[TheClimate.Vote] January 7, 2018 - Daily Global Warming News Digest
Richard Pauli
richard at theclimate.vote
Sun Jan 7 11:20:02 EST 2018
/January 7, 2018/
[Australia 47C = 117F]
*Power outages and fire bans as Sydney temperatures reach highest level
since 1939
<https://www.sbs.com.au/news/power-outages-and-fire-bans-as-sydney-temperatures-reach-highest-level-since-1939>*
Sydney has sweltered through its hottest day in eight decades with the
Rural Fire Service issuing a severe fire danger rating for the city.
Updated Updated 5 hours ago
Sydney has sweltered through its hottest day in almost eighty years with
the mercury in Penrith hitting 47.3C.
Much of Sydney reached it's peak temperature around 3pm on Sunday, with
the city's west bearing the brunt of the heat.
https://www.sbs.com.au/news/power-outages-and-fire-bans-as-sydney-temperatures-reach-highest-level-since-1939
http://www.news.com.au/national/australia-sizzles-as-east-coast-temperatures-hit-up-to-45c/news-story/4c2c2098f54cd9ac5bc57e83ded657c9
-
The Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) is urging Sydneysiders to "check up on
their elderly neighbours" on Sunday,...
<http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-01-05/bom-warns-sydneysiders-to-check-on-neighbours-amid-45c-heatwave/9305586>
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-01-05/bom-warns-sydneysiders-to-check-on-neighbours-amid-45c-heatwave/9305586
[ReInsurance]
Press release
*Natural catastrophe review: Series of hurricanes makes 2017 year of
highest insured losses ever
<https://www.munichre.com/en/media-relations/publications/press-releases/2018/2018-01-04-press-release/index.html>*
The hurricane trio of Harvey, Irma and Maria will cost the insurance
industry a record amount in 2017: the final insurance bill for those and
other natural catastrophes, including a severe earthquake in Mexico, is
expected to come to US$ 135bn - higher than ever before. And overall
losses - i.e. including uninsured losses - amounted to US$ 330bn, the
second-highest figure ever recorded for natural disasters. The only
costlier year so far was 2011, when the Tohoku earthquake in Japan
contributed to overall losses of US$ 354bn in today's dollars.
Torsten Jeworrek, Munich Re Board member responsible for global
reinsurance business: "This year's extreme natural catastrophes show how
important insurance is in absorbing financial losses in the wake of such
disasters. Munich Re is willing to develop this business further - we
have the necessary capacity and expertise. For me, a key point is that
some of the catastrophic events, such as the series of three extremely
damaging hurricanes, or the very severe flooding in South Asia after
extraordinarily heavy monsoon rains, are giving us a foretaste of what
is to come. Because even though individual events cannot be directly
traced to climate change, our experts expect such extreme weather to
occur more often in future."...
https://www.munichre.com/en/media-relations/publications/press-releases/2018/2018-01-04-press-release/index.html
*UN chief issues 'red alert' for the world
<https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/un-chief-issues-red-alert-for-the-world/ar-BBHzUEA?li=BBnbfcL>*
As the world began to ring in 2018, UN Secretary-General Antonio
Guterres called for global unity to overcome growing challenges.
In his New Year message on Sunday, Guterres said the world appeared to
have "gone in reverse" before adding, "On New Year's Day 2018 I am not
issuing an appeal, I am issuing an alert - a red alert for our world."
He continued: "As we begin 2018, I call for unity. ... We can settle
conflicts, overcome hatred and defend shared values. But we can only do
that together."
Reflecting on his January message when he assumed the secretary-general
position - in which he called for peace - Guterres said that conflicts
have deepened, global anxieties about nuclear weapons have increased,
inequalities have grown and nationalism and xenophobia are on the rise.
He stressed cooperation and collaboration should be the way forward in
2018, saying: "Unity is the path. Our future depends on it."
He then urged leaders "everywhere to make this New Year's resolution:
Narrow the gaps. Bridge the divides. Rebuild trust by bringing people
together around common goals."
