Archives of the
Global Climate Change Digest
A Guide to Information on Greenhouse Gases and Ozone Depletion
Published July 1988 through June 1999

"Keynote Address," D.J. Baker (NOAA, Rm. 5128 HCHB, 14th & Constitution NW, Washington DC 20230), Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc., 75(6), 1088-1094, June 1994.

In this address to the 1994 annual meeting of the American Meteorological Society, the administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration describes the need for a global observing system for the environment, and the development now underway of the Global Climate, Global Terrestrial and Global Oceanic Observing Systems (GCOS, GTOS and GOOS, respectively).

"Younger Dryas Age Advance of Franz Josef Glacier in the Southern Alps of New Zealand," G.H. Denton (Dept. Geol. Sci., Univ. Maine, Orono ME 04469), C.H. Heady, Science, 264(5164), June 3, 1994.

The Younger Dryas episode of marked climatic cooling after the initial retreat of the latest ice sheets has been well documented in the North Atlantic region. Radiocarbon dating of a terminal moraine in New Zealand presented here suggests that the Younger Dryas was a worldwide event, and that its source may lie in the atmosphere rather than in a North Atlantic thermohaline switch.

Two related items in Science, 264(5161), May 13, 1994:

• "Distant Effects of Volcanism--How Big and How Often?" T. Simkin (Global Volcanism Prog., Natl. Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Inst., Washington DC 20560), 913-914. Puts the following article in a research perspective, and discusses how interdisciplinary approaches are providing a better understanding of the relation between volcanism and climate change.

• "Record of Volcanism Since 7000 B.C. from the GISP2 Greenland Ice Core and Implications for the Volcano-Climate System," G.A. Zielinski (Inst. Study of Earth, Oceans & Space, Univ. New Hampshire, Durham NH 03824), 948-952. The analysis shows a period of elevated sulfate deposition in Greenland ice during the period 5000-7000 B.C., reflecting increased volcanism in the early Holocene that may have contributed to climatic cooling.

"Modeling the Climate Effect of Unrestricted Greenhouse Emissions over the next 10,000 Years," K.-Y. Kim (Dept. Meteor., Texas A&M Univ., College Sta. TX 77843), T.J. Crowley, Geophys. Res. Lett., 21(8), 681-684, Apr. 15, 1994.

Uses an energy-balance model coupled to an upwelling-diffusion deep-ocean model to the estimate the effect of utilizing a substantial fraction of the World's fossil fuel reservoir. Greenhouse warming would peak in the period 2200-2400 at 4-13°C greater than present, dominating the Milankovitch effects occurring over the same interval.

"The Importance of Atmospheric Chemistry in the Calculation of Radiative Forcing on the Climate System," D.A. Hauglustaine (Service d' Aéronomie, CNRS, Univ. Paris VI, BP 102, F-75252 Paris Cedex 05, France), C. Granier et al., J. Geophys. Res., 99(D1), 1173-1186, Jan. 20, 1994.

Investigates anthropogenic changes in the chemical composition of the atmosphere since preindustrial times, using a two-dimensional model in which dynamics, radiation and chemistry are treated interactively. Finds significant increases in the oxidizing capacity of the troposphere, and ozone depletion of up to 60% of preindustrial levels in the Antarctic lower stratosphere. The radiative results emphasize the potentially important role of chemical feedbacks on climate, and indicate that the direct forcing associated with increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases is enhanced about 30% by these feedbacks.