[TheClimate.Vote] March 17, 2018 - Daily Global Warming News Digest
Richard Pauli
richard at theclimate.vote
Sat Mar 17 11:31:22 EDT 2018
/March 17, 2018
/ [no, not Tabasco Sauce too!!]
*Tabasco Hot Sauce and the Fate of Louisiana's Shorelines
<https://www.sierraclub.org/sierra/tabasco-hot-sauce-and-fate-louisiana-s-shorelines>*
Climate change might be driving Tabasco production elsewhere
BY KATHERINE WEI
Avery Island is not strictly an island. It is a huge dome of salt in
south Louisiana, nestled in bayous, marshes, and swamps off the Gulf of
Mexico. Standing at 163 feet above sea level, it is one of the highest
points of land in flat Louisiana and is home to two of the three
ingredients for Tabasco hot sauce: salt and chili peppers. The salt is
mined from the island's salty composition, and the peppers are tabasco
peppers.
Avery Island is losing about 30 feet of its coastline each year, meaning
the planting grounds for peppers and its salt mines are in grave danger
of getting destroyed or submerged in saltwater. Avery Island's current
area is only 2,200 acres at the most. With the coastal region
disappearing under water at the rate of a football field (roughly 1.32
acres) every hour, the whole island could technically disappear in 1,667
hours (less than 70 days).
The peppers planted on Avery Island now are plucked for their seeds,
which are packaged and sent to pepper farms in Africa and Central and
South America for the main harvest. This ensures that the peppers can
grow away from Louisiana's coastal weather perils, but nobody knows
whether climate change will also impact the pepper-friendly regions in
new planting grounds, too.
https://www.sierraclub.org/sierra/tabasco-hot-sauce-and-fate-louisiana-s-shorelines
[TV news report on beer and climate change]
*Elisa Raffa - KOLR 10 News, We the People: Climate Change
<https://youtu.be/k2aoHbg3-AE>*
In a series on political polarization, Meteorologist Elisa Raffa focuses
on climate change.
97% of weather and climate experts say humans are a primary cause of
global warming. But if so, then why is the debate so heated?
Meteorologist Elisa Raffa talked with one local brewery dealing with the
impact of climate change every day, and says the solution could be a
hard brew.
https://youtu.be/k2aoHbg3-AE
[Who is Pompeo?]
*You thought Tillerson was bad?
<http://www.climatechangenews.com/2018/03/16/climate-weekly-thought-tillerson-bad/>*
Published 16/03/2018,
By Megan Darby
Nobody ever accused Rex Tillerson of being an eco-warrior, but his time
answering to ExxonMobil shareholders - and litigants - at least forced
him to pay some attention to climate science.
Now Donald Trump wants to replace him as US foreign affairs chief with
Mike Pompeo, who has faced no such constraints.
Pompeo has taken more campaign funding from the Koch Industries
anti-climate lobby than any other lawmaker and described the Paris
Agreement as a "costly burden".
The White House needs the support of Democrat senators to confirm the
appointment, Politico reports - which is unlikely to be granted readily.
If Pompeo secures the job, the question will be whether he actively
sabotages UN climate talks or merely neglects them.
When Pompeo took his job at the CIA, the New York Times' Lisa Friedman
made this helpful list
<https://twitter.com/LFFriedman/status/799613403379761154>of things he
had said about Obama's climate stance.
https://twitter.com/LFFriedman/status/799613403379761154
http://www.climatechangenews.com/2018/03/16/climate-weekly-thought-tillerson-bad/
[New is worse]
*Climate deal critic Pompeo to replace Tillerson as US secretary of
state
<http://www.climatechangenews.com/2018/03/13/climate-deal-critic-pompeo-replace-tillerson-us-secretary-state/>*
During his time at state, Tillerson has focused on cutting costs. He cut
staffing for climate diplomacy, notably scrapping the position of US
climate envoy. Many key diplomatic positions across his department
remain unfilled.
Climate campaigners criticised the choice.
Naomi Ages of Greenpeace USA said: "Donald Trump has now somehow picked
someone even worse than Rex Tillerson to run the state department.
Greenpeace has been opposed to Tillerson as Secretary of State from the
moment he was nominated, and we continue to believe that the US
government cannot and should not be run by fossil fuel industry flunkies.
