GLOBAL WARMING: 2007 FORECAST TO BE WARMEST YEAR EVER
January 4, 2007 at 4:26 pm | Posted in Globalization, History, Research, Science & Technology | Leave a comment
The Met Office is the UK’s National Weather Service
News release
4 January 2007
2007 – forecast to be the warmest year yet
For further information: |
| Met Office Press Office +44 (0)1392 886655 |
| E-mail: pressoffice@metoffice.gov.uk |
| Met Office Customer Centre 0870 900 0100 |
| If you’re outside the UK +44 (0)1392 885680 |
2007 is likely to be the warmest year on record globally, beating the current record set in 1998, say climate-change experts at the Met Office.
Each January the Met Office, in conjunction with the University of East Anglia, issues a forecast of the global surface temperature for the coming year. The forecast takes into account known contributing factors, such as solar effects, El Niño, greenhouse gases concentrations and other multi-decadal influences. Over the previous seven years, the Met Office forecast of annual global temperature has proved remarkably accurate, with a mean forecast error size of just 0.06 °C.
Met Office global forecast for 2007
- Global temperature for 2007 is expected to be 0.54 °C above the long-term (1961-1990) average of 14.0 °C;
- There is a 60% probability that 2007 will be as warm or warmer than the current warmest year (1998 was +0.52 °C above the long-term 1961-1990 average).
The potential for a record 2007 arises partly from a moderate-strength El Niño already established in the Pacific, which is expected to persist through the first few months of 2007. The lag between El Niño and the full global surface temperature response means that the warming effect of El Niño is extended and therefore has a greater influence the global temperatures during the year.
Katie Hopkins from Met Office Consulting said: “This new information represents another warning that climate change is happening around the world. Our work in the climate change consultancy team applies Met Office research to help businesses mitigate against risk and adapt at a strategic level for success in the new environment.”
Review of 2006 in the UK
This startling forecast follows hard on the heels of news that 2006 was the warmest year on record across the UK.
For 2006, all UK data have now been gathered, revealing a similar story to that of Central England Temperature already announced last month.
For the whole of the UK, 2006 was the warmest year on record with a mean temperature of 9.7 °C, 1.1 °C above the 1971-2000 long-term average. Ranked warmest years in the series going back to 1914 are:
2006 9.73 °C 2003 9.51 °C 2004 9.48 °C 2002 9.48 °C 2005 9.46 °C
Mean temperature, sunshine and rainfall for regions of the UK compared with the long-term average
|
UK regional averages for 2006, anomalies with respect to 1971-2000 |
||||||
| Region |
Mean temp |
Sunshine |
Rainfall |
|||
|
Actual [°C] |
Anom [°C] |
Actual [hours] |
Anom [%] |
Actual [mm] |
Anom [%] |
|
| UK |
9.7 |
+1.1 |
1,507 |
113 |
1,176 |
104 |
| England |
10.6 |
+1.2 |
1,638 |
112 |
8,51 |
102 |
| Wales |
9.9 |
+1.0 |
1,534 |
113 |
1,420 |
99 |
| Scotland |
8.3 |
+1.1 |
1,300 |
112 |
1,652 |
109 |
| N Ireland |
9.6 |
+1.0 |
1,409 |
115 |
1,156 |
104 |
Autumn 2006 (September to November) was also exceptionally mild over many parts of Europe at more than 3 °C above the climatological average from north of the Alps to southern Norway. In many countries it was the warmest autumn since official measurements began.
Notes:
- The Met Office is the UK’s National Weather Service, providing world-renowned scientific excellence in weather and climate change.
- Met Office climate change consultancy provides data and risk-management services that are used by other government departments and agencies, the private sector and the public to mitigate and adapt to climate change.
- Met Office Hadley Centre for Climate Change is funded by Defra and the MoD.
- The 95% confidence range of the global forecast is that the temperature will lie between 0.38 °C to 0.70 °C above normal.
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/corporate/pressoffice/2007/pr20070104.html
ARMY COUNTERINSURGENCY MANUAL
January 4, 2007 at 5:45 am | Posted in Books, Military, USA | Leave a comment
New US Army counterinsurgency manual.
The manual, a public document, can be read at:
http://usacac.army.mil/cac/repository/materials/coin-fm3-24.pdf
From the foreword:
This manual is designed to fill a doctrinal gap. It has been 20 years since the Army published a field manual devoted exclusively to counterinsurgency operations. For the Marine Corps it has been 25 years. With our Soldiers and Marines fighting insurgents in Afghanistan and Iraq, it is essential that we give them a manual that provides principles and guidelines for counterinsurgency operations. Such guidance must be grounded in historical studies. However, it also must be informed by contemporary experiences.
This manual takes a general approach to counterinsurgency operations. The Army and Marine Corps recognize that every insurgency is contextual and presents its own set of challenges. You cannot fight former Saddamists and Islamic extremists the same way you would have fought the Viet Cong, Moros, or Tupamaros; the application of principles and fundamentals to deal with each varies considerably. Nonetheless, all insurgencies, even today’s highly adaptable strains, remain wars amongst the people. They use variations of standard themes and adhere to elements of a recognizable revolutionary campaign plan.
This manual therefore addresses the common characteristics of insurgencies. It strives to provide those conducting counterinsurgency campaigns with a solid foundation for understanding and addressing specific insurgencies.
From the “Intelligence in Counterinsurgency” chapter:
3-7. Intelligence preparation of the battlefield is the systematic, continuous process of analyzing the threat and environment in a specific geographic area. Intelligence preparation of the battlefield (IPB) is designed to support the staff estimate and military decision-making process. Most intelligence requirements are generated as a result of the IPB process and its interrelation with the decision-making process (FM 34-130).
