Climate Change and its Impact
Price of Paradise · Hawaii Public Radio · aired 1995-10-01
Guests: Tom Giambelluca (Professor, University of Hawaii); Fred Mackenzie (Professor, University of Hawaii); Tom Schroeder (Professor, University of Hawaii)
Duration: 0:59:43

[00:00:00] Randall Roth: This is Randy Roth, host of the Price of Paradise Radio Show. We're broadcast live each Sunday morning on KHPR 88.1 FM, and KKUA 90.7 FM. And then rebroadcast each Sunday evening at 8:00 on KIFO 1380 a.m. We're sponsored in part by Hawaii Community Foundation, facilitating philanthropy by providing both compassionate and efficient administration of a wide variety of permanent charitable funds. Today's topic is global climate change and its possible impact on Hawaii. During the next hour, I hope to find out if the world is indeed warming, and if so, what that might do to sea level, water supply, habitats, and biodiversity here in Hawaii. I also would like to know if ozone is depleting, and if so, whether sunny days mean trouble for tourism and our own health. Finally, I'd like to know if hurricanes are likely to be more frequent or more destructive in the future than they've been in the past. Here to shed light on these subjects are three of my fellow professors from the University of Hawaii Manoa: Fred Mackenzie, Tom Giambelluca, and Tom Schroeder. Fred has a BS in Physics and Geology from Upsala College, a Masters and PhD in Geology and Geochemistry from Lehigh University. He's a professor of oceanography and member of the graduate faculty in the UH department of geology and geophysics. He's authored five books, over 150 scholarly articles, a member of many learned societies, has won some teaching awards, and has all sorts of neat things on his resume. Good morning, Fred.
[00:01:43] Fred Mackenzie: Good morning, Randy.
[00:01:44] Randall Roth: We have two Toms with Fred. First, Tom Giambelluca. Tom Giambelluca has a bachelor's degree in physical geography and math from the University of Miami. And then from Miami, he has a geography master's degree with a specialization in climatology. From the University of Hawaii, he has his PhD again in geography with a specialization in climatology. He too has written many scholarly articles, has authored or co-authored several books including a very recent one on climate change. His PhD dissertation had to do with water balance of the Pearl Harbor Honolulu Basin. He's an associate professor in the Department of Geography at the University of Hawaii Manoa, and he too is a member of various learned societies and has been awarded the Presidential citation for meritorious teaching.
[00:02:36] Randall Roth: Our third guest in the studio is Tom Schroeder. Tom has a bachelor's in math and physics from Indiana Central, a masters and PhD in atmospheric sciences from Purdue. He's an assistant professor and chairman of the Department of Meteorology at the University of Hawaii Manoa. He's past chair of the American Meteorological Society committee on severe local storms. He was a participant in the National Research Council survey of Hawaii looking into the consequences of Hurricane Iwa and the New Year's flood of 1988. He's the co-author of several books, including one that he wrote with Tom Giambelluca called Prevaling Trade Winds and that's a book that would be of particular interest, I think, to people in Hawaii. And it's available wherever fine books are sold. And then he also is a co-author of a book called Voyage of Rediscovery. Again, a book of particular interest, I think, to the people of Hawaii. Tom Giambelluca on my right and Tom Schroeder on my left. Good morning.
[00:03:38] Tom Giambelluca: Good morning, Randy. Good morning, Randy.
[00:03:40] Randall Roth: Okay. Well, we've got Fred Mackenzie, Tom Giambelluca and Tom Schroeder. The topic is global climate change and Fred Mackenzie, I know you teach a course on global climate change and you get into all sorts of possible ramifications of this. In this morning's advertiser, you wrote an article where you began by acknowledging that there have been 14 daily temperature records set this summer in Hawaii. Um, are things getting warmer here in Hawaii and warmer across the globe? Or is this just something that one might expect from time to time?
[00:04:17] Fred Mackenzie: Well, I think that the things are getting warmer across the globe. The over the last 100 years, temperatures have risen about 0.3 to 0.6 degrees centigrade.
[00:04:21] Randall Roth: You're going to have to translate everything into inches, feet, and Fahrenheit degrees for for me. Although, we probably ought to do both just because sooner or later, people like me have to make the adjustment.
[00:04:43] Fred Mackenzie: That's roughly about a degree or two of Fahrenheit.
[00:04:47] Randall Roth: Now, is that something that is should be of great concern to to people like me, or is that not a dramatic change over a 100-year period of time?
[00:04:56] Fred Mackenzie: Well, I think it should be of concern because such a temperature increase is a little more rapid than we have observed naturally, uh, within the last several thousand years. And it has consequences for precipitation, evaporation, ecosystem stability and so forth.
[00:05:16] Randall Roth: Okay. And I want to come back to that. Tom Giambelluca, we were talking the other day and you mentioned something I thought was real interesting, when you got into this field, what, 15, 20 years ago, something like that, people weren't quite as worried about global warming, you told me.
[00:05:30] Tom Giambelluca: They were worried about climate change, Randy, but as a matter of fact, they were worried about going into an ice age rather than about warming.
[00:05:37] Randall Roth: So when you were sitting in classes, everyone was saying we've got this terrible ice age, and we have to be real concerned about it?
[00:05:43] Tom Giambelluca: That was the the topic of discussion and the one that made climatology interesting at the time.
[00:05:48] Randall Roth: Does that tend to make you skeptical of all this talk about global warming, or do you see what what Fred has just sent said as being the reality that we now see that 20 years ago, we we didn't see?
[00:06:01] Tom Giambelluca: Uh, I would say I'm not skeptical about warming. Uh, I think it is, um, uh, reality. And, uh, I think when we look back at colder, uh, the possibility of colder climates, it reminds us that there are there's natural variability in the climate, and that that's something we need to pay attention to as well.
[00:06:20] Randall Roth: Okay. Now when we talk about global warming, I know there are a number of of implications, sea level, habitats, biodiversity, water supply, etc. One of them that I think is related to global warming, but I'm not certain, is um, is hurricanes. And there's something about this El Nino and and I've got some of the words and phrases but I don't really have the substance of what's going on. Tom Schroeder, you're the the island guru when it comes to uh severe weather, I'm told.
