[✔️] May 18, 2023- Global Warming News Digest |

[Richard Pauli]

/*May*//*18, 2023*/

/[  Cough, cough....hey, I live here.... ahem, cough. ] /
*Wildfire smoke from Canada impacting Seattle skies*
May 17, 2023
Wildfires have been burning in northern Alberta for over a week. Smoke 
from those wildfires has now drifted south and arrived in western 
Washington, creating hazy skies...
- -
The smoke is above 10,000 feet and not in the lower levels, so there are 
no worries about declining air quality...
Yet, the smoke is obscuring the mid-May sunshine to some degree and will 
help moderate high temperatures a few degrees from what they could have 
been. Highs in the Puget Sound area Wednesday will be around 80 degrees.

The hazy sunshine will likely continue for the next few days before a 
subtle weather pattern changes aloft and moves the smoke inland.

This warm dry weather pattern is expected to continue through the rest 
of this week.

The threat of isolated thunderstorms is expected to remain over the 
Cascades again late Wednesday.

Over the coming weekend, stronger low-level airflow from the Pacific 
will develop, with daytime temperatures for interior regions cooling 
closer to mid-May average temperatures. Readings are expected to drop 
into the mid and upper 60s, along with more marine cloudiness.

The current early season warm spell has been record-breaking. Sea-Tac 
Airport measured four consecutive days with record high temperatures. 
Friday, May 12, was 82 degrees, Saturday 86 degrees, Sunday 89 degrees, 
and Monday 88 degrees.
Monday also had the warmest low temperature for so early in the year at 
63 degrees, breaking the previous daily record by 8 degrees.

At this point, no significant rainfall is in sight until early next 
week, and if longer-range forecast charts are on track, perhaps all the 
way through Memorial Day Weekend.
https://mynorthwest.com/3889979/wildfire-smoke-from-canada-impacting-seattle-skies/


/
/

/[ So says the NYTimes ]/
*Heat Will Likely Soar to Record Levels in Next 5 Years, New Analysis Says*
Brad Plumer
By Brad Plumer
May 17, 2023
Global temperatures are likely to soar to record highs over the next 
five years, driven by human-caused warming and a climate pattern known 
as El Niño, forecasters at the World Meteorological Organization said on 
Wednesday.

The record for Earth’s hottest year was set in 2016. There is a 98 
percent chance that at least one of the next five years will exceed 
that, the forecasters said, while the average from 2023 to ’27 will 
almost certainly be the warmest for a five-year period ever recorded.

“This will have far-reaching repercussions for health, food security, 
water management and the environment,” said Petteri Taalas, the 
secretary general of the meteorological organization. “We need to be 
prepared.”

*Why It Matters: Every fraction of a degree brings new risks.*
Even small increases in warming can exacerbate the dangers from heat 
waves, wildfires, drought and other calamities, scientists say. Elevated 
global temperatures in 2021 helped fuel a heat wave in the Pacific 
Northwest that shattered local records and killed hundreds of people.

El Niño conditions can cause further turmoil by shifting global 
precipitation patterns. The meteorological organization said it expected 
increased summer rainfall over the next five years in places like 
Northern Europe and the Sahel in sub-Saharan Africa and reduced rainfall 
in the Amazon and parts of Australia.

The organization reported that there is also a two thirds chance that 
one of the next five years could be 1.5 degrees Celsius, or 2.7 degrees 
Fahrenheit, hotter than the 19th-century average.

That does not mean that the world will have officially breached the 
aspirational goal in the Paris climate agreement of holding global 
warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius. When scientists talk about that 
temperature goal, they generally mean a longer-term average over, say, 
two decades in order to root out the influence of natural variability.

Many world leaders have insisted on the 1.5-degree limit to keep the 
risks of climate change to tolerable levels. But nations have delayed so 
long in making the monumental changes necessary to achieve this goal, 
such as drastically cutting fossil-fuel emissions, that scientists now 
think the world will probably exceed that threshold around the early 2030s.

Background: La Niña, a cooling influence, is on the way out.
Global average temperatures have already increased roughly 1.1 degrees 
Celsius since the 19th century, largely because humans keep burning 
fossil fuels and pumping heat-trapping gases like carbon dioxide into 
the atmosphere.

But while that overall upward trend is clear, global temperatures can 
bounce up and down a bit from year to year because of natural 
variability. For instance, a cyclical phenomenon in the Pacific Ocean, 
the El Niño-Southern Oscillation, causes year-to-year fluctuations by 
shifting heat in and out of deeper ocean layers. Global surface 
temperatures tend to be somewhat cooler during La Niña years and 
somewhat hotter during El Niño years.

