[TheClimate.Vote] June 15, 2020 - Daily Global Warming News Digest.

[Richard Pauli]

/*June 15, 2020*/

[Reuters]
*Exclusive: U.S. Democratic Party irked by council's 'insurgent' climate 
plan - sources*
Trevor Hunnicutt, Valerie Volcovici
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Democratic National Committee's council on 
climate change irked party leadership when it published policy 
recommendations this month that ventured beyond presidential candidate 
Joe Biden's plan, according to three people familiar with the matter.
The party tension shows the tricky nature of climate politics as Biden 
seeks to court young and more progressive voters without turning off 
voters in energy-producing swing states like Pennsylvania and Ohio, 
where a boom in shale gas drilling had created blue-collar jobs.

Members of the DNC Environment and Climate Crisis Council, formed last 
year, published proposals for the party's four-year platform on June 4 
in a press release, calling for up to $16 trillion in spending to shift 
the U.S. economy away from fossil fuels while banning hydraulic 
fracturing and oil and gas exports.

The council's proposals far exceed Biden's current climate plan, which 
bans new oil and gas permits on public lands and dedicates $1.7 trillion 
to accelerate the transition to renewable energy, but allows continued 
fracking and exports in the meantime.

Biden's campaign is updating its climate plan as it prepares for the 
Nov. 3 election contest against Republican President Donald Trump, a 
fervent advocate of fossil fuel drilling and mining who has downplayed 
climate change risks and unwound hundreds of environmental regulations.

Biden is being advised by a panel led by U.S. Representative Alexandria 
Ocasio-Cortez, who has called for a vast government-run effort to move 
away from fossil fuels, and John Kerry, who helped negotiate the Paris 
climate agreement as President Barack Obama's Secretary of State.

One senior Democrat familiar with the DNC's workings said climate 
council members overstepped by putting out recommendations ahead of the 
convention that are unlikely to be adopted in the party's platform, 
which will be drafted by a DNC committee by its August convention.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-climate-exclusive/exclusive-u-s-democratic-party-irked-by-councils-insurgent-climate-plan-sources-idUSKBN23M1DO



[XR houghtful activism video interview]
*Let's not beat about the bush: Climate, Globalisation, and the State | 
Extinction Rebellion*
Jun 13, 2020 - Extinction Rebellion's Roger Hallam interviews with:
Ann Pettifor - author "The Case for the Green New Deal"
Anatol Lieven - author "Climate Change and the Nation State"
Paul Guilding - author "The Great Disruption"
A MUST-SEE ON RESET TV & YOUTUBE THIS WEEKEND
Roger Hallam interviews leading intellectuals on the world after carbon
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyHajMx-dlk


[Nebraska flood personal video story ]
*American Climate Video: The Creek Flooded Nearly Every Spring, but This 
Time the Water Just Kept Rising*
The Crosleys argued as the water line crept up toward their longtime 
benchmark. She wanted to evacuate and packed a bag. He said there was no 
way the water could crest the third step.

But the water continued to rise and Nancy decided it was time to go.

"I told Mike, 'We gotta go,'" she said. "I walked out the back door."
- -
As Mike watched the flood take over his property, his mind was racing as 
he calculated the loss he would be faced with, between the house, the 
alfalfa farm and the livestock.

It was a good thing that they were safe and warm, he said, "but just 
then you start thinking about the financial loss of, what are we losing?"

Scientists have warned that climate change is bringing more frequent and 
more intense storms, like the deluge that caused the 2019 flooding in 
the Great Plains. Because they left in such a hurry, the Crosleys didn't 
have a chance to put their valuables up on high shelves. The damage to 
the house was so severe that they simply accepted that most of their 
belongings would be destroyed.

Looking forward, the Crosleys plan to build a new home on higher ground. 
Although they never wanted to leave their house--Nancy had just put new 
shingles on the roof--they decided it was time to start anew.

"It's not a safe home anymore," Mike said. "You should feel safe in your 
home and you're not going to feel safe there now. Every time it rains in 
the spring, you're going to remember that day."
https://insideclimatenews.org/news/12062020/american-climate-crosley-flood-nebraska
video - https://youtu.be/KP4PndFbY4g



[answer: yes]
EXTREME WEATHER - 12 June 2020
*Jet stream: Is climate change causing more 'blocking' weather events?*
The past few months have seen some remarkable weather, from the UK's 
sunniest spring on record to Siberia's dramatic heatwave and "zombie 
wildfires".

Key to this unseasonable weather are persistent high-pressure "blocking" 
weather systems, which bring clear, dry conditions on the ground below 
for many days or weeks.

