WTF Climate Change News

[Beebo Brink]

This Antarctic glacier dramatically retreated., then, its ice shelf totally collapsed. | Space

Though Cadman Glacier has been thinning since the early 2000s — or possibly even as far back as the 1970s — the team suggests that warmer-than-normal ocean temperatures in 2018 and 2019 (exacerbated, in part, by human-driven global warming) likely accelerated the process, weakening the ice shelf to the point of collapse. Because ice shelves typically buttress the land-based part of a glacier, it's now expected that Cadman Glacier will lose water more rapidly. Currently, it drains some 2.38 billion tons (2.16 billion tonnes) of ice into the ocean annually, and that rate of flow will likely increase. Such glacial draining directly contributes to sea level rise, which threatens coastal regions across the globe.

 

[Soen Eber]

You know solar has made it when fossils fund misinformation campaigns

tl.dnr: it's actually a short article, documenting a tiny war on facebook and "facts" that might be pointing directly to "big oil". Not a lot there, documentation is sparse, but still, I'm not surprised and could be indicitive. Sorry, thought there was more here when I saved the clip.

As solar has grown, the fossil fuel industry has begun to attack it by funding misinformation campaigns online and among Facebook groups.

As solar power grows, some rural landowners are pushing back against its deployment. Nuanced research in New York state suggests the bigger the project, the bigger the pushback. It is also increasingly common to see pushback based on misinformation and outright lies that are likely being funded by fossil interests.

 

[Beebo Brink]

Frozen methane under the seabed is thawing as oceans warm – and things are worse than we thought (theconversation.com)

Buried beneath the oceans surrounding continents is a naturally occurring frozen form of methane and water. Sometimes dubbed “fire-ice” as you can literally set light to it, marine methane hydrate can melt as the climate warms, uncontrollably releasing methane – a potent greenhouse gas – into the ocean and possibly the atmosphere.

Colleagues and I have just published research showing more of this methane hydrate is vulnerable to warming than previously thought. This is a worry as that hydrate contains about as much carbon as all of the remaining oil and gas on Earth.

Releasing it from the seabed could cause the oceans to become more acidic and the climate to warm further.

 

[Beebo Brink]

As Financial Turmoil Threatens Plans for an Alabama Wood Pellet Plant, Advocates Question Its Climate and Community Benefits - Inside Climate News

Enviva calls itself the world’s largest producer of wood pellets for power generation, what it claims is a “renewable and sustainable energy source.” Peer-reviewed studies, however, have shown that producing energy by burning wood pellets emits more carbon dioxide emissions than coal, leading environmentalists to accuse the company of greenwashing.

 

[Beebo Brink]

This is what the Arctic’s record-hot summer looked like

This past summer was the hottest on record in the Arctic, which is warming nearly four times faster than any other location on the planet. And the symptoms of that warming laid bare a rapidly changing region that in many ways barely resembles what it once was.

Key data points show that the Arctic continues to become less icy, wetter and greener, according to a report card released by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration on Tuesday. The trends, all linked to a warming climate, have been observed for decades.

And they played out in dramatic ways this summer: Out-of-control wildfires forced entire communities to evacuate. A river surged from its banks and into homes because of dramatic glacial thinning. Near the peak of Greenland’s ice sheet, more than 10,000 feet above sea level, temperatures rose above freezing for only the fifth time on record.

 

[detrius]

Smith River Complex fire jumps border into Oregon; ‘Be Set’ evacuations ordered

The blaze has burned more than 52,500 acres in California.

www.oregonlive.com

Small update:

Too long to watch, but did the builder explain the lack of a fire buffer? I'm assuming this was uninsured, because I can't understand why an insurer would get involved with this out of fire concerns.

Late answer: I don't recall a fire buffer being mentioned anywhere in the videos, but I guess the answer would be that their property is in the middle of a forest and there's no practical way for them to create something like that.