The last record hot year, 2016, was an El Niño year. By contrast, La 
Niña conditions have dominated for much of the past three years: while 
they’ve been unusually warm, they were still slightly below 2016 levels. 
Now, scientists are expecting El Niño conditions to return later this 
summer. When combined with steadily rising levels of greenhouse gases in 
the atmosphere, that will most likely cause temperatures to accelerate 
to new highs.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/17/climate/record-heat-forecast.html

- -

/[ Clips from the press release of the World Meteorological Organization ]/
*Global temperatures set to reach new records in next five years*
Published 17 May 2023
Press Release Number: 17052023
Geneva, 17 May 2023 (WMO) – Global temperatures are likely to surge to 
record levels in the next five years, fuelled by heat-trapping 
greenhouse gases and a naturally occurring El Niño event, according to a 
new update issued by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO)...
- -
“A warming El Niño is expected to develop in the coming months and this 
will combine with human-induced climate change to push global 
temperatures into uncharted territory,” he said. “This will have 
far-reaching repercussions for health, food security, water management 
and the environment. We need to be prepared,” said Prof. Taalas.
- -
*Key points*

    --- The average global temperature in 2022 was about 1.15°C above
    the 1850-1900 average. The cooling influence of La Niña conditions
    over much of the past three years temporarily reined in the
    longer-term warming trend. But La Niña ended in March 2023 and an El
    Niño is forecast to develop in the coming months. Typically, El Niño
    increases global temperatures in the year after it develops – in
    this case this would be 2024.

    --- The annual mean global near-surface temperature for each year
    between 2023 and 2027 is predicted to be between 1.1°C and 1.8°C
    higher than the 1850-1900 average. This is used as a baseline
    because it was before the emission of greenhouse gases from human
    and industrial activities.

    --- There is a 98% chance of at least one in the next five years
    beating the temperature record set in 2016, when there was an
    exceptionally strong El Niño.

    --- The chance of the five-year mean for 2023-2027 being higher than
    the last five years is also 98%.

    --- Arctic warming is disproportionately high. Compared to the
    1991-2020 average, the temperature anomaly is predicted to be more
    than three times as large as the global mean anomaly when averaged
    over the next five northern hemisphere extended winters.

    --- Predicted precipitation patterns for the May to September
    2023-2027 average, compared to the 1991-2020 average, suggest
    increased rainfall in the Sahel, northern Europe, Alaska and
    northern Siberia, and reduced rainfall for this season over the
    Amazon and parts of Australia...
    - -

The World Meteorological Organization is the United Nations System’s 
authoritative voice on Weather, Climate and Water
https://public.wmo.int/en/media/press-release/global-temperatures-set-reach-new-records-next-five-years

- -

/[ Planning to travel this summer? ]/
*Southern Europe braces for climate change-fuelled summer of drought*
By Kate Abnett
Summary

    - 22% of Europe under drought warning
    - Spain worst-hit, already in severe drought
    - Some farmers expect worst harvest for decades
      - Climate change fuelling drought conditions

BRUSSELS, May 17 (Reuters) - Southern Europe is bracing for a summer of 
ferocious drought, with some regions already suffering water shortages 
and farmers expecting their worst yields in decades.

As climate change makes the region hotter and drier, years of 
consecutive drought have depleted groundwater reserves. Soils have 
become bone dry in Spain and southern France. Low river and reservoir 
levels are threatening this summer's hydropower production.
With temperatures climbing into summertime, scientists warn Europe is on 
track for another brutal summer, after suffering its hottest on record 
last year – which fuelled a drought European Union researchers said was 
the worst in at least 500 years.

So far this year, the situation is most severe in Spain.

"The situation of drought is going to worsen this summer," said Jorge 
Olcina, professor of geographic analysis at the University of Alicante, 
Spain.
There's little chance at this point of rainfall resolving the underlying 
drought, either. "At this time of the year, the only thing we can have 
are punctual and local storms, which are not going to solve the rainfall 
deficit," Olcina said.

Seeking emergency EU assistance, Spain’s Agriculture Minister Luis 
Planas warned that "the situation resulting from this drought is of such 
magnitude that its consequences cannot be tackled with national funds 
alone," according to an April 24 letter sent to the European Commission 
(EC) and seen by Reuters.

*CLIMATE CHANGE TREND*
Southern Europe is not alone in suffering severe water shortages this 
year. The Horn of Africa is enduring its worst drought in decades, while 
a historic drought in Argentina has hammered soy and corn crops.

More frequent and severe drought in the Mediterranean region - where the 
average temperature is now 1.5C higher than 150 years ago – is in line 
with how scientists have forecast climate change will impact the region.
"In terms of the climate change signal, it very much fits with what 
we're expecting," said Hayley Fowler, Professor of Climate Change 
Impacts at Newcastle University.