[00:06:48] Tom Giambelluca: Well, for better or for worse, I guess. Uh, the uh what we have on the uh arguments on global change and tropical cyclones have been that the uh because the we expect the ocean temperatures to warm, people draw a one-to-one relationship between that and the intensity of uh tropical cyclones that'll form. So when Hurricane Andrew came along, well, it was a uh, you know, unprecedented intense storm. We had another one this year in the Caribbean that was uh stronger even. And we find out, however, that on the long term, these things seem to be just matching what's happened in the historic past. We have problems with population development, so when a storm hits the Virgin Islands, the Virgin Islands want one to one and a half billion dollars of federal aid. Now, to put a comparison on that, the total cost for Iniki is about 2.5 billion right now of all types. Uh, part of it we're just seeing population growth, uh, infrastructure development, more exposure. 60% of the people in the Gulf Coast of the United States weren't there 20 years ago, have not experienced a tropical cyclone.
[00:07:52] Randall Roth: So if there was a terrible, terrible storm a 1000 years ago, number one, we might not know about it. Number two, there wouldn't be as as many people or as much property to be destroyed, or whatever. Is that part of what you're saying?
[00:08:04] Tom Giambelluca: That's part of it, uh, absolutely. The uh in the case of the Hawaiian Islands, which is our topic today, our only good records of tropical cyclones go back to 1950.
[00:08:14] Randall Roth: Okay. That's not too far. But I think you said as as the atmosphere warms, the ocean warms, and somehow a warm ocean translates into what, more hurricanes or or hurricanes that are more severe? Or is this so simplistic as to be totally uh worthless?
[00:08:31] Tom Giambelluca: That's a it is so simplistic as to be worthless, but that is the uh, that is the approach because the everywhere you you watch CNN, they'll say, well, the storm's moving over warm waters, therefore it's going to uh intensify. Um, they link everything to warm water, which is essential for hurricane formation. But it turns out there are six different factors that all have to come together at the same time for a tropical cyclone, which a hurricane is one type of one name for, to form. And they only happen 80 times a year on the whole planet. It's a very rare event. It takes a number of circumstances, there are a number of interesting issues that could be resolved with proper well-developed numerical models and like that of climate to see what would happen, and the results to date have been inconclusive.
[00:09:14] Randall Roth: Okay. Uh, if you haven't seen this morning's advertiser, there are there are articles by Fred Mackenzie and Tom Giambelluca where they're talking about global climate change. And one of the things that each refers to is that as there is a warming, we might expect the sea level to to rise. And uh, they have figures that I think are a little bit different because there are these figures are constantly changing. Different studies are coming out at at different times. Uh, Tom Giambelluca, I know in your piece you suggested that we could lose beaches and all sorts of what sounded like negative consequences could result. Could you talk just a little bit more about the rise in the sea level as a necessary adjunct to a warming of the atmosphere?
[00:09:58] Tom Giambelluca: Um, well, the thought is that uh with warming, um, there is a possibility of sea level rise because of thermal expansion of water in the oceans. Um
[00:10:07] Randall Roth: So it's not a melting of the of the ice cap?
[00:10:10] Tom Giambelluca: That's also looked at as a possibility, but it's not necessary for for uh sea level rise to occur.
[00:10:16] Randall Roth: So when people point out that that at least I read something that suggested that the the ice cap in various places is actually getting bigger, that doesn't necessarily mean that we wouldn't have a a rise in the sea level?
[00:10:28] Tom Giambelluca: That's right. It can happen without melting ice.
[00:10:31] Randall Roth: Okay. And so this has some some implications. Does over the next 10 years, or are we talking about 100 years, a 1000 years?
[00:10:39] Tom Giambelluca: Uh, not 10 years, but certainly um you know, it's something to think about for the coming century. Uh, there are there are some estimates that go as high as several feet. Uh, that that would be the extreme high end of the estimates, the low end is really less than a foot about four inches would be the extreme low end of the current estimates. But these are these are very uncertain. Predicting the warming is is hard enough, then to to make another step to predict the effects on sea level adds quite a bit more complexity.
[00:10:47] Randall Roth: Okay. Fred Mackenzie?
[00:10:49] Fred Mackenzie: Uh, I think we should be cautious with the sea level rise business. Um, if one goes back and reads the articles, you know, two decades ago, we were looking at this something like an eight-foot rise in sea level. This was the prediction being made back then. But now By by scientists? By scientists, yes. In matter of fact, the Environmental Protection Agency made that prediction. I thought I thought those were mostly lawyers, that they have some scientists too. Well, you know, this issue is somewhat politicized, let's face it. I I I know it. Um, we're going to talk a little bit more about this, and we're just getting some of these topics out on the table and in about five minutes, I'm going to be inviting people to to call and ask our questions and and make their comments. And and so we realize that we're not really getting into any of this stuff much now, but we will, we will. Uh, another thing that has to be on the table before we we start taking calls. Fred, um ozone depletion. Uh, I don't know if that's related to global warming or totally unrelated to it. Can you tell us a little bit kind of the basics, uh, ozone depletion 101? Ozone depletion 101. Well, we we need to distinguish between tropospheric ozone and stratospheric ozone. That's ozone in the lower atmosphere versus ozone in the upper atmosphere. And indeed, there is good evidence for depletion of stratospheric ozone.
[00:12:31] Randall Roth: Okay. Um, what's that mean? I mean, what are the consequences?
[00:12:35] Fred Mackenzie: The consequences would be enhanced, uh, ultraviolet radiation reaching Earth's surface and the propensity for increased melanoma, skin melanoma, cancer, uh, damaged ecosystems and so forth.
[00:12:49] Randall Roth: Okay. And is that completely separate from global warming?
[00:12:53] Fred Mackenzie: No, it's not because there are some connections between global warming and stratospheric ozone depletion.
[00:12:58] Randall Roth: Okay. Um, what else do we need to get on the table real quickly before we tell folks to start calling us and uh holding our feet to the fire? Gentlemen, well, I guess uh I guess we'll go ahead and uh and move to the second stage of this program. Go ahead, Fred. Well, I like to break in. There is some evidence for depletion of total column ozone above uh Hawaii. And indeed in the winter of 1994, we had only 200 Dobson units of uh ozone in in the atmosphere above Hawaii, which is about two-thirds of what we usually have.
[00:13:31] Randall Roth: Okay, okay. Well, you're listening to Pop Radio, and the topic this morning is global climate change. With me in the studio are three professors from the University of Hawaii Manoa, Fred Mackenzie, who is a professor of oceanography, Tom Giambelluca, who is in the uh Geography department, and Tom Schroeder, who is uh a professor of mete- uh meteorology? Yes, yes, that's right. I keep uh I keep having trouble reading my own writing. If you'd like to ask them a question or make a brief comment, all you have to do is call us at 955-8821. And um, uh neighbor islands are neighbor islanders are always invited to call. Collect the number again, 955-8821. And if you haven't looked at this morning's advertiser, in the focus section, on page 3, we've got two real good articles that uh I think will get you thinking about this topic, one written by Fred Mackenzie, the other by Tom Gia- Tom Gim- Giambelluca. Well, we have a caller from Round Top, Myron. Good morning, Myron.
