[TheClimate.Vote] January 10, 2019 - Daily Global Warming News Digest

[Richard Pauli]

/January 10, 2019/

[liability news]
*Massive Wildfire Costs Could Sink California's Largest Utility*
By Dana Drugmand - January 9, 2019
Facing billions of dollars in damage costs and numerous lawsuits for its 
role in sparking devastating wildfires in northern California, the 
state's largest utility is now exploring options to avoid financial 
ruin, including a possible bankruptcy filing. But while Pacific Gas & 
Electric Co. reckons with potentially crippling liability because its 
electrical equipment likely started several blazes, the question of who 
will ultimately pay for losses--particularly those from the recent Camp 
Fire, the deadliest and most destructive fire in California 
history--remains unanswered.

The Camp Fire was the world's costliest natural disaster of 2018, with 
overall losses estimated at $16.5 billion, according to new figures 
released by Munich Re, the world's largest reinsurance company. The 
cause of the fire remains under investigation.

California's utility customers may be on the hook for much of those 
costs if state lawmakers or the California Public Utilities Commission 
(PUC) allows the company to recover its losses with rate increases. Last 
year, the state legislature passed a bill that permitted investor-owned 
utilities to pass on wildfire-related costs to consumers. The bill 
pertained to the 2017 wildfires and subsequent fires beginning in 2019, 
but it did not address fires occurring in 2018.

PG&E requested a 12 percent rate increase in December, a total of $1.1 
billion. The company is asking for $9.6 billion in 2020 compared to $8.5 
billion approved for 2019.

That rate increase, if approved, would increase the typical customer's 
bill by 6.4 percent, but it would not cover liability claims. PG&E could 
face $30 billion in potential liability from the 2017 and 2018 
wildfires. That figure doesn't include fines, penalties or punitive damages.

Nearly two dozen lawsuits by Camp Fire victims have been filed against 
PG&E. Insurance companies are also suing the utility, and the state's 
attorney general indicated in a recent court filing that the company may 
be charged criminally, including for murder. PG&E's potential legal 
liability is heightened by the doctrine of inverse condemnation, which 
says a party can he held liable for property damage even if it was not 
negligent. Under California law, the doctrine applies to public utilities.

PG&E has argued that it should not be held strictly liable for these 
fires because climate change is increasingly exacerbating fire risk. 
Although utility equipment may spark fires, extremely warm and dry 
conditions play a role in amplifying the destruction. This raises 
further questions around wildfire liability costs and who should foot 
the bill...
https://www.climateliabilitynews.org/2019/01/09/wildfire-costs-california-utilities/


[going forward anyway]
*A Major Climate Treaty to Reduce Air Conditioning Emissions Just Went 
Into Force--Without the U.S.*
Brian Kahn
While the world was still hungover from the major climate conference in 
Poland last month, a game-changing climate treaty quietly went into 
effect. The Kigali Amendment entered into force as the calendar turned 
to 2019 and with it, the world began to put the clamps down on some of 
the most potent greenhouse gases on Earth. Now if only the U.S. would 
sign on.

It's taken years for the amendment to take shape and ratify, and it all 
stems from a big whoopsie in the 1980s. Then, scientists realized that 
chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs)--chemicals commonly found in air 
conditioners, refrigerators, and other cooling technologies--were 
screwing up Earth's ozone layer. The world's governments acted quickly 
to phase them out, passing the Montreal Protocol, an international 
treaty that's considered to be among the most successful environmental 
treaties ever agreed to.

There was just one problem: The chemicals that replaced CFCs were 
insanely potent greenhouse gases. Pound for pound, hydrofluorocarbons 
(HFCs) warm the planet up to 11,700 times more than carbon dioxide. And 
ironically, as the planet heats up, the need for air conditioning will 
increase, resulting in more emissions tied to HFCs. To stave that off, 
countries proposed amending the Montreal Protocol to phase these 
chemicals out too. Doing so could cut global warming up to 0.4°C by 2100.

In 2016, the world agreed to the Kigali Amendment and since then, 
countries have been signing on. The amendment went into force last week 
with 65 countries ratifying it. Those ranks include industrial heavy 
hitters like European Union, Japan, Canada, and Australia as well as a 
host of developing nations, and the United Nations said it expects more 
to join the coming weeks. Notably absent are China and the U.S., the two 
biggest manufacturers and users of HFCs. China is expected to sign on.

