[✔️] May 19, 2022 - Daily Global Warming News Digest

Thu May 19 07:26:14 EDT 2022

*May 19, 2022*

[ calculations conclude ]
*Climate change has made India’s heat wave 100 times more likely, UK 
weather service says*
MAY 18 2022

    -- The blistering heat wave in northwest India and Pakistan was made
    over 100 times more likely because of human-caused climate change,
    according to a new study from the United Kingdom’s Met Office.

    -- The analysis suggests that high temperatures that used to occur
    about every 300 years may now happen about every three years.

    -- The extreme temperatures, which began in March, have already set
    records in the region and have forced millions of people to
    rearrange how they can work and live.

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/05/18/climate-change-made-india-heatwave-100x-more-likely-uk-met-office.html

/[ Loop current ]/
*Bad news for the 2022 hurricane season: The Loop Current, a fueler of 
monster storms, is looking a lot like it did in 2005, the year of Katrina*
May 18, 2022 ...
It’s called the Loop Current, and it’s the 800-pound gorilla of Gulf 
hurricane risks.

When the Loop Current reaches this far north this early in the hurricane 
season – especially during what’s forecast to be a busy season – it can 
spell disaster for folks along the Northern Gulf Coast, from Texas to 
Florida.

If you look at temperature maps of the Gulf of Mexico, you can easily 
spot the Loop Current. It curls up through the Yucatan Channel between 
Mexico and Cuba, into the Gulf of Mexico, and then swings back out 
through the Florida Strait south of Florida as the Florida Current, 
where it becomes the main contributor to the Gulf Stream.
- -
I have been monitoring ocean heat content for more than 30 years as a 
marine scientist. The conditions I’m seeing in the Gulf in May 2022 are 
cause for concern. One prominent forecast anticipates 19 tropical storms 
– 32% more than average – and nine hurricanes. The Loop Current has the 
potential to supercharge some of those storms.

*Why the Loop Current worries forecasters*
Warm ocean water doesn’t necessarily mean more tropical storms. But once 
tropical storms reach waters that are around 78 F (26 C) or warmer, they 
can strengthen into hurricanes.

Hurricanes draw most of their strength from the top 100 feet (30 meters) 
of the ocean. Normally, these upper ocean waters mix, allowing warm 
spots to cool quickly. But the Loop Current’s subtropical water is 
deeper and warmer, and also saltier, than Gulf common water. These 
effects inhibit ocean mixing and sea surface cooling, allowing the warm 
current and its eddies to retain heat to great depths.

In mid-May 2022, satellite data showed the Loop Current had water 
temperatures 78 F or warmer down to about 330 feet (100 meters). By 
summer, that heat could extend down to around 500 feet (about 150 meters).

The eddy that fueled Hurricane Ida in 2021 was over 86 F (30 C) at the 
surface and had heat down to about 590 feet (180 meters). With favorable 
atmospheric conditions, this deep reservoir of heat helped the storm 
explode almost overnight into a very powerful and dangerous Category 4 
hurricane.
- -
La Niña has been unusually strong in spring 2022, though it’s possible 
that it could weaken later in the year, allowing more wind shear toward 
the end of the season. For now, the upper atmosphere is doing little 
that would stop a hurricane from intensifying.

It’s too soon to tell what will happen with the steering winds that 
guide tropical storms and affect where they go. Even before then, the 
conditions over West Africa are crucial to whether tropical storms form 
at all in the Atlantic. Dust from the Sahara and low humidity can both 
reduce the likelihood storms will form...
- -
Studies suggest that the Atlantic is likely to see more storms intensify 
into major hurricanes as those temperatures rise, though there won’t 
necessarily be more storms overall. A study examined the 2020 hurricane 
season – which had a record 30 named storms, 12 of them hitting the U.S. 
– and found the storms produced more rain than they would have in a 
world without the effects of human-caused climate change.

