[✔️] July 5, 2023- Global Warming News Digest | Record set, Hot Tipping points, Birds and Bugs, Insurance canary, 2012 Carbon Tax

Wed Jul 5 09:17:27 EDT 2023

/*July*//*5, 2023*/
/
//[ Just the other day ]/
*Climate change: World's hottest day since records began*
By Matt McGrath - Environment correspondent
The world's average temperature reached a new high on Monday 3 July, 
topping 17 degrees Celsius for the first time.

US researchers said the new record was the highest in any instrumental 
record dating back to the end of the 19th century.

Scientists believe a combination of a natural weather event known as El 
Niño and mankind's ongoing emissions of carbon dioxide are driving the heat.

Last month has also been confirmed as the world's warmest June yet 
recorded...
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-66104822

/[ Hot summer says Inside Climate News ]/
*June Extremes Suggest Parts of the Climate System Are Reaching Tipping 
Points*
Research shows heat domes, wildfires and vanishing polar ice are the 
symptoms; unabated greenhouse gas emissions are the cause.
By Bob Berwyn
July 4, 2023
June 2023 may be remembered as the start of a big change in the climate 
system, with many key global indicators flashing red warning lights amid 
signs that some systems are tipping toward a new state from which they 
may not recover.

Earth’s critical reflective polar ice caps are at their lowest extent on 
record in the satellite era, with the sea ice around Antarctica at a 
record-low extent by far, spurring worried scientists to share dramatic 
charts of the missing ice repeatedly. In the Arctic, the month ended 
with the Greenland Ice Sheet experiencing one of the largest June melt 
events ever recorded, and with scientists reporting that June 2023 was 
the hottest June ever measured, breaking the 2019 record by a 
“staggering” 0.16 degrees Celsius...
- -
There was record-breaking heat on nearly every continent during the 
month, according to independent climate statistician Maximilian Herrera. 
Along with the deadly late June heat in Mexico and the South-central 
United States, extreme readings have been widespread in remote Siberia, 
with hundreds of daily heat records, including readings higher than 95 
degrees Celsius close to the Arctic Circle. “The heat will just get 
worse,” he posted on Twitter.

Herrera also tracks notable regional extremes, like a historic mountain 
heatwave in Iran, where temperatures in late June spiked to between 100 
and 120 degrees Fahrenheit at elevations between 1,500 and 5,000 feet 
above sea level that are normally far cooler.  During the first week of 
July, temperatures in Iraq are forecast to breach 120 degrees Fahrenheit...
- -
Record-breaking ocean temperatures in regions around the globe are not 
surprising Trenberth, who specializes in analyzing deep ocean heat 
content, down to more than 6,000 feet below sea level, where more than 
90 percent of all the heat trapped in the atmosphere by carbon pollution 
has been absorbed.

That heat is measured as energy rather than as a temperature value, and 
it’s equivalent at this point to the energy of five nuclear bombs 
exploding in the ocean each second, or about 100 times more energy than 
all the electricity produced in 2021 globally.

For Trenberth, that global energy imbalance, building steadily since the 
start of the fossil-fueled industrial age, is the best measure of how 
humans have affected the climate, because the energy balance isn’t 
affected by seasonal or annual variations, or by shifts in regional 
climate patterns.

And if the heat building that energy imbalance in the oceans was to 
stop, many of its impacts would rapidly decrease, even though the water 
is warmer.

“It is not global temperature that matters but Earth’s energy imbalance. 
If you have a pot of water on the stove, while heating, convection 
occurs,” he said. “Ultimately it boils off water as steam. But as soon 
as you turn off the heat source, all that behavior stops. The 
temperature is the same, but the heating is no more.”
https://insideclimatenews.org/news/04072023/june-extremes-climate-tipping-points/

/[  text and audio ] /
*Birds, bugs and climate change*
Is erratic weather affecting bird nutrition?
Dan Gunderson Barnesville, Minn.
July 3, 2023
Early on a cool, smoky June morning researchers Alexis Grinde and Annie 
Bracey load up with gear and strike out across a grassland south of 
Moorhead, Minn.

They’re gathering data to better understand how changing weather might 
be affecting nutrition for aerial insectivores, birds that catch insects 
in flight.

Many studies have shown declines in bird populations and dwindling 
insect populations. As a wildlife ecologist at the University of 
Minnesota Natural Resources Research Institute in Duluth, Grinde wants 
to better understand the connections between birds and insects.

Wooden nesting boxes are set up on posts across this grassy field to 
attract tree swallows, the subjects of this study...
- -
“I’ll walk up check the box, grab an adult, and then we'll put an RFID 
on it,” said NRRI avian ecologist Annie Bracey. The adult swallow 
disappears in her hand, only its greenish blue head showing as she clips 
an identification band on one leg and a small yellow tag on the other.

The yellow tag will trigger a scanner that encircles the hole the 
swallows use to enter and leave the nest box.

“It’s kind of like a bar code scanner to estimate provisioning rates of 
the adults, to see how often they're visiting the nest and using that as 
an index of feeding for their young,” explained Bracey.

This information is key to the question these researchers are trying to 
understand.

While loss of habitat is a factor in the decline of aerial insectivores, 
insects are a critical food source and changes in insect populations are 
thought to significantly contribute to the declining bird numbers...
- -
*A nutrition mismatch*
The theory is that changing weather patterns are causing a mismatch, 
between the birds migration and breeding cycles and the availability of 
insects they depend on for food.

Grinde points to spring weather in recent years with big swings from 
warm to cold. That can significantly change when insects hatch and if 
they survive to become food for birds.

