WTF Climate Change News

[Beebo Brink]

Just in case you were feeling cheerful tonight...

Scientists discover methane leaking out from beneath the ocean around Antarctica | CNN

Planet-heating methane is escaping from cracks in the Antarctic seabed as the region warms, with new seeps being discovered at an “astonishing rate,” scientists have found, raising fears that future global warming predictions may have been underestimated.

 

[CronoCloud Creeggan]

Just in case you were feeling cheerful tonight...

Scientists discover methane leaking out from beneath the ocean around Antarctica | CNN

Fuuuuuuuucccccccckkkk!

 

[Lori Claremont]

"Raising fears that future global warming predictions _MAY_ have been underestimated" (emphasis mine)??? Really??? Every single prediction they've made they later came back and said "Oh! What a surprise, it's happening faster than we thought it would!" every single time.

At this point, when the climate science community makes a prediction I assume that they're being hopelessly optimistic.

 

[Beebo Brink]

Europe’s climate is changing fast – here’s how it’s affecting people and the economy

 

[Archer]

First Mosquitos Found in Iceland

Mosquitoes have been found in Iceland for the first time as global heating makes the country more hospitable for insects.
The country was until this month one of the only places in the world that did not have a mosquito population. The other is Antarctica.

 

[Beebo Brink]

Move nitrogen fertilizer higher on your worry list

With two huge threats to our environment coming from a single source, Minnesota needs real reform. That starts with providing farmers unbiased information about the costs of using excessive nitrogen fertilizer and recognizing that relying mainly on voluntary efforts has failed. It’s well past time for adopting enforceable standards that protect our waters, including groundwater used for drinking.

 

[Beebo Brink]

Scientists get a shocking glimpse of Arctic climate change » Yale Climate Connections
Researchers who visited Svalbard expected deep snow, but instead they found meltwater pools and thawed ground.

 

[Free]

Climate change is affecting the migration patterns of animals. No surprise there.

Whale and dolphin migrations are being disrupted by climate change

Marine mammals are being forced into new and more dangerous waters, scientists warn.

arstechnica.com

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Financial Times: The costs of Trump’s campaign to censor climate science

 

[Cindy Claveau]

 

[Erich Templar]

I'm sorry for all you folks who live there, but there is certain karmic irony in the fact that the nation that is so strongly opposed to combating climate change (or even admitting that it exists), is also one of the nations that is being most badly hit by the effects of climate change.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Trump’s Hatred of EVs Is Making Gas Cars More Expensive

Trump’s anti-climate agenda is making it more expensive to own a car, period.

www.wired.com

 

[Beebo Brink]

The ocean has been hoarding heat. Now it is building up a massive 'burp.' | Grist

When humans manage to cut enough emissions and eventually reduce global temperatures, new research shows the Southern Ocean could kick warming back into gear.

 

[Beebo Brink]

Meanwhile...

Higher CO₂ levels are making our food more calorific and less nutritious

More CO2 in the atmosphere is making food crops more caloric, less nutritious and potentially more toxic. If we do not intervene, this could cause malnutrition, even in population groups that currently have enough to eat. These are the findings of Leiden research published in Global Change Biology.

 

[Beebo Brink]

No hopium, just the stark truth about the end of complex systems. I feel perversely comforted by understanding that this is an inevitable cycle, even if I'm not thrilled with where I fall in that pattern.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

The Guardian: Trump’s anti-climate agenda could result in 1.3m more deaths globally, analysis finds

Increasing temperatures are already killing enormous numbers of people. A ProPublica and Guardian analysis that draws on sophisticated modeling by independent researchers found that Donald Trump’s “America First” agenda of expanding fossil fuels and decimating efforts to reduce emissions will add substantially to that toll, with the vast majority of deaths occurring outside the US.

Most of the people expected to die from soaring temperatures in the coming decades live in poor, hot countries in Africa and South Asia, according to recent research. Many of these countries emitted relatively little of the pollution that causes climate crisis – and are least prepared to cope with the increasing heat.

 

[Beebo Brink]

‘We sent the kids home. Then all our cellphones went out’ – This is climate breakdown | Hawaii | The Guardian

The power went out at about 5.30 that morning. It was knocked out all day; there were power lines and trees down across the roads. The first day of school was scheduled to be the very next day. I was at work. Teachers were getting their classrooms ready to welcome kids.

This was August, the middle of hurricane season. There was a big hurricane passing a couple hundred miles south of Hawaii. There were hurricane-force winds down in town. We had volleyball practice; we had enough daylight to practise in the gym. During practice, at about 3.30pm, I received a call from a parent at the school. She said: “Ryan, there’s a fire in town. We’ve lost our house. We barely got out alive.” Theirs was one of the first houses to go.

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

According to Yale University climate change could cause a global slow down of winds up to 10% until 2100.

This would mean a 30% drop in electrical power generation by wind power.

Global ‘Stilling’: Is Climate Change Slowing Down the Wind?

As carbon dioxide levels rise and the Earth’s poles warm, researchers are predicting a decline in the planet’s wind speeds. This ‘stilling’ could impact wind energy production and plant growth and might even affect the Gulf Stream, which drives much of the world’s climate.

e360.yale.edu

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Reuters: How a US home insurance fix is becoming a problem

Across the U.S., the number of homes covered by these so-called “insurers of last resort” has been steadily increasing for the past five years. FAIR plans were designed as a stopgap measure, but as climate change fuels stronger disasters, these insurers are increasingly relied on.

Evernote Link

 

[Cindy Claveau]

EPA eliminates mention of fossil fuels in website on warming’s causes.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Environmental Protection Agency has removed any mention of fossil fuels — the main driver of global warming — from its popular online page explaining the causes of climate change. Now it only mentions natural phenomena, even though scientists calculate that nearly all of the warming is due to human activity.

Sometime in the past few days or weeks, EPA altered some but not all of its climate change webpages, de-emphasizing and even deleting references to the burning of coal, oil and natural gas, which scientists say is the overwhelming cause of climate change. The website’s causes of climate page mentions changes in Earth’s orbit, solar activity, Earth’s reflectivity, volcanoes and natural carbon dioxide changes, but not the burning of fossil fuels. Seven scientists and three former EPA officials tell The Associated Press that this is misleading and harmful.