[TheClimate.Vote] February 26, 2019 - Daily Global Warming News Digest

[Richard Pauli]

/February 26, 2019/


[serious politicking]
*18 Strategies for a Green New Deal: How to Make the Climate 
Mobilization Work*
View PDF 
https://www.labor4sustainability.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/18Strategies.pdf
"The Green New Deal projects a broad vision of creating a climate-safe 
America through an economic and social mobilization on a scale not seen 
since the New Deal and World War II. That mobilization can provide a 
historic opportunity to create millions of good, high-wage jobs, 
virtually eliminate poverty, provide unprecedented levels of prosperity 
and economic security, and counteract systemic injustices. So far 
discussion about the Green New Deal has rightly focused on values and 
goals. But there are many practical problems that will have to be solved 
as well. The LNS discussion paper "18 Strategies for a Green New Deal: 
How to Make the Climate Mobilization Work" lays out how the Green New 
Deal can realize its goals."
https://www.labor4sustainability.org/articles/18-strategies-for-a-green-new-deal-how-to-make-the-climate-mobilization-work/


[Quanta magazine]
*A World Without Clouds*
A state-of-the-art supercomputer simulation indicates that a feedback 
loop between global warming and cloud loss can push Earth's climate past 
a disastrous tipping point in as little as a century...
- -
Clouds currently cover about two-thirds of the planet at any moment. But 
computer simulations of clouds have begun to suggest that as the Earth 
warms, clouds become scarcer. With fewer white surfaces reflecting 
sunlight back to space, the Earth gets even warmer, leading to more 
cloud loss. This feedback loop causes warming to spiral out of control.

For decades, rough calculations have suggested that cloud loss could 
significantly impact climate, but this concern remained speculative 
until the last few years, when observations and simulations of clouds 
improved to the point where researchers could amass convincing evidence...
- - -
But other unforeseen changes and climate tipping points could accelerate 
us toward the cliff. "I'm worried," said Kennett, the pioneering 
paleoceanographer who discovered the PETM and unearthed evidence of many 
other tumultuous periods in Earth's history. "Are you kidding? As far as 
I'm concerned, global warming is the major issue of our time."

During the PETM, mammals, newly ascendant after the dinosaurs' downfall, 
actually thrived. Their northward march led them to land bridges that 
allowed them to fan out across the globe, filling ecological niches and 
spreading south again as the planet reabsorbed the excess CO2 in the sky 
and cooled over 200,000 years. However, their story is hardly one we can 
hope to emulate. One difference, scientists say, is that Earth was much 
warmer then to begin with, so there were no ice caps to melt and 
accelerate the warming and sea-level rise.

"The other big difference," said the climatologist Gavin Schmidt, 
director of the Goddard Institute, "is, we're here, and we're adapted to 
the climate we have. We built our cities all the way around the coasts; 
we've built our agricultural systems expecting the rain to be where it 
is and the dry areas to be where they are." And national borders are 
where they are. "We're not prepared for those things to shift," he said.
https://www.quantamagazine.org/cloud-loss-could-add-8-degrees-to-global-warming-20190225/#newsletter


["Don't trust anyone over 30"]
*Don't trust the adults in the room on climate change*
Kate Aronoff, The Guardian
Older politicians are too quick to write off younger climate activists. 
But where are their solutions to the climate crisis?
- - -
None of these figures deny climate change in the conventional sense of 
spouting junk science from rightwing thinktanks. They have all agreed 
publicly and even forcefully that climate change is a pressing issue, 
and that human activity is its cause. Several have been vocal advocates 
for climate action of one sort or another. But none have proposed a 
workable alternative to the economy-wide mobilization the Green New Deal 
sets out to accomplish, to rapidly electrify the American economy and 
reach net-zero carbon emissions by 2030. Details still need to be worked 
out on that plan, of course. But it remains the only idea on the table 
even remotely approaching the "wartime footing" climate scientists are 
increasingly insistent is necessary to avert catastrophe.