"Mike Pompeo, though, is uniquely unqualified to be Secretary of State
in an entirely different way than Rex Tillerson was. In addition to
being a climate denier, like his predecessor, Pompeo is a Koch brothers'
shill and a dangerous choice who will continue to denigrate the United
States' reputation abroad and make us vulnerable to threats at home."
http://www.climatechangenews.com/2018/03/13/climate-deal-critic-pompeo-replace-tillerson-us-secretary-state/
[Arctic meets the Atlantic]
*The fast-melting Arctic is already messing with the ocean's
circulation, scientists say
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2018/03/14/the-melting-arctic-is-already-messing-with-a-crucial-part-of-the-oceans-circulation-scientists-say/?utm_term=.2a3ead67d3fa&wpisrc=nl_green&wpmm=1>*
by Chris Mooney March 14 at 3:00 PM
Scientists studying a remote and icy stretch of the North Atlantic have
found new evidence that fresh water, likely melted from Greenland or
Arctic sea ice, may already be altering a key process that helps drives
the global circulation of the oceans.
In chilly waters on either side of Greenland, the ocean circulation
"overturns," as surface waters traveling northward become colder and
more dense and eventually sink, traveling back southward toward
Antarctica at extreme depths. This key sinking process is called
convection. But too much fresh water at the surface could interfere with
it, because with less salt, the water loses density and does not sink as
easily.
In the new research, Marilena Oltmanns and two colleagues at the GEOMAR
Helmholtz Center for Ocean Research in Kiel, Germany, found that
following particularly warm summers in the remote Irminger Sea,
convection tended to be more impaired in winter. In some cases, a layer
of meltwater stayed atop the ocean into the next year, rather than
vanishing into its depths as part of the overturning circulation, which
has sometimes been likened to an ocean "conveyor belt."
One caution is that this is an observational study, not a prediction
for the future - and Oltmanns said "nobody really knows" how much
freshwater is enough to significantly slow or shut down the
circulation, which is technically called the "Atlantic meridional
overturning circulation," or AMOC. Still, it suggests that key
processes
<https://www.gfdl.noaa.gov/bibliography/related_files/td0802.pdf>
that have raised long-standing concern are already happening.
The research highlights the growing attention being paid to the crucial
ocean circulation in question, which is responsible for bringing warm
ocean water northward and, therefore, warming higher latitudes and
Europe, in particular. It has long been considered a potential weak spot
in the climate system because of the possibility that a change here
could trigger dramatic changes in a short time.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2018/03/14/the-melting-arctic-is-already-messing-with-a-crucial-part-of-the-oceans-circulation-scientists-say/
[PREPUBLICATION COPY]
*Review of the Draft Fourth National Climate Assessment
<https://www.nap.edu/catalog/25013/review-of-the-draft-fourth-national-climate-assessment>*
"...draft NCA4 key messages tend to be long and are sometimes hard to
follow"
"...the Assessment is a mandated p;ruduct developed by the United States
Global Change Research Program (USGCRP)"
Read Online <https://www.nap.edu/read/25013> https://www.nap.edu/read/25013
187 pages
Free Download PDF
<https://www.nap.edu/login.php?record_id=25013&page=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nap.edu%2Fdownload%2F25013>
https://www.nap.edu/catalog/25013/review-of-the-draft-fourth-national-climate-assessment
[Free energy in Arizona]
*Senator Flake: Negative Electricity Pricing in Arizona
<https://youtu.be/h6Y_oh9PN-w>*
by greenman3610
video statement https://youtu.be/h6Y_oh9PN-w :20
[pull up the boots]
*An extra half degree of global warming could displace 5 million people
<https://www.upi.com/An-extra-half-degree-of-global-warming-could-displace-5-million-people/7421521134075/>*
UPI.com
"Even under the best-case climate policy being considered today, many
places will still have to deal with rising seas and more frequent
coastal floods,"...
Now, new research has confirmed that the half-degree separating the two
targets is far from inconsequential. According to climate scientists at
Princeton University, an extra half degree of warming would trigger
additional sea level rise, flooding coastal regions and islands
currently inhabited by some 5 million people...
Researchers used the most up-to-date sea level and storm surge
prediction models to gauge the impact of three different global warming
scenarios -- warming of 1.5, 2 and 2.5 degrees Celsius. The published
the results of their analysis in the journalEnvironmental Research
Letters <http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/aaac87/meta>
https://www.upi.com/An-extra-half-degree-of-global-warming-could-displace-5-million-people/7421521134075/
[sensitivity is a technical term]
*Climate sensitivity - reducing the uncertainty of uncertainty
<https://phys.org/news/2018-03-climate-sensitivityreducing-uncertainty.html>*
Phys.Org
In their paper published in the journal Nature, Prof. Cox and colleagues
estimate the sensitivity to be in the 'likely' range of 2.2 degrees C to
3.4 degrees C - less than half the range given by the IPCC...
