[TheClimate.Vote] August 1, 2020 - Daily Global Warming News Digest

[Richard Pauli]

/*August 1, 2020*/

[WAPO]
*Hot ocean waters along East Coast are drawing in 'weird' fish and 
supercharging hurricanes*
Warm waters are a major concern with Hurricane Isaias forecast to ride 
up the Eastern Seaboard.
- -
Much of the Eastern Seaboard, from the Georgia coast to southern Maine, 
is in the midst of what scientists define as a marine heat wave. They 
occur when ocean temperatures are abnormally warm (in the 90th 
percentile of available data) for an extended period (at least five days).

Marine heat wave intensity is categorized from moderate to extreme. 
While the waters off the Southeast coast are mostly in a moderate heat 
wave, the intensity becomes strong along pockets of the Mid-Atlantic 
coast before swelling to strong to severe off the shores of 
Massachusetts and southeast Maine.

Temperatures off the Northeast coast are 5.4 to 7.2 degrees above 
normal, said Andrew Pershing, chief scientific officer at the Gulf of 
Maine Research Institute, in an email.
Due to human-caused buildup of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, 
marine heat waves have increased dramatically in frequency, size and 
severity in recent decades. They've altered fisheries and killed 
seabirds in the North Pacific and Bering Sea, and damaged or killed 
parts of the Great Barrier Reef, a World Heritage site...
- -
"A lot of these species you think of [as living] south of Cape Hatteras 
and now you're seeing them in southern New England,"...
- -
As a measure of how warm the water was in the northwest Atlantic when 
Dolly formed, a buoy at Georges Bank, 170 nautical miles east of 
Hyannis, Mass., recorded a sea surface temperature above 80 degrees on 
June 26. Data shows such a water temperature is unprecedented during the 
month at that location dating back to at least 1984.

Gawarkiewicz identified the warmer-than-normal water temperatures south 
of Cape Hatteras as an area of particular concern. "If we do a get a 
hurricane coming up the East Coast, that's an area where we could get 
intensification,"...

Isaias will pass through those waters Monday.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2020/07/31/marine-heat-wave-hurricanes/


[Sea Level Rise]
*Rising oceans could menace millions of people living beyond shorelines, 
study finds*
By BRAD PLUMER
THE NEW YORK TIMES - July 30, 2020
As global warming pushes up ocean levels around the world, scientists 
have long warned that many low-lying coastal areas will become 
permanently submerged.

But a new study published Thursday finds that much of the economic harm 
from sea-level rise this century is likely to come from an additional 
threat that will arrive even faster: As oceans rise, powerful coastal 
storms, crashing waves and extreme high tides will be able to reach 
farther inland, putting tens of millions more people and trillions of 
dollars in assets worldwide at risk of periodic flooding.
- -
This flooding could cause serious economic damage. The study found that 
people currently living in areas at risk from a 3-foot rise in sea 
levels owned $14 trillion in assets in 2011, an amount equal to 20% of 
global GDP that year...
- -
Scientists say the world's nations can greatly reduce future flooding 
risks by cutting emissions rapidly, especially because that could lower 
the odds of rapid ice-sheet collapse in Antarctica that would push up 
ocean levels even higher than forecast later in the century.

But, Oppenheimer added, the world has now warmed so much that 
significant sea-level rise by 2050 is assured no matter what happens 
with emissions. "That means we also need to start preparing to adapt 
now," he said.

https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/nation-world/ct-nw-nyt-global-warming-ocean-levels-study-20200730-rzkfzefpmrbtjd2o6xjbe7bdbi-story.html

- - -

[World flooding]
*A Quarter of Bangladesh Is Flooded. Millions Have Lost Everything.*
The country's latest calamity illustrates a striking inequity of our 
time: The people least responsible for climate change are among those 
most hurt by its consequences.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/30/climate/bangladesh-floods.html



[halt the reversing]
*E.P.A. Inspector General to Investigate Trump's Biggest Climate Rollback*
The agency's watchdog office said Monday it would investigate whether 
the reversal of Obama-era fuel efficiency standards violated government 
rules.
By Coral Davenport and Lisa Friedman - July 27, 2020
WASHINGTON -- The Environmental Protection Agency's internal watchdog 
said Monday it had opened an investigation into the agency's weakening 
of Obama-era regulations that would have limited automobile emissions by 
significantly raising fuel economy standards.

