[TheClimate.Vote] July 28, 2017 - Daily Global Warming News

[Richard Pauli]

/July 28, 2017/

*Paris 1.5-2 degrees C target far from safe, say world-leading 
scientists 
<http://www.climatecodered.org/2017/07/paris-15-2c-target-far-from-safe-say.html>*
by David Spratt, first published at Renew Economy
The Paris climate agreement goal of limiting global warming to 1.5 to 2 
degrees Celsius (degreesC) is well above temperatures experienced during 
the Holocene - period of human settlement over the last 11,700 years - 
and is far from safe because "if such temperature levels are allowed to 
long exist they will spur "slow" amplifying feedbacks… which have 
potential to run out of humanity's control."
That's the message from some of the world best climate scientists, 
including former NASA climate chief, James Hansen, in a newly paper, 
"Young people's burden: requirement of negative CO2 emissions", 
published in Earth System Dynamics this month.
http://www.climatecodered.org/2017/07/paris-15-2c-target-far-from-safe-say.html
http://reneweconomy.com.au/paris-1-5-2c-target-far-from-safe-say-world-leading-scientists-81532/
http://www.resilience.org/stories/2017-07-26/a-failure-of-imagination-on-climate-risks/


*How the climate crisis could become a food crisis overnight. 
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/07/27/how-the-climate-crisis-could-become-a-food-crisis-overnight/?utm_term=.29728850734e>*
By Elizabeth Winkler Washington Post Jul 27
The world's food system is particularly vulnerable to freak weather - 
the exact type of event climate change is making more common. more…
Now a new report by Chatham House 
<https://www.chathamhouse.org/sites/files/chathamhouse/publications/research/2017-06-27-chokepoints-vulnerabilities-global-food-trade-bailey-wellesley.pdf>, 
a London-based think tank, details how climate change further threatens 
that network, as the type of extreme weather event that knocked out the 
Russian harvest becomes all the more common.
Global food security depends on trade in just four crops: maize, wheat, 
rice and soybeans. The first three account for 60 percent of the world's 
food energy intake. The fourth, soybeans, is the world's largest source 
of animal protein feed, making up 65 percent of global protein feed 
supply. Their production is concentrated in a handful of exporting 
countries, including the United States, Brazil and the Black Sea region, 
from which they are flowing at ever-greater volumes. Between 2000 and 
2015, global food trade grew by 127 percent to 2.2 billion metric tons - 
and growth rates are projected to keep increasing.
But the movement of these crops hinges on just 14 "choke-point" 
junctures on transport routes through which exceptional volumes of trade 
pass.
Imagine the following frightening-yet-plausible scenario:
/https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/07/27/how-the-climate-crisis-could-become-a-food-crisis-overnight//


*Understanding Sea Level Rise 
<https://tamino.wordpress.com/2017/07/27/understanding-sea-level-rise/>*
Tamino
Sea level rise is complicated. But some people think its future course 
is oh so simple, and the recent visit by a certain Mr. Wakefield showed 
just how determined he is to stick with what I call the "simpleton's view."
It started with a post I did about Willis Eschenbach's mistaken claim 
about sea level rise at individual tide gauge stations, that they show 
steady rise at a constant rate, surely not speeding up (accelerating). 
Looking at data from 63 tide gauges around the world, Eschenbach said 
"NOT ONE of these 63 full tidal datasets shows statistically significant 
acceleration …" I showed that Willis was wrong, using exactly the same 
data he had used. To his credit, Willis didn't keep insisting he was 
right about that. He still maintains that any acceleration you can find 
is unimportant (I disagree), but at least he didn't insist that his 
initial analysis was right after it had been shown wrong.
And that's another one of the problems - that people (including voters) 
don't take the issue seriously enough unless it hits them in the face in 
their own home towns. The sad part is that by the time that happens, 
we've already wasted decades when we could have been working to reduce 
the damage. Because scientists have been warning us about this, for 30 
years now. They say that "forewarned in forearmed," but when early 
warning is discredited by know-nothings, too many people take the easy 
way out and set the issue aside. Instead of being forearmed, we end up 
disarmed, just when we most need to prepare for what's to come.
/https://tamino.wordpress.com/2017/07/27/understanding-sea-level-rise//


