climate change – Page 107 – Desdemona Despair

Committed CO2 emissions from existing and proposed energy infrastructure. Estimates of future CO2 emissions by industry sector and country/region Emissions from existing infrastructure are shown by darker shading, and emissions from proposed power plants (i.e. electricity) are more lightly shaded. Graphic: Tong, et al., 2019 / Nature

July 18, 2019

“Committed” CO2 emissions jeopardize international climate goals – Existing, planned fossil fuel-burning infrastructure must be retired early, replaced – “Without such radical changes, we fear the aspirations of the Paris agreement are already at risk”

IRVINE, California, 1 July 2019 (UCI News) – The nations that have signed agreements to stabilize the global mean temperature by 2050 will fail to meet their goals unless existing fossil fuel-burning infrastructure around the world is retired early, according to a study [pdf] – published today in Nature – by researchers at the University […]

World map showing risk assessment of future changes in potential tree cover. (A) Illustration of expected losses in potential tree cover by 2050, under the “business as usual” climate change scenario (RCP 8.5), from the average of three Earth system models commonly used in ecology (cesm1cam5, cesm1bgc, and mohchadgem2es). (B) Quantitative numbers of potential gain and loss are illustrated by bins of 5° along a latitudinal gradient. Graphic: Bastin, et al., 2019 / Science

July 16, 2019

Expert reaction to study looking at trees, carbon storage, and climate change – “It is time to stop suggesting there is a ‘nature-based solution’ to ongoing fossil fuel use. There isn’t. Sorry.”

4 July 2019 (Science Media Centre) – A new study, published in Science, reports on the capacity for trees to reduce atmospheric carbon levels. Dr James Borrell, Researcher at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, said: “Global forest restoration clearly has remarkable potential to address climate change, but restoring forest on this scale is a significant […]

Area burned by California wildfires in thousands of square kilometers, 1972-2018. Specific regions studied are at upper left. Graphic: Williams, et al., 2019 / Earth’s Future

July 16, 2019

Global warming drives 8X increase in California summer wildfires and 5X increase in area burned – “The ability of dry fuels to promote large fires is nonlinear”

By Kevin Krajick 15 July 2019 (Columbia University) – Against a backdrop of long-term rises in temperature in recent decades, California has seen ever higher spikes in seasonal wildfires, and, in the last two years, a string of disastrous, record-setting blazes. This has led scientists, politicians and media to ponder: what role might warming climate be […]

Julie Bertoia, a 50-kilometer runner, descends into the lower part of the valley during the “Running with the Devil” race in the Mojave Desert. Photo: Jonathan Newton / The Washington Post

July 16, 2019

Athlete vs. heat: Scorching conditions are increasingly common at sporting events, creating risks and challenges for athletes – “It’ll be the hottest Summer Olympics in history”

By Rick Maese 15 July 2019 LOVELL CANYON, Nevada (The Washington Post) – It was 73 degrees and the early-morning sun was still rising over the Mojave Desert as nearly six dozen long-distance runners gathered at the start line and anxiously watched numbers tick down on the digital clock overhead. “Make sure that you’re staying […]

https://blogs.ei.columbia.edu/2019/06/19/melting-himalayan-glaciers-doubled/

July 16, 2019

Melting of Himalaya glaciers has doubled in recent years

By Kevin Krajick 19 June 2019 (Columbia University) – A newly comprehensive study shows that melting of Himalayan glaciers caused by rising temperatures has accelerated dramatically since the start of the 21st century. The analysis, spanning 40 years of satellite observations across India, China, Nepal and Bhutan, indicates that glaciers have been losing the equivalent of more than […]

A kangaroo is seen stuck in drying mud in the drainage canal of lake Cawndilla, one of the four main lakes of the Menindee Lakes in New South Wales, Australia, 10 January 2019. Photo: Getty

July 15, 2019

Australia towns close to reaching “day zero” as drought dries up water supplies – “We could be looking at anything from $500,000 to $1.5 million per month to transport the water”

By Lucy Barbour 14 July 2019 (ABC News) – Across New South Wales and Queensland’s southern downs, country towns are approaching their own ‘day zero’, as water supplies dry up in the drought. Ten towns, including major centres, are considered to be at high risk of running out within six months, if it doesn’t rain […]

A woman wades through a flooded street during monsoon rain in Mumbai, July 2019. Photo: PTI

July 15, 2019

Deluge and drought: A tale of two Indian cities – Worst floods in 14 years cripple Mumbai while Chennai thirsts for a drop of water – “It’s scary and the problem persists every year despite government promises”

2 July 2019 (Gulf News) – Mumbai: Wall collapses in Mumbai and nearby towns, caused by the worst monsoon rains in a single day in 14 years, killed 30 people on Tuesday and disrupted rail and air traffic, prompting officials to shut schools and offices. Financial markets were open in the city of 18 million […]

Energy consumption and income inequality in the Philippines, 1990-2015. Data: McGee and Greiner, 2019 / Energy Research and Social Science. Graphic: James P. Galasyn

July 14, 2019

Shifts to renewable energy can drive up energy poverty, study finds – “We don’t think of energy as a human right when it actually is”

By Cristina Rojas 12 July 2019 (PSU) – Efforts to shift away from fossil fuels and replace oil and coal with renewable energy sources can help reduce carbon emissions but do so at the expense of increased inequality, according to a new Portland State University study. [Data available here: Renewable energy injustice McGee and Greiner […]

Ohio statewide butterfly population trends of nine resident species with annual variation. Plotted are model predictions for each year based on the fixed effects of year (solid line) and annual random effects (dots) to show annual variation about the trend line. Shading shows 95 percent confidence intervals based on bootstrapped model fits in the poptrend package for the temporal trend and for the annual random effects. The first year’s estimate is set to a value of 1 as a baseline for relative population changes. Graphic: Wepprich, et al., 2019 / PLOS ONE

July 13, 2019

Decades-long butterfly study shows 33 percent population loss – “These declines in abundance are happening in common species”

By Steve Lundeberg 2 July 2019 CORVALLIS, Oregon (Oregon State University) – The most extensive and systematic insect monitoring program ever undertaken in North America shows that butterfly abundance in Ohio declined yearly by 2%, resulting in an overall 33% drop for the 21 years of the program. Though the study was limited to one […]

A worker fills a tanker train with water, which will be transported and supplied to drought-hit city of Chennai, at Jolarpettai railway station in the southern state of Tamil Nadu, India, 11 July 2019. Photo: P. Ravikumar / REUTERS

July 12, 2019

Water train set to relieve drought-hit Indian city – Doctors forced to buy water for surgery – “We won’t be able to supply water even to the people who can pay a huge sum for a tanker of water”

By P. Ravikumar 11 July 2019 JOLARPETTAI, India (Reuters) – Indian authorities on Thursday filled tanks with water and loaded them onto a train in the southern state of Tamil Nadu to supply its manufacturing capital Chennai where reservoirs have run dry. Technicians in the railway station at Jolarpettai, located over 135 miles (217 km) […]