DoomiestGraph – Page 54 – Desdemona Despair

Map showing highest-impact disasters in 2020, during the Covid-19 pandemic (over 250,000 people affected). The map shows only a snapshot of disasters that took place from the beginning of the month when the epidemic was declared (March 2020) for a six-month period. More than 100 disasters occurred during this period and affected over 50 million people. There were also a number of ongoing crises, including measles in DRC and droughts in parts of east and southern Africa. Graphic: IFRC

December 24, 2020

Red Cross faced record number of climate-related disasters in 2020 – “This year has tested the resilience of tens of millions of people to breaking point”

KUALA LUMPUR, 16 December 2020 (IFRC) – In a record-breaking year, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) has responded to more climate-related disasters across Asia Pacific than any other time this century so far. The IFRC has already responded to 25 climate-related disasters in the Asia Pacific, including floods, typhoons, […]

Projected geographical shift of the human temperature niche. (Top) Geographical position of the human temperature niche projected on the current situation (A) and the RCP8.5 projected 2070 climate (B). Those maps represent relative human distributions (summed to unity) for the imaginary situation that humans would be distributed over temperatures following the stylized double Gaussian model fitted to the modern data (the blue dashed curve in Fig. 2A). (C) Difference between the maps, visualizing potential source (orange) and sink (green) areas for the coming decades if humans were to be relocated in a way that would maintain this historically stable distribution with respect to temperature. The dashed line in A and B indicates the 5% percentile of the probability distribution. Graphic: Xu, et al., 2020 / PNAS

December 17, 2020

Broken societies put people and planet on a collision course, says UNDP – “No country in the world has yet achieved very high human development without putting immense strain on the planet”

NEW YORK, 15 December 2020 (HDRO) – The COVID-19 pandemic is the latest crisis facing the world, but unless humans release their grip on nature, it won’t be the last, according to a new report [pdf] by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), which includes a new experimental index on human progress that takes into account countries’ […]

Map showing the age of sea ice in the Arctic at winter maximum in 2000 (left, week of March 18) and 2020 (right, week of March 21). Ice older than 5 years (white) is very rare today; only a small ribbon remains along the islands of the Canadian Arctic. Age is a stand-in for ice thickness and durability; young ice is thinner and more likely to melt in the summer. NOAA Climate.gov map, based on data from the National Snow and Ice Data Center. Graphic: NOAA

December 14, 2020

Sea ice loss and extreme wildfires mark another year of Arctic change – “The transformation of the Arctic to a warmer, less frozen, and biologically changed region is well underway”

8 December 2020 (NOAA) – NOAA’s 15th Arctic Report Card catalogs for 2020 the numerous ways that climate change continues to disrupt the polar region, with second-highest air temperatures and second-lowest summer sea ice driving a cascade of impacts, including the loss of snow and extraordinary wildfires in northern Russia. The Arctic Report Card is […]

The global COVID-19 lockdowns caused fossil carbon dioxide emissions to decline by an estimated 2.4 billion tonnes in 2020 - a record drop according to researchers at the University of East Anglia, University of Exeter and the Global Carbon Project. It means that in 2020 fossil CO2 emissions are predicted to be approximately 34 GtCO2, seven per cent lower than in 2019. Emissions from transport account for the largest share of the global decrease. Those from surface transport, such as car journeys, fell by approximately half at the peak of the COVID lockdowns. Total CO2 emissions from human activities - from fossil CO2 and land-use change - are set to be around 39 GtCO2 in 2020. Video: UEA

December 12, 2020

COVID lockdown causes record drop in carbon dioxide emissions for 2020

11 December 2020 (UEA) – The global COVID-19 lockdowns caused fossil carbon dioxide emissions to decline by an estimated 2.4 billion tonnes in 2020 – a record drop according to researchers at the University of East Anglia (UEA), University of Exeter, and the Global Carbon Project. The fall is considerably larger than previous significant decreases […]

Income inequality in the United States, 1913-2019. The U.S. shows a rise in the concentration of incomes unseen in other rich nations. The top 10% increase from 34% to 45% between 1980 and 2019. Half of the American population was shut from pretax economic growth. Graphic: World Inequality Database

December 11, 2020

Global inequality data update shows rise in concentration of U.S. incomes unseen in other rich nations – Latin America and the Middle East stand as the world’s most unequal regions

10 November 2020 (WIL) – The World Inequality Lab releases today a major update of global inequality data for 173 countries, making up 97% of the world population and 7.5 billion people. The data published distributes economic growth within each country making it possible to track inequality and poverty over time, countries and regions. These […]

