Westenra interviewed N.Z. climate scientist and Nobel Peace Prize winning IPCC panel member Dr Jim Salinger in November 2015 when he stated he believes we have been in abrupt climate change since 2010 at least.
The first person to bring it to my consciousness was Professor Guy McPherson, professor emeritus of the University of Arizona. McPherson has been vilified and ostracised for speaking about the imminent extinction of the human race. “Shoot the messenger”, a time honoured response from despots to un-palliative news.
As every day passes more evidence is appearing that runaway abrupt climate change is underway and McPherson’s dire predictions based on synthesizing a multitude of positive reinforcing loops is becoming more and more impossible to refute. Please note that I spent the first 2 years after learning of McPherson’s analysis trying in vain to disprove his conclusions.
” New research suggests the Earth’s climate could be more sensitive to greenhouse gases than thought, raising the spectre of an ‘apocalyptic side of bad’ temperature rise of more than 7C within a lifetime”, covered here in The Independent. This latest mainstream media article makes the point that we could have a 7C temperature rise within a generation, myself and Professor McPherson believe we are well into that window already.
Nonlinear climate sensitivity and its implications for future greenhouse warming as detailed in a paper at advances.sciencemag.org
Where would a 7C temperature rise leave planet earth?
In a well researched 2008 article in The Guardian, Oliver Tickell surmised;
On a planet 4C hotter, all we can prepare for is extinction .
The extinction of the human race will leave this planet bathing in ionising radiation from the melt-down of 450 nuclear plants and the subsequent 1200 spent fuel pool fires which will aerosol radionuclides into the atmosphere in a firestorm of heat and radiation yet to be witnessed on this planet.Perhaps our most long lasting legacy.
The below photo was taken at the crater edge at Tana, Vanuatu on one of my ocean passages.
What can we do now that we are in runaway and a climate change denier is the President elect in the second largest emitting nation on the planet? Trump has called global warming “bullshit”
Hope for the best, plan for the worst,as we face the perfect storm.
Another pressing ‘Tipping point’ will be the collapse of industrial civilisation once all faith is lost in the dire situation we find ourselves in. This event could unfold with one single climatic event like the collapse of the West Antarctic Ice Shelf or the discharge of the 50 gigatonne methane burst as predicted my Dr’s Shakova and Semiletov of the University of Fairbanks Asaska. This makes everything we love and hold dear a day to day proposition.
Methane Hydrates, Extended interview with Natalia Shakova by Nick Breeze
The situation could not be more dire, I can say that without a hint of hyperbole.
Professor McPherson and I will be touring NZ speaking about this predicament. Readers world wide can follow the tour via Facebook as we will live-stream some of the Keynote Presentations from the universities where we will be speaking.
Over the years I have completed 16 ocean passages on small yachts, over half as skipper. One of the over-riding responsibilities of a captain is to keep his passengers, crew, vessel and anyone who can come into contact with it safe at all times and when disaster strikes be brutally honest with the truth, which enables everyone to prepare as best they can.
I believe we should be declaring a Global Climate Emergency, it will be one of the key aims of our forthcoming tour to pressure the political parties of NZ to face the reality of our predicament, most especially the Green Party of Aotearoa N.Z.. Valuable time is being lost in the denial of abrupt climate change.
At the edge of extinction, only love remains.
I'm an anti-imperialist, environmental activist and blue ocean sailor, who is passionate about the earth and all it's inhabitants without favour. Brace for imminent impact as we bare witness to the non-linear unraveling of the biosphere and habitability disappearing for most if not all complex life on the only habitable planet we know of. To quote President Niinistö in North Russia: ‘If We Lose the Arctic, We Lose the World’. Folks we have lost the Arctic.
Kevin Hester 
It would make for a more convincing argument if you expanded on how and why the nuclear meltdowns will occur as our civilization collapses.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Nuclear power stations are hard to keep cool on a good day. Warming global air and water temperatures make them harder to cool. In an emergency All of your emergency systems must work faultlessly and your staff must operate the equipment. In a big collapse no one goes to work, with near term human extinction no one goes to work. The entire worlds nuclear facilities will suffer some degree of melt down and leakage.
