[TheClimate.Vote] December 28, 2017 - Daily Global Warming News Digest
Richard Pauli
richard at theclimate.vote
Thu Dec 28 10:46:21 EST 2017
/December 28, 2017
/
[Parade - Ask Marilyn]
*Climate Change: Wetter or Drier?
<https://parade.com/632032/marilynvossavant/climate-change-wetter-or-drier/>*
We hear a lot about areas of the planet that are going to be drier in
the future because of climate change. But do scientists think any places
will get wetter?
Definitely. In some places, the wet will get wetter, and the dry will
get drier. And in other places, the wet will get drier, and the dry will
get wetter. Consider the emphasis to be on the word "change."
https://parade.com/632032/marilynvossavant/climate-change-wetter-or-drier/
[Cities Pledge]
*Mayor Emanuel Announces 10 Additional Cities Sign the Chicago Climate
Charter
<https://www.cityofchicago.org/city/en/depts/mayor/press_room/press_releases/2017/december/ChicagoCharterCities.html>**
*Download this Press Release
<https://www.cityofchicago.org/content/dam/city/depts/mayor/Press%20Room/Press%20Releases/2017/December/122617_ClimateCharterCities.pdf>
67 Mayors now committed to achieving emissions reductions and moving
forward with climate action
By signing the Chicago Climate Charter, cities pledge to:
- Achieve a percent reduction in carbon emissions in line with the
Paris Agreement;
- Quantify, track and publicly report city emissions, consistent
with standards and best practices of measurement and transparency;
- Advocate alongside other mayors for greater local authority and
flexibility to develop policies and local laws that empower cities
to take aggressive action on climate;
- Recognize and include groups traditionally underrepresented in
climate policy;
- Incorporate the realities of climate change and its impacts into
local infrastructure and emergency planning through strategies of
adaptation and resilience;
- Support strong regional, state and federal policies and
partnerships, as well as private sector initiatives, that
incentivize the transition to a new climate economy; and
- Partner with experts, communities, businesses, environmental
justice groups, advocates and other allies to develop holistic
climate mitigation and resilience solutions.
We are pleased to sign the Chicago Climate Charter to emphasize our
commitment to leading through action by demonstrating practical
solutions," said Mayor Wade Troxell of Fort Collins. "In Fort Collins,
our pragmatic approach pairs our drive to improve community vitality
with realistic, measurable actions improving our future. Our climate
actions since 2005 have put us halfway to our 2020 goal of reducing
emissions 20 percent while growing our population and economy."..
Since the Trump administration's decision to pull out of the Paris
Agreement, cities across the United States and around of the world have
shown their commitment to creating a truly sustainable future for their
residents. Mayors are committed to working through existing
organizations, including Climate Mayors, C40 Cities Climate Leadership
Group, the Urban Sustainability Directors Network and ICLEI to develop
partnerships with other cities. These commitments made under the Chicago
Climate Charter will be clustered around central ideas and themes to
better aggregate impact and provide guidance for Mayors who are looking
to peers for new ideas...
The North American Climate Summit was hosted by Mayor Emanuel, in
concert with the Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate & Energy. The
Summit is supported by the Joyce Foundation, the MacArthur Foundation
and the Crown Family Philanthropies.
A copy of the Chicago Climate Charter can be found at
northamericanclimatesummit.com
<https://northamericanclimatesummit.splashthat.com/>.
https://www.cityofchicago.org/city/en/depts/mayor/press_room/press_releases/2017/december/ChicagoCharterCities.html
[theGuardian]
*Fake news is a threat to humanity, but scientists may have a solution
<https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2017/dec/27/fake-news-is-a-threat-to-humanity-but-scientists-may-have-a-solution>*
"Technocognition" proposes that we use technology and psychology to
break through the mental barriers that make people deny threats like
climate change...
We now have influential partisan media outlets that help people believe
what they want to believe, irrespective of factual accuracy.
Inconvenient facts are labeled "fake news" and disregarded. In a
nutshell, we no longer inhabit a shared reality, and as a result, major
problems are going unaddressed because a segment of Americans rejects
inconvenient truths...
People are very good at finding ways to believe what we want to believe.
Climate change is the perfect example – acceptance of climate science
among Americans is strongly related to political ideology. This has
exposed humanity's potentially fatal flaw. Denying an existential threat
threatens our existence...