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/un-chief-issues-red-alert-for-the-world/ar-BBHzUEA?li=BBnbfcL
[State power]*
****Hawaii Joins Trend: Recognizes Constitutional Right to Safe Climate
and Environment
<https://www.climateliabilitynews.org/2018/01/05/hawaii-climate-environment-constitutional-right/>*
Hawaii's highest court took an important step in December to hold the
state's agencies accountable for transitioning away from fossil fuels as
it affirmed the state's constitutional right to a clean environment. The
ruling cheered environmental activists at the end of an otherwise
stressful year.
In deciding a case
<https://earthjustice.org/sites/default/files/files/2017-12-14_Published_Opinion.pdf>involving
a power purchase agreement (PPA) between Maui Electric Company and
Hawaiian Commercial & Sugar Company, the Hawaiian Supreme Court not only
handed a a victory to the Sierra Club of Hawaii, which claimed that the
state's Public Utilities Commission had ignored citizens' environmental
rights, it gave teeth to a statute requiring the state
<http://khon2.com/2015/06/08/new-law-requires-100-percent-renewable-energy-in-hawaii-by-2045/>to
transition to 100 percent clean energy by 2045.
https://www.climateliabilitynews.org/2018/01/05/hawaii-climate-environment-constitutional-right/
[video by Peter Sinclair]
*Bomb Psychlone: Climate, Sea Level, and Superstorms in a Warming World.
<https://climatecrocks.com/2018/01/05/bomb-psychlone-climate-sea-level-and-superstorms-in-a-warming-world/>*
Video Climate, Sea Level, and Superstorms <https://youtu.be/160zc_F8-ns>
https://youtu.be/160zc_F8-ns
with Peter Sinclair
Bomb Psychlone: Climate, Sea Level, and Superstorms in a Warming World.
January 5, 2018
As the Northeast is battered by a gigantic winter storm, a reminder from
the past of what can happen with sharper temperature differentials in a
warming world.
Sea level rise is a force multiplier.
Coastal floodwaters at peak of the #BombCyclone in Boston were
legit pic.twitter.com/Irh0UmdT3S
- Brian L Kahn (@blkahn) January 5, 2018
The East Coast is waking up to an arctic chill this morning
following the bombogenesis #BombCyclone. This type of rapidly
intensifying storm with hurricane force winds in this part of the globe
during winter is rare @NWS #blizzard2018 More imagery:
https://t.co/mbgRYot60A pic.twitter.com/v1y87b83ab
- NOAA Satellites (@NOAASatellites) January 5, 2018
The view from Front Street in Scituate, MA. That's all salt water,
folks. #Scituate #bombcyclone pic.twitter.com/JVQDzSR9pe
- Cristela Guerra (@CristelaGuerra) January 4, 2018
https://climatecrocks.com/2018/01/05/bomb-psychlone-climate-sea-level-and-superstorms-in-a-warming-world/
['NUCLEAR' WINTER]
*Get used to saying 'bomb cyclone.' This is our climate now.
<https://grist.org/article/get-used-to-saying-bomb-cyclone-this-is-our-climate-now/>*
By Eric Holthaus on Jan 5, 2018
Now that one of the strongest nor'easters on record has swirled off to
Canada, it's time to talk about what everyone was thinking during the
storm: Is this just what happens now?
Short answer: yes. Get used to it. Wild storms like this week's massive
coastal cyclone will be part of winters in the Anthropocene.
This storm's frightening name - the "bomb cyclone" - was derived from an
obscure meteorological term
<https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/wjpg8m/bomb-cyclone-bombogenesis-winter-storm>
and caught on after President Donald Trump's terrifying tweet
<https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/948355557022420992>about
nuclear weapons. The storm wasn't as scary as all that, obviously, but
it still spread havoc....
It's normal for winter storms to gather strength in a hurry - dozens of
them <https://twitter.com/shawnmilrad/status/948598834904563712> do so
every year around the world
<https://twitter.com/RyanMaue/status/948599905571962880>. But the "bomb
cyclone" intensified at a rate far exceeding
<https://twitter.com/EricHolthaus/status/948971829682671617> any storm
to come close to the East Coast since the advent of weather satellites
in the 1970s. After a day of searching, the National Weather Service
found a similar storm from 1989
<https://twitter.com/NWSWPC/status/949024167587926022>about 600 miles
off the coast that didn't affect land.
