[TheClimate.Vote] August 27, 2017 - Daily Global Warming News

[Richard Pauli]

/August 27, 2017/

*Harvey unloading incredible rains over Southeast Texas; Flash flood 
emergency in Houston 
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/capital-weather-gang/wp/2017/08/26/harveys-assault-on-texas-is-just-getting-started-disastrous-inland-flooding-expected/>*
Harvey, which made landfall as a Category 4 hurricane in Southeast Texas 
Friday night, weakened to a tropical storm Saturday.  But the flood 
threat was only just beginning. The storm stalled over Southeast Texas 
and is forecast to remain there through the middle of the week unloading 
tremendous rainfall.
Through Saturday evening, 6 to 12 inches of rain had already fallen over 
much of Southeast Texas with isolated pockets of up to 18-20 inches.
Overnight Saturday, a deluge was unfolding over Houston as an extremely 
intense band of rain pivoted through the area. A flash flood emergency, 
the highest level flood alert, was issued for large parts of the Houston 
area into the predawn hours. The National Weather Service warned 
rainfall could come down at a rate of three to four inches per hour. 
"This is a PARTICULARLY DANGEROUS SITUATION. SEEK HIGHER GROUND NOW!," 
the Weather Service said.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/capital-weather-gang/wp/2017/08/26/harveys-assault-on-texas-is-just-getting-started-disastrous-inland-flooding-expected/
..
*What You Need to Know in 2 Minutes: Kerry Emanuel on Stronger 
Hurricanes 
<https://climatecrocks.com/2017/08/26/what-you-need-to-know-in-2-minutes-kerry-emanuel-on-stronger-hurricanes/>*
by greenman3610
2 minutes. This is the one worth watching and sharing for those whose 
time is pressed.
https://climatecrocks.com/2017/08/26/what-you-need-to-know-in-2-minutes-kerry-emanuel-on-stronger-hurricanes/


*Tamino: Sea level rise has accelerated 
<https://tamino.wordpress.com/2017/07/25/sea-level-rise-has-accelerated/>*
By Tamino   25 July 2017
(Open Mind) - There seems to be some interest in global sea level as 
estimated by tide gauges. In particular, we have recently been directed 
to a graph of the data from Church & White, which is the most reputable 
of the available choices. Alas, the graph we were directed to only shows 
their data up to the end of 1992. What, you may wonder, happens after that?
The data extend for another 21 years, to the end of 2013.  see: 
https://tamino.files.wordpress.com/2017/07/churchwhite.jpg
Even without acceleration, the present rate is real trouble. Miami is 
already spending about half a billion dollars to deal with the flooding 
they're already getting from sea level rise. Another foot will bring yet 
more damage, and threatens the economic viability of somewhere in the 
neighborhood of a trillion dollars of prime real estate development.
We expect to see considerably more acceleration this century. This is 
suggested by empirical models (such as those of Vermeer and Rahmstorf), 
on "process models" (which emulate the physical process), and on 
something we like to call "laws of physics." ...
https://tamino.wordpress.com/2017/07/25/sea-level-rise-has-accelerated/


*First tanker crosses northern sea route without ice breaker 
<http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-41037071>*
By Matt McGrath  BBC
A commercial LNG tanker has sailed across the colder, northern route 
from Europe to Asia without the protection of an ice-breaker for the 
first time.
The specially-built ship completed the crossing in just six-and-a-half 
days setting a new record, according to the tanker's Russian owners.
The 300-metre-long Sovcomflot ship, the Christophe de Margerie, was 
carrying gas from Norway to South Korea.
Rising Arctic temperatures are boosting commercial shipping across this 
route.
The Christophe de Margerie is the world's first and, at present, only 
ice-breaking LNG carrier.
The ship, which features a lightweight steel reinforced hull, is the 
largest commercial ship to receive Arc7 certification, which means it is 
capable of travelling through ice up to 2.1m thick.
On this trip it was able to keep up an average speed of 14 knots despite 
sailing through ice that was over one metre thick in places.
http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-41037071