But that's exactly what many ideological conservatives do. Partisan
polarization over climate change has steadily grown over the past two
decades. This change can largely be traced to the increasingly fractured
and partisan media environment that has created an echo chamber in which
people can wrap themselves in the comfort of "alternative facts" (a.k.a
spin and lies) that affirm their worldviews. We've become too good at
fooling ourselves into believing falsehoods, which has ushered in a
dangerous "post-truth" era, with no better example than the subject of
climate change....
The study found that while economic elites' and business groups'
preferences often result in policy changes, public opinion has virtually
no influence on policy outcomes. ..
The underlying problem we face is that most American votes seem to be
decided based on tribalism rather than policy preferences. As Dave
Roberts put it, this is America's epistemic crisis
<https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/11/2/16588964/america-epistemic-crisis>;
it's the root of America's moral and intellectual rot
<https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2017/dec/04/the-moral-and-intellectual-bankruptcy-of-the-republican-party>,
and it's been aided by the aforementioned growth of the partisan media
echo chamber...
To remedy the situation will require that we return to a world of shared
facts, perhaps as judged by a neutral arbiter. However, the current
politicized post-truth environment has delivered the Republican Party to
power, which means they have little motivation to change the status quo...
Democrats would be wise to implement technocognition-based policies, to
try and bring an end to the dangerous post-truth era before we foolishly
do too much lasting damage to our planet and ourselves.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2017/dec/27/fake-news-is-a-threat-to-humanity-but-scientists-may-have-a-solution
[EcoWatch]
*Does Record Snowfall Disprove Global Warming? 'Exactly the Opposite,'
Scientist Says
<https://www.ecowatch.com/snowfall-global-warming-2520296568.html>*
The historic storm - a whopping 62.9 inches since Dec. 23, with more
flakes to come - prompted the city's police department todeclare
<https://www.facebook.com/eriepolicedept/posts/1638399276216091>a "Snow
Emergency" due to dangerous and impassable roads.
Whileclimate deniers <https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/climate-denier>might
point to the cold weather as more proof of the "global warming hoax,
<https://www.ecowatch.com/trump-climate-change-hoax-2018812943.html>"
climate scientistKatharine Hayhoe
<https://www.ecowatch.com/community/katharine_hayhoe/>begs to differ.
"What's with all the snow?" she tweeted Tuesday. "Does it mean global
warming is finished? Nope; it's exactly the opposite, in fact. Warmer
temperatures are increasing the risk of lake-effect snow."
According to the National Weather Service, "Lake Effect snow occurs when
cold air, often originating from Canada, moves across the open waters of
theGreat Lakes <http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/great-lakes>. As the cold
air passes over the unfrozen and relatively warm waters of the Great
Lakes, warmth and moisture are transferred into the lowest portion of
the atmosphere. The air rises, clouds form and grow into narrow band
that produces 2 to 3 inches of snow per hour or more."
Hayhoe went on to explain over several tweets that both natural cycles
(i.e. the North Atlantic Oscillation, La Niña) and human factors (i.e.
rising temperatures from man-madeclimate change
<https://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change/>) have exacerbated this
weather phenomenon...
At the end of her twitter thread, Hayhoe joked, "When two feet of snow's
just been dumped on our driveway, we all think - I'd like a little
global warming now, please!"
https://www.ecowatch.com/snowfall-global-warming-2520296568.html
[gulfnews.com]
*Global warming fuelled five extreme weather events
<http://gulfnews.com/culture/science/global-warming-fuelled-five-extreme-weather-events-1.2147754>*
Extreme weather left its mark across the planet in 2016, the hottest
year in recorded history. Record heat baked Asia and the Arctic.
Droughts gripped Brazil and southern Africa. The Great Barrier Reef
suffered its worst bleaching event in memory, killing large swathes of
coral.
Now climate scientists are starting to tease out which of last year's
calamities can, and can't, be linked to global warming.
In a new collection of papers published last Wednesday in the Bulletin
of the American Meteorological Society, researchers around the world
analysed 27 extreme weather events from 2016 and found that human-caused
climate change was a "significant driver" for 21 of them. The effort is
part of the growing field of climate change attribution, which explores
connections between warming and weather events that have already happened.
