[✔️] March 2, 2023- Global Warming News Digest | 3x El Nino, Bernie angry, PBS emerging disease, Steel smelt efficiency, TV network coverage of climate, R. Solnit, wind and whales misinformation battle
Richard Pauli
Richard at CredoandScreed.com
Thu Mar 2 08:43:48 EST 2023
/*March 2, 2023*/
/[ Sort of links between climate and weather.]/
*The "triple-dip" La Niña may give way to an El Niño*
Andrew Freedman, author of Axios Generate
The first "triple-dip" La Niña event of the 21st century is waning, and
the odds of an El Niño in the tropical Pacific Ocean are rising, the
World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said Wednesday.
*
**Why it matters: *El Niño events release a tremendous amount of ocean
heat into the atmosphere and would increase the odds for a new record
warm year in 2024.
*State of play: *These events require a complex series of coordinated
moves to take place between the waters of the equatorial tropical
Pacific Ocean and the atmosphere, with each responding to the other as
if in a complex dance number.
It can be difficult to predict the evolution of a switch from one side
of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) to another. But forecasters
are confident that the La Niña will soon be over after lasting through
three straight winters in the Northern Hemisphere (hence the term
"triple dip").
*The chances of El Niño *in WMO's outlook gradually rise from 15% during
the April through June period, to 35% in May to July, and top out at 55%
by June through August.
But such predictions are known to be less reliable when made leading
into the spring, rather than coming out of the summer months.
The Climate Prediction Center, part of NOAA, projects increasing odds of
an El Niño event going into mid-to-late 2023, supported by a variety of
computer model simulations.
*Zoom in: *La Niña conditions are characterized by cooler than average
ocean temperatures in the equatorial tropical Pacific Ocean, causing a
series of weather pattern shifts globally.
For example, La Niña is blamed for setting in motion the failed rainy
seasons and dire famine in the Horn of Africa, which is expected to worsen.
*The big picture:* Importantly for global warming, the cool phase of
ENSO tends to put a temporary brake on the increase in global average
surface temperatures, preventing a new record-setting warm year.
Yet each La Niña year has tended to be the warmest La Niña year on
record, as human-emitted greenhouse gases influence the natural ENSO cycle.
*The intrigue: *If and when an El Niño arrives, there may be a slight
delay in its effects on global average surface temperatures.
It is likely that the effects of the La Niña event will linger longer
than usual, leading to continued dryness in the Horn of Africa and
elevated risks of flooding in Australia and Southeast Asia.
https://www.axios.com/2023/03/01/triple-dip-la-nina-followed-by-el-nino-wmo
/[ new book - the economy should give attention to climate change -
video 84 mins https://youtu.be/7FqXDJkko_I ]/
*Bernie Sanders Meets Frankie Boyle | It’s OK To Be Angry About Capitalism*
How To Academy Mindset
23,608 views Feb 27, 2023
Filmed February 24th 2023 at Brighton Dome. The longest-serving
independent in Congress, the leader of democratic socialism in America,
and a hero to progressives across the globe, Bernie Sanders joined the
comedian Frankie Boyle to take on the 1%.
Senator Sanders has a vision of what would be possible if the political
revolution took place. If we would finally recognize that economic
rights are human rights, and work to create a society that provides
them. This isn’t some utopian fantasy; this is democracy as we should
know it. Is it really too much to ask?
Frankie Boyle is one of The UK’s premier comedians and writers. Known
for his shows New World Order (BBC2), Tramadol Nights (Ch4) and his best
selling DVD’s and Netflix Special. Frankie has penned 3 best selling
books. In 2018 Frankie wrote and presented the highly acclaimed
documentary Frankie Goes To Russia for the BBC previewing the
forthcoming Russian World Cup. Frankie also regularly contributes
articles for the broadsheet press. He has topped the podcast charts with
the first three volumes of his eight volume Promethiad sequence.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FqXDJkko_I
/[ PBS News audio 7 mins and transcript ]/
*Is climate change accelerating the risk of disease spreading from
animals to humans?*
Mar 1, 2023
Scientists researching the aftermath of California wildfires say they
are finding evidence that climate change is accelerating the risk of
disease spreading from animals to humans. Science correspondent Miles
O'Brien reports...
- -
Miles O’Brien:
She is collaborating with the engineering department, seeking ways to
monitor and test bat populations remotely.