Meteorologists and weather geeks spent the storm marveling at the view
from space, but as with every big storm of our new era, this one felt
like a harbinger...
For some, all this evidence of an overheating world is too much to accept.
In comments on the Senate floor
<https://www.c-span.org/video/?438924-1/us-senate-opens-session-115th-congress&start=16908>this
week, Senator James Inhofe of snowball fame
<https://grist.org/climate-energy/inhofe-threw-a-snowball-on-the-senate-floor-and-therefore-climate-change-isnt-real/>,
riffed on another recent presidential tweet in the context of the
current cold snap. "Where is global warming when we need it?" he said.
"We sure needed it this last week."
Increasingly, it seems like the only time you hear a climate denier talk
about climate change is when a snowstorm hits. Hey, look! It's really
cold outside. This snowball sure isn't warm; therefore the world isn't
warming.
Winter may be the last refuge of climate deniers, so it makes sense that
they'll work harder to seize on cold-weather storms. It's a window into
their view of the world. Appearance is enough evidence. It's all that
really matters. Given what's at stake in the oceans
<https://grist.org/article/heartbroken-scientists-lament-the-likely-loss-of-most-of-the-worlds-coral-reefs/>
and on land,
<https://grist.org/article/heartbroken-scientists-lament-the-likely-loss-of-most-of-the-worlds-coral-reefs/>such
views should be seen for what they are: a threat to our safety, just as
real as any bomb.
https://grist.org/article/get-used-to-saying-bomb-cyclone-this-is-our-climate-now/
[Dark Snow Project]*
**Dark Snow Project Fieldwork Findings Published
<https://climatecrocks.com/2018/01/05/dark-snow-project-fieldwork-findings-published/>*
After a long and arduous path to publication, results of Marek Stibal's
observations of ice algae, which I documented in the 2014 Dark Snow
field work, have been published.
I plan to interview co-authors Marek Stibal and Jason Box next week.
Scientific American:
<https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/algae-growth-speeds-up-greenlands-melting/>
Algae growth as a result of climate change is making the Greenland
ice sheet, a primary contributor to sea-level rise, melt faster,
according to a new study.
Algae grows naturally on the ice sheet, but it thrives under a
warmer climate. It makes the Greenland ice sheet, which is the
second-largest ice sheet on Earth, less reflective of the sun, which
means the ice absorbs more of the sun's heat. This, in turn, drives more
rapid melting, according to the paper published yesterday in Geophysical
Research Letters.
Researchers found that algae accounts for about 5 to 10 percent of
total ice sheet melt each summer. That means algae plays a greater role
in melting than previously believed, said Marek Stibal, a cryosphere
ecologist at Charles University in the Czech Republic and one of the
lead authors of the new study.
"As the climate warms, the area that the algae can grow in will
expand, so they'll colonize more of the ice sheet," he said in a
statement. "Additionally, the growing season will lengthen, so the
contribution of algae to melting of the ice will probably increase over
time."
Black carbon and dust have been tracked by researchers as
contributors to melting of the Greenland ice sheet. Like algae, the dark
particles cut down on the albedo, or reflectivity, of the otherwise
white surface. The particles absorb the sun's rays and warm the Earth
underneath. Stibal said typically researchers have only looked at
inorganic materials when studying ice sheet behavior, but the new
research suggests that biological factors also play a significant role.
"Our analysis reveals that the impact of algae on bare (snow-free)
ice darkening was greater than that of other impurities and, therefore,
that algal growth was a crucial control of bare ice darkening in the
study area," the authors wrote. "Incorporating the darkening effect of
algal growth is expected to improve future projections of the Greenland
ice sheet melting."