Another trend we have been noticing is that the Loop Current’s warm 
eddies have more heat than we saw 10 to 15 years ago. Whether that’s 
related to global warming isn’t clear yet, but the impact of a warming 
trend could be devastating.
https://theconversation.com/bad-news-for-the-2022-hurricane-season-the-loop-current-a-fueler-of-monster-storms-is-looking-a-lot-like-it-did-in-2005-the-year-of-katrina-183197/
/

/- -/

/[see current sea currents]/
https://earth.nullschool.net/#current/ocean/surface/currents/overlay=significant_wave_height/orthographic=-68.02,33.77,1879/loc=-87.763,37.994/
/

/
/

/
/

/[ Dave Roberts talks with tech electric future -- A DER is Distributed 
Energy Resource ( generator or storage or using electricity)/ this is a 
very new idea ]
MAY 18, 2022
*Volts podcast: Jesse Morris on building an operating system for 
distributed energy*
*Yes, blockchain is involved.*

Recent years have seen an explosive rise in distributed energy resources 
(DERs) — energy devices that are located “behind the meter,” on the 
customer side, like solar panels, batteries, electric vehicles (EVs), 
and smart appliances.

Distributed energy has the potential to change the grid for the better, 
making it cleaner and more resilient, but as things stand, there’s a 
problem.

Consider an EV. The customer has a relationship to it, a way to see its 
capacity and behavior; it wants to operate the EV in a way that best 
serves their own transportation needs. The aggregator — an entity that 
gathers DERs and treats them as a single entity, to sell their services 
— has a different relationship with the EV; it wants to operate the EV 
to meet contractual requirements. The distribution utility has a 
different relationship; it wants to operate the EV to maintain grid 
stability. And the market manager (ISO) has yet a different 
relationship; it wants to operate the EV in the way that best serves the 
market.

All these entities want different things from the EV, but they’ve all 
built bespoke systems to track it — systems that do not communicate with 
one another. Consequently, most DERs are wildly underutilized.

This can not last. Confusion and crossed wires will only grow with 
distributed energy. What the world needs is a common, transparent, 
trusted way to track DERs, their capacity and interaction with the grid...

That is what Energy Web, an international nonprofit, aims to provide: 
“an operating system for DERs” that will assign each DER a record on the 
blockchain (yes, the blockchain), allowing all interested entities to 
have a common source of information and tracking.

I am a bit of a skeptic of toward blockchain hype, but this seems like 
an excellent use of it, which could unlock a much more sophisticated and 
resilient grid. I’m eager to talk to Energy Web CEO Jesse Morris about 
what the product is, how it can help DERs, and where we might see it 
adopted next.
https://www.volts.wtf/p/volts-podcast-jesse-morris-on-building?token=eyJ1c2VyX2lkIjoyMzY4NzE5OSwicG9zdF9pZCI6NTQ1NTExMjUsIl8iOiJQWmxDayIsImlhdCI6MTY1MjkxNDYxNiwiZXhwIjoxNjUyOTE4MjE2LCJpc3MiOiJwdWItMTkzMDI0Iiwic3ViIjoicG9zdC1yZWFjdGlvbiJ9.mOIZwFQDtluh-oW79IN7rjAXcbk0anLK_tM5mcd10ig&utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&s=r#details

- -

/[ see some videos about it ]/
*DER Task Force *
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxJJKhpjfCZrD8Q-0QzTvQA