The kids, in other words, are right. They will also be the ones forced 
to live with the consequences of the choices politicians make in the 
next several years. That's not an unfamiliar dynamic in climate 
politics. Residents of climate vulnerable nations who are already 
dealing with rising tides and temperatures have long been the ones 
pushing for the most ambitious action at the international level, 
chanting "1.5 to survive" through the halls of UN climate talks. 
Communities in the US forced to live with the health impacts of 
extraction - from Houston to the Bay Area - have for years sought an end 
to the drilling that's threatening to cook us. As they have in the last 
few weeks, adults in the room - whether US negotiators at the UN or big 
beltway conservation organizations - have in each case offered sage 
counsel: be realistic!

Yet realism on climate means something different than it did even a 
decade or two ago, when a modest carbon tax and a smattering of tax 
credits might have gotten the job done. As the IPCC noted in its latest 
report, avoiding climate breakdown at this point will mean a "rapid, 
far-reaching and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society", 
including massive investments in renewable energy and new technology and 
going to war with the world's most powerful industry, fossil fuels.

Thankfully, Sunrise, Ocasio-Cortez and other Green New Deal advocates 
are updating our shared definition of what being realistic in a 
climate-changed 21st century looks like. The adults in the room would do 
well to listen.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/feb/25/adults-room-climate-change-dianne-feinstein


[Exxon whining]
*Exxon Asks SEC to Block Climate Pressure by Shareholders*
Exxon is trying to prevent shareholders from voting on a proposal 
calling on the oil giant to set and disclose targets for reducing 
greenhouse gas emissions that would align its business with the goals of 
the Paris Climate Agreement.

Exxon sent a letter to the Securities and Exchange Commission on Jan. 31 
with its plans to omit the shareholder proposal from its 2019 proxy 
materials and prevent voting on the proposal. It asked the commission to 
confirm that it will not recommend enforcement action if it does so.

Exxon contends the proposal, which was sponsored by the New York State 
Common Retirement Fund, the Church of England and dozens of co-filers, 
is "vague and misleading" and seeks to "micro-manage" the company. It 
also said those goals have already been disclosed in its 2018 Energy and 
Carbon Summary.

"Exxon is trying to deny shareholders' right to vote on a significant 
climate risk concern," New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli said 
in a statement. DiNapoli said Exxon's opposition to the proposal is 
"shortsighted and disappointing."

Exxon was forced to release its 2018 report after shareholders succeeded 
for the first time in passing a resolution to prompt more climate risk 
disclosure. In that report,  the company claimed climate change poses 
"little risk" to its business. Critics said the report omitted 
disclosure of risks to the global economy from catastrophic climate 
change, as well of disclosure of the risks of climate change to its own 
facilities.

In the 2019 Energy and Carbon Report, which was released earlier this 
month, Exxon said it supports the Paris Climate Agreement, but does not 
mention the increasing number of climate liability suits Exxon is facing 
or the lawsuit filed by the New York State attorney general's office for 
deceiving investors over climate risks to their investments.
- - -
With an increased global awareness and concern about the catastrophic 
effects of climate change, resolutions requiring companies to disclose 
climate risks are becoming more common.

"We're in a very different context today, in terms of 
investors--including some of the biggest investors in the world--asking 
companies to be much more thoughtfully integrating climate change issues 
into their business planning and to assess what the impact of climate 
change is going to be on them and their shareholders," said Timothy 
Smith, director of environment, social and governance shareholder 
engagement for Boston Trust and Investment Company. Smith said both BP 
and Shell are supportive of similar shareholder proposals.