Christine Johnson:
And so that's what we're seeking is, with the innovative technology that
we're using to try to bring much more feasibility to wildlife surveillance.
Miles O’Brien:
There are more and more zoonotic diseases coming. The climate crisis
makes it unavoidable. A greater investment to protect public health with
some 21st century tools, along with the risky, laborious field work,
might be the only way to stop a spillover from boiling over, shutting
down the world once again.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/is-climate-change-accelerating-the-risk-of-disease-spreading-from-animals-to-humans
/[ "make it efficient" - video explaining a claimed innovation ] /
*New breakthrough claims 90% reduction in Steelmaking emissions.*
Just Have a Think
55,213 views Feb 26, 2023
Steel making accounts for about 8% of all global emissions, and that's
rising quickly as urbanisation accelerates around the world. So we need
to decarbonise the steelmaking process NOW! Here's a great new solution
for how to achieve that goal.
Main Paper citation
Harriet Kildahl, Li Wang, Lige Tong, Yulong Ding,
Cost effective decarbonisation of blast furnace – basic oxygen furnace
steel production through thermochemical sector coupling,
Journal of Cleaner Production,
Volume 389, 2023,135963,
ISSN 0959-6526,
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S095965262300121X?via%3Dihub
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eX80JkuzfTE
- -
/[ From the Journal of Cleaner Production ]/
*Cost effective decarbonisation of blast furnace – basic oxygen furnace
steel production through thermochemical sector coupling*
Harriet Kildahl, Li Wang, Lige Tong, Yulong Ding
Highlights
• Decarbonisation of BF-BOF through thermochemical closed carbon looping.
• Demonstration of mass and energy flows of thermochemical BF-BOF system.
• 88% emissions reduction of UK steel industry through £720 million
investment.
• Decarbonisation without retiring of existing BF-BOF, reducing
stranded assets.
• After 5 years, £1.28 billion savings and total UK-wide emissions
reduction of 2.9%.
*Abstract*
We present here a first-principles study of the sector coupling
between a thermochemical carbon dioxide (CO2) splitting cycle and
existing blast furnace – basic oxygen furnace (BF-BOF) steel making
for cost-effective decarbonisation. A double perovskite,
Ba2Ca0.66Nb0.34FeO6, is proposed for the thermochemical splitting of
CO2, a viable candidate due to its low reaction temperatures, high
carbon monoxide (CO) yields, and 100% selectivity towards CO. The CO
produced by the TC cycle replaces expensive metallurgical coke for
the reduction of iron ore to metallic iron in the blast furnace
(BF). The CO2 produced from the BF is used in the TC cycle to
produce more CO, therefore creating a closed carbon loop, allowing
for the decoupling of steel production from greenhouse gas
emissions. Techno-economic analysis of the implementation of this
system in UK BF-BOFs could reduce steel sector emissions by 88%
while increasing the cost-competitiveness of UK steel on the global
market through cost reduction. After five years, this system would
save the UK steel industry £1.28 billion while reducing UK-wide
emissions by 2.9%. Implementation of this system in the world's
BF-BOFs could allow the steel sector to decarbonise in line with the
Paris Climate Agreement to limit warming to 1.5 °C.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S095965262300121X?via%3Dihub
/[ Annual study by Media Matters ]/
*How broadcast TV networks covered climate change in 2022*
BY TED MACDONALD
PUBLISHED 2/28/23
Breaking a decade-long trend of year-to-year fluctuation, corporate
broadcast TV networks' climate coverage increased for the second
consecutive year. However, climate coverage still accounted for just
around 1% of all corporate broadcast programming in 2022, a figure that
is woefully inadequate in the face of a worsening climate crisis.
In our annual analysis of broadcast news climate coverage, Media Matters
found that morning, evening, and Sunday morning political shows on ABC,
CBS, NBC, and Fox Broadcasting Co. spent approximately 1,374 minutes —
nearly 23 hours — discussing climate change. This is roughly equivalent
to the high-water mark of nearly 22 hours that networks achieved in 2021...
The coverage was largely driven by another year of apocalyptic extreme
weather events including brutal, record-shattering heat across Europe
and Asia, famine exacerbated by both flooding and drought in East
Africa, and historic flooding in Pakistan. In the U.S., extreme weather
has exposed the vulnerability of our power system and its aging
infrastructure and threatened water supplies for communities across the
Southwest.