LikeLike
There are approximately 450 operating nuclear reactors in the world. The designers assumed that once the fission reaction is stopped the spent nuclear fuel rods will be kept cool for 5-10 years until the thermal energy that they generate will have dropped to the point where the rods can be placed in robust casks. The bulk of spent nuclear fuel, from many years of the reactor’s operation, is stored in spent fuel pools, typically located at the power plant complexes. The engineering assumption is that during the 5-10 year cooling period there will be ample numbers of trained nuclear workers to maintain the cooling pool equipment. They assume that there will be ample supplies of replacement parts for equipment that breaks down, or is intended to be replaced periodically. The cooling pools also require ample supplies of external AC power to operate during that lengthy period of time.
If industrial civilization breaks down rapidly around the world these assumed support systems will be lost. The result will be that the radioactive decay energy, produced by the spent fuel rods, will heat the pool water to boiling and that will evaporate away over a period of time of a couple of months. When the zirconium alloy rods become uncovered they will overheat, rupture and some will burn, releasing the fuel pellets into the bottom of the storage pool. That could lead to a criticality accident. Even without that, some of the pellets will shatter causing the release of fission product particles into the atmosphere above the pools. The result would be radioactive plumes traveling downwind of of the nuclear power plants. That could result in large areas becoming so contaminated that people could no longer live there, or produce crops on that land.
No analytics have been done of such scenarios because the authorities have considered such a loss of infrastructure as being not credible. Few analyst regard Anthropogenic Climate Disruption (ACD) as a grave near term threat. To the contrary, many admirers, of nuclear power, view global warming as an opportunity to vastly expand the use of nuclear power plants. They tend to not believe we are anywhere close to a threshold beyond which recovery is impossible.
The triple reactor meltdown accident, at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant, was considered not credible since the plant had numerous layers of backup systems and the reactors had little in common with each other. Yet many of those backup systems failed in unexpected ways.
LikeLiked by 2 people
EXCELLENT explanation of the meltdown factors. (Due to the way it appeared on my NSA app, I’m sorry if I accidently gave credit to Kevin HESTER rather than Gasbuggy, but the info is important enough to re-post in several places.) including NRC safety and consequence management page at http://www.Energy.gov — MANY THANKS
LikeLiked by 1 person
Excellent web site Kevin. The last of us trying to be honest here in D.C. about Nuclear problems connected to climate are in big trouble with Trump. EPA will be cut to shreds. I’ll send you a doc about cutting all methane control measures. Wow this is bad. Thanks for all you do. Homeland non security !!!
LikeLiked by 2 people
We Are All Ready Baked in to a 7C. Temp. Rise, even if we stopped emitting Carbon and Methane Right Now !
Heating Up, and Burning Up, with Record Heat and Rain Year after Year
“There is no carbon budget any more and 7C is baked in according to both ” Kevin Hester, an Guy McPherson
With Record Breaking Wind, Hurricanes, Tornadoes, Earth Quakes, Rain, Snow and Heat !.
That are HIGHER, Than Normal ! We are going to go Off the Charts !
There is No Atmospheric Budget For More Carbon, Methane, or Nuclear !
We must Stop Trump, Koch bros, Warren Buffets, Bill Gates, and their Fossil Fuel allies from FUKUSHIMIATIZING Us !
Greenland is Melting and Calving Now, Jonas just went over Greenland at above Freezing Temps, for the first Time in the Dead of Winter 2016
“And for the Winter of 2016 it’s possible that the Arctic may never experience typical conditions.
For, according to NOAA, the first half of February saw this record, Spring-like, warmth extend on through today.
It’s as if these coldest zones in the Northern Hemisphere haven’t yet experienced Winter
— as if the freak storm that drove Arctic temperatures to record levels during late December has, ever since, jammed the thermometer into typical April levels and left it stuck there. ” Robert Scribbler
Greenland has 20 Feet of Sea Level Rise !
Now is the Time for Feed in Tariff Clean Kilowatts, Home Owners and Commercial Business owners selling Renewable Energy, Wind and Solar to the Utility !
Dump Net Metering (Second Utility) Third Party Leasing.
Protect Our Communities with Solar Policies that keep the Money in the Wallets and Purses of Head of House Holds.
