[TheClimate.Vote] July 30, 2017 - Daily Global Warming News

[Richard Pauli]

/July 30, 2017/
*
Climate Change Science Politics: From Bipartisan to Divisive | Time 
<http://time.com/4874888/climate-change-politics-history/>
*Over the past three decades, the scientific evidence underpinning 
man-made global warming has grown, with scientists now confirming the 
phenomenon with virtual certainty. But, in the same time period, climate 
change has evolved from a bipartisan cause of concern to a polarized 
political issue in Washington. Gradually, over time, ideological 
differences and an intricate campaign to discredit climate science led 
to a rift perhaps greater today than at any time in decades...
In perhaps the most famous example of a concerted effort to affect the 
conversation about climate-change, in the 1990s the company backed a 
massive public-relations campaign that involved supporting groups like 
the Global Climate Coalition, which sowed doubt about the science behind 
climate change, took out advertisements to that end and lobbied elected 
officials. (Exxon has said that its actions were meant to fund 
"legitimate scientific observations" in light of "differences on policy 
approaches," not to deny climate change.) Such campaigns were known 
about during the 1990s, with extensive reporting about how lobbyists 
groups hoped to scuttle international negotiations on climate change. 
The New York Times, for instance ran a story with the headline 
"Industrial Group Plans To Battle Climate Treaty" ahead of talks in 
Kyoto in 1998. In recent years, however, the issue has received 
additional attention thanks to series of 2015 reports in the Los Angeles 
Times and Inside Climate News, the latter of which was a Pulitzer Prize 
finalist for its reporting on the subject...
But, nonetheless, climate change remains deeply divisive. Trump 
announced he will withdraw the U.S. from the Paris Agreement, and the 
EPA is reportedly gearing up to hold a televised event pitting 
mainstream climate scientists against climate change skeptics.And the 
'80s seem still a distant memory.
http://time.com/4874888/climate-change-politics-history/*


Ocean warmth predicts US drought and fire risk 
<http://climatenewsnetwork.net/ocean-warmth-predicts-us-drought-and-fire-risk/>*
7/29/2017
Ocean cycles help to determine US drought and fire risk in several 
western states, with global warming adding to their severity.
LONDON, 29 July, 2017 – There is now a new way to forecast western US 
drought and fire risk, notably in Arizona and California. It's simple: 
test the temperature of the oceans.
If the Atlantic is warm while the Pacific is relatively cold, then the 
risk of prolonged drought and wildfire conditions in California and on 
the other side of the Rockies becomes higher. It's a natural consequence 
of oceanic cycles but, scientists warn, global warming as a consequence 
of human action can also make such droughts more severe.
Research like this matters because it identifies yet another working 
part in the global machinery of climate. Changes in ocean temperature 
drive vast and long-distance atmospheric changes that send the 
moisture-laden winds away from the thirsty soils.
The implication is that sustained drought, followed by raging wildfires 
in tinderbox forests, does not simply represent a bad run of the climate 
dice. Long-term natural forces are at work. And if climate scientists 
and meteorologists know in advance that drought is more likely, they can 
give farmers and growers and city authorities some useful warning.
"Our results document that a combination of processes is at work. 
Through an ensemble modelling approach, we were able to show that 
without anthropogenic effects, the droughts in the southwestern United 
States would have been less severe," said Axel Timmermann, who directs a 
centre for climate physics at Pusan National University in South Korea.
And once soil moisture evaporates and ground cover becomes parched, the 
risk of fire amplifies. Researchers have warned that global warming must 
make fire risk ever greater, particularly in the US southwest, even 
though many blazes begin to race through the dry forests as a 
consequence of human action.
And it now seems that the risks of such droughts can be read in advance 
in the details of temperature differences in two oceans. The models 
offered a forecast time of between 10 and 23 months for wildfire, and 10 
to 45 months for drought. The next step is to test such a mechanism for 
forecasting fire and drought in other vulnerable parts of the world: the 
Mediterranean, or Australia.
"Of course, we cannot predict individual rainstorms in California and 
their local impacts months or seasons ahead," said Lowell Stott of the 
University of Southern California in Los Angeles, and a co-author.
"But we can use our climate computer model to determine whether on 
average the next year will have drier or wetter soils or more or less 
wildfires. Our yearly forecasts are far better than chance." – Climate 
News Network
http://climatenewsnetwork.net/ocean-warmth-predicts-us-drought-and-fire-risk/


