[✔️] May 1, 2021 - Daily Global Warming News Digest

Sat May 1 09:00:40 EDT 2021

/*May 1, 2021*/

[Follow the money]
NY Times
*In Opposing Climate and Diversity Proposals, Buffett Risks Looking Out 
of Step*
The Berkshire chief opposes shareholder proposals on climate and diversity.
Berkshire bucks the trend
Tomorrow is Berkshire Hathaway’s annual shareholder meeting, the 
gathering known as “Woodstock for capitalists.” Like last year, the 
company is bowing to the times by holding the meeting virtually. But 
another aspect of the discussion may show that Warren Buffett is 
increasingly out of step with the times, DealBook’s Michael de la Merced 
reports.

Investors are pressing Berkshire to disclose more about climate change 
and work-force diversity. Shareholders, including the Calpers public 
pension fund, argue that Buffett’s conglomerate isn’t doing enough to 
disclose its portfolio companies’ progress in addressing those issues. 
Buffett opposed these initiatives ahead of the meeting, arguing that 
they cut against Berkshire’s philosophy of letting its subsidiaries 
operate largely independently.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/30/business/dealbook/buffett-berkshire-climate-diversity.html 

[what of our future?]
EMISSIONS 29 April 2021
*Explainer: Will global warming ‘stop’ as soon as net-zero emissions are 
reached?*
Media reports frequently claim that the world is facing “committed 
warming” in the future as a result of past emissions, meaning higher 
temperatures are “locked in”, “in the pipeline” or “inevitable”, 
regardless of the choices society takes today.

The best available evidence shows that, on the contrary, warming is 
likely to more or less stop once carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions reach 
zero, meaning humans have the power to choose their climate future.

When scientists have pointed this out recently, it has been reported as 
a new scientific finding. However, the scientific community has 
recognised that zero CO2 emissions likely implied flat future 
temperatures since at least 2008. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate 
Change (IPCC) 2018 special report on 1.5C also included a specific focus 
on zero-emissions scenarios with similar findings. ...
https://www.carbonbrief.org/explainer-will-global-warming-stop-as-soon-as-net-zero-emissions-are-reached 

[no two rivers flow the same]
*Glacier mass decreasing across Arctic but at different rates, says study*
Glacier mass is decreasing worldwide with an average total loss of 267 
billion tonnes of mass per year, says a new study.
By Eilís Quinn -April 30, 2021

The period looked at was between 2000 and 2019. The loss of glacier mass 
during this period also accounted for 21 per cent of the observed 
sea-level rise, the authors said.

The study, “Accelerated global glacier mass loss in the early 
twenty-first century” was published in the journal Nature on Wednesday.

Glacier mass loss has been accelerating by about 50 billion tonnes 
annually each decade since 2000, the study found...
- -
To do the study, the researchers used satellite and aerial imagery to 
look at 217,175  glaciers around the world to estimate the mass loss.

A supercomputer, co-funded by the University of Northern British 
Columbia and the Hakai Institute, a Canadian scientific research 
institution, also located in British Columbia, created digital elevation 
models from over 440,000 images.

“The UNBC and Hakai Institute computer facilities allowed us to generate 
time series of surface elevation, essentially time-varying topographies, 
at 100-metre resolution for about one-half of a billion individual 
locations over Earth’s glaciers and their surroundings,” Romain Hugonnet 
said in a news release. Hugonnet is the study’s lead author and is with 
the University of Toulouse in France and ETH Zurich, a Swiss university.

