[TheClimate.Vote] July 2, 2017 - Daily Global Warming News
Richard Pauli
richard at theclimate.vote
Sun Jul 2 12:40:31 EDT 2017
/July 2, 2017/*
***
*Iranian city soars to record 129 degrees: Near hottest on Earth in
modern measurements
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/capital-weather-gang/wp/2017/06/29/iran-city-soars-to-record-of-129-degrees-near-hottest-ever-reliably-measured-on-earth/>*
By Jason Samenow (The Washington Post) – A city in southwest Iran
posted the country’s hottest temperature ever recorded Thursday
afternoon, and may have tied the world record for the most extreme high
temperature.
tienne Kapikian, a forecaster at French meteorological agency
MeteoFrance, posted to Twitter
<https://twitter.com/EKMeteo/status/880464412611661824> that the city of
Ahvaz soared to “53.7°C” (128.7 degrees Fahrenheit). Kapikian said the
temperature is a “new absolute national record of reliable Iranian heat”
and that it was the hottest temperature ever recorded in June over
mainland Asia. Iran’s previous hottest temperature was 127.4.
Weather Underground’s website indicates
<https://www.wunderground.com/history/airport/OIAW/2017/06/29/DailyHistory.html>
the temperature in Ahvaz climbed even higher, hitting 129.2 degrees at
both 4:51 and 5 p.m. local time.
If that 129.2 degrees reading is accurate, it would arguably tie the
hottest temperature ever measured on Earth in modern times. […]
The excessively hot air over Ahvaz, a city of 1.1 million people, felt
even more stifling due to high humidity. As the temperature climbed into
the high 120s, the dew point, a measure of humidity, peaked in the low
70s; a high level for the desert location (due to moist air flow from
the Persian Gulf, to the south). The heat index — a measure of how hot
it feels factoring in the humidity — exceeded 140 degrees. This
combination of heat and humidity was so extreme that it was beyond
levels the heat index was designed to compute.
A study published in the journal Nature Climate Change in 2015
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2015/10/26/climate-change-could-soon-push-persian-gulf-temperatures-to-lethal-extremes-report-warns/>
cautioned that by the end of the century, due to climate change,
temperatures in the Middle East may become too hot for human survival.
http://www.desdemonadespair.net/2017/06/iran-city-soars-to-record-129-degrees.html
*
****Germany 'massively weakened' draft G20 climate plan to appease Trump
<http://www.climatechangenews.com/2017/06/29/germany-massively-weakened-draft-g20-climate-action-plan-appease-trump/>*
German chancellorAngela Merkel has said
<http://climatechangenews.us1.list-manage1.com/track/click?u=6316d25f7b68919349e54a251&id=9fb5791282&e=5d555e0c1b>
she will go to the floor with Trump over climate change at next week's
G20 meeting in Hamburg /(July 7-8th)/.
But documents exclusively leaked to Climate Home show just how far
Germany was prepared to bend
<http://climatechangenews.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=6316d25f7b68919349e54a251&id=6f334eb207&e=5d555e0c1b>in
the months before president Donald Trump announced his decision to
withdraw the US from the Paris Agreement, in order to keep him on board.
Ahead of the summit, the German hosts have been working on a climate
action plan, Arthur Neslen reports. But between March and May, they
gutted the draft of ambitious language and opened the door for some
fossil fuels, possibly even some coal projects, to be treated as "clean"
energy.
Since their diplomatic efforts failed, it remains to be seen whether
Germany will stick with the watered-down report, produce a stronger
version to be agreed by the G19 (without the US) or abandon the
initiative altogether....
Climate Home has seen two versions, drafted in March and May of this
year. The latter shows the degree to which the German presidency has
bent to the will of the Trump White House.
Several elements that have been removed in the May draft are:
- A 2025 deadline for the end of fossil fuel subsidies
- References to the risk of "stranded assets"
- A call for "the alignment of public expenditure and infrastructure
planning with the goals of the Paris Agreement"
- A push for carbon pricing
- A commitment to publish mid-century decarbonisation blueprints by next
year
- A pledge to develop a "profound" climate plan for multilateral
development banks
- Seven references to the UN's 2018 review of nationally-determined
contributions
- 11 references to the 2050 mid-century pathway for net zero emission
- 16 mentions of infrastructure decarbonisation
"The US massively weakened the language in the energy part of the action
plan," one source with knowledge of the negotiations said. "It pushed
for references to so-called 'clean' fossil fuels and made it less
explicit that the energy transition has to be built on energy efficiency
and renewables."
http://www.climatechangenews.com/2017/06/29/germany-massively-weakened-draft-g20-climate-action-plan-appease-trump/
*'Killer heat' due to climate change may spike in U.S. cities, says
study
<https://www.curbed.com/2017/6/30/15894570/extreme-heat-climate-change-cities-nrdc>*
Thousands of Americans will die each summer if emissions go unchecked,
according to the NRDC
The record-breaking heat wave that gripped Southwest U.S. last week was
particularly relentless—temperatures in Phoenix topped 115 degrees
Fahrenheit for five days in a row. The extreme heat was not just
uncomfortable or inconvenient, it quickly transformed the city into a
deadly landscape: Hospitals reported treating people for third-degree
burns and severe dehydration as temperatures hovered in the triple
digits well into the night. A total of 12 people died from heat last
week just in Phoenix.