Planning for deployment begins with a thorough mission analysis, including IPB. IPB is accomplished in four steps:
- Define the operational environment.
- Describe the effects of the operational environment.
- Evaluate the threat.
- Determine threat courses of action.
3-8. The purpose of planning and IPB before deployment is to develop an understanding of the operational environment. This understanding drives planning and predeployment training. Predeployment intelligence must be as detailed as possible. It should focus on the host nation, its people, and insurgents in the area of operations (AO).
Commanders and staffs use predeployment intelligence to establish a plan for addressing the underlying causes of the insurgency and to prepare their units to interact with the populace appropriately. The goal of planning and preparation is for commanders and their subordinates not to be surprised by what they encounter in theater.
3-9. IPB in COIN operations follows the methodology described in FM 34-130/FMFRP 3-23-2.
However, it places greater emphasis on civil considerations, especially people and leaders in the AO, than does IPB for conventional operations. IPB is continuous and its products are revised throughout the mission.
Nonetheless, predeployment products are of particular importance for the reasons explained above. Whenever possible, planning and preparation for deployment includes a thorough and detailed IPB. IPB in COIN requires personnel to work in areas like economics, anthropology, and governance that may be outside their expertise. Therefore, integrating staffs and drawing on the knowledge of nonintelligence personnel and external experts with local and regional knowledge are critical to effective preparation.
3-10. Deployed units are the best sources of intelligence. Deploying units should make an effort to reach forward to deployed units. The Secret Internet Protocol Router Network (SIPRNET) allows deploying units to immerse themselves virtually in the situation in theater. Government agencies, such as the Department of State, U.S. Agency for International Development, and intelligence agencies, can often provide country studies and other background information as well.
3-11. Open-source intelligence is information of potential intelligence value that is available to the general public (JP 1-02). It is important to predeployment IPB. In many cases, background information on the populations, cultures, languages, history, and governments of states in an AO is in open sources. Open sources include books, magazines, encyclopedias, Web sites, tourist maps, and atlases. Academic sources, such as journal articles and university professors, can also be of great benefit.
TAIWANESE ECONOMIC PLANNERS & PROFESSOR MEADE BOOK
January 4, 2007 at 4:40 am | Posted in Asia, Books, Economics, Financial, Globalization, History | Leave a comment
A Political Explanation of Economic Growth
State Survival, Bureaucratic Politics, and Private Enterprises in the Making of Taiwan’s Economy, 1950-1985.
HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS
Yongping Wu
Taiwan is a classic case of export-led industrialization. But unlike South Korea and Japan, where large firms have been the major exporters, before the late 1980s Taiwan’s successful exporters were overwhelmingly small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The SMEs became the engine of the entire economy, yet for many years the state virtually ignored the SMEs and their role as exporters.
What factors account for the success of the SMEs and their benign neglect by the state? The key was a strict division of labor: state and large private enterprises jointly monopolized the domestic market. This gave the SMEs a free run in export markets. How did this industrial structure come into being? The author argues that it was an unintended consequence of the state’s policy toward the private sector and its political strategies for managing societal forces. Indeed, Taiwan’s unique industrial structure was shaped by both the witting and the unwitting interactions of the state and the private sector.
Moreover, as the author shows, this industrial policy was a product of the internal politics of the economic bureaucracy, and the formulation and implementation of economic policy hinged on mechanisms for solving differences within the state.
Comment: Yongping Wu in his A Political Explanation of Economic Growth, mentions James Meade’s “Planning and the Price Mechanism” as a kind of bible for early Taiwanese economic planners.
Planning and the Price Mechanism: The Liberal-Socialist Solution
by James Edward Meade. 132 pgs.
Publication details
Contributors: James Edward Meade
Publisher: Macmillan
Place of Publication: New York
Publication Year: 1949
Prices & Economic Policy,
Table of contents
ENDLESS UNIVERSE: BOOK
January 4, 2007 at 3:35 am | Posted in Books, History, Philosophy, Research, Science & Technology | Leave a comment
Endless Universe
A New History of the Cosmos
Written by:
Paul J. Steinhardt and Neil Turok
- Category: Science – Cosmology
- Format: Hardcover, 256 pages
- On Sale: June 5, 2007
- Price: $24.95
- ISBN: 978-0-385-50964-0 (0-385-50964-2)
ABOUT THIS BOOK
The Big Bang theory–widely regarded as the leading explanation for the origin of the universe–posits that space and time sprang into being about 14 billion years ago in a hot, expanding fireball of nearly infinite density. Over the last three decades, the theory has repeatedly had to be revised to address such issues as how galaxies and stars first formed and why the expansion of the universe is speeding up today. Furthermore, an explanation has yet to be found for what caused the Big Bang in the first place.
In ENDLESS UNIVERSE, Paul J. Steinhardt and Neil Turok, both distinguished theoretical physicists, present a bold new cosmology. Steinhardt and Turok “contend that what we think of as the moment of creation was simply part of an infinite cycle of titanic collisions between our universe and a parallel world” (Discover).
They recount remarkable developments in astronomy, particle physics, and superstring theory that together form the basis of their groundbreaking “Cyclic Universe” theory. According to this picture, the Big Bang was not the beginning of time, but the bridge to a past filled with endlessly repeating cycles of evolution, each accompanied by the creation of new matter and the formation of new galaxies, stars, and planets. Written in an engrossing style, ENDLESS UNIVERSE provides answers to longstanding problems with the Big Bang model, while offering a provocative new view of both the past and the future of the cosmos. It is a “theory that could solve cosmic mystery” (USA TODAY).
http://www.randomhouse.com/catalog/display.pperl?isbn=9780385509640
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