[00:14:34] Speaker 1: Oh, good morning. Uh I have one for Tom Schroeder, please.
[00:14:38] Randall Roth: Okay.
[00:14:39] Speaker 1: Uh Tom, is there uh um any record of a full-fledged hurricane, uh, winds, uh, um affecting I'm sorry, uh downtown, shall we say downtown Honolulu. Um, uh, that's the question. Uh since the uh time of Captain Cook.
[00:15:01] Tom Giambelluca: No, uh Myron, there is no We didn't have Of course, we don't have detailed measurements prior to the anemometers coming to the state, but uh the weather service employee Sam Shaw years ago did a historic uh check all the way back to the 1830s and found some uh you know, evidence of tropical storms in the islands, nothing specific for the island of Oahu though. There were some good cases, for example, on Kauai and for Maui and the Big Island in 1871. But the closest thing I recall is in the 1930s there was one storm that sprung up suddenly on the islands here and put some winds in the 60-mile an hour range, which would be a good tropical storm, but not a hurricane intensity.
[00:15:40] Randall Roth: Well, you know, Myron asks this I I've never thought about this, but is there some real I just assume that it was bad luck for the people of Kauai that that they got hit pretty hard twice. Is there something that might suggest that they're more likely to be hit in the future than are the people on Oahu?
[00:15:57] Tom Giambelluca: I hope you're deferring this to Tom Schroeder.
[00:15:59] Randall Roth: Yes, I am.
[00:16:01] Tom Giambelluca: Hope so too.
[00:16:02] Randall Roth: Oh, come on, Myron. I know you. I think you have an opinion.
[00:16:07] Tom Giambelluca: Uh do Riley has one too.
[00:16:08] Randall Roth: Yeah, you know, I bet he does. Um, my comment would be that there is this is a there's quite a bit of debate about this around because of people worried about their insurance rates and other things right now. But uh, I would say that there's not enough good physical argument to say Honolulu is particularly safe. Uh the favorite case in point was if Hurricane Iniki had turned about 6 hours earlier, we'd probably still be picking up the pieces.
[00:16:30] Tom Giambelluca: But there was a reason for it. Wouldn't you say?
[00:16:34] Randall Roth: What's that?
[00:16:35] Tom Giambelluca: That it that it uh it didn't turn sooner.
[00:16:38] Randall Roth: Uh, I don't think I don't buy that argument, so okay. Well, you guys you guys have have pointed out something that that it just never occurred to me that maybe that there is some reason why it's hit Kauai rather than than hitting any of the other islands. But Tom, you're very skeptical of that.
[00:16:55] Tom Giambelluca: I tend to be skeptical of that. I think it's very bad policy. You don't think the Big Island deflects the storm a little bit? Uh matter of fact, we recent numerical results uh coming out of the Naval Research Laboratory would indicate that that would be the opposite of what would happen if a storm got near the Big Island.
[00:17:11] Randall Roth: Okay. Myron, thank you for your call. Real interesting question.
[00:17:14] Tom Giambelluca: Well thank you very much, both of you.
[00:17:16] Randall Roth: We have a caller from Waikekee, Esther. Good morning, Esther.
[00:17:20] Speaker 2: Oh, good morning. Yeah, um, I was concerned living right on the eye of Oahu. My son came to visit from California and got sick and then he looked right out and he said, the cap rock has been broken. The freshwater lens that allows um seawater to get underneath the buildings and our uh pipes are corroded, so we have water pollution problems and lead pipes, you know, in this Commodore Apartments which is about 50 years old. However, what I was concerned about, if we have a clean water act, would our water recede?
[00:17:50] Randall Roth: Well, I'll tell you what, uh Tom Giambelluca is our our hydrologist, and I don't know if you know about pipes, but uh Tom, what do you have to say? Not a plumber.
[00:18:03] Tom Giambelluca: But I do know something about the caprock. Um is your uh can you you tell me a little bit more about your concern about the caprock?
[00:18:10] Speaker 2: Yes. Um when my son came here from California, he got lymph nodic uh streptococcus, I think I'm saying it right, all over his body. And then we had Minahoni come in and check a water filter system I had, which I won't say the company, but it had the same bacteria count as without it. So um I did get Minahoni, but Andre went to UH for 6 years and he studied oceanography, and he said that underneath the whole islands, all the islands, is a lens, a freshwater lens that holds our precious freshwater system. And when we're building, we we break the caprock from over development.
[00:18:43] Tom Giambelluca: Okay. And and I think we've And that goes under the what under the building.
[00:18:50] Randall Roth: We've got several aspects to to your situation. And the one that that I'm going to ask Tom Giambelluca to to focus on is just what is this caprock thing, and and how does that Let's somehow fit into today's topic.
[00:19:03] Tom Giambelluca: Um the caprock first of all is a geological formation that uh is found along the coastline especially uh uh on southern the southern part of Oahu and it has a lot to do with our groundwater resource. It tends to uh contain the fresh groundwater which does exist in a lens that floats on seawater in the basaltic rock and helps to separate it from the ocean water. And there occasionally are concerns raised about uh some kinds of development that may disturb the caprock and cause uh leakage from it and therefore affect our water supply.
[00:19:36] Randall Roth: Mhm. Mhm. And so that that goes to development as opposed to climate change.
[00:19:41] Tom Giambelluca: I'm not sure what the links would be with climate change except that uh there are there are some concerns if there's sea level rise that that sea level rise could impact our fresh water lens by intruding. Okay.
[00:19:52] Randall Roth: Esther, thank you for your call. We have
[00:19:54] Speaker 2: Hello. I know you know how we call and the Clean Water Act, 1995 not uh your 2000. Without that we don't have life, to life.
[00:20:03] Randall Roth: Thank you, Esther. We have a caller from the Big Island. Good morning, David.
[00:20:07] Speaker 3: Yeah, good morning Randy. I have a question for your hurricane guru. That's Tom Schroeder. Right. Um Tom um according to the uh almanac, the Big Island, and I think Maui also, have never been hit by the full force of a hurricane since 1950. And correct me if I'm wrong but my theory is that the hurricane is a big horizontal wheel spinning on the surface of the ocean and when it hits the high mountain, it deflects around it.
[00:20:35] Randall Roth: Let's let's get a response to that, David.
[00:20:37] Tom Giambelluca: Uh the a hurricane is a wheel that spins all right but it spins to about 50,000 feet. Uh the when you scale the big when you scale the Big Island to uh the scale of the actual volume of a hurricane, you find out the Big Island ain't that big.