*- Record temperatures around the world**
**- Coral bleaching in the Great Barrier Reef**
**- Drought in Africa**
**- Wildfires in North America**
**- The warm "blob" in the Pacific Ocean*
http://gulfnews.com/culture/science/global-warming-fuelled-five-extreme-weather-events-1.2147754
*Alaskan microgrids offer energy resilience and independence
<https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/12/171222092734.htm>*
The electrical grid in the contiguous United States is a behemoth of
interconnected systems. If one section fails or is sabotaged, millions
of citizens could be without power. Remote villages in Alaska provide an
example of how safeguards could build resilience into a larger
electrical grid. These communities rely on microgrids - small, local
power stations that operate autonomously. Nine articles in the recent
issue of the Journal of Renewable and Sustainable Energy, from AIP
Publishing, provide the first reviews of energy technologies and costs
for microgrids in Alaska...
"Some communities are so remote that they can only get fuel delivered
once or twice a year when the ice melts and a barge can move up the
river," Whitney said. "This situation translates into some of the
highest energy costs in the nation."
Whitney explains that oil and local, renewable resources can work in
tandem to supply electricity to microgrids. A diesel generator typically
provides base power generation, while renewable energy sources reduce
the load on the generators and save fuel, lowering energy costs.
Even above the Arctic Circle, where the region is cloaked in darkness
for a portion of the year, communities harness seasonal renewable
resources by switching between solar power during summer months and wind
power during the winter months.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/12/171222092734.htm
[Scientific American (blog)]
*Rapper's Lyrics about Climate Change Are Smart
<https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/rappers-lyrics-about-climate-change-are-smart/>*
Baba Brinkman makes climate rap hot
He's become a bit of a phenomenon in the science and policy community,
first with The Rap Guide to Evolution and his more recent collection of
24 songs called The Rap Guide to Climate Chaos. He performed what may be
his biggest hit, "Make It Hot," at the COP21 climate meeting in Paris.
And I heard him perform that piece last week at the AGU Annual Meeting
in New Orleans, a conference of 23,000 earth, climate and space
scientists. The audience was spellbound.
The organizers invited Brinkman, who now lives in New York City, to
perform the song at the beginning of a major keynote address for the
week. Not knowing what to expect, the audience was a little skeptical
when Brinkman appeared - a tall, clean cut, well-dressed, middle-aged
man who began by talking about climate, not rapping. But the large crowd
became thoroughly enthralled after he got about a minute into the song.
That's because the lyrics are smart. Really smart.
Video - Baba Brinkman – "Make It Hot" – Carbon Pricing Rap
<https://youtu.be/t8gsh0AD3Go> https://youtu.be/t8gsh0AD3Go
Lyrics
Scientists are telling us that we're standing on a precipice
And we have to convert the global economy and make it emissionless
And those emissions are caused by every single one of our jobs
Every one of us contributing carbon emissions to the smog
For instance, if I write a rhyme tryin' to describe climate change
And it's hot, so it catches on, someone's gonna fly me someplace
To perform it, and the appeal of that is enormous
It's not an option for me to turn down work for global warming
'Cause I make it hot, people say my rhymes are dope
I twist words until they're unrecognizable
I make it hot, make it heezy fa sheezy
So hot even climate change skeptics will believe me
I make it hot, like the temperature it needs to be
Before the tea party will believe the IPCC
I make it hot, I liquify the Greenland ice sheets
Seven meters of sea level rise, that'll do nicely
And yeah, humans are adaptable, and we can toughen up
But that response ignores people who feel like it's already tough enough
Make a list of countries that nobody visits as a tourist
They have low carbon emissions, the richest inflicted this on the
poorest
We did it by heating our houses, and feeding our spouses
And flying and driving places and having no patience for power outages
The Pope calls it anthropocentric, he calls it obnoxious
But I got work to do, and work takes energy to accomplish
And I make it hot, I turn up the heat on the crowd
You make it hot too though, so don't try to be weaselling out
I make it hot like the African sun
Like the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum
I make it hot, feel that bass when it vibrates
Hot like the permafrost releasing methyl hydrates
I make it hot, like a planet with low albedo
Like me rockin' a trench coat on a beach instead of a speedo
Hot with no apologies, but still I'm feelin' a lot grief
For the impact my lifestyle has on the planet's ecology
My carbon footprint is bigger than crypto-zoology's
I'm talkin' loch ness monstrous, so I'm not at peace
Because the aggregate effect of every decision I'm makin' is tragic
But I can't just quit, they say that we're "carbon emission addicts"
But that's just glib, you want me to live in poverty abject
And if I did, what happens to greenhouse gasses on average?