To be clear, this range is not necessarily how much warming anyone
should expect. It only reflects how much warming there would be for a
doubling of CO2 levels since the baseline period of
pre-industrialisation - although we're about halfway to that threshold
already.
This simple parameter is known as the climate's sensitivity, and it
dominates our uncertainty about future global warming. ... "I sort of
see this as good news, in that our range says values above 4 degrees C
are unlikely, and so we're not yet too late to avoid the 2 degrees C
limit set by the Paris Agreement," said Prof. Cox.
https://phys.org/news/2018-03-climate-sensitivityreducing-uncertainty.html
[political warrior Tom Steyer]
*A Climate Activist's Impeachment Campaign Heats Up
<https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/03/why-tom-steyer-is-hot-about-climate-change-and-impeachment.html>*
Tom Steyer is hot about Democrats' lack of initiative on climate change
and impeachment.
Billionaire megadonor Tom Steyer, founder of the climate advocacy group
NextGen, has, for some time, been one of the most prominent climate
activists in the Democratic Party. He's recently turned his attention to
an expansive effort to build support for removing Trump from office.
He's spent millions on an impeachment ad campaign and will begin a
national town hall tour on the subject Thursday night in Columbus, Ohio.
*Osita Nwanevu:* ... But climate policy hasn't been a major part of the
conversation within the party and on the left since the election, even
as the need to address climate change obviously grows more urgent each
passing year. Why do you think that is?
*Tom Steyer:* You know it's hard for me to speculate about what they're
thinking about. To me, there's no way to get away from the centrality of
clean air and clean water and the need to rebuild a sustainable America.
When you think about the future of this country, it is hard for me to
see how we talk to people without talking about the right people have to
breathe clean air and drink clean water. That seems to me to be a basic
right that's being abridged. And it's a real health issue. And I think
in terms of thinking about both the current economic position of the
country and of working people and the future economic position of the
country and of working people, it's impossible not to see that we need
to rebuild the United States of America and we need to do it in a
sustainable way. Whether you're talking about creating good paying jobs
or when you're talking about the health of American citizens, you know
you are in effect talking about climate. You're just not talking about
it directly.
- - - -
I mean, I was talking to a super senior Democrat today who's an old
friend. And you know, the guy just hates impeachment. I mean he was
talking to me and said, "You know, I just don't want to talk about
impeachment because I disagree with you." And I was like, "OK, do you
think the guy is a traitor? That he's refusing to protect the American
people from electronic attacks by a hostile foreign power?" And he's
like, "Oh, yeah that's true." I said, "Do you think he's lawless?"
"Absolutely lawless." "So you think he's a traitor who is not obeying
the laws of the United States. And he's not putting the American people
first. He's the president. But you're not for impeachment?" "No." I'm
like, "Why not?" He's like, "Well, tactical reasons." And I'm like,
"This isn't a tactical question. This is a moral question. This is a
question of right and wrong. And you're telling me you won't stand up
for right and wrong because it's not tactically smart, in your opinion."
He says, "Yes." I don't want to extrapolate that conversation to
everybody else. But what I'm seeing is a lack of mojo. They're lying for
money. It's not nice. I wish it weren't true. But that's actually what's
happening. It's very simple. And so, if you're not willing to say that,
I have no idea what is scaring you. But for some reason, you're being
scared away from telling an obvious truth. That is absolutely hampering
us. And until we start telling the obvious truth-that this is a lawless
president controlled by a hostile foreign power-how are we supposed to
deal with it? We have to have the guts and the confidence to step up and
tell the truth because the American people need the truth.
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/03/why-tom-steyer-is-hot-about-climate-change-and-impeachment.html
[just words]
*FEMA Drops 'Climate Change' From Its Strategic Plan
<https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/03/15/594140026/fema-drops-climate-change-from-its-strategic-plan>*
March 15, 201811:49 PM ET
Richard Gonzales
The Federal Emergency Management Agency, the federal government's first
responder to floods, hurricanes and other natural disasters, has
eliminated references to climate change from its strategic planning
document for the next four years.
