High temperatures in the Arctic

The NOAA map below shows sea surface temperature anomalies above 8 degrees Celsius in the Arctic Ocean.

These anomalies are very high, considering that it is now June and the melting season has only just begun.

Partly causing these high temperatures in the Arctic Ocean is water flowing into the Arctic Ocean from rivers. As the map below shows, a number of large rivers flowing through Siberia end in the Arctic Ocean.

map from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Rs-map.png

The Naval Research Laboratory image below shows waters with very low salinity levels (top white rectangles) where warm water from rivers in Siberia enters the Arctic Ocean.

Accelerated warming of the Arctic has changed (and is still further changing) the Jet Streams, increasing the occurence of heat waves on the Norhern Hemisphere that cause huge amounts of warm water to flow into the Arctic Ocean. This is illustrated by the animation below.

[ note: animation is a 2 MB file that may take some time to fully load - click on image to enlarge ]

Another spot to watch, indicated on above map with the bottom white rectangle, is where the Mackenzie River flows into the Beaufort Sea. In this area, sea surface temperatures up to ~17°C (63°F) were recorded from June 26 to 28, 2014, as illustrated by the image below.

As the map below shows, similarly high sea surface temperatures were recorded in the Bering Strait.

High temperatures over North America are making the situation worse. On June 28, 2014, temperatures as high as 27°C (81°F) were recorded in the north of Canada and temperatures as high as 23°C (74°F) were recorded in Alaska, as the map below illustrates.

[ click on image to enlarge ]

The 15-hour forecast below, run on June 29, 2014, shows temperatures in the north of North America of up to ~30°C (86°F) in many areas.

As long as the soil is frozen and covered with snow and ice, much of the sunlight is reflected back into space, while much of the sunlight that gets absorbed goes into melting the snow and ice. Once the snow and ice has melted, that energy goes into heating up the soil. The energy required to melt a volume of ice can raise the temperature of the same volume of rock by 150º C.

In Greenland, meltwater percolation is causing latent heat transport into the firn, making it warm up by as much as +5.7°C at midlevel elevations (1400–2500 m), according to a recent study by Polashenski et al.

The situation is particularly dire for the Arctic Ocean, due to the very warm water on the Northern Hemisphere, currently featuring a sea surface temperature anomaly above 1.5º C, as illustrated by above image.

The prospect of an El Niño event striking this year now is 90%, according to predictions by the European Centre for Medium-range Weather Forecasts.

Arctic sea ice volume minimum is typically reached around halfway into September.

This is still months away, and the number of days the Arctic Ocean is covered by sea ice has fallen dramatically over the years, as illustrated by the image on the right, from a recent study by Claire Parkinson.

The danger is that heat will penetrate sediments underneath the Arctic Ocean that contain huge amounts of methane in the form of hydrates and free gas, resulting in huge eruptions of methane from the seafloor of the Arctic ocean, as described at the methane-hydrates blog.

This risk is intolerable and calls for comprehensive and effective action, as discussed at the Climate Plan blog.

Post by Sam Carana.

Middle East Is "Sizzling" - ISIS Will Ultimately Turn To Israel

The paragraph at the bottom of this first article is key. ISIS is closing in around Israel and will soon be in a position to attack. Make no mistake about it - the ultimate goal is Israel; it always has been and it always will be. Now, it is just a matter of time. 

Mid East Is Sizzling: Armed U.S. Drones Over Baghdad, Saudi, Jordanian Tanks Deploy

To the south of Lebanon, Israel’s unusually mild military retaliation against “terrorist targets” in Gaza for the swelling hail of rockets aimed day by day at Ashkelon, Hof Ashkelon and the Eshkol District , points to a decision by Israel’s government military leaders to avoid being dragged into the cauldron boiling up around its borders.

Israel’s armed forces and three intelligence services, the Shin Bet, Mossad and AMAN,  are in fact nursing the blow to their prestige from the failure of their massive, all-out hunt of two weeks discover the three teenagers abducted on June 10.

Some serious soul-searching is taking place about the wisdom of throwing all of the IDF’s deterrent strength against the kidnappers, who have since been identified as a pair of Hamas operatives, who outsmarted Israel’s mightiest resources and vanished off the face of the earth with their captives.