The consistent volume of coverage from 2021 through 2022 — after years
of advocacy by climate journalists, activists, and researchers pushing
for more and better climate coverage by TV news shows — was supported by
commitments from corporate broadcast networks to cover climate through
collaborative initiatives like Covering Climate Now and dedicated
reporting during key climate events.
However, some problematic trends continued to materialize in the quality
of corporate broadcast news coverage of climate change, including, for
at least the sixth year in a row, an overwhelming proportion of
non-Hispanic white men featured as guests in climate coverage, despite
the disproportionate harm people of color suffer from climate change.
Additionally, while broadcast networks are increasingly covering the
impacts of, and potential solutions to, the climate crisis, they largely
fail to explicitly name the primary drivers of global warming or the
main impediments to climate action.
- -
Top trends from climate coverage on broadcast TV news in 2022
*Key Findings:*
*-- In 2022, total corporate broadcast news climate coverage
slightly exceeded the high water mark set in 2021:* Morning news
shows, evening news shows, and Sunday morning shows on corporate
broadcast TV networks aired nearly 23 hours of combined climate
coverage in 2022 — a total of 1,374 minutes across 554 segments.
This is roughly the same amount aired in 2021 (1,316 minutes across
604 segments) and more than triple the amount of climate coverage in
2020, when these networks aired just 380 minutes across 221 segments.
*-- ABC and NBC exceeded their peak coverage records set in 2021.
*While CBS aired the most coverage across its morning, nightly, and
Sunday programming with over 8.5 hours of coverage in 2022, it fell
short of its peak in 2021 (just under 9.5 hours of coverage). NBC
aired just over 7.5 hours, while ABC aired over 6 hours of climate
coverage — both network records.
*-- Nightly news had its highest volume of climate coverage since
Media Matters began tracking this information in 2011. *Nightly news
shows on ABC, CBS, and NBC aired nearly 7 hours of climate coverage
(404 minutes) across 195 segments in 2022, which is approximately 1
more hour of coverage than in 2021.
- PBS NewsHour’s volume of climate segments decreased slightly
to 147 segments from its peak of 151 climate segments in 2021.
The program still is a media leader in the depth and quality of
coverage and *its 147 segments in 2022 are approximately twice
the amount aired by any of its corporate network counterparts*.
PBS NewsHour, however, is not included in the full data set as
it is publicly funded and the format of the program is different
than that of its corporate network counterparts.
*-- Morning news shows maintained their volume of coverage from the
previous year.* ABC, CBS, and NBC aired nearly 14 hours of climate
coverage (821 minutes) across 363 segments on morning shows in 2021,
which increased to just over 14.5 hours (871 minutes) across 322
segments in 2022.
-- With 36 climate segments in 2022, *Sunday political shows* on
ABC, CBS, Fox Broadcasting Co., and NBC *saw their combined climate
coverage drop by nearly half* from its zenith of 60 climate segments
in 2021. However, they still aired more than twice the amount of
segments they did in 2020 (14).
*-- Global extreme weather was the biggest driver of climate
coverage. Discussion of extreme weather events appeared in 41% of
coverage*, or 225 out of the 554 climate segments.
- The months from July through September, which represent peak
extreme weather season, accounted for 48% of climate-related
segments across morning, nightly, and Sunday programming.
- July had the most coverage of any month with 134 segments, or
nearly a quarter of all segments.
- Climate change’s impact on infrastructure (including power
grids) and on resources (specifically water) represented an
emerging trend in coverage in 2022. Impacts related to our power
system were mentioned 25 times, while impacts on water were
mentioned 39 times.
*-- Other major climate stories, including the war in Ukraine (which
rolled back global climate efforts), the passage of the Inflation
Reduction Act, and COP27 did not garner adequate coverage.* Climate
was mentioned in relation to the war in Ukraine in only 20 segments;
the vast majority of coverage of the landmark Inflation Reduction
Act failed to detail the climate implications of the historic $369
billion allocated for climate action within the law, and overall the
coverage accounted for 6% of network climate coverage; and coverage
of the United Nations’ annual global climate negotiations decreased
from 11% in 2021 to 2% of climate coverage in 2022.
*-- For at least the sixth year in a row, non-Hispanic white men
dominated guests featured in climate segments. *A whopping 57% of
guest appearances on morning news, evening news, and Sunday morning
shows — 374 out of 657 guest appearances — were made by non-Hispanic
white men. Only 9% of guest appearances were made by women of color.