The inspector general demanded that top E.P.A. officials turn over 
briefing materials and other documents pertaining to the regulation, 
which was finalized in late March as the Trump administration's single 
largest rollback of federal climate change rules.

Auditors said they intended to investigate whether the Trump 
administration acted "consistent with requirements, including those 
pertaining to transparency, record-keeping, and docketing, and followed 
the E.P.A.'s process for developing final regulatory actions."

The yearlong effort to write the Trump administration rule was plagued 
with controversy. Just weeks before the final rule was published, the 
administration's own internal analyses showed that it would create a 
higher cost for consumers than leaving the Obama-era standard in place 
and would contribute to more deaths associated with lung disease by 
releasing more pollution into the air...
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/27/climate/trump-fuel-efficiency-rule.html



[divisive issues divide media empire]
*News Corp: Rupert Murdoch's son James quits company*
James Murdoch, the younger son of media mogul Rupert Murdoch, has 
resigned from the board of News Corporation citing "disagreements over 
editorial content".

In a filing to US regulators, he said he also disagreed with some 
"strategic decisions" made by the company.

The exact nature of the disagreements was not detailed.

But Mr Murdoch has previously criticised News Corp outlets, which 
include the Wall Street Journal, for climate change coverage.

Rupert Murdoch, News Corp's executive chairman, and his other son 
Lachlan, co-chairman, wished James well in a joint statement.

"We're grateful to James for his many years of service to the company," 
the statement said. "We wish him the very best in his future endeavours."

Representatives of Mr Murdoch and his wife Kathryn have acknowledged the 
couple's "frustration" with coverage of the subject by some of most 
influential Murdoch-owned news brands, including Fox News.

They have also spoken of particular disappointment about climate change 
denial in Murdoch-owned Australian outlets.

News Corp also owns The Times, The Sun and The Sunday Times in the UK, 
as well as a stable of Australian newspapers, including The Australian, 
The Daily Telegraph and The Herald Sun.
Earlier this year, amid devastating wildfires in Australia, Mr Murdoch 
and his wife Kathryn expressed their frustration with climate change 
coverage by News Corp and Fox...
- -
Rupert Murdoch has described himself as a climate change "sceptic" and 
denies employing climate deniers.

But critics of News Corp pointed to its comment articles and reporting 
of the alleged role of arson in the wildfires as minimising the impact 
of a changing climate.
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-53617966


[Green Changes]
*IRISH CITIZENS WIN CASE TO FORCE GOVERNMENT ACTION ON CLIMATE CHANGE*
A group of citizens have just won a landmark case against the Irish 
government for failing to take adequate action on climate change.

Climate Case Ireland was started by Friends of the Irish Environment and 
is the first case in Ireland to hold the government to account for its 
contributions to dangerous levels of climate change...
- -
All seven Supreme Court Judges made the unanimous decision this morning 
with Chief Justice Frank Clarke saying the government's plan "lacked the 
specificity to comply with the law."

He added that a sufficient plan "is not a five-year plan but rather a 
plan covering the full period remaining to 2050"...
- -
Daly believes that victory has "put the government on notice" showing 
that it "cannot make promises that it will not fulfil". She hopes that 
the country will see substantial changes to climate policy in the future 
adding that CCI will continue to hold them to account.

The government will now have to come up with a new plan.
Climate Case Ireland says that its decision to take action was inspired 
by other climate cases around the world. In December 2019 the Dutch 
Supreme Court upheld a decision which found that the Dutch government 
had obligations to urgently reduce its emissions to meet human rights 
obligations.

The Supreme Court victory was brought about by a partnership between an 
NGO and 900 Dutch citizens. It upheld an earlier ruling which required 
the government to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 25 per cent by 2020.