Blocking events bat away oncoming low-pressure systems that would bring 
the prospect of clouds and rain. They are particularly synonymous with 
heatwaves and drought in summer and bitterly cold conditions in winter.

But what are the prospects for blocking events in a warming climate? And 
could a rapidly warming Arctic also have a role to play?...
- -
So how do these blocking weather patterns arise? Woollings points out 
that "there are several different mechanisms involved and the balance 
between these seem to be different in different regions".

In general, however, "Rossby waves" in the atmosphere are "thought to be 
crucial", says Woollings. Rossby waves - named after Carl-Gustaf Rossby, 
the Swedish-born American meteorologist who identified them - are giant 
meanders in the jet stream that stretch across the mid-latitudes. They 
are also known as "planetary waves".

Rossby waves are a natural phenomenon that form as a result of the 
rotation of the Earth. As they are a feature of rotating fluids, they 
are also observed in the oceans and in other planets, such as gas giants 
Jupiter and Saturn.

Blocking weather patterns can occur when Rossby waves "become amplified 
and/or break", says Woollings. Amplified Rossby waves can be seen in a 
"wavy" jet stream. This tends to slow the east-to-west progression of 
weather systems, making conditions more persistent and, potentially, 
allowing blocks to form.

An example is the "omega block", so-called because it resembles the 
uppercase letter omega (Ω) in the Greek alphabet. In this shape, 
alternating areas of high and low pressure form in the peaks and troughs 
of the Rossby waves, respectively...
- - -
A block interrupts the prevailing flow of westerly winds, which 
typically bring in mild air during winter and cooler, fresher conditions 
in summer. Therefore, it opens up the potential for more extreme 
conditions, depending on which type of weather system is overhead.

In the summer of 2010, for example, an omega block left a high-pressure 
system sitting over western Russia for much of July and August. The 
resulting heatwave saw most of western Russia record its hottest summer 
in history. As a 2011 paper on the event explains:

"The heat over Russia produced many days where the high temperature was 
greater than 40C (104F). Russia had a record-warm summer, with Moscow 
averaging near +18C and +16C above normal for the months of July and 
August, respectively."

The hot, dry and still weather also brought the worst drought conditions 
in roughly 40 years. In total, the heat, wildfires and associated poor 
air quality caused at least 56,000 deaths in Moscow and other parts of 
western Russia...
- - -
Around the mid-latitudes of the northern hemisphere, low-pressure 
weather fronts, which bring cloudy, windy and potentially wet weather, 
generally move from west to east. These are carried along by the jet 
stream - a current of fast-flowing air high up in the troposphere, the 
lowest layer of the Earth's atmosphere. (Jet streams encircle the 
mid-latitudes of both the northern and southern hemispheres.)

The jet generally keeps a steady stream of weather systems moving across 
the Earth's surface. This means that any low-pressure system - or 
intervening high-pressure system that brings clear, still and sunny 
conditions - will generally only linger for a matter of days before 
being shunted on by the next system...
- - -
video - What is the jet stream and how does it affect the weather? 
https://youtu.be/Lg91eowtfbw
- -- 
While models - tentatively - suggest that blocking events could decline 
in the mid-latitudes, there is also a prominent theory that a rapidly 
warming Arctic could bring more of them.

The Arctic is warming more than twice as quickly than the global surface 
average. This phenomenon is known as "Arctic amplification". In part, 
this stems from the rapid loss of sea ice cover in the region - as the 
ice diminishes, energy from the sun that would have been reflected away 
by the bright white ice is instead absorbed by the ocean, causing 
further warming. (Declining snow cover over Arctic land areas has the 
same effect.)

There are some theories that these rapid changes in the Arctic "might 
influence the frequency of blocking events", explains Shaffrey:

"The theories suggest that as the Arctic warms, changes in the strength 
and position of the northern hemisphere jet stream will allow blocking 
events to become more frequent."

For example, as the strength of the jet stream is driven by the 
difference in temperature between the cold air over the Arctic to the 
north and the milder air to the south, a fast-warming Arctic reduces 
this temperature difference...
- -
And any impact that the Arctic has could be outweighed by influences 
from elsewhere, adds Woollings:

"As Arctic warming strengthens, we expect it to impact the jet stream 
and this could act to increase blocking in some regions. Climate models 
currently suggest the competing influence of the warming tropics will be 
more important, consistent with an overall decrease in blocking."