[00:20:53] Randall Roth: David?
[00:20:53] Speaker 3: Okay. Thank you.
[00:20:55] Randall Roth: Okay. Thank you much. Um just want to remind you this is pop radio. We're talking about global climate change. We have some lines open. If you'd like to get into the conversation by asking a question or making a brief comment, just call us at 955-8821. Well, I want to ask a couple more questions about this global warming stuff because one of our listeners, they evidently heard our promo, uh sent to me an article from a publication called The Public Interest and the name of the article is Why Global Warming Would Be Good for You. I read the article and I got to tell you it hung together real well for me. Uh I finished the article thinking number one, maybe I shouldn't be at all uh upset about global warming that maybe even if it is going on and the article is really quite suspicious about that but even if it is that maybe it's a good thing. Fred MacKenzie, what do you think?
[00:21:48] Fred Mackenzie: Well, I think over the last couple of decades or so that most of the negative factors of global warming have been brought to the public. And unfortunately, some of these have been politicized. Oh, and we're having that going on right now in the congressional arena in US Congress.
[00:22:05] Randall Roth: And when you say politicized, blown out of proportion because it helps someone achieve their agenda? Absolutely. Okay. Um
[00:22:12] Fred Mackenzie: There are positive consequences of global warming. Certain areas will become wetter and warmer, which will extend crop seasons. There'll be potential fertilization of crops because of the increasing carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere. And indeed, if you look at uh historical climate records, and you go back to the uh medieval warming which occurred about a thousand years ago, and you go back to the Holocene climatic optimum of four the 6,000 years ago, the climate of the planet appears to been have been more equitable at that time and civilization, although it was quite small in terms of population, did not really have too hard and too difficult a time adjusting to the warmer climate. If you look at the little ice age in contrast of 1350 to 1850, civilization had a very difficult time at that during that 400 years.
[00:23:10] Randall Roth: That's one of the things his article was saying that that civilizations over the the history of of mankind uh have thrived when we had relatively hot temperatures on Earth, and they've suffered a lot when it's been relatively cold. Tom Jim Baluca, you look as though you think I'm crazy. Sound like some lawyer talking about climate change. Well, we won't get into lawyers right now but uh uh one of the uh considerations that must be made uh you know, as kind of a follow-up to what Fred said is it we got we we should remember that uh it's not just the magnitude, the changes that worry uh worry us, it's the rate of change and that's that's a big concern. It's also one of the things that's very difficult to predict.
[00:23:53] Tom Giambelluca: But even though we may have had climates like this in the past that the human population was able to adjust to, uh the question may be can we adjust and can natural systems and agricultural systems and so forth adjust if the if the rate of change is very high.
[00:24:05] Randall Roth: So one degree over a hundred years is is very quick compared to what we know about the past. That's right. Okay. Well, we have some callers on the line. Let's first go to Steve in Makiki. Good morning, Steve.
[00:24:16] Speaker 4: Good morning, Randy. Very interesting show. Thanks. Um you know, uh I worked for a couple years with Scripps Oceanography on uh long-range global uh climate forecasting. Coming out of that, then I was a computer guy, not exactly a scientist. I um I wonder if you're your uh guest will agree. I think that uh science in the United States in regard to this climate question and the environment, has become essentially political science. and that we're clearly out of step with the rest of the world. Um recently a UN resolution came down up uh involving uh industry and uh certain suggestions that uh industry and human activity are causing the degradation of the climate and the environment. I wonder if you could comment on uh on, you know, that sort of thinking and how much political power comes down.
[00:25:14] Randall Roth: Okay. Well, Fred, you're the one that used uh the term. What do you think of Steve's comment?
[00:25:20] Fred Mackenzie: Well, I think in in part you're correct. Um there are certain scientists which I would consider on either fringe that have politicized the global warming question. But I think of importance to the discussion is the fact that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which has written reports both in 1990 and a new report will appear this year, 1995. The consensus of scientists, and that's uh quite a large number now numbering in the thousands, is that global warming unless we change the way we do business, will occur some time in the future and there will be both negative and positive consequences of that of that warming.
[00:26:07] Randall Roth: Well, the the fellow who wrote the article that I was mentioning a little bit ago, he said that that those folks who are saying we need to change the way we do things so that we can slow down and and maybe even halt this this warming trend, he said they have projected, again, these are the folks who say we need to do something. The author of the article said, they've said in order to get a one-third reduction in emissions by the year 2040, we would have to spend almost a trillion dollars a year between now and then. And his point was you know, let's not uh jump too quickly and do too much. What do you think about that, Fred?
[00:26:48] Fred Mackenzie: Well, one of the major forcings on global warming is our burning of fossil fuels, coal, oil and gas. Now, there are other reasons to wean ourselves from the burning of fossil fuels. Fossil fuels are responsible for the potential of global warming, they're responsible for the problem of acid deposition, they're responsible for photochemical smog which occurs in downtown Honolulu when we have uh Kona winds. They're responsible indeed for even the amount of trash that the society makes because we use petroleum to make plastics. So there are lots of reasons to begin to wean ourselves away from the use of fossil fuels, those our primary energy source.
[00:27:32] Randall Roth: And that in itself would help to alleviate the problem.
[00:27:37] Tom Giambelluca: Adding to that is the fact that uh fossil fuels are non-renewable resources and we uh at some point in our future as humans are going to have to find an alternative to those to those fuels anyway. Uh I I would like also to add one other point regarding the uh question about politicizing the uh the the debate and that is that there are certainly interests on the side of uh saying that this is all uh very speculative and and really isn't a good science because um certainly there are big industries that stand to lose if there are uh controls imposed on the use of fossil fuels.
[00:28:13] Randall Roth: And and and I would tend to say, well, academics from the University of Hawaii, you have nothing, you know, on to gain or lose on one side or the other and therefore you're objective. But my hunch is once you take a position, the other side will find some reason for saying that that you're biased. Is is that right, Fred?
[00:28:30] Fred Mackenzie: Well, I here's where I think we have to be a little careful. A a scientific hypothesis is is advanced. In this in this case, it's the hypothesis of global warming. Then by the very nature of science, controversy, debate come about because one scientist comes up with something that disproves or partially disproves the hypothesis. Another comes up with an observation that tends to prove it. Eventually, and it takes time and it takes much controversy and debate in the scientific community before that hypothesis is proven to where we're we're happy with it.
[00:29:06] Randall Roth: So it's it's a necessary process.
[00:29:08] Fred Mackenzie: It's a necessary process. Okay.