Since the Greenland ice sheet is a major contributor to sea-level
rise, the study has implications for future projections of the rate of
expected rise, the study found. Further study is needed to determine how
sea levels could be affected by more rapid growth of algae that is
expected as a result of global warming. The study also has implications
outside of the Arctic, the authors found. Other areas of the world
covered in ice, including the Himalayas, also have algae on the ice,
which could affect rates of melting there.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/algae-growth-speeds-up-greenlands-melting/
- video It's Alive: Blooming Algae Darken Greenland Ice
<https://youtu.be/fIb00VMEIOc> https://youtu.be/fIb00VMEIOc
American Geophysical Union:
<https://news.agu.org/press-release/algae-growth-reduces-reflectivity-enhances-greenland-ice-sheet-melting/>
The authors of the new study headed into the Greenland ice sheet in
the summer of 2014 to quantify the contribution of algae to the
darkening effect. Several members of their team camped at a study site
in the southwestern region of the ice sheet for 56 days while gathering
data on the sheet's reflectivity and algal population.
Stibal and his colleagues used portable spectrometers and
albedometers to measure the reflectivity spectrum of the bare ice
surface each day. They also collected samples of surface ice and used a
field microscope to characterize the algae and count the number of algal
cells in each sample. They analyzed the relationship between the growth
of the algae and the amount of light being reflected by the ice sheet
surface.
The authors found the ice sheet reflected significantly less light
as the algal population grew. They calculated algal growth accounted for
approximately 70 percent of the variation in the light reflectance data,
making it the dominant contributor to the phenomenon. The rest of the
variation was due to rain and how much time had passed, and non-algal
impurities weren't significant in their analysis.
https://news.agu.org/press-release/algae-growth-reduces-reflectivity-enhances-greenland-ice-sheet-melting/
https://climatecrocks.com/2018/01/05/dark-snow-project-fieldwork-findings-published/
[Book Reviews]
*Ecological science fiction: Two hits and a miss
<http://climateandcapitalism.com/2018/01/05/kim-stanley-robinsons-ecological-science-fiction-two-hits-and-a-miss/>
*Three novels by Kim Stanley Robinson
Aurora (Orbit, 2015)
<https://www.amazon.com/dp/0316098108/sr=1-1/qid=1515269598/ref=olp_product_details>
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0316098108/sr=1-1/qid=1515269598/ref=olp_product_details
Shaman (Orbit, 2013)
<https://www.amazon.com/Shaman-Kim-Stanley-Robinson/dp/0316098086>
https://www.amazon.com/Shaman-Kim-Stanley-Robinson/dp/0316098086
New York 2140 (Orbit, 2017)
<https://www.amazon.com/New-York-2140-Stanley-Robinson/dp/031626234X/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_14_img_2>
https://www.amazon.com/New-York-2140-Stanley-Robinson/dp/031626234X/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_14_img_2
reviewed by Martin Empson
Three novels by Kim Stanley Robinson: Aurora is monumental and Shaman is
a great evocation of the past, but New York 2140 understates both the
climate crisis and the solutions needed
Martin Empson is the author of Land and Labour: Marxism, Ecology and
Human History.
These reviews were first published in his blog, Resolute Reader.
http://climateandcapitalism.com/2018/01/05/kim-stanley-robinsons-ecological-science-fiction-two-hits-and-a-miss/
*This Day in Climate History January 7, 1982
<http://www.nytimes.com/1982/01/07/us/warming-of-world-s-climate-expected-to-begin-in-the-80-s.html>
- from D.R. Tucker*
January 7, 1982: The New York Times reports:
"Mankind's activities in increasing the amount of carbon dioxide and
other chemicals in the atmosphere can be expected to have a
substantial warming effect on climate, with the first clear signs of
the trend becoming evident within this decade, a scientist at the
National Aeronautics and Space Administration said here today.
"The changes are in prospect because of excess carbon dioxide put into
the atmosphere as humans burn coal, gas, oil and wood and cut forests
for agriculture and other purposes. More recently there has also been
an atmospheric buildup of methane, nitrous oxide and other chemicals
as a result of agriculture and industry, said Dr. James Hansen of the
space agency's Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York.
"Dr. Hansen spoke at a session of the annual meeting of the American
Association for the Advancement of Science here and amplified some of
his remarks at a news conference."
http://www.nytimes.com/1982/01/07/us/warming-of-world-s-climate-expected-to-begin-in-the-80-s.html
/
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