Creating the elevation models required the equivalent of 584 modern 
computers running for a year.
https://thebarentsobserver.com/en/climate-crisis/2021/04/glacier-mass-decreasing-across-arctic-different-rates-says-study
- -
[source is the Journal nature]
Published: 28 April 2021
*Accelerated global glacier mass loss in the early twenty-first century*

    *Abstract*
    Glaciers distinct from the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets are
    shrinking rapidly, altering regional hydrology1, raising global sea
    level2 and elevating natural hazards3. Yet, owing to the scarcity of
    constrained mass loss observations, glacier evolution during the
    satellite era is known only partially, as a geographic and temporal
    patchwork4,5. Here we reveal the accelerated, albeit contrasting,
    patterns of glacier mass loss during the early twenty-first century.
    Using largely untapped satellite archives, we chart surface
    elevation changes at a high spatiotemporal resolution over all of
    Earth’s glaciers. We extensively validate our estimates against
    independent, high-precision measurements and present a globally
    complete and consistent estimate of glacier mass change. We show
    that during 2000–2019, glaciers lost a mass of 267 ± 16 gigatonnes
    per year, equivalent to 21 ± 3 per cent of the observed sea-level
    rise6. We identify a mass loss acceleration of 48 ± 16 gigatonnes
    per year per decade, explaining 6 to 19 per cent of the observed
    acceleration of sea-level rise. Particularly, thinning rates of
    glaciers outside ice sheet peripheries doubled over the past two
    decades. Glaciers currently lose more mass, and at similar or larger
    acceleration rates, than the Greenland or Antarctic ice sheets taken
    separately7,8,9. By uncovering the patterns of mass change in many
    regions, we find contrasting glacier fluctuations that agree with
    the decadal variability in precipitation and temperature. These
    include a North Atlantic anomaly of decelerated mass loss, a
    strongly accelerated loss from northwestern American glaciers, and
    the apparent end of the Karakoram anomaly of mass gain10. We
    anticipate our highly resolved estimates to advance the
    understanding of drivers that govern the distribution of glacier
    change, and to extend our capabilities of predicting these changes
    at all scales. Predictions robustly benchmarked against observations
    are critically needed to design adaptive policies for the local- and
    regional-scale management of water resources and cryospheric risks,
    as well as for the global-scale mitigation of sea-level rise.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-03436-z

[video observation and commentary]
*Climate and Ecological Emergency. Can you really make a difference??*
Apr 30, 2021
*Just Have a Think*
251K subscribers

Climate and ecology are inextricably linked. Both are now in great 
peril. If we do not tackle those challenges with co-ordinated efforts 
then we stand far less chance of solving either of them. This holistic 
approach forms the basis of the Climate and Ecological Emergency Bill, 
recently tabled in the UK Parliament by the MP Caroline Lucas. The paper 
is a blueprint for how all national governments will need to legislate 
in the coming years. And it contains clauses that ensure ordinary folks 
like you and me can be fully involved in the decision making process.

About the CEE Bill Alliance

The CEE Bill Alliance campaign aims to create the magnitude of 
grassroots' momentum that will activate/force the levers of government 
power to legislate for dual emergency climate- nature legislation 
through the CEE Bill. The CEE Bill - developed in collaboration with 
experts across the science and legal disciplines - provides the 
framework and principles, and an embedded citizens' assembly, to produce 
a climate-nature law fit to address our 21st century planetary crisis.
You can be part of making this Bill law by signing up to support the 
campaign and writing to your MP and councillors.
Please visit our website:
https://www.ceebill.uk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LhuuVIj9FoU

[Better keep an eye on this one]
*Antarctic ‘doomsday glacier’ may be melting faster than was thought*
Study finds more relatively warm water is reaching Thwaites glacier than 
was previously understood
An Antarctic glacier larger than the UK is at risk of breaking up after 
scientists discovered more warm water flowing underneath it than 
previously thought.

The fate of Thwaites – nicknamed the doomsday glacier – and the massive 
west Antarctic ice sheet it supports are the biggest unknown factors in 
future global sea level rise.

Over the past few years, teams of scientists have been crisscrossing the 
remote and inaccessible region on Antarctica’s western edge to try to 
understand how fast the ice is melting and what the consequences for the 
rest of the world might be.

“What happens in west Antarctica is of great societal importance,” said 
Dr Robert Larter, a scientist with the British Antarctic Survey and 
principal investigator with the International Thwaites Glacier 
Collaboration, the most ambitious research project ever carried out in 
Antarctica. “This is the biggest uncertainty in future sea level rise.”...
- -
The worst-case scenarios for Thwaites are grim. It is the widest glacier 
on the planet, more than 1km deep and holds enough ice to raise the sea 
level by 65cm.