That document, released by FEMA on Thursday, outlines plans for building
preparedness and reducing the complexity of the agency.
"Disaster costs are expected to continue to increase due to rising
natural hazard risk, decaying critical infrastructure, and economic
pressures that limit investments in risk resilience. As good stewards of
taxpayer dollars, FEMA must ensure that our programs are fiscally sound.
Additionally, we will consider new pathways to long-term disaster risk
reduction, including increased investments in pre-disaster mitigation."
The document does not say what could be contributing to "rising natural
hazard risk," or what conditions could require the "increased
investments in pre-disaster mitigation."
Similarly, under a section about "Emerging Threats," the document cites
cybersecurity and terrorism. There are no references to global warming,
rising sea levels, extreme weather events or any other term related to
the potential impact of rising surface temperatures.
https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/03/15/594140026/fema-drops-climate-change-from-its-strategic-plan
[globalization]
*Global Warming and Climate Instability: One Last Chance to Save
Ourselves
<https://www.globalresearch.ca/global-warming-and-climate-instability-one-last-chance-to-save-ourselves/5631803>*
By Richard Gale and Dr. Gary Null
-----------------------------------
There is a peculiar arrogance when sentimental environmentalists
proclaim the Earth is sick and humanity must unite and collectively
gather together and heal her. This view also perpetuates the myth of
human supremacy over Nature and further reinforces the assumption shared
by most members of the scientific community, private corporations, and
among high governmental officials who have an unswerving faith in the
potentials of human intelligence and ingenuity to override the forces of
Nature. Regardless of how critical, or even desperate, a situation
becomes, there dangles before us the faux promise that we can find the
technology to solve it. But humanity is not a savior for the simple fact
the Earth does not need saving, except from our own limited, awry
perception and destructive actions. "Global warming," writes Roy
Scranton, author of Learning to Die in the Anthropocene, "is what is
called a 'wicked problem': it doesn't offer any clear solutions, only
better or worse responses." Regardless of the billions of tons of carbon
dioxide, methane and other greenhouse gases our culture pumps into the
atmosphere, regardless of how acidic we turn the oceans, the Earth will
tweak and re-tweak itself in order to return to a homeostatic state,
with or without the numerous species now faced with extinction. It will
continue to self-organize and reestablish stability. It may require many
thousands of years after the Anthropocene has passed before she finds a
new balance and bursts anew, albeit without us or the presence of
countless other creatures extinguished by climate change. This was the
overriding theme in Alan Weisman's bestselling thought experiment, The
World Without Us, later made into a PBS special, which portrayed a
planet coming alive again after humanity destroyed itself. Earth will
heal nicely, thank you, without our technological intervention and the
hubris of the superiority complex unique to our species.
---------------------------
There are certain dominant characteristics that define psychopathic
behavior. One is the inability to feel remorse over destructive
behavior or for committing a crime that inflicts terrible suffering upon
another. Another common psychopathic trait is to regard violent acts as
permissible and perhaps even beneficial. Therefore, we destroy and kill
thousands of species, live off a diet responsible for the butchering of
billions of animals daily, mow over ecosystems for mining and
development or to raise livestock and sow genetically engineered crops,
survey and drill and drill some more for the Earth's last drops of
fossil fuels, all in the name of capitalist growth and expansion. At the
same time, corporations and the global elite, the captains of industry,
our governments, international banks, our educational institutions, and
the corporate media whitewash these ecocidal actions as being virtuous
and necessary in order for us to enjoy the comforts and ease of
postmodern civilization has to offer. Perversely, we are being told it
is better to sustain the artifacts of our modern culture than the Gaian
life support necessary to live, breath and nourish us.
Such a view is pathologically dangerous. And it is indicative of the
human psychology that today defines the Anthropocene Age.
https://www.globalresearch.ca/global-warming-and-climate-instability-one-last-chance-to-save-ourselves/5631803
*This Day in Climate History - March 17, 2015
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/robert-kenner-battles-climate-change-deniers-with-merchants-of-doubt/2015/03/16/8011a19c-c80e-11e4-a199-6cb5e63819d2_story.html?hpid=z4>
- from D.R. Tucker*
March 17, 2015:
The Washington Post profiles "Merchants of Doubt" director Robert Kenner.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/robert-kenner-battles-climate-change-deniers-with-merchants-of-doubt/2015/03/16/8011a19c-c80e-11e4-a199-6cb5e63819d2_story.html?hpid=z4
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