*Mammoth Antarctic iceberg is on the move, while the ice shelf it left 
behind grieves its loss 
<http://mashable.com/2017/07/26/antarctic-iceberg-moves-away-larsen-c-new-cracks/#J9atuDznoOqf>*
The Delaware-sized iceberg that calved off the Larsen C Ice Shelf in 
Antarctica sometime between July 10 and July 12 is drifting farther from 
its former home, while breaking into smaller pieces.
More importantly, new cracks are appearing in the ice shelf that could 
portend the creation of additional icebergs and the possible 
destabilization of larger parts of the ice sheet, which holds back 
land-based ice from flowing into the sea and raising sea levels.
Satellite imagery from the Landsat 8 satellite as well as the the camera 
aboard the European Space Agency's (ESA) Sentinel-1 satellite are 
helping scientists keep tabs on the gargantuan iceberg despite the 
shroud of darkness during the Antarctic winter season.
http://mashable.com/2017/07/26/antarctic-iceberg-moves-away-larsen-c-new-cracks/#J9atuDznoOqf


*Huge landslide triggered rare Greenland mega-tsunami 
<http://www.nature.com/news/huge-landslide-triggered-rare-greenland-mega-tsunami-1.22374>*
By Quirin Schiermeier Nature Jul 27
Scientists hope studying last month's deadly event will improve 
modelling of rockslides that could become more frequent with climate change.
One of the tallest tsunamis in recorded history - a 100-metre-high wave 
that devastated a remote settlement in Greenland last month - was 
caused, unusually, by a massive landslide, researchers report.
Seismologists returning from studying the rare event ... warn that such 
events could become more frequent as the climate warms.
The landslide occurred on the evening of 17 June, in the barren Karrat 
Fjord on the west coast of Greenland. It caused a sudden surge of 
seawater that wreaked havoc in the fishing village of Nuugaatsiaq, 
located on an island within the fjord about 20 kilometres away (see 
'Greenland tsunami'). The wave washed away eleven houses, and four 
people are presumed dead.
The slide was so large that it generated a seismic signal suggestive of 
a magnitude-4.1 earthquake, confounding initial efforts to identify its 
cause, says Trine Dahl-Jensen, a seismologist at the Geological Survey 
of Denmark and Greenland. But more careful examination indicated no 
significant tectonic activity just before the landslide.
A research team that visited the site earlier this month found that a 
large volume of rock had plunged - probably spontaneously - from one of 
the steep sides of the fjord into the water 1,000 metres below, and 
shattered chunks of a glacier. That disturbance pushed water levels up 
by more than 90 metres along the coastline on the same side as the 
slide. And although the tsunami dissipated quickly as it crossed the 
deep, six-kilometre-wide fjord, it still had enough energy to send water 
50 metres up the hillside opposite. The team also measured an increase 
in water levels of about 10 metres on shorelines 30 kilometres away.
"Landslide-generated tsunamis are much more locally limited than 
tsunamis produced by sea quakes, but they can be massively tall and 
devastating in the vicinity," says Hermann Fritz, an environmental 
engineer at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta who led the 
research team...
Fritz adds that the Greenland event is reminiscent of a 1958 tsunami - 
the tallest ever recorded1 - in Lituya Bay, Alaska. A magnitude-8.3 
quake triggered a landslide into a narrow fjord and the bay's shallow 
water, causing the water to rise 500 metres above the normal tide level 
(a measure known as run-up). By comparison, the 2011 quake-triggered 
tsunami in Japan, which killed more than 16,000 people and caused the 
Fukushima nuclear disaster, reached only about 40 metres at its maximum 
height.
And in 2015, a landslide-generated tsunami in the Taan Fjord in Icy Bay, 
Alaska, caused a 300-metre run-up of water, says Synolakis.
"Earlier, we didn't really believe such extremes were possible," he 
says. "But with global warming and sea level rise, such landslides are 
going to be far more common."
http://www.nature.com/news/huge-landslide-triggered-rare-greenland-mega-tsunami-1.22374
*
Video Captures Moment When Tsunami Hits Greenland's West Coast 
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amWshLXe74s>
*https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZQ6IBa_N7A
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2017/06/video-shows-greenland-deadly-tsunami-landslide-spd/*
* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amWshLXe74s
In pictures: Greenland tsunami aftermath 
<http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-40347552>
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-40347552