Nonetheless, Woollings concludes: "Arctic warming is one of the 
processes in the mix of several which will shape blocking behaviour in 
the future".*
*https://www.carbonbrief.org/jet-stream-is-climate-change-causing-more-blocking-weather-events*
*



[Chinese Academy of Sciences]
JUNE 12, 2020
*Nitrogen in permafrost soils may exert great feedbacks on climate change*
What nitrogen is getting up to in permafrost soils may be much more 
interesting than researchers have long believed--with potentially 
significant consequences for our management of climate change.
Nitrogen is a constituent part of nitrous oxide (N2O)--an often 
overlooked greenhouse gas, and there is a vast amount of nitrogen stored 
in permafrost soils.

But little is known about N2O emissions from permafrost soils and until 
recently, it was assumed that releases had to be fairly minimal because 
of the cold climate.

Decomposition of organic matter is slow in low temperatures. 
Exacerbating this, there would have to be high competition amongst 
organisms for what little nitrogen there was in a form that they can 
use. So there couldn't be much nitrogen left over to contribute to N2O 
releases.

In recent years however, a growing number of papers have started to hint 
that there might be very high N2O emissions from such soils, perhaps as 
much as those from tropical forests or croplands, which suggests that 
there's a gap in our understanding of what happens to nitrogen in 
permafrost soils.

To get to the bottom of the issue, Dr. Michael Dannenmann from the 
Karlsruhe Institute of Technology and Dr. Chunyan Liu from the Institute 
of Atmospheric Physics at the Chinese Academy of Sciences with their 
colleagues have established the "NIFROCLIM" project in a high-latitude 
permafrost region in northeast China that is part of the Eurasian 
permafrost complex--the world's largest permafrost area.

The profile of "NIFROCLIM" was publsihed on May 23 in Advances in 
Atmospheric Sciences.

"In contrast to the huge volumes of research into permafrost carbon 
climate feedbacks, research into permafrost nitrogen climate feedbacks 
is lagging behind terribly," said Elisabeth Ramm, the first author of 
the News & Views article. "We urgently need to better understand what is 
happening to nitrogen in these soils, especially as the world warms and 
permafrost thaws."

The researchers are taking high-resolution soil and gas samples down to 
the upper layers of the permafrost across multiple sites with differing 
landscape characteristics, from upland forests to lowland bogs, as well 
as engaging in experiments that simulate varying levels of warming.

Building a scientific outpost on the southern edge of this region is 
ideal for studying impact of climate change on permafrost as the arctic 
and subarctic in particular is being hit hard already by global warming.

Temperature increases occur here at more than double the pace of the 
global average, accelerating permafrost degradation and N transformations.

"If anywhere is going to tell us if we've been getting the math wrong on 
nitrogen, it's here." said Liu.
https://phys.org/news/2020-06-nitrogen-permafrost-soils-exert-great.html



[new data brings new conclusions]
*Climate worst-case scenarios may not go far enough, cloud data shows*
Modelling suggests climate is considerably more sensitive to carbon 
emissions than thought

Worst-case global heating scenarios may need to be revised upwards in 
light of a better understanding of the role of clouds, scientists have said.

Recent modelling data suggests the climate is considerably more 
sensitive to carbon emissions than previously believed, and experts said 
the projections had the potential to be "incredibly alarming", though 
they stressed further research would be needed to validate the new numbers.

Modelling results from more than 20 institutions are being compiled for 
the sixth assessment by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on 
Climate Change, which is due to be released next year...
Compared with the last assessment in 2014, 25% of them show a sharp 
upward shift from 3C to 5C in climate sensitivity - the amount of 
warming projected from a doubling of atmospheric carbon dioxide from the 
preindustrial level of 280 parts per million. This has shocked many 
veteran observers, because assumptions about climate sensitivity have 
been relatively unchanged since the 1980s.

"That is a very deep concern," Johan Rockstrom, the director of the 
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, said. "Climate 
sensitivity is the holy grail of climate science. It is the prime 
indicator of climate risk. For 40 years, it has been around 3C. Now, we 
are suddenly starting to see big climate models on the best 
supercomputers showing things could be worse than we thought."...
He said climate sensitivity above 5C would reduce the scope for human 
action to reduce the worst impacts of global heating. "We would have no 
more space for a soft landing of 1.5C [above preindustrial levels]. The 
best we could aim for is 2C," he said.

Worst-case projections in excess of 5C have been generated by several of 
the world's leading climate research bodies, including the UK Met 
Office's Hadley Centre and the EU's Community Earth System Model.

Timothy Palmer, a professor in climate physics at Oxford University and 
a member of the Met Office's advisory board, said the high figure 
initially made scientists nervous. "It was way outside previous 
estimates. People asked whether there was a bug in the code," he said. 
"But it boiled down to relatively small changes in the way clouds are 
represented in the models."