[00:29:09] Randall Roth: One more comment, Tom, and then we need to move on.
[00:29:12] Tom Giambelluca: I just add to that. Uh scientists are trained to be skeptical and uh we we naturally look at every um everything said by other scien uh scientists with some skepticism. We're trained to do that. And that's often interpreted as meaning we we have very uh big uncertainties, perhaps bigger uncertainties than really exist.
[00:29:29] Randall Roth: Okay. Steve, thank you for your call. on the line for a while. Thank you for waiting. First Ed in Makiki. Good morning, Ed.
[00:30:20] Fred Mackenzie: Thank you, Randy. Once again, very interesting program. A question from Professor MacKenzie's article, describing that in the last century, the ocean sea level has risen 10 to 25 cm. If I remember my conversions, right, that's what roughly 5 to 10 inches.
[00:30:36] Randall Roth: Thank you, Ed. I appreciate that as the non-metric guy.
[00:30:40] Fred Mackenzie: Since I'm a metric person. What what's your point, Ed? Oh, well, maybe I'm old enough that it seems to me that the sea level in the last 50 years has not risen any 5 inches or something like that. Does he possibly mean millimeters? Uh no, the the uh rise in sea level over this period of time is on that order of centimeters with our best guess about 15 centimeters over the last 100 years.
[00:31:09] Randall Roth: Let let me see if your fellow scientists in the room are are skeptical of what you're saying, Fred, or if they're in total agreement, Tom Schroeder?
[00:31:14] Tom Giambelluca: I'm going to agree with Fred, but you can get can you get some confusion if you're looking in the cave if you're looking locally here with the Hawaiian Islands because uh there are a number of other interesting things going on like the fact that the islands are subsiding. And uh when you take out that process, my colleagues at the uh sea level center here that we run at the in the oceanography department are would say that for Honolulu, there's been very little change of any really so but on Fred's quoting the proper evaluation of the global trend.
[00:31:43] Randall Roth: Okay. Let's get to I agree with Tom. I mean for in terms of the local situation, it's different. Okay, let me hear something from Tom Jim Baluca, and then I'm going to come back to you yet.
[00:31:51] Tom Giambelluca: Just to clarify something that Tom said uh because the islands are themselves moving, it makes it difficult and and that's a problem really that we have uh everywhere in the world and trying to evaluate sea level rise. Uh here in Hawaii, the islands uh can actually be tipping and that is they're going to be rising in one place and sinking in another. And so the uh the apparent sea level change can be different on opposite sides of the island.
[00:32:12] Fred Mackenzie: My goodness. You're good. Uh just one other comment. Use of fossil fuels, unfortunately like it or not, you shut off oil, the state of of Hawaii literally shuts down, goes into the black. That's the unfortunate fact right now. Thank you.
[00:32:25] Randall Roth: Okay. Thank you, Ed. Uh we have, let's see, in the Almoana area, Bertha. Good morning, Bertha.
[00:32:32] Speaker 5: Good morning. I'm happy to see your article in the news today.
[00:32:37] Randall Roth: Thank you. I I didn't write him but but thank you.
[00:32:44] Speaker 5: All right. Uh first of all, I believe uh that there is an evolution of matter due to oxygenization. Uh then uh I have heard that the has expanded in circumference many times in over the centuries and that it has turned before and that there are four polarities. Uh do you have any knowledge of a pending polarity change?
[00:33:15] Randall Roth: Bertha, I have no idea what that question means and so I'm just going to ask anyone in this room who who wants to respond to that. Um Fred, you know, it's not my language. I'm I don't understand the terms. Go ahead. Okay.
[00:33:27] Fred Mackenzie: Bertha, I I assume you're referring to magnetic polarity changes. Yes. And you're absolutely right. There are changes in magnetic polarity for the planet Earth, but the timescale of those changes is much greater than the timescale of global warming. And it's also natural. It's natural.
[00:33:50] Speaker 5: feel feel uh the in other words, you feel the global warming is ahead over the changes or um Just what are you saying?
[00:33:58] Randall Roth: Exactly. What are you saying? Exactly. Okay. Global warming is a problem for the very immediate future. The changes in magnetic magnetic polarity is not a concern for the future.
[00:34:17] Speaker 5: I feel that to all of this that is happening now um with the oxygenization of of all matter. Uh is uh is conducive to and not only your greenhouse effect, but that it is a um uh You're You're saying it's all related.
[00:35:42] Randall Roth: In and in here, I understand exactly what's going on. These are little Pac-Mans, right, that are up there eating the the ozone and and I think what Ruth is pointing out is that the government is requiring that when we fix the air conditioner on our car or whatever, we use something that's a lot more expensive than what we used to use so that we somehow better protect the ozone layer. Tom Schroeder?
[00:35:56] Tom Giambelluca: This is a good example of the scientific skepticism and testing of a hypothesis that turned out to be correct. In 1973 roughly, Rolland and Molina published in Nature, the the CFC hypothesis. It took us about 20 years to get the right kind of equipment to go out and check what's actually happening up there. But for example, it took it a great risk. People flew U2s to the South Pole in conditions that planes weren't supposed to fly in to actually determine that these trace gases that were the byproduct of these CFC breakdown in the atmosphere, in the upper atmosphere, were they were present and were playing a role in the ozone depletion. So a consequence of that is, at least from the scientific viewpoint, that hypothesis has been proven. Uh it is real. It is real and action is being taken and this is a consequence of it.
[00:36:48] Randall Roth: It it's not being argued anymore. Fred was saying that the natural sequence is to argue these things and it's been argued and concluded and everybody in this room agrees that that these CFCs have had a a significant impact on ozone.
[00:37:00] Fred Mackenzie: Well, I I know that everyone in this room agrees. There are a few skeptical scientists still out there that do disagree. So you would suggest that even though it it does increase the cost of people like Ruth and and all of us, that again, not a blank check, but generally speaking, the damage potential is great enough that we should expect to incur some additional costs? No matter if if we want a reasonable environment, be it globally, locally, or regionally, we're going to have to pay for it.
[00:37:32] Speaker 6: May I just say one thing. Uh I am paying, I live in a studio and I have a refrigerator, a new refrigerator that has to be noisy all the time because of this shift.
[00:37:49] Randall Roth: Okay. Thank you, Ruth. I really appreciate your call. We have a caller from Maui. Good morning. It's Doug from Maui.