The most worrying thing about the unusually high temperatures that
sizzled the Southwest last week was that they're not all that unusual
anymore. A new study by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC)
shows the direct correlation between climate change, extreme heat, and
summertime deaths. Heat-proofing cities and curbing emissions by
adhering to the Paris agreement, it argues, could help the U.S. save
thousands of lives in the near future.
"This report carries a dire warning: Reneging on our climate commitments
could cause tens of thousands of Americans to die," says Juanita
Constible, special projects director in NRDC's Climate & Clean Air
program. "If carbon pollution isn't reined in, climate change will
continue superheating summer with terrible consequences for public
health in some of our biggest cities."
The study looks at the number of deaths on "dangerous summer days" in 45
U.S. cities with a population of one million or more. If climate change
goes unchecked, about 150 Americans will die daily each summer due to
extreme heat by 2040, with about 29,850 summertime deaths each year by
the end of the century. That's double the number of homicides the U.S.
experiences annually today....
...Cities can combat extreme heat by rolling out simple, effective
solutions, according to the NRDC report: Planting more trees, painting
roofs white, using alternatives to asphalt, building structures that
don't act like giant magnifying glasses. But since the fastest-growing
contributor to climate change is transportation, this is where the
decrease in emissions really needs to occur. And of course, more hot
days means more people running their air conditioners, putting more
stress on an already overtaxed grid (which is likely running on fossil
fuels that make climate change worse), so any switch to renewable energy
generation helps.
If all 331 U.S. mayors who have pledged to uphold the Paris accord
follow through with their climate commitments, it will not only make
their neighborhoods more livable but also avoid needless deaths. Cooling
cities could mean saving lives.
https://www.curbed.com/2017/6/30/15894570/extreme-heat-climate-change-cities-nrdc
*
**'A reckoning for our species': the philosopher prophet of the
Anthropocene - podcast
<https://www.theguardian.com/world/audio/2017/jun/26/timothy-morton-anthropocene-philosopher-podcast>*
Timothy Morton wants humanity to give up some of its core beliefs, from
the fantasy that we can control the planet to the notion that we are
'above' other beings. His ideas might sound weird, but they're catching on
https://www.theguardian.com/world/audio/2017/jun/26/timothy-morton-anthropocene-philosopher-podcast
*Read the text version here
<https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jun/15/timothy-morton-anthropocene-philosopher>*
A reckoning for our species': the philosopher prophet of the Anthropocene
Timothy Morton wants humanity to give up some of its core beliefs, from
the fantasy that we can control the planet to the notion that we are
'above' other beings. His ideas might sound weird, but they're catching
on. By Alex Blasdel..
Part of what makes Morton popular are his attacks on settled ways of
thinking. His most frequently cited book, Ecology Without Nature,
says we need to scrap the whole concept of "nature". He argues that
a distinctive feature of our world is the presence of ginormous
things he calls "hyperobjects" - such as global warming or the
internet - that we tend to think of as abstract ideas because we
can't get our heads around them, but that are nevertheless as real
as hammers. He believes all beings are interdependent, and
speculates that everything in the universe has a kind of
consciousness, from algae and boulders to knives and forks. He
asserts that human beings are cyborgs of a kind, since we are made
up of all sorts of non-human components; he likes to point out that
the very stuff that supposedly makes us us - our DNA - contains a
significant amount of genetic material from viruses. He says that
we're already ruled by a primitive artificial intelligence:
industrial capitalism. At the same time, he believes that there are
some "weird experiential chemicals" in consumerism that will help
humanity prevent a full-blown ecological crisis...
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jun/15/timothy-morton-anthropocene-philosopher
*Hydrogen fuel reaches lift-off
<http://climatenewsnetwork.net/hydrogen-fuel-reaches-lift-off/>*
Using surplus electricity from renewables to make hydrogen fuel is
starting a new era for all forms of heavy transport.
LONDON, 1 July, 2017 - Trucks, trains and ships using hydrogen fuel
cells for propulsion are no longer just theoretically possible: they
have reached the trial stage.
Decades of work on refining the technology have coincided with the need
to store surplus energy from solar and wind farms when supply exceeds
demand.
And making and storing hydrogen from surplus renewable energy that can
then be used as fuel for vehicles is good economic sense, according to
the Norwegian research group SINTEF.
Fuel cells are much lighter than batteries and with hydrogen fuel they
provide a better method of propulsion for all sorts of freight and
passenger transport. The only residue of burning hydrogen is water, so
there is no pollution.
Top-secret research and development has been going on since 1980 at
SINTEF in an attempt to make fuel cells competitive with the internal
combustion engine for transport. The technology is already used in some
niche markets, but it is now expected to become mainstream, according to
Steffen Møller-Holst, vice-president for marketing at SINTEF.
SINTEF's enthusiasm for hydrogen is yet another example of what can be
achieved by a judicious mix of ingenuity and the prospect of unchecked
climate change. - Climate News Network
http://climatenewsnetwork.net/hydrogen-fuel-reaches-lift-off/
*This Day in Climate History July 2, 2006 - from D.R. Tucker*
<http://web.archive.org/web/20060705111127/http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110008597>
July 2, 2006: Notorious climate denier Dick Lindzen whines, moans,
kvetches and complains about "An Inconvenient Truth" in a piece for the
Wall Street Journal's OpinionJournal.com.
http://web.archive.org/web/20060705111127/http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110008597
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