Total greenhouse gas emissions from China and OECD nations, 1990-2019. In 2019, China’s GHG emissions passed the 14 gigaton threshold for the first time, reaching 14,093 million metric tons of CO2 equivalent (MMt CO2e). This represents a more than tripling of 1990 levels, and a 25 percent increase over the past decade. As a result, China’s share of the 2019 global emissions total of 52 gigatons rose to 27 percent. Data: Rhodium Group / UNFCCC. Graphic: Rhodium Group

China’s greenhouse gas emissions exceeded the developed world for the first time in 2019

By Kate Larsen, Hannah Pitt, Mikhail Grant, and Trevor Houser 6 May 2021 (Rhodium Group) – Each year Rhodium Group provides the most up-to-date global and country-level greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions estimates through the ClimateDeck (a partnership with Breakthrough Energy). In addition to our preliminary US and China GHG estimates for 2020, Rhodium provides annual estimates of economy-wide emissions—including all […]

Map showing the Global Peace Index for 2020. The average level of global peacefulness deteriorated 0.34 percent on the 2020 GPI. This is the ninth time in the last 12 years that global peacefulness has deteriorated. Graphic: Institute for Economics and Peace

Global peacefulness falls for the fourth time in the last five years – “We find ourselves at a critical juncture”

11 June 2020 (Institute for Economics and Peace) – This is the 14th edition of the Global Peace Index (GPI), which ranks 163 independent states and territories according to their level of peacefulness. In addition to presenting the findings from the 2020 GPI, this year’s report includes an analysis of the effect of the COVID-19 […]

A 929 millibar beast followed by another meteorological bomb as the pressure of Storm Dennis dropped to 920, one of the lowest on record in this part of the world, and then the two combined into a massive cyclone while doing a Fujiwhara dance, 16 February 2020. Video: Stu Ostro / The Weather Channel / Twitter

Two-fisted storm system pummels Iceland, British Isles – “This is not normal flooding, we are in uncharted territory”

By Bob Henson 17 February 2020 (Weather Underground) – A rapid-fire pair of winter storms swept across the North Atlantic from late last week into the weekend, bringing the most widespread flood alerts on record for the United Kingdom and one of the lowest surface pressures ever recorded in this part of the world. The […]

Flood water surrounds tomb stones at a graveyard in Tenbury Wells, after the River Teme burst its banks in western England, 16 February 2020. Photo: Oli Scarff

Storm Dennis, 2nd-strongest bomb cyclone on record in North Atlantic, wreaks havoc across UK, parts of France – Record 594 flood warnings and alerts issued in UK

17 February 2020 (AFP) – Britain on Monday began to clear up after Storm Dennis battered the country over the weekend, leading the government’s weather agency to issue a rare “danger to life” warning amid widespread flooding and high winds. Hundreds of flood warnings remained in place, including five “severe” warnings around the River Teme […]

Racks of computers used for Bitcoin mining line a hallway inside Genesis Mining’s Enigma facility in Iceland. Photo: Lisa Barnard

Photo gallery: Inside the Icelandic facility where Bitcoin is mined – Cryptocurrency mining now uses more of Iceland’s electricity than its homes

By Laura Mallonee 3 November 2019 (Wired) – Less than two miles from Iceland’s Reykjavik airport sits a nondescript metal building as monolithic and drab as a commercial poultry barn. There’s a deafening racket inside, too, but it doesn’t come from clucking chickens. Instead, tens of thousands of whirring GPUs perform the complex, exhaustive calculations […]

Aerial views of glaciers in Iceland taken in 1989 and 2019 showing how much ice has been lost over this 30-year period. Photo: National Land Survey of Iceland / Kieran Baxter

Images reveal Iceland’s glacier melt – “We saw a staggering difference in a very short amount of time”

By Rebecca Morelle 25 October 2019 (BBC News) – A photography project has highlighted the extent of ice loss from Iceland’s glaciers. A team from Scotland and Iceland compared photographs taken in the 1980s with present-day drone images. They focused on the south side of the Vatnajökull ice cap, which covers about 7,700sq km of […]

Satellite views of the Okjökull glacier in Iceland in 1986 and 2019. Data: Landsat / U.S. Geological Survey. Photo: Joshua Stevens / NASA Earth Observatory

Iceland commemorates first glacier lost to global warming – “The world that we learned how it was, learned by heart as some kind of eternal fact, is not a fact any more”

By Toby Luckhurst 18 August 2019 (BBC News) – Mourners have gathered in Iceland to commemorate the loss of Okjokull, which has died at the age of about 700. The glacier was officially declared dead in 2014 when it was no longer thick enough to move. What once was glacier has been reduced to a […]

Satellite views of the Okjökull glacier in Iceland in 1986 and 2019. Data: Landsat / U.S. Geological Survey. Photo: Joshua Stevens / NASA Earth Observatory

Okjökull glacier remembered

By Kathryn Hansen 9 August 2019 (NASA) – On 18 August 2019, scientists will be among those who gather for a memorial atop Ok volcano in west-central Iceland. The deceased being remembered is Okjökull—a once-iconic glacier that has melted away throughout the 20th century and was declared dead in 2014. A geological map from 1901 estimated Okjökull […]

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