Ice loss has accelerated in the last 30 years and it now contributes 
about 4% of all global sea level rise. Experts say this could increase 
dramatically if the ice at the front of Thwaites breaks up, with 
knock-on effects for other glaciers in the area.

To heighten scientists’ concerns, west Antarctica has been one of the 
fastest-warming place on Earth in the past 30 years, and since 2000 it 
has lost more than 1tn tons of ice.

Last year, a team of British scientists discovered cavities half the 
size of the Grand Canyon under Thwaites that, like decay in a tooth, 
allow warm ocean water to erode the glacier, internally accelerating 
melting. And because a lot of the ground on which the glacier sits is 
below sea level, it is thought to be particularly vulnerable to melting 
as warmer water encroaches further under the ice inland.

Larter said: “The bed gets deeper upstream and there is a glaciological 
theory that says this is potentially a very unstable situation … it is a 
very scary scenario when you first hear it, but there are various 
negative feedback scenarios that might counter it.”

He said if the glacier’s “pinning points” were lost in the next few 
years it would start to flow faster “and put more ice into the sea”. But 
he said the question no one could currently answer was exactly how much 
extra ice will go into the sea if the glacier begins to break up.

“That is a tricky question,” said Larter. “I think I would have to say 
come back in a couple of years.”

He added: “Nobody knows how it is going to respond to persistent warming 
– we don’t know because in human history we have never seen it happen. 
We are trying in every way we can to get a handle on what is going to 
happen.”

Ella Gilbert, a research scientist at the University of Reading, said 
what was happening in the polar regions demanded an urgent response from 
the international community.

“The polar regions are the canary in the coalmine – they are the symbol 
of climate change,” said Gilbert, who was a joint author of a recent 
study warning of the catastrophic impact of global heating on Antarctic ice.

“We really do need to minimise our emissions because if we lose the 
polar regions, not only are we going to amplify climate change … it will 
contribute to sea level rise which affects everyone around the globe.”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/apr/30/antarctic-doomsday-glacier-may-be-melting-faster-than-was-thought

[need for more wildfire fighters]*
* *Wildland firefighter speaks truth to Congressional power*
Bill Gabbert - April 29, 2021
“I have grown impatient with inaction”
Riva Duncan testifies fire Congressional hearing
Riva Duncan testifies remotely during Congressional hearing, April 29, 
2021. Still image from live video.
In the oversight hearing today before the House of Representatives 
Subcommittee on National Parks, Forests, and Public Lands a former U.S. 
Forest Service firefighter spoke truth to power.

Riva Duncan, who recently retired from the Fire Staff Officer position 
on the Umpqua National Forest in Oregon, testified remotely about job 
classification, pay disparity, employee health and wellbeing, 
recruitment, size of the workforce, and fire seasons transforming into 
fire years...
https://wildfiretoday.com/2021/04/29/wildland-firefighter-speaks-truth-to-congressional-power/
- -
[powerful video testimony]
*Wildfire in a Warming World*
April 29, 2021

    "I have watched many Congressional hearings about wildland fire and
    the agencies that manage them, and this is the first time I can
    remember that a firefighter who had worked their way up from an
    entry level position and had not been tainted by serving time in the
    Washington Office, testified about firefighting conditions. In 2016
    Kelly Martin, then Yosemite National Park’s Chief of Fire and
    Aviation Management, testified about sexual harassment, but she was
    not asked questions about pay, hiring, and retention.