The U.S. remains a wildcard, though, largely due to the White House and 
its seeming inability to get its act together. The Kigali is a rare 
environmental agreement that basically everyone else agrees is necessary...
https://earther.gizmodo.com/a-major-climate-treaty-to-reduce-air-conditioning-emiss-1831545369


[clips from Interview w Diva of Climate Communications]
*Katharine Hayhoe: 'A thermometer is not liberal or conservative'*
Jonathan Wattts
The award-winning atmospheric scientist on the urgency of the climate 
crisis and why people are her biggest hope
Katharine Hayhoe:*'Fear is a short-term spur to action, but to make 
changes over the long term, we must have hope.' *

Katharine Hayhoe is an atmospheric scientist and director of the Climate 
Science Center at Texas Tech University. She has contributed to more 
than 125 scientific papers and won numerous prizes for her science 
communication work. In 2018 she was a contributor to the US National 
Climate Assessment and was awarded the Stephen H Schneider award for 
outstanding climate science communication.
*In 2018, we have seen forest fires in the Arctic circle; record high 
temperatures in parts of Australia, Africa and the US; floods in India; 
and devastating droughts in South Africa and Argentina. Is this a 
turning point? *
This year has hit home how climate change loads the dice against us by 
taking naturally occurring weather events and amplifying them. We now 
have attribution studies that show how much more likely or stronger 
extreme weather events have become as a result of human emissions. For 
example, wildfires in the western US now burn nearly twice the area they 
would without climate change, and almost 40% more rain fell during 
Hurricane Harvey than would have otherwise. So we are really feeling the 
impacts and know how much humanity is responsible...
- - -
*What are the most positive developments you have seen in the past year 
in the climate field? *

I'm asked what gives me hope on a daily basis, and my answer is, I don't 
find hope in my science, I find it in people. Over the last few years, 
the number of people who want to talk about and do something about 
climate has increased exponentially. Then, there is the unexpected 
leadership of organisations such as Young Evangelicals for Climate 
Action, RepublicEN, the Iron and Earth group – young professionals in 
the oil and construction industries who want to be part of the move from 
fossil fuels; and the take-up of renewables even in conservative states 
like Texas, which now gets 20% of its energy from wind and solar power.

Finally, there's the encouraging news such as solar being the 
fastest-growing power source around the world, clean energy jobs growing 
from India to the US, and new technology being developed every year that 
drops the price and increases the accessibility of fossil fuel alternatives.

*This year has also seen the rise of disruptive campaigning, for example 
Extinction Rebellion in the UK; the student strikes led by Greta 
Thunberg; and direct action in the US and Canada against oil pipelines. 
Is there a point when scientists also have to speak out more forcefully?*

We are moving in that direction. Scientists are not just disembodied 
brains floating in a glass jar, we are humans who want the same thing 
every other human wants, a safe place to live on this planet we call 
home. So while our work must continue to be unbiased and objective, 
increasingly we are raising our voices, adding to the clear message that 
climate change is real and humans are responsible, the impacts are 
serious and we must act now, if we want to avoid the worst of them.

*What are the key political moments in 2019 for climate policy in the US 
and the world? *
International talks are important but we should be looking at 
subnational actors because there is a lot going on at the city and 
corporate level. Across the US a hundred cities have committed to going 
100% clean energy. Companies like Apple have already achieved that goal. 
In the US there's a new climate bill with bipartisan sponsors, which is 
essential for legislation to succeed long-term.

*Are we likely to get any respite from climate change? *
(Sighs.) Climate change is a long-term trend superimposed over natural 
variability. There'll be good and bad years, just like there are for a 
patient with a long-term illness, but it isn't going away. To stabilise 
climate change, we have to eliminate our carbon emissions. And we're 
still a long way away from that.
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2019/jan/06/katharine-hayhoe-interview-climate-change-scientist-crisis-hope


[BBC opinions philosophical]
Deep Civilisation  Prediction  Philosophy
*The perils of short-termism: Civilisation's greatest threat*
Our inability to look beyond the latest news cycle could be one of the 
most dangerous traits of our generation, says Richard Fisher.
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20190109-the-perils-of-short-termism-civilisations-greatest-threat


[some calculations say more]
*Global warming of oceans equivalent to an atomic bomb per second*
Seas absorb 90% of climate change's energy as new research reveals vast 
heating over past 150 years

Global warming has heated the oceans by the equivalent of one atomic 
bomb explosion per second for the past 150 years, according to analysis 
of new research.

More than 90% of the heat trapped by humanity's greenhouse gas emissions 
has been absorbed by the seas, with just a few per cent heating the air, 
land and ice caps respectively. The vast amount of energy being added to 
the oceans drives sea-level rise and enables hurricanes and typhoons to 
become more intense.