*(Video) Adam Ruins Everything - Climate Change is Already Happening. 
Now what? 
<http://www.trutv.com/shows/adam-ruins-everything/videos/climate-change-is-already-happening-now-what.html>*
The question isn't will warming happen; the question is how bad will it be?
Check Adam's Sources: http://bit.ly/1Q7MHpK
In Adam Ruins Everything, host Adam Conover employs a combination of 
comedy, history and science to dispel widespread misconceptions about 
everything we take for granted. A blend of entertainment and 
enlightenment, Adam Ruins Everything is like that friend who knows a 
little bit too much about everything and is going to tell you about 
it... whether you like it or not.
http://www.trutv.com/shows/adam-ruins-everything/videos/climate-change-is-already-happening-now-what.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AN5wNFlwiag

(*audio) Adam Ruins Everything Episode 17: Dale Jamieson Tells Us Why 
'Going Green' Won't Stop Global Warming (And Why He Still Has Hope for 
Our Planet) 
<http://www.maximumfun.org/adam-ruins-everything/episode-17-dale-jamieson-tells-us-why-going-green-wont-stop-global-warming-and>*
On the season finale of Adam Ruins Everything, Adam ruins 'going green', 
the idea that individual choices such as recycling, driving hybrid cars, 
or reusing plastic bags are not enough to combat climate change. Today's 
podcast guest, Dale Jamieson, who appeared on Adam Ruins Going Green, 
says those choices on their own will not stop global warming and instead 
we need to make larger, systemic changes and work together with other 
countries to curb our carbon emissions.
Dale is a Professor of Environmental Studies and Philosophy and Chair of 
the Environmental Studies Department at New York University. On the 
podcast, he and Adam discuss why individual choices of going green are 
ineffective, the actual science of the global temperature increases and 
its implications, and what the incoming administration means for the 
United States' role in fighting climate change.
  Adam is on Twitter @AdamConover and you can find past episodes and 
bonus content from the TruTV show at AdamRuinsEverything.com.
http://www.maximumfun.org/adam-ruins-everything/episode-17-dale-jamieson-tells-us-why-going-green-wont-stop-global-warming-and


*Climate change is wreaking havoc on our water 
<http://www.climatecentral.org/news/climate-change-toxic-algae-blooms-21651>*
By Andrea Thompson on Jul 28, 2017   from Climate Central
For two days in early August 2014, the 400,000 residents in and around 
Toledo, Ohio, were told not to drink, wash dishes with, or bathe in the 
city's water supply. A noxious, pea-green algae bloom had formed over 
the city's intake pipe in Lake Erie and levels of a toxin that could 
cause diarrhea and vomiting had reached unsafe levels.
The bloom, like the others that form in the lake each summer, was fed by 
the excessive amounts of fertilizer nutrients washed into local 
waterways from surrounding farmland by spring and summer rains. Efforts 
are underway around the Great Lakes ­- as well as other places plagued 
by blooms, like the Gulf of Mexico and Chesapeake Bay - to reduce 
nutrient amounts to control the blooms, which can wreak havoc on the 
local ecology and economy....
As warming temperatures lead to increases in precipitation, more 
nitrogen, one of those nutrients feeding the blooms, will be washed into 
the nation's waterways, the work, detailed in the July 28 issue of the 
journal Science, finds.
The biggest increases in such nitrogen loading will likely come in the 
Midwest and Northeast, areas already seeing the biggest uptick in heavy 
downpours...
Algae blooms are vast mats of microscopic organisms that, like plants, 
need sunlight, water, and nutrients to flourish. When an overabundance 
of nutrients like phosphorous and nitrogen from fertilizers are washed 
into lakes and coastal areas by rains, they can cause an explosive burst 
that forms a bloom...
The study makes it clear that local managers and policymakers will need 
to rethink some of the ways they combat nutrient pollution and society 
will also have to develop technological solutions to reduce nutrient 
pollution, from implementing more efficient agricultural practices to 
potentially recycling various forms of nitrogen in sewage into animal 
feed, according to a commentary piece also published in Science.
If you want to manage nutrient loading "you need to account for the fact 
that the climate is changing at the same time," Michalak said.
http://www.climatecentral.org/news/climate-change-toxic-algae-blooms-21651

*
**In Case You Missed it: The Tropics Are Coming, The Tropics Are Coming! 
<https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/blogs/earthmatters/2017/07/26/in-case-you-missed-it-the-tropics-are-coming-the-tropics-are-coming/>*
July 26th, 2017 by Adam Voiland
The concentrations of greenhouse gases in Earth's atmosphere have risen 
rapidly during the past century, mainly because of fossil fuel burning. 
Some of the effects of this are pretty straightforward: more carbon 
dioxide in the atmosphere means air temperatures will rise; ice in the 
high latitudes will begin to melt; and sea level will rise.
https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/blogs/earthmatters/2017/07/26/in-case-you-missed-it-the-tropics-are-coming-the-tropics-are-coming/