    Ms. Duncan, now the Executive Secretary of the Grassroots Wildland
    Firefighters, submitted 13-pages of testimony, but the last portion
    of her five-minute opening oral remarks had a memorable impact on
    the politicians. Toward the end she choked up a little — you can
    probably guess which section provoked that response.
    House Natural Resources Committee Democrats"

The video of the hearing below should be cued up to begin about 10 
seconds before Ms. Duncan’s opening remarks. If it does not start there, 
you can skip to 36:00.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpBxfI8kJ3g&t=2166s

- -

[supply and demand - plus fire and bark beatles]
*Why Dead Trees Are ‘the Hottest Commodity on the Planet’*
Blame climate change, wildfires, hungry beetles … and Millennial home 
buyers.
ROBINSON MEYER - APRIL 27, 2021...
- -
Since 2018, a one-two punch of environmental harms worsened by climate 
change has devastated the lumber industry in Canada, the largest lumber 
exporter to the United States. A catastrophic and multi-decade outbreak 
of bark-eating beetles, followed by a series of historic wildfire 
seasons, have led to lasting economic damage in British Columbia, a 
crucial lumber-providing province. Americans have, in effect, made a mad 
dash for lumber at the exact moment Canada is least able to supply it.
Climate change, which has long threatened to overturn dependable facts 
about the world, is now starting to make itself known in commodities 
markets, the exchanges that keep staple goods flowing to companies and 
their customers. For years, scientists and agricultural forecasters have 
warned that climate change could result in devastating failures among 
luxury goods, such as fine chocolate and wine. Others have speculated 
about several grain-producing regions slipping into a simultaneous 
drought, a phenomenon dubbed “multiple breadbasket failures.” But for 
now, a climate-change-induced shortage is showing up more subtly, 
dampening supply during a historic demand crunch.

“There are people who say, ‘Climate change isn’t affecting me,’” Janice 
Cooke, a forest-industry veteran and biology professor at the University 
of Alberta, told me. “But they’re going to go to the hardware store and 
say, ‘Holy cow, the price of lumber has gone up.’”
- -
“That was all fine. Salvage was going along,” Cooke said. “And then we 
had the forest fires.”

In 2017, British Columbia recorded the worst wildfire season in its 
history. Fires cleared 1.2 million hectares of land, or more than 1 
percent of the province’s area, and forced 65,000 people to evacuate. 
That record was surpassed the following year, when 1.3 million hectares 
burned. Worst of all, the fires struck with awful efficiency, consuming 
exactly the forest that the salvage plan had saved for last. They “burnt 
the last-standing dead supply,” Cooke said. British Columbia’s lean time 
had arrived early.

The fires were made more likely by climate change, but—in an ugly 
feedback loop—the beetle outbreak also contributed. When conifers are 
attacked by pests, they secrete more pitch in self-defense, Cooke said. 
Pitch is extremely flammable. When trees are drought-prone and filled 
with pitch, it’s like “fire starter on the landscape,” she said. (Nor is 
wildfire the only risk of pitch: British Columbia sawmills and pulp 
mills have exploded while processing pitch-loaded wood, Cooke said.)...
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2021/04/climate-origins-massive-lumber-shortage/618727/

[rise above the waters]
*House lifting is big business following a record year of storms*
Diana Olick - APR 19 2021
KEY POINTS

    - With storms intensifying, rainfall increasing and sea levels
    rising, waterfront property owners have to get more creative. For
    some, that means moving to higher ground, but for others, it’s just
    moving the house higher.
    - New Jersey tops the list of states with the most homes that are
    expected to see at least one major flood per year by 2050. More than
    74,000 homes will be affected, according to Climate Central.
    - New Jersey is followed by Florida (57,865), California (36,845),
    Louisiana (33,372) and North Carolina (33,334).
      House lifting has long been a strategy for waterfront real estate,
    but it is now becoming a far bigger business due to climate change.

“The more that things flood, the more there’s going to be a need for 
it,” said Mike Brovont of Wolfe House and Building Movers. He’s been in 
the house-lifting business for more than two decades.

Brovont points to flooding hot spots like Houston, Louisiana, Alabama 
and Mississippi. “Of course, New Jersey and Connecticut shoreline are 
always susceptible to that as well,” he added. “And then you get those 
high tides, what they call king tides in some areas. You get that 
combined with a storm coming in, and that can just do tremendous damage.”