*-- In 2022, appearances by those most impacted by climate change
rose to 201 from 107 guests in 2021* across morning news, evening
news, and Sunday morning shows, which suggests that broadcast TV
news is beginning to cover the climate crisis as a current rather
than a future event.
*-- Despite the high volume of coverage, climate accountability and
justice discussions were mostly lacking from TV news coverage. *The
term “fossil fuels” to describe what is driving planetary warming
appeared in only 8% of climate segments.
--The humanitarian crisis in West Africa, resulting from a
climate-induced famine, and inclusion of “loss and damage” at the
COP27 negotiations prompted a limited discussion of climate justice
across TV news programs.*“Climate justice,” which refers in part to
the fact that those most impacted by the climate crisis have
historically contributed the least to it, was mentioned in just 18
of the 554 total segments.*
*The volume of corporate broadcast TV climate coverage increased
slightly from 2021 to 2022, breaking a trend of falling coverage every
other year*
https://www.mediamatters.org/abc/how-broadcast-tv-networks-covered-climate-change-2022
/[ Opinion -- A key question for our morality ]/
*Fossil fuels kill more people than Covid. Why are we so blind to the
harms of oil and gas?*
Rebecca Solnit
Tue 28 Feb 2023
Were we able to perceive afresh the sheer scale of fossil fuel impact we
might be horrified, but because this is an old problem too many don’t
see it as a problem
f fossil fuel use and impact had suddenly appeared overnight, their
catastrophic poisonousness and destructiveness would be obvious. But
they have so incrementally become part of everyday life nearly
everywhere on Earth that those impacts are largely accepted or ignored
(that they’ve also corroded our politics helps this lack of alarm). This
has real consequences for the climate crisis. Were we able to perceive
afresh the sheer scale of fossil fuel impact we might be horrified. But
because this is an old problem too many don’t see it as a problem.
Human beings are good at regarding new and unfamiliar phenomena as
dangerous or unacceptable. But long-term phenomena become acceptable
merely because of our capacity to adjust. Violence against women (the
leading form of violence worldwide) and slower forms of environmental
destruction have been going on so long that they’re easy to overlook and
hard to get people to regard as a crisis. We saw this with Covid-19,
where in the first months most people were fearful and eager to do what
it took to avoid contracting or spreading the disease, and then grew
increasingly casual about the risks and apparently oblivious to the
impacts (the WHO charts almost 7 million deaths in little over three years).
To normalize is to turn something into the status quo, into something no
longer seen as a problem, and this in turn undermines the impetus to
pursue a solution. The very term crisis often implies a turning point or
a decisive moment; these are problems with no turning point in sight, a
long succession of indecisive moments as the damage mounts. Often what
activists need to do is turn the status quo back into a crisis, as US
Civil Rights Movement organizers so ably did in the 1960s by making
racial inequality, exclusion and violence more dramatically visible and
more unacceptable, as well as insisting that the world could be
different, that change was possible.
The fossil fuel industry through airborne particulate matter alone
annually kills far more people every year than Covid-19 has in three
years. Recent studies conclude that nearly 9 million people a year die
from inhaling these particulates produced by burning fossil fuel. It’s
only one of the many ways fossil fuel is deadly, from black lung among
coal miners and cancer and respiratory problems among those near
refineries to fatalities from climate-driven catastrophes such as
wildfire, extreme heat and floods.
The way we befouled our water, air and land, allowed manufacturers to
introduce dangerous materials – lead, PCBs, PFAs (sometimes called
“forever chemicals”), dioxin, high-level radioactive waste,
microplastics, pesticides and herbicides – may seem to later generations
shocking, stupid and amoral. Often the deployment of these substances
offered short-term and specific advantages while leaving long-term and
widespread damage; often the few benefited and the many paid. But all
this was normalized.
One consequence of these habits of mind is the hostile reaction to the
impact of renewables. Renewables require mining; the total amount of
mining they require is far less than the fossil-fuel mining that goes on
all around us and has for a long time. As a scientific paper put it in
2021: “The transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy systems
involves enormous decreases in materials, mining, and political risk.
Since renewable systems need no fuel, they depend on trade only for the
acquisition of materials and components during construction. Once the
system is operating, no trade is required to sustain it. Therefore
renewable energy production is not exposed to the political risks that
plague fossil fuel production.” That is, you don’t have to cozy up to
Russia or Saudi Arabia to keep going.