[00:38:00] Speaker 7: uh fragmented as it may be composed and then I'll get off the line and listen to the answer roundabout uh address to all the gentlemen. My concern would be in the radiation department, uh the UVB, I've heard that term thrown around. I don't know what it means. uh I've heard the Weld's sea report coming out of Antarctica. I don't know what or who those people were if it even existed. Uh regarding a study that lasted about 18 months in Antarctica down by you know south of New Zealand and um and uh of course, I go to the beach and that's the question everybody seems to be avoiding is uh what does sunbathers do? What is UVB? What does 15 mean? What does 10 mean? What is UV8? What is stay in the sun 8 uh 8 minutes and get out for your life?
[00:38:44] Speaker 8: All I know is is use one of those with a 30 on it instead of a 15. I don't know. Let's everyone's in the in studio has something to say, Doug, you've obviously had some really good questions. I'm going to start on my right with Tom Gambalucca.
[00:38:56] Speaker 7: Okay, I'll get off the line.
[00:38:57] Speaker 9: Thank you, Doug. Thanks for your question, Doug. Um yes, we're all concerned about uh increasing levels of UV UV radiation, ultraviolet radiation. UVA and B refer to two different wavelength uh ranges of the UV um spectrum and um UV is ultraviolet ultraviolet radiation, part of the sun's radiation. Uh there are different uh possible human health concerns and especially for your skin having to do with those two different uh ranges. Uh but uh the advice probably all of us would give would be to use sunscreen when you're anytime you're outdoors in Hawaii.
[00:39:30] Speaker 8: Mm-hmm. Fred, you had something to add?
[00:39:32] Speaker 10: Well, I agree with Tom on the advice that use sunscreen and and stay out of the sun particularly between 12:00 and about 2:00 or 3:00 in the afternoon. Uh the the the reason we have or potentially have enhanced UVB reaching Earth's surface obviously goes back to the problem of the destruction of the stratospheric ozone layer. So with reduced uh stratospheric ozone, we would anticipate increased UVB radiation on the surface.
[00:40:02] Speaker 8: Okay, Tom Schroder.
[00:40:04] Speaker 11: Yeah, I agree with everything that's been said, but I would like to make a point that even before the ozone uh crisis developed, if you had just looked at the UV concentrations in the Hawaiian islands or at elevation on Haliakal like that, you should have been using sunscreen anyhow because skin cancer has been an issue well before they discovered the ozone hole.
[00:40:22] Speaker 8: Fred?
[00:40:23] Speaker 10: I think we should point out that Hawaii is located in a position in which the natural ozone stratospheric ozone layer is thinned anyway. So we only have in terms of uh the the units used for measuring total column ozone, we only have about roughly 250 Dobson units here. Whereas if you go to the high northern and southern latitudes, you're looking at on the average at least 320 Dobson units, calling the difference.
[00:40:53] Speaker 9: Tom Gambalucca? Making that uh a little bit worse is the fact that uh we get more intense radiation anyway uh because of the sun's angle. So we're in the tropics, we get more intense radiation and we have less of a shield than the mid-latitudes. So even without any effects on the uh the ozone shield, we're already in a place that uh is conducive to to giving us skin problems.
[00:41:14] Speaker 8: Okay. Well, you're listening to Pop Radio. My name is Randy Roth. I have three guests in the studio with me, Fred McKenzie, Tom Gambalucca, and Tom Schroder. Each is a professor at the University of Hawaii, Manoa. Our topic is global climate change. We're talking about things like global warming, ozone depletion, uh the El Nino effect and the possibility of more and more severe hurricanes. We have some open lines if you'd like to get in on this action, just call us at 955-8821. And if you tuned in late and would like to hear the show in its entirety, tonight at 8 o'clock on KIFO 1380 AM, you'll have the entire rebroadcast. Tom Schroder.
[00:41:57] Speaker 11: Yeah, I don't know if we really discussed El Nino very much in that, really, really why don't you give us the uh the one-minute uh you know that you've written a book about. Why don't you give us the one-minute story? The one-minute that will become five minutes? Okay. Well, first of all, we should uh discuss what just briefly what El Nino is. It's badly handled in the press most of the time, but basically, we it's an phenomena that occurs on a year-to-year basis uh in the equatorial Pacific, where the ocean temperature distribution changes dramatically, it has impacts on the atmosphere. Uh the impacts on the atmosphere that we're most concerned about are changes in the wind fields which impact things like the hurricane frequency in the Atlantic. It shuts down the number of hurricanes that form in the Atlantic, though of course, Andrew occurred during an El Nino, which means it doesn't say how big they are when they do form. It does have impact for the Hawaiian Islands in that it does cause a shift in the wind circulations that will bring storms more frequently near the islands, like in Niki and Eva.
[00:42:53] Speaker 8: Does it also give us more Kona winds, Kona conditions which, you know, are are more oppressive in terms of humid and uncomfortable?
[00:43:03] Speaker 11: It gives you more Kona conditions in the uh in the uh let me say, in the winter actually, which you're uh when the subtropical ridge sits on us and we get a we go into winter drought.
[00:43:13] Speaker 8: Yeah. Okay, anything else on El Nino?
[00:43:15] Speaker 11: Uh one other comment would be that some of the local new global circulation models indicate uh that doubling CO2 may give a more frequent El Nino, more frequent El Ninos or even a perpetual El Nino as the ground state for the Pacific.
[00:43:28] Speaker 8: Okay. And one of the charts that that Fred showed me the other day, and it it didn't end up in the newspaper this morning, they evidently didn't have the space. But I guess on on Mauna Loa is it they're they're measuring the the CO2, the carbon dioxide in the air on a daily or weekly or monthly basis. And this chart, Fred, over the last 20 or 30 years, it was just as constant and predictable as possible heading up on the chart. Tell us a little bit about the implications of that.
[00:43:55] Speaker 10: Well, the Mauna Loa curve, the record of carbon atmospheric carbon dioxide from Mauna Loa was um started really by Dave Keeling at Scripps Institute of Oceanography in 1958. And at that time, there were recorded at Mauna Loa, 315 parts per million by volume of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. That simply means that for every million parts of air, you had about 315 parts of carbon dioxide. Today, in actual fact, last year at Mauna Loa, the record broke 360 parts per million by volume. The globe currently has approximately globally now, 359 parts per million by volume. So there has been a continuous rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration as recorded at Mauna Loa and a number of other stations throughout the world.
[00:44:52] Speaker 8: Do we do we speculate, we being scientists, since I'm among scientists, that that's a a leading indicator or a following indicator, or how does how does that relate to global warming?
[00:45:04] Speaker 10: Well, carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas. That means it will absorb earth radiation that's re-radiated back to space and cause a heating of the planet. So we would anticipate at scientists the more carbon dioxide we add to the atmosphere, the more the potential for global warming.