*
****(audio) Of global warming, plastic waste and velociraptors 
<https://www.pri.org/stories/2017-08-26/global-warming-plastic-waste-and-velociraptors>*
Living on Earth
"That's a big problem," says Sophie Bushwick, senior editor for Popular 
Science, "because that suggests that global warming is really pushing up 
the temperatures."
Bushwick says to think of El Niño and global warming like a ride on an 
escalator. Global warming is the escalator taking you up. If you jumped 
high in the air in a couple of places along the ride, that would be like 
an El Niño, because you'd be momentarily higher, but come right back 
down. Global warming is the thing that continues taking you up and up.
As predicted by decades of climate modeling, these warmer temperatures 
have been affecting weather patterns around the world. Canada has been 
reporting more flooding than normal; droughts are becoming more frequent 
in Montana and the Dakotas; and large wildfires are threatening many 
places in the world, including British Columbia, California and southern 
Europe.
https://www.pri.org/stories/2017-08-26/global-warming-plastic-waste-and-velociraptors


*Climate Change Is Making This Bolivian Village a Ghost Town 
<https://insideclimatenews.org/news/25082017/climate-change-shocks-bolivia-rural-poor-migration-agriculture-quinoa>*
Two years of drought and rising temperatures dried up the river and 
quinoa fields, pushing a wave of migration to cities as people searched 
for work.
BY BEN WALKER, INSIDECLIMATE NEWS
SANTIAGO K, Bolivia - Someone's nearly always lived in Santiago K.
Cupped in the Bolivian highlands that border Chile, the small village is 
littered by centuries of conquest and expansion: from the pre-Incas, who 
ringed the surrounding hills with protective fortresses, to the 
gold-hungry Spanish conquistadors drawn to the region's mineral wealth.
But after centuries of settlement, Santiago K has become a ghost town. 
Drought, debt and climate change have squeezed roughly 80 percent of 
Santiago's residents from their homes in search of work and a better life.
In 2012, a staggering uptick in demand for quinoa-from the United States 
especially-pushed Santiago's farmers to expand production. Flush with 
bank credit, farmers purchased tractors and encroached on land normally 
left to wild shrubs. The idea was to harvest more, faster. And for a 
while, business was good. From 2000 to 2014, the price of quinoa tripled.
Then the rain stopped. For two seasons, from 2015 to 2016, as the El 
Niño weather cycle combined with rising global temperatures, crops 
shriveled. Production dropped to nothing. The river that jags through 
Santiago slowed to a trickle, then dried to sand....
The solution Calcina prefers is community-based tourism. Thousands of 
tourists flock each year to nearby Uyuni, to see its expanse of salt 
flats, some of the largest in the world.
https://insideclimatenews.org/news/25082017/climate-change-shocks-bolivia-rural-poor-migration-agriculture-quinoa


*Did the Department of Energy ask a Scientist to Remove the Words 
'Climate Change' from a Grant Proposal? 
<http://www.snopes.com/2017/08/25/doe-grants-climate-change/>*
A professor posted what she claims is an email from the DOE asking her 
to remove the words "climate change" from her proposal.
Jennifer Bowen, an Ecology professor.. ...posted an email that appeared 
to be from the DOE asking her to remove the language so that the grant 
proposal, which is to be funded through the DOE's Joint Genome 
Institute, could be posted on the department's web site.
This story is developing and will be updated when more details can be 
verified.
http://www.snopes.com/2017/08/25/doe-grants-climate-change/


*Harvard scientists took Exxon's challenge; found it using the tobacco 
playbook 
<https://skepticalscience.com/harvard-scientists-exxon-challenge-tobacco-playbook.html>*
Posted on 23 August 2017 by dana1981
Read all of these documents and make up your own mind.
That was the challenge ExxonMobil issued when investigative journalism 
by Inside Climate News revealed that while it was at the forefront of 
climate science research in the 1970s and 1980s, Exxon engaged in a 
campaign to misinform the public.
Harvard scientists Geoffrey Supran and Naomi Oreskes decided to take up 
Exxon's challenge, and have just published their results in the journal 
Environmental Research Letters. They used a method known as content 
analysisto analyze 187 public and internal Exxon documents. The results 
are striking:
*- In Exxon's peer-reviewed papers and internal communications, about 
**80% of the documents /acknowledged/ that climate change is real and 
human-caused*.
*- In Exxon's paid, editorial-style advertisements **("advertorials") 
published in the New York Times, about**80% /expressed doubt/*// *that 
climate change is real and human-caused.*
https://skepticalscience.com/harvard-scientists-exxon-challenge-tobacco-playbook.html
..
*Exxon spent millions misleading the public on climate change, study 
shows 
<https://news.vice.com/story/exxon-spent-millions-denying-climate-change-knowing-all-along-it-was-real>*
https://news.vice.com/story/exxon-spent-millions-denying-climate-change-knowing-all-along-it-was-real
*..
Analysis of 187 documents concludes Exxon "misled the public" on climate 
change 
<https://arstechnica.com/science/2017/08/review-of-documents-suggests-exxon-mobil-misled-public-on-climate-change/>*
"Read all of these documents and make up your own mind," ExxonMobil said.
https://arstechnica.com/science/2017/08/review-of-documents-suggests-exxon-mobil-misled-public-on-climate-change/
..
*Inside an investigation into Exxon Mobil's climate change 
misinformation 
<https://www.theverge.com/2017/8/23/16194366/exxon-mobil-knew-climate-change-misinformation-harvard-study>*
How Exxon sowed doubt about climate change, according to an author of a 
new study
https://www.theverge.com/2017/8/23/16194366/exxon-mobil-knew-climate-change-misinformation-harvard-study