"Clouds will determine humanity's fate - whether climate is an 
existential threat or an inconvenience that we will learn to live with," 
said Palmer. "Most recent models suggest clouds will make matters worse."

In a recent paper in the journal Nature, Palmer explains how the new 
Hadley Centre model that produced the 5+C figure on climate sensitivity 
was tested by assessing its accuracy in forecasting short-term weather. 
This testing technique had exposed flaws in previous models, but in the 
latest case, the results reinforced the estimates. "The results are not 
reassuring - they support the estimates," he wrote. He is calling for 
other models to be tested in a similar way.

"It's really important. The message to the government and public is, you 
have to take this high climate sensitivity seriously. [We] must get 
emissions down as quickly as we can," he said.

The IPCC is expected to include the 5+C climate sensitivity figure in 
its next report on the range of possible outcomes. Scientists caution 
that this is a work in progress and that doubts remain because such a 
high figure does not fit with historical records.

Catherine Senior, head of understanding climate change at the Met Office 
Hadley Centre, said more studies and more data were needed to fully 
understand the role of clouds and aerosols.

"This figure has the potential to be incredibly alarming if it is 
right," she said. "But as a scientist, my first response is: why has the 
model done that? We are still in the stage of evaluating the processes 
driving the different response."

While acknowledging the continued uncertainty, Rockstrom said climate 
models might still be underestimating the problem because they did not 
fully take into account tipping points in the biosphere.

"The more we learn, the more fragile the Earth system seems to be and 
the faster we need to move," he said. "It gives even stronger argument 
to step out of this Covid-19 crisis and move full speed towards 
decarbonising the economy."
- - -
[news item in the journal Nature]
*Short-term tests validate long-term estimates of climate change*
Six-hour weather forecasts have been used to validate estimates of 
climate change hundreds of years from now. Such tests have great 
potential -- but only if our weather-forecasting and climate-prediction 
systems are unified.
Tim Palmer
How sensitive is climate to atmospheric carbon dioxide levels? For a 
doubling of CO2 concentration from pre-industrial levels, some models 
predict an alarming long-term warming of more than 5 C. But are these 
estimates believable? Writing in the Journal of Advances in Modeling 
Earth Systems, Williams et al.1 have tested some of the revisions that 
have been made to one such model by assessing its accuracy for very 
short-term weather forecasts. The results are not reassuring -- they 
support the estimates.

There is little doubt, at least among those who understand the science, 
that climate change is one of the greatest challenges facing humans in 
the coming decades. However, the extent to which unchecked climate 
change would prove catastrophic rests on processes that are poorly 
understood. Perhaps the most important of these concern the way in which 
Earth's hydrological cycle -- which includes the evaporation, 
condensation and movement of water -- will react to our warming planet.

One of the key problems is how clouds adjust to warming2. If low-level 
cloud cover increases, and high-level cloud decreases, then clouds will 
offset the warming effect of increased atmospheric CO2 concentrations 
and thereby act as a negative feedback, or damper, on climate change, 
buying us some breathing space. By contrast, if there is positive cloud 
feedback -- that is, if low-level clouds decrease with warming and 
high-level clouds increase -- then, short of rapid and complete 
cessation of fossil-fuel use, we might be heading for disaster...
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-01484-5
-  -
[From AGU journal]
*Use of Short‐Range Forecasts to Evaluate Fast Physics Processes 
Relevant for Climate Sensitivity*
K. D. Williams  A. J. Hewitt  A. Bodas‐Salcedo - First published:23 
March 2020
*Abstract*
The configuration of the Met Office Unified Model being submitted to 
CMIP6 has a high climate sensitivity. Previous studies have suggested 
that the impact of model changes on initial tendencies in numerical 
weather prediction (NWP) should be used to guide their suitability for 
inclusion in climate models. In this study we assess, using NWP 
experiments, the atmospheric model changes which lead to the increased 
climate sensitivity in the CMIP6 configuration, namely, the replacement 
of the aerosol scheme with GLOMAP‐mode and the introduction of a scheme 
for representing the turbulent production of liquid water within 
mixed‐phase cloud. Overall, the changes included in this latest 
configuration were found to improve the initial tendencies of the model 
state variables over the first 6 hr of the forecast, this timescale 
being before significant dynamical feedbacks are likely to occur. The 
reduced model drift through the forecast appears to be the result of 
increased cloud liquid water, leading to enhanced radiative cooling from 
cloud top and contributing to a stronger shortwave cloud radiative 
effect. These changes improve the 5‐day forecast in traditional metrics 
used for numerical weather prediction. This study was conducted after 
the model was frozen and the climate sensitivity of the model 
determined; hence, it provides an independent test of the model changes 
contributing to the higher climate sensitivity. The results, along with 
the large body process‐orientated evaluation conducted during the model 
development process, provide reassurance that these changes are 
improving the physical processes simulated by the model.