Biomass and anthropogenic mass estimates since the beginning of the twentieth century on a dry-mass basis. The green line shows the total weight of thebiomass (dashed green lines, ±1 s.d.). Anthropogenic mass weight is plotted as an area chart, where the heights of the coloured areas represent the mass of the corresponding category accumulated until that year. The anthropogenic mass presented here is grouped into six major categories. The year 2020±6 marks the time at which biomass is exceeded by anthropogenic mass. Anthropogenic mass data since 1900 were obtained from ref. 22, at a single-year resolution. The current biomass value is based on ref. 11, which for plants relies on the estimate of ref. 10, which updates earlier, mostly higher estimates. The uncertainty of the year of intersection was derived using a Monte Carlo simulation, with 10,000 repeats. Data were extrapolated for the years 2015–2025 (lighter area). Graphic: Elhacham, et al., 2020 / Nature

December 10, 2020

The mass of human-made materials now equals the planet’s biomass – “Anthropogenic” mass is doubling every twenty years

9 December 2020 (Weizmann Institute of Science) – Earth circa 2020: The mass of all human-produced materials – concrete, steel, asphalt, etc. – has grown to equal the mass of all life on the planet, its biomass. According to a new study at the Weizmann Institute of Science, we are right at this tipping point, […]

Map showing surface air temperature anomaly for November 2020 relative to the November average for the period 1981-2010. Data source: ERA5. Graphic: Copernicus Climate Change Service / ECMWF

December 7, 2020

Global November temperatures reached a record high in 2020 – Europe experienced its warmest autumn on record

7 December 2020 (Copernicus Climate Change Service) – The Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S), implemented by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) on behalf of the European Commission, announced today that global average temperatures in November 2020 were the highest recorded for the month by a clear margin in the C3S data set. Reanalysis data […]

Overall state of all natural World Heritage sites in 2014, 2017, and 2020. Graphic: IUCN

December 7, 2020

Climate change now top threat to natural World Heritage sites – Great Barrier Reef declines to “critical” status

GLAND, SWITZERLAND, 2 December 2020 (IUCN) – Climate change is now the biggest threat to natural World Heritage, according to a report [pdf] published today by IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature). A third (33%) of natural World Heritage sites are threatened by climate change, including the world’s largest coral reef, the Great Barrier […]

Cumulative change in U.S. jobs since before the pandemic, 6 December 2020. Data: Bureau of Labor Statistics. Graphic: Ella Koeze / The New York Times

December 6, 2020

U.S. job market slowed further in November 2020 – “We’re going to have a few of the toughest months of this pandemic, and there will be a lot of scars left to heal”

6 December 2020 (The New York Times) – The American economic recovery continues to slow, stranding millions who have yet to find a new job after being thrown out of work by the coronavirus pandemic. The latest evidence came Friday when the Labor Department reported that employers added 245,000 jobs in November, the fifth month in a […]

Environmental relevance of 6PPD-quinone. (A) Using retrospective UPLC-HRMS analysis of archived sample extracts, 6PPD-quinone was quantified in roadway runoff and runoff-impacted receiving waters. Each symbol corresponds to duplicate or triplicate samples, boxes represent first and third quartiles. For comparison, the 0.8 pg/L LC50 value for juvenile coho salmon and detected 6PPD-quinone levels in 250 and 1000 mg/L TWP leachate are included. (B) Predicted ranges of potential 6PPD-quinone mass formation in passenger cars (e.g., 4 tires, -36 kg tire rubber mass) and heavy trucks, (e.g., 18 tires, -900 kg of tire rubber) (represented in orange) and measured 6PPD-quinone concentrations in affected environmental compartments (represented in blue, with experimental data italicized). Predicted ranges reflect calculations applying 0.4-2% 6PPD per total vehicle tire rubber mass followed by various yield scenarios (1-75% ultimate yields) for 6PPD reaction with ground-level ozone to form 6PPD-quinone. Graphic: Tian, et al. / Science

December 4, 2020

Tire dust killing coho salmon returning to Puget Sound, new research shows – “I find it incredibly sad to watch the adults when they are sick”

By Lynda V. Mapes 3 December 2020 (Seattle Times) – First they circle. Then they gasp at the surface of the water. Soon they can’t swim. Then they die. For decades now, scientists have known something was killing beautiful, adult coho salmon as soon as they hit Seattle’s urban waters, ready to spawn. They had […]