Much of the heat has been stored in the ocean depths but measurements 
here only began in recent decades and existing estimates of the total 
heat the oceans have absorbed stretch back only to about 1950. The new 
work extends that back to 1871. Scientists have said that understanding 
past changes in ocean heat was critical for predicting the future impact 
of climate change.

A Guardian calculation found the average heating across that 150-year 
period was equivalent to about 1.5 Hiroshima-size atomic bombs per 
second. But the heating has accelerated over that time as carbon 
emissions have risen, and was now the equivalent of between three and 
six atomic bombs per second.

"I try not to make this type of calculation, simply because I find it 
worrisome," said Prof Laure Zanna, at the University of Oxford, who led 
the new research. "We usually try to compare the heating to [human] 
energy use, to make it less scary."

She added: "But obviously, we are putting a lot of excess energy into 
the climate system and a lot of that ends up in the ocean,. There is no 
doubt." The total heat taken up by the oceans over the past 150 years 
was about 1,000 times the annual energy use of the entire global population.

The research has been published in the journal Proceedings of the 
National Academy of Sciences and combined measurements of the surface 
temperature of the ocean since 1871 with computer models of ocean 
circulation.

Prof Samar Khatiwala, also at the University of Oxford and part of the 
team, said: "Our approach is akin to 'painting' different bits of the 
ocean surface with dyes of different colours and monitoring how they 
spread into the interior over time. If we know what the sea surface 
temperature anomaly was in 1871 in the North Atlantic Ocean we can 
figure out how much it contributes to the warming in, say, the deep 
Indian Ocean in 2018."

Rising sea level has been among the most dangerous long-term impacts of 
climate change, threatening billions of people living in coastal cities, 
and estimating future rises is vital in preparing defences. Some of the 
rise comes from the melting of land-bound ice in Greenland and 
elsewhere, but another major factor has been the physical expansion of 
water as it gets warmer.

However, the seas do not warm uniformly as ocean currents transport heat 
around the world. Reconstructing the amount of heat absorbed by the 
oceans over the past 150 years is important as it provides a baseline. 
In the Atlantic, for example, the team found that half the rise seen 
since 1971 at low and middle latitudes resulted from heat transported 
into the region by currents.

The new work would help researchers make better predictions of sea-level 
rise for different regions in the future. "Future changes in ocean 
transport could have severe consequences for regional sea-level rise and 
the risk of coastal flooding," the researchers said. "Understanding 
ocean heat change and the role of circulation in shaping the patterns of 
warming remain key to predicting global and regional climate change and 
sea-level rise."

Dana Nuccitelli, an environmental scientist who was not involved in the 
new research, said: "The ocean heating rate has increased as global 
warming has accelerated, and the value is somewhere between roughly 
three to six Hiroshima bombs per second in recent decades, depending on 
which dataset and which timeframe is used. This new study estimates the 
ocean heating rate at about three Hiroshima bombs per second for the 
period of 1990 to 2015, which is on the low end of other estimates."
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/jan/07/global-warming-of-oceans-equivalent-to-an-atomic-bomb-per-second



[up again]
*U.S. Carbon Dioxide Emissions Are Once Again On The Rise*
January 8, 2019
Heard on All Things Considered
Carbon dioxide emissions in the U.S. are on the rise again after several 
years of decline, and a booming economy is the cause.

That's according to a report out today from the Rhodium Group, an 
independent research firm that tracks CO2 emissions in the U.S.

"It appears based on preliminary data that emissions in the U.S. grew by 
the highest rate since 2010 when we were recovering from the great 
recession," says Trevor Houser, a partner at Rhodium and an author on 
the new estimate.

Emissions rose roughly 3.4 percent in 2018, he says.

The big drivers were increased electricity demand and growth in trucking 
and aviation.

The report underscores an unusual upside to an economic downturn: When 
the economy shrinks, greenhouse gas emissions also go down. That's what 
happened in the throes of the financial crisis in 2008 -- carbon dioxide 
emissions plummeted. They've been bouncing up and down since then. But 
last year, the strong economic growth meant a rise. A cold winter was 
also a factor, particularly because it led to higher consumption of 
natural gas and fuel oil in homes for heat.
There were some areas where decisions by government and industry helped 
to reduce some types of emissions. A record number of coal-fired power 
plants closed last year. And emissions from passenger automobiles 
dropped slightly, due to better fuel-economy standards. But it wasn't 
enough, and Houser wants more aggressive policies to drive drown CO2. 
That seems unlikely for now. Policies to limit greenhouse gas emissions 
started under the Obama administration are now being halted and even 
reversed under President Trump.

"What we've seen is backsliding in federal policy, and we're starting to 
feel the effects of that now," Houser says.