*Plain Language Summary*
Climate sensitivity is a leading order measure of the climate system. 
The latest Met Office model has a higher climate sensitivity than its 
predecessor and many other models, so warrants additional tests. Here we 
follow a published method to test in weather forecast mode, model 
changes contributing to the higher climate sensitivity. The model 
changes increasing the climate sensitivity are found to improve the 
short‐range weather forecast and reduce the error growth over the first 
few hours of the forecast which is a measure of the error in the local 
physical processes. This increases our confidence that the model changes 
contributing to the higher sensitivity are improving the physical 
realism of the model.
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2019MS001986


[Digging back into the internet news archive]
*On this day in the history of global warming - June 15, 2010 *

In an address from the Oval Office, President Obama declares:
"For decades, we have known the days of cheap and easily accessible oil 
were numbered.  For decades, we've talked and talked about the need to 
end America's century-long addiction to fossil fuels.  And for decades, 
we have failed to act with the sense of urgency that this challenge 
requires.  Time and again, the path forward has been blocked -- not only 
by oil industry lobbyists, but also by a lack of political courage and 
candor.

"The consequences of our inaction are now in plain sight. Countries like 
China are investing in clean energy jobs and industries that should be 
right here in America.  Each day, we send nearly $1 billion of our 
wealth to foreign countries for their oil.  And today, as we look to the 
Gulf, we see an entire way of life being threatened by a menacing cloud 
of black crude.

"We cannot consign our children to this future.  The tragedy unfolding 
on our coast is the most painful and powerful reminder yet that the time 
to embrace a clean energy future is now.  Now is the moment for this 
generation to embark on a national mission to unleash America's 
innovation and seize control of our own destiny.

"This is not some distant vision for America.  The transition away from 
fossil fuels is going to take some time, but over the last year and a 
half, we've already taken unprecedented action to jumpstart the clean 
energy industry.  As we speak, old factories are reopening to produce 
wind turbines, people are going back to work installing energy-efficient 
windows, and small businesses are making solar panels.

"Consumers are buying more efficient cars and trucks, and families are 
making their homes more energy-efficient.  Scientists and researchers 
are discovering clean energy technologies that someday will lead to 
entire new industries.

"Each of us has a part to play in a new future that will benefit all of 
us.  As we recover from this recession, the transition to clean energy 
has the potential to grow our economy and create millions of jobs -- but 
only if we accelerate that transition. Only if we seize the moment.  And 
only if we rally together and act as one nation -- workers and 
entrepreneurs; scientists and citizens; the public and private sectors.

"When I was a candidate for this office, I laid out a set of principles 
that would move our country towards energy independence.  Last year, the 
House of Representatives acted on these principles by passing a strong 
and comprehensive energy and climate bill –- a bill that finally makes 
clean energy the profitable kind of energy for America's businesses.

"Now, there are costs associated with this transition.  And there are 
some who believe that we can't afford those costs right now. I say we 
can't afford not to change how we produce and use energy -- because the 
long-term costs to our economy, our national security, and our 
environment are far greater.

"So I'm happy to look at other ideas and approaches from either party -- 
as long they seriously tackle our addiction to fossil fuels.  Some have 
suggested raising efficiency standards in our buildings like we did in 
our cars and trucks.  Some believe we should set standards to ensure 
that more of our electricity comes from wind and solar power.  Others 
wonder why the energy industry only spends a fraction of what the 
high-tech industry does on research and development -- and want to 
rapidly boost our investments in such research and development.

"All of these approaches have merit, and deserve a fair hearing in the 
months ahead.  But the one approach I will not accept is inaction.  The 
one answer I will not settle for is the idea that this challenge is 
somehow too big and too difficult to meet.  You know, the same thing was 
said about our ability to produce enough planes and tanks in World War 
II.  The same thing was said about our ability to harness the science 
and technology to land a man safely on the surface of the moon.  And 
yet, time and again, we have refused to settle for the paltry limits of 
conventional wisdom.  Instead, what has defined us as a nation since our 
founding is the capacity to shape our destiny -- our determination to 
fight for the America we want for our children.  Even if we're unsure 
exactly what that looks like.  Even if we don't yet know precisely how 
we're going to get there.  We know we'll get there."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQJW4_FvVKo
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/16/us/politics/16obama.html?pagewanted=all

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