"That's why it's distressing to watch ExxonMobil say 'we don't even want 
to see this resolution put on the ballot.'"
https://www.climateliabilitynews.org/2019/02/25/exxon-sec-climate-change-resolution/


[let the blaming begin]
*CO2 Mitigation Curves: 1.5 degrees*
http://folk.uio.no/roberan/img/GCB2018/PNG/s00_2018_Mitigation_Curves_1.5C.png


[...lifting all boats]
*Continued sea-level rise on East and Gulf coasts detailed*
Nearly all non-Alaskan West Coast tide stations also saw higher seas
Date: February 25, 2019
Source: Virginia Institute of Marine Science
Summary: Interactive plots provide annual sea-level projections to 2050 
for 32 localities along the US coastline from Maine to Alaska.
Researchers at William & Mary's Virginia Institute of Marine Science 
have issued the first annual update of their sea level "report cards," 
marking 50 years of water-level observations from 1969 through 2018.

These web-based charts -- available online at 
https://www.vims.edu/research/products/slrc/index.php -- project sea 
level out to the year 2050 based on an ongoing analysis of tide-gauge 
records for 32 localities along the U.S. coastline from Maine to Alaska. 
Release of this year's cards was delayed by the 35-day government 
shutdown, which precluded compilation of and access to NOAA's latest 
tide-gauge records...
- - -
The difference between the linear rates used in NOAA's sea-level 
forecasts and the non-linear, accelerating rates used in VIMS' report 
cards can lead to sharply different forecasts of our sea-level future. 
Extending NOAA's linear sea-level projections to mid-century for the 
tide gauge in Norfolk, Virginia indicates that sea level here will be 
0.3 meters (11.8 inches) higher by 2050, while the VIMS forecast -- 
using a non-linear, accelerating rate -- is 0.49 meters, or 19.3 inches. 
That extra 20 centimeters (8 inches) of sea-level rise would have major 
implications for the low-lying region.

The VIMS team moreover cautions that sea level is likely to experience 
short-term variations in the future just as it does today. Thus, coastal 
residents and planners in Virginia and other areas likely to experience 
significant sea-level increases by 2050 must also account for storm 
surges and other transient forces raising sea level even higher than the 
projected mean rise value. The 95% confidence bands placed about the 
projected quadratic curve in VIMS' sea-level report cards are a further 
reminder that average sea level in any given month can deviate from the 
projected annual mean by as much as 20 centimeters (8 inches).
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/02/190225123513.htm


[Big ice mass ready to fall into the ocean]
Countdown to Calving at Brunt Ice Shelf
*Cracks growing across Antarctica's Brunt Ice Shelf are poised to 
release an iceberg with an area about twice the size of New York City.* 
It is not yet clear how the remaining ice shelf will respond following 
the break, posing an uncertain future for scientific infrastructure and 
a human presence on the shelf that was first established in 1955.

The cracks are apparent by comparing these images acquired with Landsat 
satellites. The Thematic Mapper (TM) on Landsat 5 obtained the first 
image (left) on January 30, 1986. [The second image (right), from the 
Operational Land Imager (OLI) on Landsat 8, shows the same area on 
January 23, 2019.]

The crack along the top of the January 23 image--the so-called Halloween 
crack--first appeared in late October 2016 and continues to grow 
eastward from an area known as the McDonald Ice Rumples. The rumples are 
due to the way ice flows over an underwater formation, where the bedrock 
rises high enough to reach into the underside of the ice shelf. This 
rocky formation impedes the flow of ice and causes pressure waves, 
crevasses, and rifts to form at the surface.

The more immediate concern is the rift visible in the center of the 
image. Previously stable for about 35 years, this crack recently started 
accelerating northward as fast as 4 kilometers per year.

The detailed view shows this northward expanding rift coming within a 
few kilometers of the McDonald Ice Rumples and the Halloween crack. When 
it cuts all the way across, the area of ice lost from the shelf will 
likely be at least 1700 square kilometers (660 square miles). That's not 
a terribly large iceberg by Antarctic standards--probably not even 
making the top 20 list. But it may be the largest berg to break from the 
Brunt Ice Shelf since observations began in 1915. Scientists are 
watching to see if the loss will trigger the shelf to further change and 
possibly become unstable or break up.