New Jersey tops the list of states with the most homes that are expected 
to see at least one major flood per year by 2050, based on projected 
sea-level rise. Some 74,165 homes in the state will be affected, 
according to Climate Central. Next are Florida (57,865), California 
(36,845), Louisiana (33,372) and North Carolina (33,334).

Santo Siciliano and his wife adore living by the water. “I grew up on 
the shore. So for me, it’s a no-brainer,” he said.

The flood risk to their Oceanport, New Jersey, home is increasing, 
however, so to stay in their home, they had to lift it...
https://www.cnbc.com/2021/04/19/house-lifting-is-big-business-following-a-record-year-of-storms.html

[German youth ruling]
*Delaying Climate Action Harms Youth, German High Court Rules in 'Huge 
Win for the Climate Movement'*
Climate Nexus - Apr. 30, 2021
Germany's highest court ruled Thursday that the country's 2019 climate 
law unconstitutionally saddles young people with the burden of fighting 
climate change by "irreversibly offload[ing] major emission reductions 
burdens onto periods after 2030."

Olaf Scholz, Germany's finance minister, said the government would 
rapidly propose legislation to comply with the ruling. The case was 
brought by young people who argued the German plan to reach net-zero 
carbon pollution by 2050 backloaded too much of the required emissions 
cuts until after 2030.
"We are super happy with the court's decision," 22-year-old plaintiff 
Sophie Backsen, who fears sea level rise will engulf her family's farm, 
told reporters. "Effective climate protection has to be implemented now 
and not in 10 years' time, when it'll be too late."

As reported by The Guardian:

    One of the complainants, Luisa Neubauer, an activist from Fridays
    for Future, welcomed the ruling, saying: "This is huge. Climate
    protection is not nice to have; climate protection is our basic
    right and that's official now. This is a huge win for the climate
    movement, it changes a lot."
    ---
    Neubauer said the climate lobby's success at Karlsruhe was only the
    beginning, emphasising that the five months leading up to the
    federal elections in September, in which the pro-environmental
    Greens have a good chance of entering government, would be crucial.
    "We will continue to fight for a 1.5 degree policy which protects
    our future freedoms, instead of endangering them," she said, adding,
    "gone are the days when we were called ignorant for demanding
    climate action."

https://www.ecowatch.com/climate-action-germany-youth-2652835439.html

[The news archive - famous hoax exposed on May 1st]
*On this day in the history of global warming  May 1, 1998 *

May 1, 1998: The AP reports on a bogus petition allegedly claiming that 
15,000 scientists reject the evidence of human-caused climate change.

http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?slug=2748308&date=19980501
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Py2XVILHUjQ

/-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------/

/Archive of Daily Global Warming News 
<https://pairlist10.pair.net/pipermail/theclimate.vote/2017-October/date.html> 
/
https://pairlist10.pair.net/pipermail/theclimate.vote

/To receive daily mailings - click to Subscribe 
<mailto:subscribe at theClimate.Vote?subject=Click%20SEND%20to%20process%20your%20request> 
to news digest./

- Privacy and Security:*This mailing is text-only.  It does not carry 
images or attachments which may originate from remote servers.  A 
text-only message can provide greater privacy to the receiver and sender.
By regulation, the .VOTE top-level domain must be used for democratic 
and election purposes and cannot be used for commercial purposes. 
Messages have no tracking software.
To subscribe, email: contact at theclimate.vote 
<mailto:contact at theclimate.vote> with subject subscribe, To Unsubscribe, 
subject: unsubscribe
Also you may subscribe/unsubscribe at 
https://pairlist10.pair.net/mailman/listinfo/theclimate.vote
Links and headlines assembled and curated by Richard Pauli for 
http://TheClimate.Vote <http://TheClimate.Vote/> delivering succinct 
information for citizens and responsible governments of all levels. List 
membership is confidential and records are scrupulously restricted to 
this mailing list.

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://pairlist10.pair.net/pipermail/theclimate.vote/attachments/20210501/1d116d25/attachment.htm>