Israel’s conduct in this episode appears in retrospect to have been ruled less by sense than by emotions.
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu was sidetracked by his fixed desire for a reckoning with Hamas and with the Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas for dealing with this extremist group – notwithstanding their near-irrelevance to the main stream of events in the region.

Three months after Israel’s National Intelligence Estimate judged the prospect of a conventional war close to nil, Al Qaeda’s cohorts are grabbing wide stretches of Iraq and knocking on the doors of Jordan and Saudi Arabia.

Iran, Hizballah - and now ISIS - must be wondering what makes Israel tick in view of this behavior.  Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi’s jihadis are fighting under the flag of the Islamist State of Iraq and the Levant. For them, the Levant is not just Syria and Lebanon and Jordan, but also “Palestine” i.e. Israel.

Jerusalem had better wake up fast. Jordan and Saudi Arabia have deployed tank divisions on their borders against ISIS encroachments. The two kingdoms are Israel’s eastern and southern next door neighbors.

After Direct Hit On Sderot Factory, Two More Rockets Fired At Israel

Residents in the Sdot Negev Regional Council took cover Saturday night as another barrage of rockets was launched from the Gaza Strip, following a direct hit on a Sderot paint factory earlier in the evening.

The two rockets in the second salvo likely landed in open territory, according to initial reports, bringing the total amount of projectiles launched at Israel Saturday night to four.

Four people were injured in Sderot after the factory was set ablaze by the rocket. Four employees were reportedly inside the factory at the time, but managed to escape unharmed.

Sderot mayor Alon Davidi said after the incident that the residents of Sderot would not be “deterred by the atrocious acts of terrorists, who fire rockets at population centers.”

“We stand firmly behind the aims of the prime minister, the defense minister and the army chief who are operating to bring the boys back home as well as a sense of normalcy to us all,” he said.

The latest series of attacks came amid an escalation of hostilities along Israel’s southern border with the Palestinian enclave as IDF troops scour the West Bank for three missing Israeli teenagers, Naftali Fraenkel, Eyal Yifrach and Gil-ad Shaar. Israel has accused Hamas of carrying out the June 12 abduction of the teens and named two Hamas men as being the masterminds.

The rocket that hit Sderot marked the first direct hit on an Israeli target since the recent escalation in rocket fire on Israel from the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip.

The rocket fire came after Israel and Gaza operatives were engaged in a series of retaliatory attacks over the past 48 hours.

Early Saturday morning, Israel planes struck Hamas military targets in the Gaza Strip in response to rocket fire from the Palestinian territory hours before.

Residents of the coastal enclave reported multiple explosions, and the IDF said in a statement that it targeted “two terror activity sites and a weapons manufacturing facility in the central Gaza Strip, and a weapons storage facility in the southern Gaza Strip.” The Israeli military confirmed direct hits. 

On Friday evening, Israel’s Iron Dome system intercepted two rockets launched at southern Israel from the Gaza Strip following the targeted assassination by Israel of two Gaza operatives.

The Coming NAU, UN in America, Jordan Requesting U.S./Israeli Intervention Against ISIS

There is certainly a lot going on recently regarding the signs we watch on a routine basis, and things seem to be falling into place rapidly. All of this is painfully predictable based upon biblical prophecy:

'After America Comes North America'

Former general and CIA chief David Petraeus (shown), a key figure in the globalist Council on Foreign Relationsand the shadowy Bilderberg network, boasted at a recent conference that the United States of America is set to be merged into the continental regime being erected under the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Speaking at the Margaret Thatcher Conference on Liberty last week in London, the ex-commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan and Iraq essentially celebrated the end of U.S. independence — and by extension, the demise of the Constitution.   

“After America comes North America,” Petraeus said confidently in answering the question about what comes after the United States, the theme of the panel discussion. “Are we on the threshold of the North American decade, question mark? I threw that away — threw away the question mark — and boldly proclaimed the coming North American decade, says the title now.” He also boasted about how the three economies have been put “together” over the last 20 years as part of the “implementation” of the North American Free Trade Act.