The report means the U.S. is less likely to meet its reduction targets 
under the global Paris climate agreement, according to Andrew Light, a 
senior fellow at the World Resources Institute. When the U.S. signed on 
to the agreement in 2015, then-President Obama promised a 26-28 percent 
reduction from 2005 levels by 2025.

There's still time to catch up, Light says. "If we do get back on track 
in the United States toward having an energy policy that's consistent 
with the threat of climate change then we can turn these things around," 
he says.

Stock markets have faltered in recent months, indicating the U.S. might 
be headed toward another recession. That could cause emissions to drop, 
but Houser says it would not be productive.

"A short-term emissions decline as a result of a recession is not 
something anyone's cheering for," he says. "We do the best on this issue 
when the economy is thriving, and there are policies in place that can 
channel investment into clean energy technologies."
https://www.npr.org/2019/01/08/683258294/u-s-carbon-dioxide-emissions-are-once-again-on-the-rise


[heat rises, ice melts]
*When the ice melts: the catastrophe of vanishing glaciers*
As global temperatures rise, shrivelling glaciers and thawing permafrost 
threaten yet more climate disruption. How should we confront what is 
happening to our world?
By Dahr Jamail
My teammates pull me up to the lip of the crevasse. I repeatedly plunge 
the pick of my ice axe into the snow and haul myself out, never before 
as grateful for being on top of a glacier. I stand and gaze up at a 
mountain to the west, behind which the sun has just set. Snow plumes 
stream off one of its ridges, turned into red ribbons by the setting 
sun. Snowflakes flicker as they float into space.

As relief floods my shivering body, I roar in gratitude. Utterly 
overwhelmed by being alive and surrounded by the beauty of the mountain 
world, I hug each of my three climbing partners. Now that I am safe, it 
sinks in just how close to death I've been.

That was 22 April 2003 – Earth Day. In hindsight, I believe the emotion 
I felt then stemmed in part from something else – a deeper consciousness 
that the ice I had seen was vanishing. Seven years of climbing in Alaska 
had provided me with a front-row seat from where I could witness the 
dramatic impact of human-caused climate disruption. Each year, we found 
that the toe of the glacier had shrivelled further. Each year, for the 
annual early season ice-climbing festival on this glacier, we found 
ourselves hiking further up the crusty frozen mud left behind by its 
rapidly retreating terminus. Each year, the parking lot was moved closer 
to the glacier, only to be left farther away as the ice withdrew. Even 
sections of Denali – the highest mountain in North America, which stands 
more than 20,000 feet tall and is roughly 250 miles from the Arctic 
Circle – had already undergone startling changes in 2003: the ice of its 
glaciers was disappearing quickly...
- - -
A glacier is essentially suspended energy, suspended force. It is, in a 
sense, life frozen in time. But now they are themselves running out of 
time. The planet's ecosystems, pushed far beyond their capacity to adapt 
to human-generated traumas and stresses, are in a state of freefall. 
Just as I watched hundreds of years of time compressed into glacial ice 
flash before my eyes in a matter of seconds as I fell into the crevasse, 
swathes of the natural world are, in the blink of a geological eye, 
falling into oblivion.

Modern life has compressed time and space. You can traverse the globe in 
a matter of hours, or gain information in nanoseconds. The price for 
this, along with everything we want, on demand, all the time, is a total 
disconnection from the planet that sustains our lives...
- -
While western colonialist culture believes in "rights", many indigenous 
cultures teach of "obligations" that we are born into: obligations to 
those who came before, to those who will come after, and to the Earth 
itself. When I orient myself around the question of what my obligations 
are, a deeper question immediately arises: from this moment on, knowing 
what is happening to the planet, to what do I devote my life?

This is an edited extract from The End of Ice by Dahr Jamail, which will 
be published by The New Press on 15 January
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2019/jan/08/when-the-ice-melts-the-catastrophe-of-vanishing-glaciers?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Gmail


*This Day in Climate History - January 10, 2017- from D.R. Tucker*
In his final address as President, Barack Obama declares:

    "Take the challenge of climate change.  In just eight years, we've
    halved our dependence on foreign oil, doubled our renewable energy,
    and led the world to an agreement that has the promise to save this
    planet.  But without bolder action, our children won’t have time to
    debate the existence of climate change; they'll be busy dealing with
    its effects: environmental disasters, economic disruptions, and waves
    of climate refugees seeking sanctuary.
    "Now, we can and should argue about the best approach to the problem.
    But to simply deny the problem not only betrays future generations; it
    betrays the essential spirit of innovation and practical
    problem-solving that guided our Founders."

http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol-obama-farewell-speech-transcript-20170110-story.html
https://youtu.be/siyBp8Csugk
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