Changing climate

One of my regular reads is an electronic version of Scientific American which covers a wide range of scientific matters I find interesting. The latest covers a range of things scientists are doing in an effort to get a better picture of what is really happening in our atmosphere. Some may seem totally wacky, but all have a serious purpose and - to me at least - seem to be far more valid than some of the simplistic and often politically motivated ideas the idiots of Greenpeace and Fiends of the Earth scream, protest and campaign about.

Entitled Ten Important Atmospheric Experiments the ten snapshot articles are worth looking at. They certainly give a better picture of just how sciences is getting to grips with the problem of getting data that gives the real picture and some things that might possibly be done about correcting it. It's well worth the read.

Did you know that atmospheric carbon appears to be collecting at the North Pole and Oxygen appears to be richer at the South? No, neither did the scientists until recently and this is just one thing they are now having a better look at. Another is a proposal to change the inefficient, smoky and carbon soot producing stoves used by huge numbers of people in India for more efficient ones. This will reduce the atmospheric discharge of "black carbon" vast clouds of which drift over the Indian and Pacific Oceans at present and is apparently largely from these stoves. Changing them as part of a philanthropic programme will helpresearchers identify the effect this has on the carbon clouds observed drifting away from these countries.