The “highly integrated” forces of Canada, the United States, and Mexico, Petraeus continued, will become the world’s powerhouse for energy and science. “There are four revolutions that are ongoing at various levels in each of the countries but foremost in the United States,” said the former CIA chief, who now serves as chairman of the KKR Global Institute. “The energy revolution is the first of those, which has created the biggest change in geopolitics since the rise of China since 1978.” The other “revolutions” include IT, manufacturing, and life sciences, which, “as highly integrated as they are, allow you to argue that after America comes North America,” he added.

Most of the establishment press missed Petraeus’ comments at the summit, as well as the significance of what he was saying. Outside of the alternative media and a blog post about the London gathering in the U.K. Telegraph, in fact, there was virtually no coverage of the comments on the “North American” superpower that the senior establishment figure openly claimed was going to take over after America’s dominance fades.

One of the few to catch it all was reporter David Knight at Infowars. “He essentially dances on the grave of the sovereign state of America that he says is being replaced, or has been replaced, by NAFTA,” Knight said in a newscast about Petraeus’ extreme comments. “Of course, it's ironic that Margaret Thatcher was essentially driven out of being the U.K. prime minister after she opposed the idea of getting rid of nation-states in the European Union when she went to Bilderberg.” In recent years, Petraeus has become a regular at the annual Bilderberg summits, where top globalists in Big Business and Big Government meet.

It is not the first time, though, that Petraeus has been openly touting the establishment dream of building a “North America” by smashing American sovereignty — and by extension, self-government and guarantees for individual liberties under the U.S. Constitution. Earlier this year, for example, writing in the CFR’s Foreign Affairs publication, Petraeus was similarly boasting about the ongoing merger in a piece entitled “Perfect Partners: North America's Shared Future” he authored with fellow fringe globalist and ex-World Bank President Robert Zoellick. 

In the piece, the globalist duo wrote that “all three countries have the chance to forge a new forward-looking agenda for North American competitiveness and integration.” The term integration, of course, was and continues to be used to describe what is happening around the world as formerly sovereign nations are merged into unaccountable regional regimes such as the EU, the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR), the African Union, ASEAN, the Gulf Cooperation Council, and more. Globalists around the world often use the term “New World Order” to publicly describe the end game. 

The three “democracies” in North America, he said, need a “common vision” so the “region” can “meet its full potential.” While NAFTA laid the foundation, Petraeus said what is required now is “a comprehensive and interlocking program of policies and projects that draws together not only the three countries’ national governments, but also their state and provincial authorities, private sectors, and civil societies.” Why such a program was supposedly needed was not immediately clear, but it is happening quickly. 

Virtually every realm of government policy, though, should be continental in scope, Petraeus suggested. He called for “continental cooperation” in “security, commerce, and protection of the environment.” The continent must also have a “unified energy strategy,” Petraeus said. Even foreign policy should entail a “common approach,” and crime fighting should feature enhanced “North American coordination,” the globalist operative declared. He concluded by calling on Obama to work with the government leaders of Mexico and Canada to “advance the shared future North America needs.”   

Petraeus again cited the “four revolutions” underpinning his dubious theories about “North America,” but as usual, failed to mention the fact that all of the “integration” is proceeding quietly and under the radar. Indeed, as Americans and Canadians discover what is happening, the opposition to the “North America” scheming continues to grow like wildfire. Still, the process of regionalization and sovereignty destruction is accelerating, too — all over the world, but especially in North America. 

North American “integration” reveals clearly, the plot to quash American sovereignty under various regional and global governance regimes is far from dead yet. In fact, at this moment, U.S. “trade” officials are quietly plotting with the EU and various governments along the Pacific Rim to erect even broader “free trade” regimes that threaten to obliterate what remains of American sovereignty. Already, transnational “NAFTA tribunals” are overruling U.S. courts and laws, with the process accelerating.

If Americans do not rise up soon to stop the dangerous “integration” schemes, their national sovereignty and independence will continue to be eroded until it is all but gone. The loss of U.S. independence will inevitably be accompanied by the further loss of freedom, self-government, God-given rights, and likely prosperity as well. That is what globalists such as Petraeus and his cohorts at the CFR and Bilderberg intend. Whether they will get their wish, though, depends largely on the levels of resistance mustered by everyday Americans, Mexicans, and Canadians to the wild plot.