/[ Excellent college-level lecture on deception and misinformation - 
very current video ]/
*Breaking Democracy: Lies, Deception and Disinformation*
101 views  May 18, 2022  With conspiracy theories and disinformation on 
the rise in both media and politics, is our democracy at risk? We may 
lose trust in society, in the institutions that inform us, and, 
ultimately, in the democratic process. Our sense of responsibility for 
the everyday information we share may diminish. Deceitful politicians 
may escape scrutiny by claiming that truths are false, falsehoods are 
true, and in any case nothing can be proved. How should we respond to 
these challenges?
A lecture by Andrew Chadwick
The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available 
from the Gresham College website:
https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/breaking-democracy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Lauwoz6Jjg
- -
[transcript pages ]
With conspiracy theories and disinformation on the rise in both media 
and politics, is our democracy at risk? We may lose trust in society, in 
the institutions that inform us, and, ultimately, in the democratic 
process. Our sense of responsibility for the everyday information we 
share may diminish. Deceitful politicians may escape scrutiny by 
claiming that truths are false, falsehoods are true, and in any case 
nothing can be proved. How should we respond to these challenges?
https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/breaking-democracy

/[ we forgot to comply ]/
*Automakers lobbying toward climate catastrophe, production goals won’t 
meet <1.5C target*
Jameson Dow - -  May. 17th 2022

https://i0.wp.com/electrek.co/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2022/05/Screen-Shot-2022-05-16-at-1.48.40-PM.jpg?w=2500&quality=82&strip=all&ssl=1

Major automakers are currently on track to fail to meet necessary 
climate goals to keep the world under 1.5 degrees Celsius of warming, 
according to a new report by InfluenceMap.

The report showed that while companies are largely making 
climate-forward public statements, these statements do not match up with 
their actions in terms of future production plans or their lobbying 
efforts...
- -
Unsurprisingly, Japanese automakers lag behind the rest, occupying the 
bottom 3 positions on the table. Nissan is slightly better than Honda 
and Toyota in this respect but still lags behind all non-Japanese 
automakers. However, the report, which used data ending March 2022, did 
not account for Honda’s April announcement of increased EV investment, 
which could improve its position.

The report noted that most companies tend to embrace and advocate for 
better climate policy in direct proportion to their future EV production 
goals, but that a few companies are outliers to this trend. BMW, 
Stellantis, and Mercedes have all set relatively high targets (but not 
high enough, except Mercedes) for future production, but their 
engagement with lobbying efforts has largely been against climate action...
- -
These climate goals are necessary to avoid the worst impacts of climate 
change, including the possibility of positive feedback loops that will 
only make it harder to bring warming under control. The necessity of 
keeping warming below 1.5 degrees Celsius is not some political opinion 
but a result of the projections of thousands of scientists showing that 
we are at a breakpoint where we can still avoid the worst and costliest 
effects of climate change.

And there is no way that we can negotiate or lobby our way out of this. 
In this negotiation, our adversary is physics, and physics does not care 
about how many dealers you have to wrangle, how many engineers you have 
to retrain, how many battery recycling plants you need to construct, or 
any of the other traditional excuses the auto industry has made for 
their complacency. It only cares that you need to reduce carbon in the 
atmosphere, and it’s not going to budge or compromise, no matter how 
hard you lobby it or how difficult you say compliance would be.

We must keep warming underneath these target temperatures. We caused it, 
we are the only ones who can stop it, so we must get to work.

Simply put, automakers and governments (and consumer demand, see SUVs) 
must do better than what current production plans and policy indicate, 
lobbying against progress needs to end, and the industry must take 
action – today. We have to do more. End of discussion.
https://electrek.co/2022/05/17/automakers-lobbying-toward-climate-catastrophe-production-goals-wont-meet/

[Electric Bicycles - video]
*Wheel-E Podcast! Lightweight e-bikes, FREY CC fat e-bike, solar RV 
trike, new e-Harley & more*
4,460 views  Streamed live on May 7, 2022  This week on Electrek’s 
Wheel-E podcast, we discuss the most popular news stories from the world 
of electric bikes and other nontraditional electric vehicles. This week 
that includes new electric bikes from the original Mini Cooper maker, 
FREY launching a fat tire version of the CC commuter e-bike, C3STROM’s 
motorcycle style e-bike, dueling cannonball runs on electric 
motorcycles, an electric skateboard on tank treads, and lots more.