If I quit and you don't, it's still hell in a hand-basket
A traffic jam with no plan of action, fantastic
This is a classic arms race that we're trapped in, it's ominous
Self-interested parties stuck in a tragedy of the commons
The problem is caused by our collective emissions of carbon
But the person who emits is not the person emissions are harmin'
So it's a failure of the market, everyone is incentivized
To pollute as much as they can get away with, and catch a free ride
So it's no surprise to see emissions on the rise
When the cost of burning fossil fuel is externalized
It's effectively subsidized, it's paid for by the victims
Of the eventual climate impacts caused by our emissions
And Bill McKibben and the Guardian have been targeting investments
Like: "Dirty energy is the new tobacco, so keep your distance
From anybody makin' a profit off of fossil fuels"
Cool, I'm down with the boycott, I'm just boycotting myself too
'Cause I make it hot, I cause a heat wave
How about nine degrees hotter than the hottest ones these days?
I make it hot, like climate refugees
Picture a hot hundred million displaced Bangladeshis
I make it hot, split flames, rap metaphors
A five-alarm blaze killing the last redwood forest
I make it hot, what if I make it six degrees?
Causing the extinction of forty percent of species
Hot! So what are we left with?
A speeding train with no brakes? Some kind of a death wish?
A scientific consensus that we're standing on a precipice
And a population with no idea of how to reduce their emissions
Some people do offset their footprint voluntarily
With the milk of human altruism, hope, faith and charity
But that's not gonna cut it – it's not counterproductive
But we have a global carbon budget that's globally busted
And there are hundreds of gigatons that you would have to offset
You might as well donate your piggy bank to the national debt
I ain't got no spare change to donate to carbon offsetting
I don't even want to calculate my footprint, I find it upsetting
It's like the medieval Catholic church, back when it was
indulgence-selling
If you get a big mac and a diet coke, your belly is still swelling
But here's what I'm willing: I'm willing to pay a tax
A fee that's calculated against my carbon impacts
And globally harmonized to switch incentives around
And make sure most of that carbon stays safely underground
But I'm not gonna pay it, not unless you all pay it too
That way I can be sure that you'll do what you say you'll do
How about everyone has to pay it, no free riders allowed
No international pact with the US or China left out
You can invest it in green R&D, or you can dividend it back to me
But either way I won't be happy until the day they're carbon taxing me
'Cause then I can make it hot, without ever feelin' a chill
I'm sick of the guilt trip killin' my high when I'm feelin' a thrill
So I make it hot, I get your emotions aroused
If we can't make those hot, we're not gonna keep the oceans down
So let's make it hot, people, let's turn up the heat
On polluters tryin' to catch a ride on all the rest of us for free
I make it hot on the mic, and in my social life
When I agitate for my friends to agitate for a carbon price
And that's how you make it hot
credits
from The Rap Guide to Climate Chaos, released September 30, 2016
Written by D. Brinkman and D. Moross
Produced by Soulful Spider
Additional Production and Mix by Tom Caruana
Keys by Simon Kendall
Additional vocals by Linda Kidder
https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/rappers-lyrics-about-climate-change-are-smart/
*This Day in Climate History December 28, 2010
<http://www.frumforum.com/climate-change-deniers-pull-off-a-snow-job/>
- from D.R. Tucker*
David Jenkins, a former aide to Sen. Pete Domenici (R-NM), ridicules
the ultra-conservatives who insist that snowstorms disprove climate
change:
"These skeptics, who are quiet as a mouse when summer temps soar into
triple digits, brandish every winter weather event as irrefutable
proof that climate change is a hoax. Fox News and right-wing talk
radio will do their part to amplify the message, and invariably a few
other media outlets will report on this spin and make it seem like
there is a legitimate controversy."
http://www.frumforum.com/climate-change-deniers-pull-off-a-snow-job/
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