Meet The Man Who Will Be In Charge Of The UN Takeover Of America

[This sounds sensational and radical, but is it really? With everything that is happening in the world today, this sounds not only plausible, but quite possibly expected]

In Part One, I detailed how the United Nations is posturing to seize American guns as a prelude to martial law. If you have not read Part One, it will be helpful to do so before reading the rest of this article.

Any police detective will tell you that it is sometimes necessary to look at the facts of an old crime in order to solve a new crime. If one wants to understand the forces at work which are posturing to enslave America, one has to first take a summary look at the forces behind the so-called Gulf Oil Spill because many of the players, one in particular, will prominently figure in what is coming.

On June 19, 2014, I wrote a story which detailed how America’s southwestern border is being overrun by illegal aliens, mostly children. Why just the children? That same day on my website, I published an article which contained an advertisement by the US government for escorts to help illegal immigrant children who were going to be illegally crossing the border. In other words, this immigration crisis was planned at least 7 months in advance by the United States government.

The national mainstream media is not yet covering the growing holocaust on our border with Mexico to the degree that it needs to be. People are soon going to be starving, dying of thirst from crossing the border in very hot 110+ temperatures and some of these immigrants are bringing diseases into the US because of the extremely unsanitary conditions on the border.

The local media in Arizona is covering this horrific event, but not the national media

Question: When will the UN be called into play and take command of the “international crisis on the American border? Answer: When helpless children begin to die in the hot Arizona summer and America’s compassion for children, regardless of where they come from, is put into play. This will get the UN “relief workers” to be initially accepted.

Watch the news events in the coming days and weeks. Soon, every news item on this event will accentuate the suffering that these poor children are going through as they are herded into America without any adult supervision. And yes, God does command us to help these innocent ones. However, this will be the excuse that is needed to roll out these prepositioned UN assets.

The immigration/border crisis is at least one part of the plot to subjugate America. And when it comes to relocating the soon-to-be millions of children flooding here to safe havens, who will be in charge? It will be Peter Sutherland and the UN Migration Council. And once the UN troops are openly on our streets, the foothold will have been achieved. Gun confiscation and martial law will be a foregone conclusion as the next, yet undefined, false flag event will unfold.

When you see the blue helmets on your streets, it will be Peter Sutherland in charge. And I am certain that he will handle this crisis with the same demeanor and integrity as he handled the Gulf crisis.

U.S.: Jordan May Ask Israel To Go To War Against ISIL

Jordan may ask Israel and the United States to help it fight the al-Qaeda-linked jihadi group that threatens Syria and Iraq if it threatens Amman as well, senior Obama administration officials said.

According to a Friday report by The Daily Beast, the officials told senators in a classified briefing earlier this week that the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) is eyeing Jordan as well as its war-torn neighbors, and that some of its jihadists have already tweeted out photos and messages saying they have seized a key Jordanian town.

The Daily Beastquoted one of the Senate staff members who attended the briefing as saying that, according to the administration officials, if Jordan were to face a military onslaught from ISIL, it would “ask Israel and the United States for as much help as they can get.”

Israel and Jordan signed a peace treaty in 1994.

Another senator said the main “concern” voiced during the briefing was that “Jordan could not repel a full assault from ISIL on its own at this point.”

On Thursday, the US met with its top Sunni state allies in the Mideast to consider how to confront the region’s growing turmoil that has been spawned by a Sunni Muslim insurgency group.

However, according to The Daily Beast, Israel has indicated behind the scenes that it would be willing to give military assistance to its ally Jordan, with which it signed a peace treaty in 1994.

“I think Israel and the United States would identify a substantial threat to Jordan as a threat to themselves and would offer all appropriate assets to the Jordanians,” the media outlet quoted Thomas Sanderson, the co-director for transnational threats at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, as saying.

Report: Israel, U.S. Prepared To Help Jordan Fight ISIS

Israel and the US may be prepared to aid Jordan as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) eyes the Jewish State's eastern neighbor, The Daily Beast on Saturday quoted US officials as saying.

