Registration Open for Delhi Youth Summit on Climate 2008
Climate change poses the single largest threat to the future of humanity. Scientific reports are now indicating that to slow down the effects of a run-away climate catastrophe, carbon emissions must not exceed 350 ppm. In the wake of this threat, nations around the world are grappling for solutions to establishing pathways to low carbon economies to avoid a wave of mass planetary extinction.
– Come Create History – By Writing the Future –
Delhi Youth Summit on Climate (DYSoC 2008)
Though we may attempt to fix the problems technologically, it is widely acknowledged that real solutions will only come from changes in lifestyle.
Lifestyles are greatly impacted by none other than the planning of cities—the rise of which gave birth to “civilization.” The unsustainable use of local resources has also in the past lead to the collapse of entire city states. Thus to tackle climate change and the challenges it poses to already struggling developing economies, we must address development issues at the city level.
Many cities around the world are already planning vigorously to reduce emissions and adopt efficient use of energy and resources. In the United States alone, nearly 800 cities have pledged to sign the Kyoto Protocol and ensure that emissions from those cities meet the international targets.
Delhi, the seat of power of the world’s largest democracy makes little mention to climate change in its Master Plan 2021. With the capital very much under construction in its attempt to become a “world class city,” there is much to be done to incorporate mitigation and adaptation to the changing climate now, while there is still time. Young people must have their voices heard to ensure their policy perspectives are incorporated in the plans of the decision makers of the city.
The Delhi Youth Summit on Climate (DYSoC) aims to bring together the youth of Delhi, to begin the dialogue on Delhi’s fate in the wake of climate change. In addition, the summit will hammer out a Delhi Youth Charter on Climate: how Delhi can adapt to and mitigate in response to climate change.
Date: 28th and 29th of May, 2008
Time: 9.30 AM onwards
Venue: Nehru Memorial Museum & Library, Teen Murti Bhawan
Age Group: 18 to 30 years (Others are requested to come as observers)
We encourage you to join us and be part of the process!
For further information and participation (registration), write to:
contact@delhigreens.org
Pre-Registration is mandatory and shortlisting is being done on a first come first serve basis.
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THE COOLING EARTH
Nowadays it is fashionable to talk and write about global warming; so much so that it may sound like blasphemy if I say that the Earth is cooling. But it is a simple fact that all members of the solar system except the Sun are in fact cooling off continuously from the time of inception. Any hot body will shed its heat until its temperature corresponds to the temperature of its environment. If we consider the Earth as a whole, including its atmosphere, the temperature may be roughly 250 degree C more than the outer space. It’s inevitable that the earth must cool off, for a considerable time to come.
Heat received by the Earth from the Sun is neglible, beyond 55 degree north and 55 degree south latitude. The slanting sunrays will not produce any worthwhile heat. Again, the heat received in the middle region up to 8 am and after 5 pm can be ignored. Whatever heat is absorbed between 8 am and 5 pm is lost during the night! All this is in summer. In winter sunlight has no effect at all.
“But we have striking and sufficient evidence that the superficial shell of the globe is not only heated above that of the ambient air, by the action of its own deep-seated fires” (Physical Geography by Thomas Milner)
How does the earth remain warm? We must look inwards for an answer. The interior of the earth is very hot (The reasons have been explained in the article below on Gravity). The temperature may be thousands of degrees C. Slowly this heat seeps outwards. As we go down the earth it becomes extremely hot. Heat may be transferred from the interior to the surface of the earth by the process of conduction. Heat is also transferred by water molecules. If there is no water in the oceans, the ocean beds would be extremely hot. But actually the temperature of the water in ocean beds may be of the order of 3 degree C. This is because of convection currents caused by the ice caps in the Polar Regions and the hot cauldron of sea bed below. This can be proved by a simple experiment.
A drum filled with water may be heated from below and cooled by a block of ice floating above. If you measure the temperature, you may find the water slightly warmer below the ice block than the water at the bottom of the drum. Water molecules, absorbing heat at the bottom, travel up and ice cooled water from the top comes down. In the same way hot water from the sea bed goes up and water (at 0 degree C) below the polar ice cap travels down towards the sea bed. This way heat from the interior of the earth is slowly transferred to the sea water. Eventually this heat is transmitted to outer space.
There is another less known mechanism of heat transfer, from the interior of the earth. Water molecules are driven towards the ocean beds under tremendous pressure. We know how it is, if it rains continuously for a few days! What if it rains for 365 days? Or imagine a water tank constructed in a field (bottom being earth without water) the height of the tank being 6kms. Well, this is how the ocean bed is! The constant pounding of the ocean bed by the pressure of up to 1000 atmospheres, makes the earth pulpy and water infiltrates down. Marine geologists tell us that the terrain below the ocean is not much different from the terrain of the continents. When the surface temperature of the earth was higher than 100 degree C, there was no water in the seas. There was no difference between land and sea. It was all land. The sea bed was normal height of the plain. The continents are merely plains of greater height like Tibetan plateau we are familiar with. There are mountains and valleys in the ocean beds also. Tunnels and caves we find in the continent are there in the sea beds too. These will get filled with water; under high temperature, acquired from geo-thermal energy and high pressure, the water becomes super heated steam. Water goes down but steam presses up and ultimately finds its way to the ocean. There are about 30 thousand volcanoes and any number of hot springs in the ocean through which heat continuously comes out. This may, perhaps, be the source of hot currents in the ocean.
The oceans can never be heated from above. The warm layer of water formed by sun rays cannot travel down and will become cool before the next day break. The ice cold water from the Polar region will sink to the ocean bed, never to rise up, unless heated by the earth. Ultimately, the whole ocean will become a block of ice if the earth is heated only from above by the Sun.
Let us now look at a strange thing about the Earth. The Arctic Circle is comparatively well populated with Eskimo’s etc living permanently there. The corresponding region in the Antarctic Circle is extremely cold and inhospitable. Man makes his presence felt in this region only in the southern summer. The reasons are obvious. The Arctic region being land locked, there are any number of hot springs there, (see my article on Saraswati ) warming the atmosphere. On the other hand the Antarctica is surrounded by deep oceans : the Pacific ocean on one side and the Indian ocean on the opposite side. There must be hot springs in this region also; but being too deep the warm waters get cooled.\
From the above discussion one thing is clear – the earth is kept warm by geo thermal energy, and not by the heat from the Sun. Today life forms depend very much on sunlight; but the bottom of the sea too contains even developed life forms. Tomorrow if the sun suddenly disappears, I am sure mother Earth will continue to nurture her children, giving the warmth from her own bosom.
If you look at the map of the world, you will find that the whole of the hemisphere on the Pacific side and 90 % of the southern hemisphere is water. Comparatively few points of the continent comprise of urban areas. Industrial activity in these urban centers can contribute but a miniscule percentage to global warming, which has been going on much before industrialization. (see para on CO2)
Therefore, all this hullabaloo about global warming may be unwarranted.
According to one theory, ‘Ice Age’ occurs every 18,000 years or so. The warming earth melts the polar ice cap, and the ice cold water comes down to northern Canada, Europe and northern Siberia. This will cause severe winter and the whole area will be covered with ice ushering in another ‘Ice Age’. The cycle repeats itself.
hello sir,
myself madan Singh general Secty. Dhanak Mhasabhsa regd. Chandigarh we are working here for upliftment of dhanak caste people which are very poor and mostly living in low standard we are the followers of Great Saint Kabir
our mission is to unite dhanak people for bettre lives