Other Crap

Gore beats climate change drum in Dubai

"Al Gore was beating the climate change drum again on Tuesday, this time in Dubai, as the former U.S. vice president warned global warming will create 'hundreds of millions of climate refugees.'

'Each one metre of sea level rise is associated with 100 million climate refugees in the world,' the Nobel laureate told a business forum in Dubai, which could see its famous man-made islands disappear under the waves if his predictions prove true.

'The North Pole ice cap is 40 percent gone already and could be completely and totally gone in the winter months in the next 5 to 10 years,' he warned.

If the North Pole were to melt it could increase sea levels by 67 metres, Gore said, speaking in the heart of an oil-rich region not known for its regard for the environment."

IMPORTANT NOTE: I do not believe that Al Gore actually said these things. He is an intelligent man, and these claims are ludicrous, as you can see with a pencil and elementary arithmetic. This must be some kind of hoax. If you're doing the math at home, that means that the seas will rise more than 200 feet in the next five to ten years, and those 67 meters will cause 6.7 billion climate refugees, which is almost precisely the current population of the world. In other words, the entire planet will be under water within the next decade. Quick, get Kevin Costner on the phone.

Late note: as of Sunday A.M., the site has changed the quote to "6 to 7" meters rather than "67." That still represents some 20 feet, and that is still more than 100 times higher than the current estimates. The sea levels are currently rising at about 3mm per year. Values for predicted sea level rise over the course of the next century center around 4.8 mm per year. In 10 years that is about 2 inches, not 20 feet!

I was certain that Gore could not possibly have said 67 meters, which would basically put the planet under water. He may have said 6-7 meters, but in order to make that claim, he would have to stretch the timetable out to the theoretical end of time. At the predicted rates of increase, it would take more than a thousand years for the seas to rise seven meters. If the rates of increase triple, the timetable is still something like five centuries. You won't need to move to a mountain top just yet.