US officials speaking under anonymity have speculated that if ISIS were to pursue a full-on assault on Jordan, the Amman might not be able to repel the Islamists. The official continued by stating that in such an event Jordan, "will ask Israel and the United States for as much help as they can get.”

"Behind the scenes, Israeli diplomats have told their American counterparts that Israel would be prepared to take military action to save the Hashemite Kingdom," stated the Daily Beast report.

ISIS, with its recent take-over of the only Iraqi border crossing to Jordan, set off alarm bells that the country could be the next to find itself engulfed in jihadist mayhem.

Roadmap for Repowering California for all Purposes with Wind, Water, and Sunlight

A study by Mark Z. Jacobson et al. concludes that California’s power needs (electricity, transportation, heating/cooling, industry) can be met entirely by WWS technologies.

The necessary WWS (wind, water, and sunlight) technologies consist of wind turbines, concentrated solar power (CSP) plants, solar photovoltaic (PV) plants and rooftop systems, solar hot water heater systems, geothermal power plants, a few additional hydroelectric power plants, and a small amount of tidal and wave power.

Transportation will use battery electric vehicles (BEVs), hydrogen fuel cell vehicles (HFCVs), and hybrid BEV-HFCVs. The hydrogen, where needed, will be produced with electrolysis (i.e. with electricity). While using electrolytic hydrogen in transportation will generally be less efficient and more costly than using BEVs, there are some segments of transportation where hydrogen-energy storage may be preferred over battery-energy storage (e.g., ships, aircraft, long-distance freight).

High temperatures for industrial processes will be produced with electricity and hydrogen, with hydrogen again produced with electricity.

Electricity-powered air-source and ground-source heat pumps, geothermal heat pumps, and backup electric resistance heaters will be used for building heating and air conditioning. Air-source heat pump water heaters powered by electricity and solar hot water preheaters will provide hot water for buildings.

This roadmap can serve as a template for plans in other states and countries. The implementation of similar plans worldwide should essentially eliminate energy-related global warming and energy insecurity, while substantially reducing energy insecurity.

For more, go to:

http://thesolutionsproject.org/

and

http://web.stanford.edu/group/efmh/jacobson/Articles/I/susenergy2030.html

Post by Sam Carana.

Updates From The Middle East: ISIS Oil Fields, Trouble On Israel's Borders

Israel is having more and more trouble on the Gaza border, and now the Golan Heights Syrian Border are of great concern. Israel's surrounding enemies are closing in:

Israel Strikes Gaza In Response To Rocket Fire

Israel planes struck Hamas military targets in the Gaza Strip early Saturday morning in response to rocket fire from the Palestinian territory hours before.

Residents of the coastal enclave reported multiple explosions, and the IDF said in a statement that it targeted “two terror activity sites and a weapon manufacturing facility in the central Gaza Strip, and a weapon storage facility in the southern Gaza Strip.” The Israeli military confirmed direct hits. 

There were no immediate reports of casualties in the airstrikes.

Saturday’s pre-dawn Israeli Air Force hits on the Gaza Strip came amid an escalation of hostilities along Israel’s southern border with the Palestinian enclave as IDF troops scour the West Bank for three missing Israeli teenagers. Israel has accused Hamas of carrying out the June 12 abduction of the teens.

Earlier on Friday evening, Israel’s Iron Dome system intercepted two rockets launched at southern Israel from the Gaza Strip following the targeted assassination by Israel of two Gaza operatives the Israel Defense Forces said were responsible for recent rocket fire and attacks on civilians.

A total of six rockets were fired from the Gaza Strip Friday, with the remaining four landing in open territory. No damage or injuries were reported in the attacks.

Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon said Friday that Hamas was responsible for every attack emanating from the Gaza Strip and warned the terror group not to test Israel’s patience or determination. His warning came after a spate of rocket attacks on Israel’s southern cities and several incidents on the border with Gaza over the past week.

“We will not allow rocket fire on Israel or attempted attacks on our civilians or troops. We will hunt down those who carry out or plan [these attacks], like we did today,” said Ya’alon.

The defense chief’s statement came after Israeli jets struck a car in the Gaza Strip earlier Friday, killing two Palestinian terrorists in the Shati refugee camp.