[00:45:23] Speaker 8: Okay. Well, we've got some callers on the line. First, Tina from McCully. Good morning, Tina.
[00:45:28] Speaker 12: Good morning. Uh someone earlier, I don't know who on the panel, mentioned that there's a connection between ozone depletion and global warming. I'd like to hear more about that, please.
[00:45:38] Speaker 8: Uh Fred, I think that was you.
[00:45:40] Speaker 10: Yes, um ozone depletion, stratospheric ozone depletion actually tends to cool the atmosphere. Uh whereas global warming tend tends obviously to warm the atmosphere. Now, it's been shown again, this is through model calculations, that the cooling of the atmosphere owing to stratospheric ozone depletion is about equivalent to the warming of the lower atmosphere due to the introduction of CFCs, Freon 11 and Freon 12 into the atmosphere. And those compounds are greenhouse gases. So these freons destroy stratospheric ozone, but they are also greenhouse gases. In destroying stratospheric ozone, they cool the planet. In terms of their accumulation in the atmosphere, they warm the planet.
[00:46:37] Speaker 8: This is one of those reasons why it's so difficult to predict, right?
[00:46:40] Speaker 10: Absolutely. This is just one reason.
[00:46:42] Speaker 8: Okay. Tom Schroder?
[00:46:43] Speaker 11: A subtle point also that when we're looking at, when we're talking about global warming, we're talking about surface warming and if we talk, if we do radiative equilibrium for the entire atmosphere, warming of the surface actually would be correspond to some cooling aloft anyhow. And a critical thing on the activation of these these CFC byproducts is the temperature. That's why the ozone, the strange interactions occur up in in the Antarctic during the Antarctic winter because it's cold.
[00:47:08] Speaker 8: Okay. Tom Gambalucca?
[00:47:09] Speaker 9: Uh just one comment there. Um Fred had talked about possible um uh effects that counter one another. In other words, there are things that humans are doing that are affecting the climate and may cancel one another out. I think there's some danger in assuming that everything will be okay if we have cancelling effects because there may be other internal changes so whereas we might have warming due to one effect and cooling to another, they may change the way the energy is distributed and have effects that are very difficult to anticipate.
[00:47:36] Speaker 8: Okay, Fred?
[00:47:37] Speaker 10: Well, I think it should be pointed out that the recent report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change to be published this year, will actually look has looked into these effects in some detail. And the the cooling effect due to sulfate aerosols in the atmosphere, the cooling effect due to the enhanced cloudiness plus the warming effect due to potential greenhouse warming effect.
[00:48:06] Speaker 8: Okay, Tina, thank you for your call. That was very interesting. We've got a number of folks on the line and we're running down to the last 13 or so minutes of our show, so we're going to try and move a little bit more quickly. Esther from Waikiki, good morning.
[00:48:20] Speaker 13: Aloha. This has to do with the global global warming. And I have um noticed in the past four years that we're losing a tremendous amount of our feeling stations to development. Um I feel that we are using fossil fuels which are actually natural bowel movements of the earth. They're are filling our everything. At any rate, I have an idea that if we begin to use solar energy, which is natural to Hawaii, you know, using the lava which is system of uh passive solar that uh we could create an ideal situation here and have solar.
[00:49:01] Speaker 8: Okay. Let me Let me get a reaction to that, Tom. Thank you, Esther.
[00:49:07] Speaker 9: I think all of us agree 100% that we should be using solar energy here in Hawaii and it is a resource that uh uh is very valuable to us and is possible replacement for some of the fossil fuel use.
[00:49:19] Speaker 8: Okay. Esther, thank you very much. Again, we've got all our lines are full right now, and I'm going to try to
[00:49:23] Speaker 13: And I know changes are coming fast. Aloha. I love you guys.
[00:49:31] Speaker 8: Thank you, Esther. We have uh Tony from Round Top. Good morning, Tony.
[00:49:36] Speaker 14: Oh good morning guys. Uh just a quick question and I'll get off and let you talk. Um I'm very curious with the budget cutbacks at the university and NSF nationally, apparently no federal funding for anything anymore. How's this going to affect your ability to keep figuring out what we need to do?
[00:49:53] Speaker 8: Yeah, great question, and I think all our listeners realize that everyone in in this room here in the studio is at the University of Hawaii. Fred, uh what do you think of Tony's question?
[00:50:03] Speaker 10: An excellent question, Tony. And do you remember Sputnik? In 1957.
[00:50:09] Speaker 8: Oh, we lost Tony. Go ahead.
[00:50:11] Speaker 10: Well, anyway, prior to Sputnik, science science was in a demise after World War II in terms of research funding. Also scientific education was in a lull and it took Sputnik to wake the people up and money to be transferred into science and science education. In my opinion, right now we are in the same situation and rightly or wrongly, we have a a Congress uh in power right now that is not overly sympathetic towards these environmental problems.
[00:50:44] Speaker 8: I I just realized I was suggesting earlier that no matter what side you're on, somebody's going to say you're biased. The obvious bias, Fred, is that you're trying to get people as worried about this as we were about Sputnik. What do you think?
[00:50:55] Speaker 10: Well, I think there is real worry now in terms of science. And I am trying to get people worried about it.
[00:51:02] Speaker 8: I'm just kidding. We're going to get a comment from Tom Schroder, and then we're going to try to move through the rest of our callers. Go ahead, Tom.
[00:51:07] Speaker 11: Well, for there are there have been some uh some rather outspoken uh scientists who have been pushing agendas who have kind of caused a a bit a little bit of a feedback, probably. I know the the line that I still sticks in my mind is we have a somewhat distinguished congressman from Orange County who referred to everything we're talking about here today as liberal claptrap, for example.
[00:51:30] Speaker 8: All right. Well, we're going to keep moving uh in case you joined us late, this is Pop Radio. We're talking about global climate change. I have three professors from the University of Hawaii, Manoa. Fred McKenzie, who is a professor of oceanography, Tom Gambalucca, who is a professor in the geography department, and Tom Schroder, a professor of meteorology. Um if you'd like to, well, I'm not even going to give you the phone number because we've got so many people on on the line. Um I I just want to add as a as a member of the faculty at UH, it's really an an honor to have these three gentlemen in here this morning. They not only have extremely impressive uh research credentials but all are highly regarded by students at UH as being excellent teachers. Well, let's keep moving and see if we can get to all of our callers. We've got Glenn on Maui. Good morning, Glenn.