*(music video) Ludovico Einaudi - "Elegy for the Arctic" 
<https://www.fairobserver.com/region/europe/global-warming-arctic-climate-change-greenpeace-news-51431/>*
https://youtu.be/2DLnhdnSUVs
(opinion) A beautiful piece of music <https://youtu.be/2DLnhdnSUVs>is 
drawing attention to global warming.
Climate change is something that affects the entire planet and all its 
inhabitants, but nowhere is global warming happening faster and more 
dramatically than in the Arctic. Snow and ice stored in its vast 
glaciers are responsible for reflecting a large proportion of sun's 
energy. Even a temperature rise of 2 degrees Celsius affects the 
planet's ability to refract the incoming heat as ice and snow melt, 
accelerating the overall speed of global warming.
According to recent studies, even though warm spans have occurred in the 
past and as far back as 1890, the Arctic is now warming twice as fast as 
the rest of the planet. The North Pole has warmed by an average of 1.3 
degrees Celsius a decade since the late 1970s, and a further warming of 
just under 2 degrees Celsius - or an equivalent of 1,000 gigatons of 
carbon dioxide accumulated in the atmosphere - will mean an ice-free 
Arctic during the summer.
Greenpeace has been leading the campaign to protect the fragile 
ecosystem from the effects of manmade climate change and threats like 
oil drilling. To raise awareness of the dramatic loss of the Arctic ice 
sheet and biodiversity, the charity teamed up with Italian composer and 
pianist Ludovico Einaudi, who performed his magical Elegy for the Arctic 
amidst the crumbling Wahlenbergbreen glacier in Svalbard, Norway.
With 8 million signatures on the petition to create a marine protected 
area that would encompass nearly 10% of the international waters of the 
Arctic Ocean, Greenpeace's campaign faces opposition from the 
governments of Norway, Iceland and Denmark that want it left open to oil 
exploration and industrial fishing.
https://www.fairobserver.com/region/europe/global-warming-arctic-climate-change-greenpeace-news-51431/
https://youtu.be/2DLnhdnSUVs


*This Day in Climate History August 27, 1989 
<http://www.nytimes.com/1989/08/27/us/summit-of-sorts-on-global-warming.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm> 
-  from D.R. Tucker*
August 27, 1989: The New York Times reports:
"Top Soviet and American scientists, environmentalists, policymakers,
industry leaders and artists today urged President Bush and President
Mikhail S. Gorbachev of the Soviet Union to form an 'environmental
security alliance' to reverse what they fear could be a catastrophic
warming of the planet.
"The gathering urged that the superpowers promote energy-efficient
technologies and phase out production and use of chlorofluorocarbons
no later than the year 2000. The group said the countries should
'substantially reduce' carbon dioxide emissions, reduce the loss of
forests and promote tree planting worldwide. Participants asked that
the two leaders appeal directly to their citizens to help.
"The joint letter avoided specific goals to achieve a compromise
between the Soviet and American participants and within the American
contingent, even though some participants had wanted specific
numerical and time goals on cutting emissions. But it represented the
most concerted Soviet-American action yet over fears that the emission
of industrial chemicals into the atmosphere is causing a worldwide
warming trend, or 'greenhouse effect.'
"'Soviet and U.S. scientists agreed that continued buildup of
greenhouse gases at present rates will insure that global temperatures
rise before the middle of the next century above anything in human
history,' an accompanying report stated. The report said disruptions
in agriculture and rising sea levels would cause 'massive refugee
problems.'"
http://www.nytimes.com/1989/08/27/us/summit-of-sorts-on-global-warming.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm

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