*Cloud physics could be the key to understanding climate change 
<https://qz.com/1034370/the-weather-in-dominica-isnt-as-it-appears-and-the-clouds-that-form-there-could-change-our-predictions-of-climate-change/>*
It's raining above Dominica, and cloud physics can't quite explain why.
Clouds are far more important to the environment than you may think. Not 
only do they provide some sunburn protection for the fair-skinned and 
produce rain for crops, but they also act as a buffer for the sun's 
radiation and insulate the globe's heat. This means that understanding 
how and why they form is essential to predicting, modeling, and perhaps 
even controlling climate change.
"We want to predict the future, but we are currently struggling to 
predict these clouds," says Campbell Watson, an atmospheric scientist 
who used to study fluffy cumulus formations above the tiny tropical 
island of Dominica. Moreso than other greenery-covered islands in this 
region, for six hours a day rain buckets as it from a sputtering shower 
head, only broken by brief glimpses of clear blue sky. Conditions change 
so quickly that even on cool, windless mornings, it could begin pouring 
by afternoon tea. And no current textbook, study, or climate model can 
rationalize why.
This time lapse <https://youtu.be/MpriPhBiFe0> 
https://youtu.be/MpriPhBiFe0 is taken from Roseau, the capital of 
Dominica, located on the western side of the island. It looks toward the 
east, where you can see cumulus clouds bubbling up over the windward 
side of the island. The clouds disappear as quickly as they form, 
allowing for sunny skies above the capital.
https://qz.com/1034370/the-weather-in-dominica-isnt-as-it-appears-and-the-clouds-that-form-there-could-change-our-predictions-of-climate-change/


*Loss of Fertile Land Fuels 'Looming Crisis' Across Africa: 
<https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/29/world/africa/africa-climate-change-kenya-land-disputes.html>*Climate 
change, soil degradation and rising wealth are shrinking the amount of 
usable land in Africa. But the number of people who need it is rising fast.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/29/world/africa/africa-climate-change-kenya-land-disputes.html


*Climate Lab That Sits Empty 
<https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/28/opinion/greenhouse-gas-emissions-trump-funding.html>*
BOULDER, Colo. - Behind a locked door on the ground floor of a new 
University of Colorado science center here, a laboratory outfitted with 
specially reinforced concrete floors sits dark and empty, like a dining 
room set for a guest who never arrived. In this case, the no-show is a 
$2 million, 12-ton machine that is vital to addressing global warming.
The machine, a high-precision accelerator mass spectrometer, uses 
nuclear physics to detect the presence of a rare, heavy isotope of 
carbon. It enables scientists to distinguish fossil fuel emissions from 
all other sources of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, information 
crucial to monitoring and reducing those emissions....
Losing that program would be catastrophic to the world’s ability to 
track and address climate change. The monitoring system, called the 
Global Greenhouse Gas Reference Network and run by NOAA, is the most 
extensive network of its kind. It also provides the scale against which 
every other international institution calibrates its greenhouse gas 
measurements...
The greenhouse gas monitoring network costs about $7 million a year. 
Defunding it would be a huge mistake. The data it generates is helping 
scientists understand how our highly complex climate system works - and 
how we can help stabilize it to fend off environmental catastrophes...
This is precisely the kind of basic science the federal government needs 
to support. Yet President Trump’s proposed budget calls for a cut of up 
to one-third in NOAA's oceanic and atmospheric research programs, with 
climate science a specific target.
For comparatively little money, the United States could be getting an 
independent count of our fossil-fuel-related emissions. And once the 
carbon 14 research was up and running, the government could expand the 
program, using the air flasks from around the world to verify other 
countries' claims of emissions reductions...
As the United States retrenches, though, China is already heavily 
investing in atmospheric monitoring, including carbon 14 research. It's 
just one more example of how an Asian superpower is stepping up to 
embrace the future as America chooses to render itself irrelevant.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/28/opinion/greenhouse-gas-emissions-trump-funding.html


*This Day in Climate History July 30, 2010 <http://youtu.be/sWlwmzgLzVc> 
-  from D.R. Tucker*
July 30, 2010: On MSNBC's "The Rachel Maddow Show," fill-in host Chris 
Hayes and Mother Jones reporter Kate Sheppard discuss the coal 
industry's role in killing climate-change legislation.
http://youtu.be/sWlwmzgLzVc
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