In Order to Ready Themselves for coming, Record Breaking Rain, Wind, Snow and Temps.
Food Shortages, Heat,, Floods, Fire, Quakes, Volcanoes, Hurricanes. and Sea Level Rising 220 Feet !
With Ca. Residential and Commercial Feed in Tariff
Help Protect Hard Working, Tax Paying, Voting, Citizens from our Koch Bros, Warren Buffet, Warren Gates, Fossil Fueled Energy and Water Policies !
Allow Home Owners to sell Their Renewable Energy to the Utility, aka Feed in Tariff.
16 cents per kilowatt hour, 5to the grid for usage, 11 cents Home Owner !
We Need To Decommission are Nuclear Reactors Now !
And Relocate to above 3,000 Feet !
Each 1C. Temp Rise, Atmospheric Moisture increases 7%
We have increased Temp 1.7C. and Climbing
1850 ppm Carbon 270
1980 ppm carbon 350
2015 ppm of Carbon 405 and Rising
2016 ppm carbon 412 and rising !
What will the ppm of Carbon be when Greenland All Melts ?
Diablo Nuclear, San Onofre Fuel Rods, and All Nuclear needs to be relocated to 3000 feet above Sea Level
Over 3 Million Years of Waxing and Waning From the Poles, with the Arctic Keeping North America Cool, Now it is Greenland Because of Fossil Fuels !
Massive Sea Life Die Off on Pacific and Atlantic Coast !
Pacific and Atlantic Oceans 4 – 18 degrees warmer than Normal
Antarctica has 200 feet of Sea Level Rise
Arctic Region Warming Twice as fast as the rest of the planet !
Over 440 Nuclear Reactors at Sea Level Now !
From Kevin Hester comes this message: Professor Guy McPherson will be touring New Zealand in November 2016 talking about Runaway Abrupt Climate Change. Regular updates are provided at KevinHester.Live and Facebook events will be created as the date draws near.
______
Sign and Share for a Ca. Residential Feed in Tariff. Go to the youtube site, look six inches below video, click on Show More, then click on blue link to sign the petition.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Kevin, I’m interested in the methane figures that have/have not been coming out of NOAA . There is talk of the data being capped, which looking at satellite data seems reasonable. If the GWP of methane is 87 (although Michael Mann seems to put this at 120) and the readings are 2400, the CO2E figure is 600ppm+. Are the figures being cooked? That would explain the huge anomalies we are seeing? Sorry not a scientist, so this may all be bollocks. Keep up the good work
LikeLiked by 1 person
Last year I received an email from my colleagues in the Arctic Methane Emergency Group asking me to download a methane spike recorded on a graph at NOAA. The graph was removed 2 days later.
http://ameg.me/
LikeLike
Wishing you safety during these super moon super sized shakes. In the words of Guy “If ever you stumble across the opportunity to create the conditions that brought you joy, seize the moment on behalf of someone else. After all, that someone else is really another form of you.”
Kevin, Per the comment above I can get records from meetings regarding the reason why methane data is suppressed – rather than the exact values assigned by NOAA. Partly because, natural gas industry will take major legal action if there is any variation in methane potency. Molecules. Decay rates. They can get technical and go on a rampage if any group of scientists have even slight a discrepancy in data. Safer not to publish rather than perish in the binds of fracking industry backlash.
I’m looking forward to sailing away from the USA as soon as I can escape again. Your safer with the Wellington quakes than sharks in Washington D.C..
LikeLiked by 1 person
Reblogged this on Move for Change and the Brooklyn Culture Jam and commented:
Reblogging thoughts from pal activist Kevin Hester, who brought us the parlor game of ‘faster than previously expected’. It is a sobering thought that Hester’s observations would not be welcome in any gathering of EITHER major party in the US.
LikeLiked by 1 person
LikeLike
10C in 10 years, that’s the abrupt shift we have been warning of.
https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/11/08/ignoring-climate-catastrophes/?fbclid=IwAR1awDsMJayK0g4uzlM717xshcn_uk3rOEjrvEGiEiQOrV1LELGfIk_ZUWM
LikeLike
Excellent work Kevin. Much admiration. True thanksgiving 2 u
LikeLiked by 1 person