At the time UN Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet 
applauded the decision saying that it provided a basis for other 
citizens to take action:

"This landmark ruling provides a clear path forward for concerned 
individuals in Europe – and around the world – to undertake climate 
litigation in order to protect human rights."
https://www.euronews.com/living/2020/07/31/irish-citizens-win-case-to-force-government-action-on-climate-change



[Foreign Affairs]
*Climate Change Will Drive People Across Borders*
But the Real Crisis Would Be Making Them Stay
By Sonia Shah - July 29, 2020
Extreme wildfires savaged Northern California in 2018, leaving the 
homeless to camp out in a Home Depot parking lot in Oakland, not far 
from the billionaire hub of Silicon Valley. Hurricane Irma displaced 
more than 1,500 inhabitants of Barbuda in 2017: their government made 
plans to sell their communally held land to celebrity investors while 
survivors recovered in shelters. Melting permafrost and rising seas 
threaten the town of Shishmaref, on a barrier island off the northwest 
coast of Alaska--to which the administration of U.S. President Donald 
Trump has responded by gutting federal support for relocating homes to 
safer ground.

Such events are early harbingers of a global phenomenon: climate change 
is scrambling the habitability of the planet, and neither governments 
nor international organizations are meeting the needs of those displaced 
as a result. Already, more people live outside of their countries of 
birth than ever before, and according to the UN's International 
Organization for Migration, as many as 200 million people might need to 
leave their homes for climate-related reasons by 2050.
Despite these projections, no legal framework exists to help such 
migrants relocate, let alone to protect them in their most vulnerable 
moments. Instead, governments worldwide have neglected and exploited 
this new class of "climate displaced"--exposing them to both climate 
shocks and the abuse that often follows. Governments and international 
organizations can pursue a better course by enabling vulnerable 
populations to migrate before and after disaster strikes. The benefits 
of such a policy far outweigh the short-term costs...
- -
*A GLOBAL PROBLEM*
Climate disasters such as Hurricane Dorian will become more common as 
the climate continues to shift, but the consequences do not need to be 
as catastrophic as they have been for the Haitian community in the 
Bahamas. Rather than hardening borders and trapping people in countries 
that violate their human rights, governments and international 
institutions can facilitate the movement of vulnerable populations 
before disaster strikes. Climate scientists and migration experts widely 
agree that the long-term benefits to both the receiving and the 
originating countries offset the short-term costs of such migrations. 
Indeed, migrants bring cultural diversity and economic power to the 
nations they enter, while providing helpful remittances to those they 
leave behind.

Some proposed, though unsuccessful, amendments to international 
agreements have sought to address the coming waves of climate migration. 
The nonbinding 2018 Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular 
Migration, for example, calls for humanitarian visas and temporary work 
permits for the climate displaced, as well as planned relocations and 
prohibitions on the forcible return of migrants to uninhabitable places. 
A proposed amendment to the Paris agreement called the "Climate Change 
Displacement Coordination Facility" recognizes the right of the climate 
displaced to move and resettle across borders and establishes a 
mechanism to facilitate treaties on where, when, and how such migration 
might flow...
- -
The political stalemate over the costs of climate change and the problem 
of climate migration persist in large part because the populations most 
vulnerable to climate displacement are poor and the countries from which 
they flee carry little international clout. The governments of wealthy 
countries look upon climate migration not as a coming reality to be 
managed or a moral obligation to be met but as a political and economic 
burden. Such displacement, they figure, is other countries' problem and 
not their own.

But this insular mindset will soon be put to the test. Wildfires already 
encroach on wealthy cities, and extreme storms threaten expensively 
developed coastlines. Climate displacement will soon affect the 
prosperous residents of powerful countries--and their opportunities for 
safe, legal, and dignified movement will hinge upon the success of 
international efforts such as the one in Madrid.

"It might be too late to avert a climate crisis," says the climate 
migration expert Jane McAdam, who directs the Kaldor Centre for 
International Refugee Law at the University of New South Wales. "But we 
can avert a displacement crisis if we start to act now." To do so will 
require casting climate migration in a new light: not as a burden to be 
repelled but as a shared global reality to collectively manage.
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/central-america-caribbean/2020-07-29/climate-change-will-drive-people-across-borders



[Digging back into the internet news archive]
*On this day in the history of global warming - August 1, 1988 *

August 1, 1988: Sacramento, California-based right-wing talk radio host 
Rush Limbaugh begins his nationally syndicated program; over the next 
three decades, Limbaugh aggressively promotes the notion that climate 
science is a "hoax."

http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2007/05/wolcott200705

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