“That has huge consequences for what the birds are doing and what their 
potential productivity for the season is,” said Grinde. “And if we're 
not making more birds here during the breeding season, there's not going 
to be a population increase ever."
At least one study has found tree swallows are getting smaller, perhaps 
in response to the effects of climate change on their diet.

After weighing and measuring the adult bird, Bracey carefully removes a 
half dozen tiny recently hatched birds from the nest. They are four days 
old with no feathers, just a few wisps of down on their bare skin.

Working quickly to make sure the nestlings are safely handled and don’t 
get chilled, the researchers weigh and measure the tiny birds to 
document their growth and collect fecal samples.

DNA analysis will tell them what insects adult birds are feeding the babies.

Insects are also being collected here throughout the breeding season to 
understand the relationship between the emergence of insects on the 
landscape and what the birds are eating.
“Figuring out what's going on with those dynamics, how fast the 
nestlings grow, how many survive, how does that relate to food 
availability, it's a huge next step in ecology,” said Grinde.

The research sites range across different landscapes in western 
Minnesota, from agricultural land to grasslands to a mix of the two 
types of land use.

The researchers planned to also study eastern bluebirds which will nest 
near tree swallows, but they haven't found that species in the study 
area over the last two years. Grinde is not sure why bluebirds are 
absent, but they are also a species in decline...
- -
*Critical questions*
There hasn't been much research looking at the interface between 
changing insect populations and breeding insectivores, said Grinde, but 
it is critical to understanding the future of these birds.

“They're coming to Minnesota to breed in the month of June. And they're 
coming here for the insects because there's a ton of food, food is not 
scarce,” she said.

Plentiful food available at the wrong time in the breeding season could 
be significant.

“That's a real problem because the moms not going to be able to get 
enough food to actually lay the eggs. The nestlings aren’t going to get 
enough food or they're going to be delayed in how much food that they're 
getting,” said Grinde.

“When you don't have that buffet that you came here for it can get kind 
of rough and that can definitely affect the energy they have to put into 
breeding.”

This is the second and final year of data collection for this project 
funded by the Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund. Grinde hopes 
to continue the work because long term monitoring of birds and insects 
can provide important insights on the effects of a changing climate.
https://www.mprnews.org/story/2023/07/03/birds-bugs-and-climate-change

/[ Insurance now  a big problem, getting bigger ]/
*Dr Alice Hill: The Insurance industry is the retreating canary in the 
CLIMATE coal mine*
Nick Breeze ClimateGenn
Jun 28, 2023  ClimateGenn #podcast  produced by Nick Breeze
- -
Welcome to the ClimateGenn podcast. This summary version is edited from 
the full interview. Included are the key points from the discussion and 
the full version can be accessed by all Youtube and Patreon members.
Overview of topics covered:
US politicians debate the causes of extreme weather, stymying effective 
longterm policy.
“California is the 4th largest insurance market in the world… so to pull 
out of that is big news!”
State run back-up plan - but back-up plans are ballooning as 
concentrated risk discourages insurers.
Extensive wildfires in 2017 and 2018 wiped out quarter of a century 
(25yrs) of profits in California.
Insurers in California are not allowed to use models that account for 
the growing risk of climate change.
Insurance policies evaluate 1 year of risk but climate is a long-term issue.
AXA: At some point the world becomes uninsurable with climate change.
Can the risk be spread across the nation?
How do we build national resilience (fortresses?)?
Too much infrastructure already at great risk.
Post Covid, many Americans moved into areas “destined to burn”.
East coast of America is subsiding and has one of the worst rates of 
sea-level rise in the world - “A bad combination!”
“A profound risk to the stability of our real estate markets. We are 
watching the problem but there is a reluctance to address the problem… 
because it is so large!”
What do we need to do?
We will see large movements of people and devaluation of assets over time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JMPxAFf8yb4

/[The news archive - looking back at a time when economics could be 
humorous ]/
/*July 5, 2012*/
July 5, 2012: Economist Yoram Bauman and law professor Shi-Ling Hsu 
point out the benefits of a federal carbon tax in a New York Times article.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/05/opinion/a-carbon-tax-sensible-for-all.html

=======================================
*Mass media is lacking, many daily summariesdeliver global warming news 
- a few are email delivered*

=========================================================
**Inside Climate News*
Newsletters
We deliver climate news to your inbox like nobody else. Every day or 
once a week, our original stories and digest of the web’s top headlines 
deliver the full story, for free.
https://insideclimatenews.org/
---------------------------------------
**Climate Nexus* https://climatenexus.org/hot-news/*
Delivered straight to your inbox every morning, Hot News summarizes the 
most important climate and energy news of the day, delivering an 
unmatched aggregation of timely, relevant reporting. It also provides 
original reporting and commentary on climate denial and pro-polluter 
activity that would otherwise remain largely unexposed.    5 weekday
=================================
*Carbon Brief Daily https://www.carbonbrief.org/newsletter-sign-up*
Every weekday morning, in time for your morning coffee, Carbon Brief 
sends out a free email known as the “Daily Briefing” to thousands of 
subscribers around the world. The email is a digest of the past 24 hours 
of media coverage related to climate change and energy, as well as our 
pick of the key studies published in the peer-reviewed journals.
more at https://www.getrevue.co/publisher/carbon-brief
==================================
*T*he Daily Climate *Subscribe https://ehsciences.activehosted.com/f/61*
Get The Daily Climate in your inbox - FREE! Top news on climate impacts, 
solutions, politics, drivers. Delivered week days. Better than coffee.
Other newsletters  at https://www.dailyclimate.org/originals/

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

/Archive of Daily Global Warming News 
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. This is a personal hobby production curated by Richard Pauli
By regulation, the .VOTE top-level domain 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/20230705/1e9f4127/attachment.htm>