Here are a few of the articles that we will discuss during the podcast 
today:

00:25 Mini Cooper maker launches four new electric bicycles with 
regenerative braking
4:50 New electric bicycle powertrain claims to be lightest in the world, 
adds just 3.2 kg (7 lbs.)
16:00 FREY CC fat tire e-bike unveiled as 1,500W full-suspension 
electric comfort bike
20:00 C3STROM Astro combines e-bike design with motorcycle styling for a 
fast, new electric moped
25:00 Check out this solar electric RV that is both a camper and an 
electric boat… and an e-bike
30:15 Harley-Davidson’s LiveWire drops teaser video for new electric 
motorcycle, to be unveiled next week
36:30 Dueling electric motorcycles set new cannonball run record in 
daring race across the US
41:30 Start your week with this 30 mph electric skateboard with tank 
treads instead of wheels
45:00 Q&A
https://youtu.be/u33YyLPO_v0

/[  Europe takes notice ]/
*Parliament tries to boost climate efforts as emissions and temperatures 
soar*
Surge in CO2 pollution is tied to the end of the pandemic, but an 
analyst says it ‘is just a bump on the road.’..
- -
Although the final votes on the committee's positions were decisive, 
there were much narrower margins for core elements of the reform of the 
EU’s Emissions Trading System, which covers about 40 percent of the 
bloc’s total greenhouse gas pollution.

A left-leaning alliance passed an amendment to set a tougher limit on 
emissions for sectors covered under the carbon market against fierce 
opposition from conservative factions, winning the vote by 46 to 41.

It’s unclear whether the narrow committee majority can hold when the 
full Parliament votes in June; center-right lawmakers have already said 
they plan to mount another attempt to kill the amendment.

Conservatives see the left-wing groups’ ETS changes as “problematic” 
because the EU “is in a big crisis, and we need to replace Russian gas,” 
said center-right MEP Peter Liese.

“There will be some coal to replace Russian gas. Coal is dirty. But the 
war in Ukraine is dirtier. And that’s why we have to accept some coal to 
replace Russian gas and this would contradict with a huge step up” on 
capping emissions in the near term, he added.

That point was emphasized Monday when data showed pollution has surged 
back to pre-pandemic levels.
https://www.politico.eu/article/parliament-boost-climate-effort-emission-temperature-soar/

/[ VICE news is sometimes difficult to receive - video ]/
*How Oil Became Russia’s Strongest Weapon | System Error*
8,474 views  May 18, 2022  Oil fuels international conflict, corruption 
and authoritarianism while also killing the planet. Until now, most 
nations were happy to put up with this, but Russia’s war with Ukraine 
may spell an end to that. 

So far, EU countries have paid Russia $44 billion for oil and gas since 
the conflict began. In this episode, we investigate how the fossil fuels 
are financing Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=esFBQphVuuk

[The news archive - looking back at significant events ]
*May 19, 2008*
The Guardian reports:

"A shareholder revolt at ExxonMobil led by the billionaire Rockefeller 
family has won the support of four significant British institutional 
investors who will call on Monday for a shakeup in the governance of the 
world's biggest oil company.

"Guardian.co.uk has learned that F&C Asset Management, Morley Fund 
Management, the Co-Operative Insurance Society and the West Midlands 
Pension Fund are throwing their weight behind a resolution demanding 
that ExxonMobil appoints an independent chairman to stimulate debate on 
the company's board.

"Exxon is facing a rebellion from its investors over its hardline 
approach to global warming. The firm has refused to follow rival oil 
companies in committing large-scale capital investment to 
environmentally friendly technology such as wind and solar power.

"The Rockefeller dynasty, whose ancestor John D. Rockefeller founded the 
original oil business at the core of ExxonMobil, have sponsored four 
shareholder resolutions demanding changes at Exxon. One of these calls 
on Exxon's chief executive Rex Tillerson, to relinquish his role as 
chairman in favour of an outsider to bring in an alternative point of view."

http://www.theguardian.com/business/2008/may/19/exxonmobil.oil

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