"The near-term future of Brunt Ice Shelf likely depends on where the 
existing rifts merge relative to the McDonald Ice Rumples," said Joe 
MacGregor, a glaciologist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. "If 
they merge upstream (south) of the McDonald Ice Rumples, then it's 
possible that the ice shelf will be destabilized."

The growing cracks have prompted safety concerns for people working on 
the shelf, particularly researchers at the British Antarctic Survey's 
Halley Station. This major base for Earth, atmospheric, and space 
science research typically operates year-round, but has been closed down 
twice in recent years due to unpredictable changes in the ice. The 
station has also been rebuilt and relocated over the decades. The 
detailed image shows the station's location (Halley IV) until it was 
closed in 1992. In 2016-2017, the Halley VI station was relocated to a 
safer location (Halley VIa) upstream of the growing crack.

Calving is a normal part of the life cycle of ice shelves, but the 
recent changes are unfamiliar in this area. The edge of the Brunt Ice 
Shelf has evolved slowly since Ernest Shackleton surveyed the coast in 
1915, but it has been speeding up in the past several years.

"We don't have a clear picture of what drives the shelf's periods of 
advance and retreat through calving," said NASA/UMBC glaciologist Chris 
Shuman. "The likely future loss of the ice on the other side of the 
Halloween Crack suggests that more instability is possible, with 
associated risk to Halley VIa."
https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/144563/countdown-to-calving-at-brunt-ice-shelf



[Ugh, flush, ugh. Ick.]
*Great Barrier Reef authority gives green light to dump dredging sludge*
The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority has approved the dumping of 
more than 1m tonnes of dredge spoil near the reef, using a loophole in 
federal laws that were supposed to protect the marine park.

The Greens senator Larissa Waters has called for the permit - which 
allows maintenance dredging to be carried out over 10 years at Mackay's 
Hay Point port and the sludge to be dumped within the marine park's 
boundaries - to be revoked.

"The last thing the reef needs is more sludge dumped on it, after being 
slammed by the floods recently," Waters said. "One million tonnes of 
dumping dredged sludge into world heritage waters treats our reef like a 
rubbish tip."...
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/feb/20/great-barrier-reef-authority-gives-green-light-to-dump-dredging-sludge



[see the rate-of-change maps 2002-2018]
*NASA Earth Observatory Global Maps*
Snow Cover
Sea Surface Temperature
Chlorophyll
Net Radiation
Cloud Fraction
Vegetation
Aerosol Optical Depth
Water Vapor
https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/global-maps



[Classic Climate Lecture 1 hour 37 mins]
*James Hansen's Lecture: Global Climate Change: Can the Next Generation 
Avert a Catastrophe?*
American Association of Geographers
Published on May 25, 2017
April 7, 2017--James Hansen, known for his climate research and his 
Congressional testimony on climate change that raised awareness of 
global warming, delivered a featured talk, "Global Climate Change: Can 
the Next Generation Avert a Catastrophe?" at the 2017 AAG Annual Meeting 
in Boston. The session was chaired and moderated by AAG President Glen 
MacDonald. Hansen was also honored as the 2017 AAG Honorary Geographer 
during the AAG Awards Luncheon.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abOPul78Ilk


*This Day in Climate History - February 26, 2003 - from D.R. Tucker*
February 26, 2003: The New York Times reports:

    "A panel of experts has strongly criticized the Bush
    administration's proposed research plan on the risks of global
    warming, saying that it 'lacks most of the elements of a strategic
    plan' and that its goals cannot be achieved without far more money
    than the White House has sought for climate research.

    "The 17 experts, in a report issued yesterday, said that without
    substantial changes, the administration's plan would be unlikely to
    accomplish the aim laid out by President Bush in several speeches:
    to help decision makers and the public determine how serious the
    problem is so that they can make clear choices about how to deal
    with it."

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/26/us/panel-of-experts-faults-bush-plan-to-study-climate.html
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