The Israel Air Force confirmed a direct hit on the car carrying O​sama Has​sumi, 29, and Mohammad Fatzih, 24, from the Popular Resistance Committees, a coalition of armed groups in Gaza.

The IDF said the two terror operatives were involved in a cell responsible for repeated rocket fire on Israel’s southern cities over the past several weeks and were planning terror attacks on Israeli civilians.

“​Militants, like Hassumi and Fatzih, attacking Israel from Gaza, are not safe, do not have immunity, and will not be free to plan, plot and operate. We will continue to strike the instigators and agitators with patience, determination and precision. Gaza rocket terrorism does not pay,” said IDF spokesperson ​Lt. Col. Peter Lerner.

ISIS Sees Cash Cow In Capture Of Iraqi Oil Fields

The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, is targeting Iraq’s oil fields as part of its plan to raise revenue and build its caliphate infrastructure.

The move makes it unlikely the ISIS would destroy the fields, unless the Iraqi military regroups and attempts to recapture them.

In addition to the oil and natural gas field in the Sunni-controlled region of Iraq, ISIS is about to capture the Balad Air Base just north of Baghdad where U.S. F-16s were slated to be based. ISIS is advancing on the Haditha Dam, which produces power and controls the flow of water to the south into the Shiite-controlled region of Iraq.

As a result of its blitzkrieg moves from Syria into Iraq in recent weeks, ISIS has virtual control over Iraq’s largest oil refinery, the Bayji facility in Salahaddin province. In Syria, the jihadist group has taken control of the Al Omar oil field in Deir al Zour province near the town of Al Mayadin.

The gains are in addition to its takeover of the Ajeel oil wells east of deposed Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s hometown of Tikrit. Along with the oil wells, ISIS has captured a natural gas field called Ajeel.

All of this has sources convinced ISIS is targeting Iraq’s oil infrastructure. If ISIS proceeds south, it then would be in a position to capture the oil fields in that region of the country as well as in Kuwait, both of which provide oil for the world economy.

For ISIS, these oil fields are revenue generators. In addition, control over the flow of water into the south puts additional pressure on the Shiite government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki

ISIS sees all of the facilities as part of its grand plan not only to raise revenue but help in building a caliphate subject to strict Islamic, or Shariah, law.

The vision by ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi is to create an Islamic caliphate. It would stretch from the Mediterranean through Mesopotamia, or modern-day Iraq, which also includes the countries of Cyprus, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and even Israel, an area once referred to as Greater Syria.

As ISIS takes control of the region, it can help ensure a following by using oil revenue to finance social programs and restore public services.

Today, however, it is ISIS that controls the oil fields and could head into southern Iraq to take the country’s other oil and natural gas fields and threaten Saudi Arabia.

The prospect raises concern over who would control world oil production and its price – the markets, or ISIS.

Anti-Assad Rebels Said To Control 95% Of Syrian Golan Heights

Almost the entire Syrian side of the Golan Heights is now under the control of rebel forces, including radical Islamist groups, a senior Israeli military commander in the area said Friday.

Only the Quneitra border area is still in the hands of forces loyal to President Bashar Assad, Lt.-Col. Anan Abbas, deputy commander of the Golan Brigade, told Israel’s Channel 10. About 95 percent of the Syrian side of the Golan is in the hands of anti-Assad rebels, including radical Islamic groups such as the Al-Nusra Front, affiliated with al-Qaeda, a rival of the burgeoning Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, better known as ISIL or ISIS.

One of two Syrian army brigades that used to control the area has completely disappeared, the officer said.

At present, the Islamist groups in the area are focused on the war against Assad, he said, “but we know their goal is to harm Israel; we’ve seen their propaganda material.”

The Golan Heights is a strategic plateau on the Israeli-Syrian border. Israel captured the territory in the 1967 war, having been attacked from the Golan over the previous 20 years, and extended Israeli law to the area in 1981. Unsuccessful peace efforts over the years have seen Israel ready to trade most of the Golan for a permanent accord with Damascus, but the notion of Israeli-Syrian peace has all but disappeared as Syria collapsed into anarchy over the past three years of civil war.