 

[Beebo Brink]

10 Cities Where Climate Change Is Likely to Be the Worst by 2050 (businessinsider.com)

 

[Katheryne Helendale]

So this happened along California's coast yesterday:

TikTok - Make Your Day

www.tiktok.com

The video was taken on the beach in the city of Ventura, a bit north of Los Angeles. Similar surf occurred all along the Central Coast, and even as far south as San Diego.

 

[Kokoro Fasching]

So this happened along California's coast yesterday:

TikTok - Make Your Day

www.tiktok.com

The video was taken on the beach in the city of Ventura, a bit north of Los Angeles. Similar surf occurred all along the Central Coast, and even as far south as San Diego.

The Flea Dip cycle has begun.

 

[detrius]

So this happened along California's coast yesterday:

TikTok - Make Your Day

www.tiktok.com

The video was taken on the beach in the city of Ventura, a bit north of Los Angeles. Similar surf occurred all along the Central Coast, and even as far south as San Diego.

As a Frisian, it's so weird to me that someone would just place city directly on the coastline, without dikes protecting it from the ocean - or at least a terp (or warft) for the houses to stand on. It's like asking to be swept away and drowned by the tides.

 

[Katheryne Helendale]

Thankfully, I live about a hundred miles inland at a couple hundred feet of elevation. Though if Tulare Lake grows enough, we might be in trouble.

 

[Khamon]

We’re in Glendora this week listening to locals talk about people having to be rescued for standing around watching the waves come up the street.

 

[Soen Eber]

Officials limit access to Upper Red Lake after 122 anglers were rescued after becoming stranded on the ice

Yes, I admit it. People up in that part of the state are strange.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Interestingly, both Net Zero Watch and Extinction Rebellion, whom you wouldn't expect to agree about much, have tweeted approvingly about her work and the interview.

 

[Beebo Brink]

Rishi Sunak under fire after week of devastating flooding across England | Flooding | The Guardian

 

[Free]

NASA scientist on 2023 temperatures: “We’re frankly astonished”

NASA, NOAA, and Berkeley Earth have released their takes on 2023’s record heat.

arstechnica.com

Earlier this week, the European Union's Earth science team came out with its analysis of 2023's global temperatures, finding it was the warmest year on record to date. In an era of global warming, that's not especially surprising. What was unusual was how 2023 set its record—every month from June on coming in far above any equivalent month in the past—and the size of the gap between 2023 and any previous year on record.

The Copernicus dataset used for that analysis isn't the only one of the sort, and on Friday, Berkeley Earth, NASA, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration all released equivalent reports. And all of them largely agree with the EU's: 2023 was a record, and an unusual one at that. So unusual that NASA's chief climate scientist, Gavin Schmidt, introduced his look at 2023 by saying, "We're frankly astonished."

 

[Beebo Brink]

Ruh roh.

 

[Katheryne Helendale]

Record high tide in Maine washes away 3 historic fishing shacks | APNews

 

[Cindy Claveau]

Lauren Boebert’s Hot Take On The Cold Weather Goes Embarrassingly Awry

Amid extreme winter weather across most of the U.S., Boebert on Sunday posted on X, formerly Twitter:

“You’ve got to appreciate the irony of climate protestors trudging through a foot of snow and -30 degree wind chills to yell about how the planet is warming.”
“They just don’t see it, do they?” she added.

Critics mocked Boebert’s incorrect understanding of climate change.

I had to gently correct my younger sister when she equated weather with climate, too. And she's a lot smarter than Lauren

 

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

Lauren Boebert’s Hot Take On The Cold Weather Goes Embarrassingly Awry



I had to gently correct my younger sister when she equated weather with climate, too. And she's a lot smarter than Lauren

It’s also an example of Imperialist trash. Send her temperatures from the southern hemisphere, say Western Australia with their extreme heat warnings. “Well duh it’s summer there,” she protests s as she’s reminded the Earth is not flat. “Well duh, it’s winter here.” There are points on the globe, that’s right, a globe, outside America, Lauren.