With Katrina, everyone plays the blame game. My all time favorite is global warming, because most people don’t have the slightest idea of the scientific facts on which it is based. And yes, there are scientific bases for global warming and I thank Natural Resources Defense council (NRDC) for a brilliant article, which they have titled “Climate Science 101”.

In fact, I consider this information vital so that when the non- scientific community (Exxon/Mobil, for example) try to deny 1) that there is such a thing as global warming and 2) that if it did exist, it has minimal impact if any, we of a scientific bent can refute their bubbemeisers with some real facts.

We start with rings. Humans have wrinkles but trees have rings – actually 2 rings - which not only tell their ages but which tells the story of their development throughout the year. Different trees require different nutrients and by comparing the ring widths of trees that are still alive with trees that are dead, scientists can trace the history of trees to way back when- actually, about 9000 years - and are thus able to discern patterns of drought and temperature change.

Then we go to hot air. What we call greenhouse gases: carbon dioxide, water vapor, methane, nitrous oxide and chlorofluorocarbons, keep much of the sun’s warmth in earth’s lower atmosphere from returning to space. This stabilized the earth’s temperature but now, as we pump more of these gases into the atmosphere, we are filling the earth with hot air. In the 1950’s, the data from Charles Keeling, a California scientist, showed that even in locations such as Antarctica, far from industrial emissions, CO2 was escalating to heights unexplained by the variability of nature. This indicates that industrial emissions are being stored, to a degree, in the atmosphere. Scientific predictions view CO2 levels doubling by 2100, bringing temperatures up as much as 10 degrees from the 1990’s.

Biology depends upon timing for survival and a study named phenology, focuses on recurring biological events. For instance, the time when the leaves appear on trees, affects the hatching time of the moths that eat the leaves, and the migration time of the birds that feed on the moths.

Phenologists examined animal and plant records and surmised that global warming had been affecting the biological clocks of many species. For example, the blooming time on the D.C. cherry trees is a week earlier than it was 30 years ago. More than 1500 species all over the world now mate, nest or bud a week sooner than they did 50 years ago.

It all started over a million years ago. As snow fell and didn’t completely melt each year, it turned into deep layers of ice. Then, about 8000 years ago, at latitudes lower than the Arctic, some ice began to melt but the ancient ice still remains in the Arctic. Scientists can analyze the oxygen atoms – light or heavy – and thus ascertain the air temperature when the atoms were falling as snow. In other words, the snowfall of a specific year acts as a temperature gauge by measuring the ratio of light to heavy oxygen along the core of the ice. Their findings: temperature varies from time to time but the warming was most abrupt after the rise of industry. Since we have started burning fossil fuels we have increased our levels of CO2.

It’s all in the “albedo”, the whiteness of the earth’s ice surface, reflecting the sunlight and which scientists measure because of its relation to the earth’s balance of energy. Closer to the poles, what’s more important is the changes in albedo. As an example, the artic day lasts for 6 months with constant sunlight. When ice melts, the water is exposed and with a lower albedo and winds blowing heat into the ocean, the melting is even greater. Summer lasts longer and winter isn’t long enough for a strong, new ice cover. As measured in 2004, arctic ice covered 15% less of the ocean than 30 years ago.

Don’t get around much anymore and therein lies the problem. The winds direct surface water and temperature, and saltiness directs the flow of currents beneath the water like a giant conveyor belt. However, if ice caps melt the belt may shut down. Over the past few decades, scientists have pictured the oceans and atmosphere as controlled by an interconnected planetary thermostat. Oceans are capable of storing 4 times as much energy as can air and they are absorbing more heat than ever. Eventually, this heat will be sent back into the atmosphere, in perhaps as little as 10 years, and temperatures could jump by 1.1 degrees Fahrenheit.

So next time someone makes light of global warming or accuses you of playing politics, quote chapter and verse from the primer of global warming. Hurricanes may be an act of the Almighty, but human tinkering may have made them more lethal.