Despite these long-held forecasts, preparation is lagging. Many farming 
regions have yet to adopt water-saving methods like precision irrigation 
or switch to more drought-hardy crops, such as sunflowers.

"Governments are late. Companies are late," said Robert Vautard, a 
climate scientist and director of France's Pierre-Simon Laplace 
Institute. "Some companies are not even thinking of changing the model 
of their consumption, they are just trying to find some miraculous 
technologies that would bring water."

France is emerging from its driest winter since 1959, with drought 
"crisis" alerts already activated in four departmental prefects, 
restricting non-priority water withdrawals - including for agriculture, 
according to government website Propluvia.

Portugal, too, is experiencing an early arrival of drought. Some 90% of 
the mainland is suffering from drought, with severe drought affecting 
one-fifth of the country - nearly five times the area reported a year 
earlier.

In Spain, which saw less than half its average rainfall through April 
this year, thousands of people are relying on truck deliveries for 
drinking water, while regions including Catalonia have imposed water 
restrictions.

Some farmers have already reported crop losses as high as 80%, with 
cereals and oilseeds among those affected, farming groups have said.

"This is the worst loss of harvest for decades,” Pekka Pesonen, who 
heads the European farming group Copa-Cogeca, said of Spain. "It's worse 
than last year's situation."

Spain is responsible for half of the EU's production of olives and one 
third of its fruit, according to the Commission.

With its reservoirs at on average 50% of capacity, the country last week 
earmarked more than 2 billion euros ($2.20 billion) in emergency 
response funding. It is still awaiting a reply from the Commission on 
its request for a 450-million-euro crisis fund to be mobilized from the 
bloc's farming subsidy budget.

The Commission said it was monitoring the situation closely.

"Severe drought in Southern Europe is particularly worrying, not only 
for the farmers there but also because this can push up already very 
high consumer prices if the EU production is significantly lower," 
Commission spokesperson Miriam Garcia Ferrer said.

Similar struggles could emerge in Italy, where up to 80% of the 
country’s water supply goes toward agriculture. With this year’s thin 
mountain snow cover and low soil moisture, Italian farmers are planning 
to cut back – sowing summer crops across an area 6% smaller than last 
year’s planting area, according to national data on sowing intentions.

After two years of water scarcity, parts of northern Italy entered May 
with a 70% deficit in snow water reserves and a 40% deficit of soil 
moisture, said Luca Brocca, a Director of Research at Italy's National 
Research Council.

With the ground so parched, rain when it does arrive fails to soak in, 
with devastating consequences. Authorities in Italy on Wednesday said at 
least three people had been killed in floods in Italy's Emilia Romagna 
region, where the rains were expected to continue for several hours.

($1 = 0.9084 euros)
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/southern-europe-braces-climate-change-fuelled-summer-drought-2023-05-17/



/[ Perhaps Congress should repeal the Laws of Thermodynamics ---   ]/
*Republican senators claim NASA being distracted by climate change and 
diversity initiatives*
Jeff Foust
May 17, 2023
WASHINGTON — Republican senators used a hearing on NASA’s fiscal year 
2024 budget proposal to criticize the agency’s role in topics like 
climate change and social issues they argued were a distraction to its 
efforts to return humans to the moon.

During the 90-minute hearing by the Senate Commerce Committee May 16, 
senators raised few issues with the substance of the agency’s $27.2 
billion budget proposal for fiscal year 2024. Instead, top Republicans 
on the committee targeted items on the periphery, from plans to replace 
the agency’s fleet of motor vehicles with electric vehicles to 
investments in diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.

“I do worry sometimes that we may be losing focus on what makes America 
the preeminent spacefaring nation,” claimed Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), 
ranking member of the committee. He cited development of an equity 
action plan by NASA and regulations that NASA, along with the Defense 
Department and General Services Administration, to have contractors 
identify their greenhouse gas emissions.

“Rather than helping us win the space race, the proposed rule would 
ensure that NASA could do less exploration and less science for more 
taxpayer dollars,” he said. He added that he and fellow Republican 
senators were dissatisfied with the response from NASA Administrator 
Bill Nelson to a letter they had about the proposed rule.

Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.), ranking member of the committee’s space 
subcommittee, made similar arguments. “I strongly disagree with this 
administration’s obsession with misguided, woke policies related to 
climate change and diversity, equity and inclusion,” he said, arguing 
they were a diversion from a human return to the moon. “We must be 
laser-like focused on our approach.”

The two senators claimed that such policies risked politicizing NASA, 
which has traditionally enjoyed bipartisan support. Nelson, testifying 
before the committee, reiterated his longstanding desire to keep NASA a 
“nonpartisan” agency.

