Graph of the Day – Page 36 – Desdemona Despair

Monthly mean atmospheric methane abundance, 1983-2021. The globally-averaged, monthly mean atmospheric methane abundance is determined from marine surface sites. Values for 2021 are preliminary. Graphic: NOAA Global Monitoring Laboratory

April 14, 2022

Increase in atmospheric methane set another record during 2021 – Carbon dioxide levels also record a big jump – “The evidence is consistent, alarming, and undeniable”

7 April 2022 (NOAA) – For the second year in a row, NOAA scientists observed a record annual increase in atmospheric levels of methane, a powerful, heat-trapping greenhouse gas that’s the second biggest contributor to human-caused global warming after carbon dioxide. NOAA’s preliminary analysis showed the annual increase in atmospheric methane during 2021 was 17 […]

A haze caused by dust covers the capital Nicosia, in the southeast Mediterranean island of Cyprus, on Monday, 4 April 2022. The World Health Organization (WHO), the U.N. health agency, says nearly everybody in the world breathes air that doesn't meet its standards for air quality. WHO is calling for more action reduce fossil-use use that generate pollutants that cause respiratory and blood-flow problems and lead to millions of preventable deaths each year. Photo: Petros Karadjias / AP Photo

April 10, 2022

Millions dying across the world due to poor-quality air that 99 percent of world’s population breathes – “After surviving a pandemic, it is unacceptable to still have 7 million preventable deaths and countless preventable lost years of good health due to air pollution”

By Jamey Keaten 4 April 2022 GENEVA (AP) – The U.N. health agency says nearly everybody in the world breathes air that doesn’t meet its standards for air quality, calling for more action to reduce fossil-fuel use, which generates pollutants that cause respiratory and blood-flow problems and lead to millions of preventable deaths each year. The […]

Death rates from all drug poisonings per 100,000 Washington state residents, 2003-2020. Graphic: UW ADAI

April 9, 2022

DEA warns of “mass overdose events” from fentanyl as deadly trend spreads across U.S. – “I’ve been doing drug-trends research for 20 years, and fentanyl’s growth is the biggest, fastest shift we’ve ever seen—and also the most lethal”

By Beth Dalbey 7 April 2022 SEATTLE, Washington (Patch) – A rash of deadly “mass overdose events” across the country has the Drug Enforcement Administration warning Washington and other states to prepare for the worst. Drug Enforcement Administration head Anne Milgram said in the letter to local, state and federal law enforcement officials that in […]

FAO Food Price Index (left) and FAO Food Commodity Price Indices (right), January 2021 - March 2022. Graphic: FAO

April 8, 2022

The FAO Food Price Index makes a giant leap to another all-time high in March 2022

8 April 2022 (FAO) – The FAO Food Price Index (FFPI) averaged 159.3 points in March 2022, up 17.9 points (12.6 percent) from February, making a giant leap to a new highest level since its inception in 1990. The latest increase reflects new all-time highs for vegetable oils, cereals, and meat sub-indices, while those of […]

Global net anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions projected to 2050. Projected global GHG emissions from Nationally Determined Contribution (NDCs) announced prior to COP26 would make it likely that warming will exceed 1.5°C and also make it harder after 2030 to limit warming to below 2°C. Graphic: IPCC

April 5, 2022

Amid backsliding on climate, the renewables effort now must be tripled – “A litany of broken climate promises”

By António Guterres 4 April 2022 (The Washington Post) – A report released Monday by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is a litany of broken climate promises. Together with the IPCC’s previous two reports on physical science and adaptation in the past year, it reveals the yawning gap between climate pledges and reality. And the reality is that we are […]

Futures prices of West Texas intermediate crude oil and lithium, May 2021-March 2022. Graphic: Bloomberg

March 29, 2022

A world that’s more expensive is starting to destroy demand – “A renewed spike in gas prices would see demand destruction become more widespread”

By David R Baker, Allison Smith, and Sheela Tobben 27 March 2022 (Bloomberg) – Prices for some of the world’s most pivotal products – foods, fuels, plastics, metals – are spiking beyond what many buyers can afford. That’s forcing consumers to cut back and, if the trend grows, may tip economies already buffeted by pandemic […]

Aerial view of the town of Beenleigh, Queensland on 29 February 2022 compared with 2 March 2022 (after flooding). The images were captured by the Nearmap proprietary aerial camera system attached to planes. Photo: Nearmap / The Washington Post

March 23, 2022

Australia’s cataclysmic floods raise specter of permanent retreat as towns become uninsurable – Sydney to be hit by another 100mm (4 inches) of rain in four days as bureau warns of flood fatigue – “The taxpayer is now the insurer”

By Sarah Keoghan and Laura Chung 22 March 2022 (SMH) – The Bureau of Meteorology has urged residents in flood-prone areas to remain vigilant as 100 millimetres of rain is forecast for Sydney over the next four days. Senior meteorologist Jackson Browne said the weather bureau was concerned flood-fatigued residents living in at-risk areas may […]

Daily high surface temperature at Dome C at the top of the Antarctic Plateau, on 18 March 2022. Graphic: Dr. Robert Rohde

March 22, 2022

Graph of the Day: Daily high surface temperature at Dome C in Antarctica, 18 March 2022

By Dr. Robert Rohde 21 March 2022 (Twitter) – Heat wave in Antarctica, +38 °C (+68 °F) above normal. That’s not an error, or a typo. The remote research station at Dome C recorded a temperature nearly 40°C above normal for this time of year, beating the previous March record by a startling 20°C. […] […]

Regional Trends of Negative Affect and Stress, 2006-2021. Negative affect as a whole was highest and rising in MENA and South Asia, with the increase greatest in South Asia. All regions have more negative affect now than ten years ago, except for Eastern Europe. Graphic: SDSN World Happiness Report

March 20, 2022

Amid war and disease, World Happiness Report 2022 shows bright spot, but anger grows in South Asia

18 March 2022 (McGill University) – In this troubled time of war and pandemic, the World Happiness Report 2022 shows a bright light in dark times. According to the team of international researchers, including McGill University Professor Christopher Barrington-Leigh, the pandemic brought not only pain and suffering but also an increase in social support and benevolence. As the […]

Geographical distribution of the measured mass light absorption coefficient (at 365 nm, babs-365, Mm−1, M = 10−6) of water-soluble brown carbon (BrC) in the circum-Arctic. The data dots are plotted at the middle of each sample. The shading was interpolated based on the measurements using the Data-Interpolating Variational Analysis method in the software Ocean Data View. The color range is set as the 10th and 90th percentiles of babs-365. The observed babs-365 of water-soluble BrC at Utqiaġvik (formerly Barrow) from August to September (2012) for PM10 samples (diamond) and at Alert from May to early June (1991) for total suspended samples (square) is also shown for comparison. Graphic: Yue, et al., 2022 / One Earth

March 20, 2022

Brown carbon from biomass burning imposes strong Arctic warming feedback – “We expect an increasing importance of brown carbon in the warming of the circum-arctic in the future”

18 March 2022 (Max Planck Institute for Chemistry) – Rapid warming in the Arctic and accelerated glacier and sea ice melting have a huge impact on the global environment. Greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide, and black carbon aerosols are well-known warming agents. In contrast, atmospheric, light absorbing brown carbon particles belong to the least […]