7 June 2021 (NOAA) – Atmospheric carbon dioxide measured at NOAA’s Mauna Loa Atmospheric Baseline Observatory peaked for 2021 in May at a monthly average of 419 parts per million (ppm), the highest level since accurate measurements began 63 years ago, scientists from NOAA and Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California San Diego announced today. […]
ROME, 4 June 2021 (FAO) – Global food prices rose in May at their fastest monthly rate in more than a decade, even as world cereal production is on course to reach a new record high, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) reported today. The FAO Food Price Index averaged 127.1 points in […]
26 May 2021 (NOAA) – […] The atmospheric abundance of CO2 has increased by an average of 1.85 ppm per year over the past 41 years (1979-2020). This increase in CO2 is accelerating — while it averaged about 1.6 ppm per year in the 1980s and 1.5 ppm per year in the 1990s, the growth rate increased to […]
12 May (BBC News) – The Covid-19 pandemic was preventable, an independent review panel has said. The panel, set up by the World Health Organization, said the combined response of the WHO and global governments was a “toxic cocktail”. The WHO should have declared a global emergency earlier than it did, its report said, adding […]
By Jeff Berardelli 8 May 2021 (CBS News) – Just a quick glance at the new U.S. Climate Normals maps published by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) on Tuesday is enough for most climate scientists to say, “I told you so.” And it’s not just because the maps show a warmer and wetter […]
By Sam Courtney-Guy 15 May 2021 (MetroUK) – A huge chunk of the world’s solar panels production depends on forced labour from China’ Uighur Muslims, according to new research. An investigation by Sheffield Hallam University estimates almost half of global supplies of polysilicon are produced by Uighurs under conditions ‘tantamount to enslavement’ in their home […]
By Mike Hixenbaugh, Suzy Khimm, Perla Trevizo, , Ren Larson, and Lexi Churchill 29 April 2021 HOUSTON (The Texas Tribune) – When Shalemu Bekele awoke on the morning of 15 February 2021, the townhouse he shared with his wife and two children was so cold, his fingers felt numb. After bundling up in extra layers, […]
By Danielle Ivory, Lauren Leatherby, and Robert Gebeloff 17 April 2021 (The New York Times) – About 31 percent of adults in the United States have now been fully vaccinated. Scientists have estimated that 70 to 90 percent of the total population must acquire resistance to the virus to reach herd immunity. But in hundreds […]
By Graham Readfearn 22 April 2021 (The Guardian) – Twirling and meandering ocean currents that help shape the world’s climate have gone through a “global-scale reorganisation” over the past three decades, according to new research. The amount of energy in these ocean currents, which can be from 10km to 100km across and are known as […]
By Jeffrey Gettleman, Suhasini Raj, and Hari Kumar 21 April 2021 NEW DELHI (The New York Times) – India’s health care system shows signs of buckling under the strain of a second wave of coronavirus infections, as the authorities reported nearly 300,000 new cases on Wednesday and an accident at a Covid-19 hospital killed more […]
![Annual Greenhouse Gas Index (AGGI), 1750-2020. For 2020, the AGGI was a record high 1.47, representing an increase in total direct radiative forcing of 47 percent since 1990. This increase in CO2 is accelerating — while it averaged about 1.6 ppm per year in the 1980s and 1.5 ppm per year in the 1990s, the growth rate increased to 2.4 ppm per year during the last decade (2009-2020). Pre-1978 changes in the CO2-equivalent abundance and AGGI based on the ongoing measurements of all greenhouse gases reported here, measurements of CO2 going back to the 1950s from C.D. Keeling [Keeling et al., 1958], and atmospheric changes derived from air trapped in ice and snow above glaciers [Machida et al., 1995, Battle et al., 1996, Etheridge, et al., 1996; Butler, et al., 1999]. Equivalent CO2 atmospheric amounts (in ppm) are derived with the relationship between CO2 concentrations and radiative forcing from all long-lived greenhouse gases. Graphic: Butler and Montzka, 2021 / NOAA](https://desdemonadespair.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/AGGI-1750-2020-Butler-and-Montzka-2021-NOAA.png)