He added, though, that he did not necessarily agree with their claims. 
“The reality, Sen. Cruz — and you know I love you — is the fact that we 
have political differences,” he said. “But I can guarantee you that NASA 
is being run in a nonpartisan way.”

Nelson declined to engage on some of the other criticisms about climate 
change and DEI policies beyond noting that the rulemaking on the 
greenhouse gas regulations is still in progress. Echoing comments from 
past hearings, he agreed with them that NASA is racing China to the 
moon, and warned that if China got to the lunar south pole before NASA, 
it might claim water ice resources there.

Other Republican senators at the hearing did not echo those criticisms, 
focusing their questions on topics such as aeronautics, space nuclear 
propulsion and, in the case of former committee chairman Sen. Roger 
Wicker (R-Miss.), investments in NASA’s Stennis Space Center in his state.

Multiyear NASA authorization
The chair of the committee, Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), reiterated at 
the hearing her desire for a new NASA authorization. She announced in 
February that she wanted to enact a multiyear authorization just a year 
after a NASA authorization was included in the CHIPS and Science Act.

“It is my goal to complete another NASA bill this Congress, this time 
with a multiyear authorization that will help ensure that the nation’s 
leading space and aeronautic research agency has stable, predictable 
funding that it needs to succeed,” she said. That would be the first 
multiyear authorization for NASA since 2010.

Nelson, who as a senator spearheaded the passage of that 2010 
authorization act, endorsed a multiyear authorization, saying it would 
provide stability for both the agency and industry. “I would welcome a 
multiyear approach,” he said. “I think a five-year authorization bill 
would be very, very well received in the aerospace community.”
https://spacenews.com/republican-senators-claim-nasa-being-distracted-by-climate-change-and-diversity-initiatives/



/[ Natural Gas is not natural ---  fascinating engineering video ]/
*What Really Happened During the Gas Explosions in the Merrimack Valley?*
Practical Engineering
  May 16, 2023  #39 on Trending
A summary of one of the worst natural gas disasters in US History.

On September 13, 2018, a pipeline crew in the Merrimack Valley in 
Massachusetts was hard at work replacing an aging cast iron natural gas 
line with a new polyethylene pipe. By the end of the day, over a hundred 
structures would be damaged by fire and explosions, several homes would 
be completely destroyed, 22 people (including three firefighters) would 
be injured, and one person would be dead.

Watch this video ad-free on Nebula: https://nebula.tv/videos/practical-en...

Signed copies of my book (plus other cool stuff) are available here: 
https://store.practical.engineering/

Practical Engineering is a YouTube channel about infrastructure and the 
human-made world around us. It is hosted, written, and produced by Grady 
Hillhouse. We have new videos posted regularly, so please subscribe for 
updates. If you enjoyed the video, hit that ‘like’ button, give us a 
comment, or watch another of our videos!

CONNECT WITH ME
____________________________________
Website: http://practical.engineering
Twitter: https://twitter.com/HillhouseGrady
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPL8dh6b1M0



/[  A difficult task, with little success. See Climate Comedy produced  
- video ]/
*2023 ITG climate comedy = Dr Gameshow special episode!*
Climate Comedy
May 17, 2023
Jo Firestone and Manolo Moreno partnered with CU Boulder Inside the 
Greenhouse climate comedy experiment in 2023 with this Dr. Gameshow episode!

On Dr. Gameshow, Jo and Manolo play original listener-created games with 
callers from all over the world! Listen as Jo, Manolo and the players 
struggle through these outrageous family-friendly games that are played 
regardless of quality!

more information about other shows is here 
https://maximumfun.org/podcasts/dr-ga...
& more about Manolo Moreno is here https://www.manolosomething.com/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Om70VLNag3c

- -

/[ Sort of related -- -a polite video rant  ]/
*luxury doomsday bunkers: an elitist disaster fantasy | Internet Analysis*
tiffanyferg
May 17, 2023
Internet Analysis
luxury doomsday bunkers??
PATREON: https://www.patreon.com/tiffanyferg …
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1tqDH6MmEEg



/[The news archive - looking back -- //I was a TV news photographer for 
KOMO-TV in Seattle ]/
/*May 18, 1980  --  Mt St Helens eruption*/

That Sunday was a very cold day - damp weather - gloves, raincoats, 
scarf, boots. Could not tell if it was ash or snow falling.  Totally 
different for the heat wave today -- shorts, sunscreen, drink lots of 
water for the 80 degrees heat.  Smoke from distant wildfires gives a 
tinge of yellow.

Read all about it with the Wikipedia article.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1980_eruption_of_Mount_St._Helens

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