*Climate change scientists 'very worried' Greenland ice sheet might 
start to melt 'faster and faster'* 
<http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change-scientists-greenland-ice-sheet-melt-faster-worried-algae-a7858876.html>
Only a small amount has to melt to threaten millions in coastal 
communities around the world'
Scientists are "very worried" that the Greenland ice sheet might start 
to melt "faster and faster", a leading scientist has said.
The problem is that the warmer weather is allowing more dark algae to 
grow on the ice.
Because ice is white, it reflects much of the sun's energy, but dark 
algae absorb the heat, increasing the rate of melting.
The Greenland ice sheet is up to 3km thick and would raise sea levels by 
seven metres if it all melted into the sea. The current rate of melting 
is adding about 1mm a year to the global average sea level.
Now a team of scientists has begun a new five-year research project, 
called Black and Bloom, to discover how algal growth might affect this, 
BBC News reported.
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change-scientists-greenland-ice-sheet-melt-faster-worried-algae-a7858876.html


*A profile of award-winning climate scientist Kevin Trenberth 
<https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2017/jul/27/a-profile-of-award-winning-climate-scientist-kevin-trenberth>*
Kevin Trenberth - recent award winner - is one of the world's foremost 
climate scientists
The American Geophysical Union - the pre-eminent organization of Earth 
scientists - presents annual awards to celebrate the achievements of 
scientists. The awards, which are often named after famous historical 
scientists, reflect the contributions to science in the area of the 
award namesake. With the 2017 award winners just announced, it's 
appropriate to showcase one of the winners here.
The 2017 winner of the Roger Revelle medal is Dr. Kevin E. Trenberth. 
One of the most well-known scientists in the world, he is certainly the 
person most knowledgeable about climate change that I know.
But perhaps Dr. Trenberth won the award because of the sheer volume and 
impact of his scholarship. He is closing in on 70,000 citations to his 
work. This puts him near the top of the list worldwide for impact.
Or maybe he won because of his tireless efforts in service to the 
scientific community, with leadership roles in the IPCC, the World 
Climate Research Programme, NOAA, and other groups. Or lastly, it could 
be because he is tireless as both a researcher and a communicator. Dr. 
Trenberth can be heard or read almost weekly in major newspapers, 
magazine articles, radio and television shows. When reporters need 
complex climate science explained, he is a go-to person, and has been 
for years....
Why would I write about this aspect of Trenberth's career? Because it 
shows that he has suffered slings and arrows for his tireless work. He 
has spent his career being honest about the limits of our knowledge of 
the Earth's climate but also being clear about our certainty of 
human-caused climate change. His reward for this tireless service to 
society has been attacks on his research and his person. However, he has 
been impeccable in character and scholarship. The ill-advised who tangle 
with Trenberth have discovered they are on the short end of the 
intellectual battle.
It is my view that the AGU, by granting awards such as these to 
scientists, effectively encourage others to reach the highest standards 
in their profession.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2017/jul/27/a-profile-of-award-winning-climate-scientist-kevin-trenberth


*(sarcasm) The Onion Reviews 'An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth To Power' 
<http://www.theonion.com/video/onion-reviews-inconvenient-sequel-truth-power-56495>*
  The Onion's movie critic Peter K. Rosenthal reviews 'An Inconvenient 
Sequel' in this week's Film
/http://www.theonion.com/video/onion-reviews-inconvenient-sequel-truth-power-56495/


*This Day in Climate History July 28, 2012 
<http://www.bradblog.com/?p=9453>-  from D.R. Tucker*
July 28, 2012: Physicist Richard Muller, long known for accusing climate 
scientists of data manipulation, writes an opinion piece for the New 
York Times acknowledging that he cannot disprove the monumental evidence 
pointing to human activity as the main driver of climate change. Days 
later, in an interview with Betsy Rosenberg, Muller continues to smear 
acclaimed climate scientist Michael E. Mann.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/30/opinion/the-conversion-of-a-climate-change-skeptic.html?pagewanted=all
http://www.bradblog.com/?p=9453
/
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
////You are encouraged to forward this email /

        . *** Privacy and Security: * This is a text-only mailing that
        carries no images which may originate from remote servers.
        Text-only messages provide greater privacy to the receiver and
        sender.
        By regulation, the .VOTE top-level domain must be used for
        democratic and election purposes and cannot be used for
        commercial purposes.
        To subscribe, email: contact at theclimate.vote with subject: 
        subscribe,  To Unsubscribe, subject: unsubscribe
        Also youmay subscribe/unsubscribe at
        https://pairlist10.pair.net/mailman/listinfo/theclimate.vote
        Links and headlines assembled and curated by Richard Paulifor
        http://TheClimate.Vote delivering succinct information for
        citizens and responsible governments of all levels.   List
        membership is confidential and records are scrupulously
        restricted to this mailing list.

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://pairlist10.pair.net/pipermail/theclimate.vote/attachments/20170728/78c68f42/attachment.html>