[00:52:16] Speaker 15: Good morning. Uh this is a this is a good show. I appreciate it. Uh this is a uh question for Dr. Schroder. Uh as you know, uh Tom, uh Dr. William Gray at Colorado State University and uh has done a very fantastic job of forecasting this really hyper uh hurricane season in the Atlantic Ocean. I'm just wondering why isn't anybody doing that sort of thing for the Pacific Ocean? And also, is there a link you see between when it's very active in the Atlantic that we're having a very slow season hurricane-wise in the Pacific?
[00:52:49] Speaker 11: Uh that's a good question. I think my uh my somewhat skeptical comment would be on the first part that the reason uh no one has quote looked at it is that people probably have looked at it and haven't found as clear cut a pattern that uh as Gray has uh found in the Atlantic uh I've I have spent a good bit of time looking at this and you find out that I can come up with counterexamples to confute ever every generality that we put forward on uh tropical storms out in this area. So it seems like the Atlantic behaves a little differently. There are several other issues uh in there on that one. So uh that would be my comment on that part.
[00:53:26] Speaker 8: Okay. Glenn, thank you for your call. We have Just from the Big Island. Good morning, Just.
[00:53:31] Speaker 16: Oh, good morning. Thank you. Um living over here in the path of uh hurricanes, uh every time there's a warning, uh we kind of get ready, and uh then we're uh happily not disappointed when it uh is deflected or uh changes direction or just uh kind of peter's out.
[00:53:51] Speaker 16: No, I I've heard that uh an explanation for this is that uh uh these uh cyclones require the warm moist air uh from the ocean uh created by the uh sun uh uh heating the uh moisture out of the ocean and that uh because of our uh great mass of dry land and cold air high up on top of the mountain, that it it just kind of defuels and deflects uh these hurricanes so that even though uh South Point is in the direct path of almost every hurricane in the North Pacific here, uh we we just seem to be impervious and invulnerable, that there it doesn't seem to be any record of this uh ever hitting uh the the uh four force hurricane winds.
[00:54:42] Speaker 8: Let's get a reaction from Tom Schroder because this is real similar to something raised earlier, and I know, Tom, you have a strong opinion on this.
[00:54:48] Speaker 11: Well, there are two issues here. In 1871, a tropical cyclone of without no anemometers don't know the strength, the tropical cyclone went right through Waimea, right over Havi, and recurved over Maui. So yes, and uh the other comment would be that we again, I I made a scaling argument earlier, but uh there have been the story for Maui about this before. You think it's cold up at the top of the mountains there, but you got to realize that those at that at that elevation, it's cold in the hurricane also. And that actually on a given day when the sun's shining on Mauna Loa like it is right now, the temperature on Mauna Loa is substantially hotter than it is 100 miles east of the island.
[00:55:26] Speaker 9: Uh I just wanted to uh remind Tom about a uh an illustration he did in a guest lecture in one of my classes one time that I thought was very good about how rare it is for the destructive part of a hurricane to cross any particular point in the ocean. And and this addresses the question of you know we see all these uh storms coming across they rarely hit a particular point. Tom, do you remember that? Can you construct?
[00:55:47] Speaker 11: I don't remember the exact illustration, but the total the total area of uh damaging winds in a of winds that we really worry about like say hurricane-strength winds in a hurricane and Niki were the only about 50 nautical miles, a very narrow swath. Uh and the uh so we're a fairly small target and so it is it takes a real you know real good luck or bad luck to get the, you know the only, we've only had two times, one real good time where an eye of a hurricane went over a Hawaiian island. Yeah, but what I said originally was that uh they seem to be uh directly on uh the target uh on the path towards South Point or Hilo or Puna, and uh they uh almost invariably turn away.
[00:56:26] Speaker 8: Let's just get a quick response, then we need to move on because we're running out of time.
[00:56:30] Speaker 11: A follow-up point to that would be the one thing that helps us much of the time is that there are winds aloft in the upper atmosphere that are usually blowing from the west or southwest, and they run into that wind environment, that's at 35,000 feet when they get out near the islands, and that tends to shear them apart, as we say, or rip them apart. So and that happens whether it's the Big Island or Oahu or Kauai. Storms coming from the east do have to fight through a long way through a rather uh adverse environment to get to us, but it's not because the island's big.
[00:56:57] Speaker 16: So just don't stop getting ready, right?
[00:57:00] Randall Roth: We're recording out there. Pay attention. Thank you, Jeff. We're quickly running out of time and we're not going to get to everyone, but let's take one more call. Mike from Manoa. Good morning, Mike.
[00:57:08] Speaker 17: Good morning. This is regarding global warming and this week's issue of Time Magazine, there was a two page article on something called the International Panel on Climate Change and apparently sponsored by the UN and with a lot of input from all over the world. And they came to the conclusion that there was a possibility of severe climate change, 6 degrees Fahrenheit increase in temperatures over the next 100 years and 3 feet in the sea level. And I wondered what your panel might think about their findings and I'll hang up and listen. Thank you.
[00:57:41] Randall Roth: Well, great question to end the show on. Let's start. Fred, I think you're real familiar with that group.
[00:57:47] Fred Mackenzie: Oh, I read the article. I not only read the article, but I was a member, I am a member of the intergovernmental panel on climate change.
[00:57:56] Randall Roth: We've got just a few seconds. Can you quickly respond to Mike's point?
[00:57:58] Fred Mackenzie: I think your numbers that you quoted are a little bit on the extreme in terms of the next century. We would anticipate from what we know today the potential of about a 0.8 to 2.5 degree centigrade increase in temperature and a sea level rise on the order of 10 cm to 80 cm. The numbers have been lowered from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change volume of 1990 because of certain variables that were not included in that older report.
[00:58:36] Randall Roth: Okay. Tom Schroeder, you've got 10 seconds and then I got to go.
[00:58:39] Tom Giambelluca: Okay. We'll just real quick noting the numbers that Mike cited on the phone there versus what Fred just said. If you look very closely, you notice Mike, what you've got there are the two that Fred's extreme range or the numbers that are close to what you're quoting there. And that's stands like standard headline writer material.
[00:58:54] Randall Roth: You guys are a little critical of the media on this topic.
[00:58:56] Fred Mackenzie: Well, in actual fact, I don't like the term apocalypse and it was used in that Time Magazine article.
[00:59:01] Randall Roth: Okay. Well, I want to thank my guest Fred McKenzie, Tom Giambelluca, and Tom Schroeder, each of whom is an outstanding member of the faculty at the University of Hawaii, each of whom is highly regarded by students for their teaching ability and concern. Our director of operations is Jeff Alardi. Subbing for Suzy Roth this morning as producer was Jenny Tanji. You've been listening to the Price of Paradise Radio Show. I'm Randy Roth. Aloha.