The climate movement has spent decades trying to stop one kind of
extraction; I wish I could say that we could end the age of extraction
altogether, but the billions of people on Earth cannot all revert to a
pre-industrial state. With renewables the materials need to be extracted
once and then are used for many years and are thereafter, in many cases,
recyclable; with fossil fuel we burn it up as we go, so constant new
interjections of coal, oil or gas are needed. They literally go up in smoke.
Battery technology is rapidly advancing, and much research on making
batteries from more readily available materials than lithium is under
way. Just last week came the announcement that “Volkswagen’s joint
venture with JAC in China has produced the first electric car powered by
the nascent sodium-ion battery technology.” So while it is urgent to
pursue existing means for electrifying everything, it also seems clear
that we are early in a technological revolution likely to provide new
and better ways of doing what needs to be done. Or as Greta Thunberg
once put it: “Avoiding climate breakdown will require cathedral
thinking. We must lay the foundation while we may not know exactly how
to build the ceiling.”
Obviously it matters where materials are extracted. Endangered species,
significant habitat, local communities and indigenous sovereignty should
be respected. They are not respected by fossil fuel extraction – just
think of the gigantic festering expanse of Alberta’s tar sands, which
have hugely impacted wildlife and encroached on traditional lands of
several First Nations groups. As Inside Climate News put it: “Oil and
gas companies like ExxonMobil and the Canadian giant Suncor have
transformed Alberta’s tar sands – also called oil sands – into one of
the world’s largest industrial developments. They have built sprawling
waste ponds that leach heavy metals into groundwater, and processing
plants that spew nitrogen and sulfur oxides into the air, sending a sour
stench for miles.” To consider another example, a report in Bloomberg
News stated last fall, “A roughly Taiwan-sized area of Alaska’s Arctic
will be auctioned for oil and gas development …”
Astroturf organizations backed by conservatives and fossil-fuel
interests have pushed false claims about health threats and organized
locals against both wind turbines and solar installations. But the space
they take up can be far less than that occupied by fossil fuel, and many
turbines and solar panels coexist with agriculture. (Studies shows that
sheep and solar panels can be mutually beneficial; elsewhere farmers
adding turbines to their farms reap good income.) Bloomberg News
recently published a piece mismeasuring the scale of renewables versus
fossils: “A 200-megawatt wind farm, for instance, might require
spreading turbines over 13 sq miles (36 sq km). A natural-gas power
plant with that same generating capacity could fit onto a single city
block.” But the wind farm is actually generating the energy it uses, and
quite possibly coexisting with other land uses, while the gas plant
depends on ceaseless mining for methane elsewhere that may permanently
damage and poison the land. The way we have long operated was always
destructive, and it’s now a crisis larger than any in human history.
Change needs to come, swiftly, and though practical change is crucial,
so are changes in imagination, perception and values. The two go
together, and they always have.
Rebecca Solnit is a Guardian US columnist. Her most recent books are
Recollections of My Nonexistence and Orwell’s Roses
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/feb/28/fossil-fuels-kill-more-people-than-covid-why-are-we-so-blind-to-the-harms-of-oil-and-gas
/[ A different Rebecca handles this disinformation salvo - skillfully
counter-attacked - YouTube video ]/
*Republicans: Save the Whales, Kill the Wind Farms*
Rebecca Watson
Mar 1, 2023
SUBSCRIBE at https://www.youtube.com/user/rkwatson
+++
Links + transcript available at https://www.patreon.com/posts/79245273
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O0dwD6ii1lc
/[The news archive - looking back at the abuse of scientists ]/
/*March 2, 2005 */
March 2, 2005: Rick Piltz resigns from the US Climate Change Science
Program after relentless, extensive efforts by Bush White House
officials to censor scientific reports on climate change.
http://www.heatisonline.org/contentserver/objecthandlers/index.cfm?id=5316&method=full
- - - -
*
March 2, 2012: The Virginia Supreme Court brings an end to Virginia
Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli's legal harassment of climate scientist
Michael Mann.
http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2012-03-02/local/35448477_1_cuccinelli-global-warming-skeptics-climate-scientist
<http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2012-03-02/local/35448477_1_cuccinelli-global-warming-skeptics-climate-scientist>
*
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