[✔️] Feb 21 2024 Global Warming News | Methane, Two methane studies, How hot the heatwaves. 2010 when Republican abandoned

Wed Feb 21 08:51:02 EST 2024

/*February*//*21, 2024*/

/[ Methane has always been a wildcard - it's hard to measure, hard to 
control, yet it appears everywhere, then it does horrific damage to the 
atmosphere ]*
*/
*TPDS: Methane: possible tipping points or surprises*
World Climate Research Programme
Nov 12, 2023  Tipping Elements Discussion Series
This webinar is part of the AIMES, Earth Commission, Future Earth, WCRP 
Safe Landing Climates Lighthouse Activity, and partners discussion 
series on tipping elements, irreversibility, and abrupt changes in the 
Earth. We discussed why is methane rising, how are sources and sinks 
changing, what is the risk from hydrates?

Speakers:
  Euan Nisbet (Royal Holloway, University of London): Global Methane - 
is methane telling us that climate warming feedbacks have already driven 
us over a termination-scale tipping point?

Sara Knox (McGill University): Network science: unlocking novel insights 
on regional and global methane cycling.

The presentations were followed by a Q&A/ discussion time.

This webinar was moderated by Gabrielle Dreyfus (Institute for 
Governance & Sustainable Development).

Read more: 
https://methane-possible-tipping-points-or-surprises.confetti.events/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJlyBVT-OJg

- -

[ Methane has always been a wild-card - a persistent rabbit hole ]
*Methane: possible tipping points or surprises*
Why is methane rising, how are sources and sinks changing, what is the 
risk from hydrates?
7 NOVEMBER 2023
Presentations
*Global Methane - is methane telling us that climate warming feedbacks 
have already driven us over a termination-scale tipping point? *Euan 
Nisbet (Royal Holloway, University of London) 
https://earthcommission.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Euan_Nisbet_Presentation.pdf
*Network science: unlocking novel insights on regional and global 
methane cycling* Sara Knox (McGill University) 
https://earthcommission.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Sarah_Knox_Presentation.pdf
https://methane-possible-tipping-points-or-surprises.confetti.events/

/[ Psychological health ]/
Bloomberg news
*Climate Change Is Fueling a New Type of Anxiety, Therapists Say*
Mental health experts are reporting a rising number of patients 
experiencing high levels of stress over global warming and its impacts. 
How are they treating it?

By Olivia Rudgard and Jack Wittels
February 16, 2024
When psychotherapist Caroline Hickman was asked to help a child overcome 
a fear of dogs, she introduced them to her Labradoodle, Murphy.

“You get the child to feel confident in relation to the dog and teach 
the child skills to manage a dog,” she says. “You build the skills, 
build the competence, build the confidence, and then they’re less scared 
of dogs generally.”

Climate anxiety is a different beast, Hickman says. “We don’t 100% know 
how to deal with it. And it would be a huge mistake to try and treat it 
like other anxieties that we are very familiar with that have been 
around for decades. This one is much, much worse.”

In the most critical cases, climate anxiety disrupts the ability to 
function day to day. Children and young people in this category feel 
alienation from friends and family, distress when thinking about the 
future and intrusive thoughts about who will survive, according to 
Hickman’s research. Patients obsessively check for extreme weather, read 
climate change studies and pursue radical activism. Some, devastatingly, 
consider suicide as the only solution. And Hickman isn’t the only expert 
seeing this. In her book A Field Guide to Climate Anxiety, Sarah Ray 
describes a student who had such severe “self-loathing eco-guilt” that 
she stopped consuming much at all, including food.
Most people’s concern about global warming isn’t that pronounced. It can 
be difficult to pin down exactly what climate anxiety is, and therefore 
what to do about it. Especially for adults, there’s still a stigma in 
admitting that it’s severely affecting your life. But therapists report 
they are grappling with a rise in demand from clients who say climate 
change is having a profound effect on their mental health, and studies 
suggest the angst is increasingly widespread. Existing professional 
methods for dealing with anxiety aren’t always suitable in these 
situations. For the counseling community, the situation calls for a new 
playbook.

In 2021, a study of 10,000 children and young people in 10 countries, 
co-authored by Hickman and published in The Lancet Planetary Health, 
found that 59% were very or extremely worried about climate change and 
more than 45% said it had a negative effect on their daily life. A 
survey of mental health professionals in the UK, published last year in 
The Journal of Climate Change and Health, found that they perceived 
“significantly more” patients describing climate change as a factor in 
their mental health or emotional distress, an increase the participants 
expected to continue. Frustratingly, climate anxiety can also overlap 
existing mental health problems, making it difficult to analyze in 
isolation.

Therapists told Bloomberg Green that they typically see an uptick in 
patients struggling with climate anxiety when climate change is in the 
news; often around the time of a UN climate conference, a major 
scientific report or an episode of severe weather. Scientists working on 
climate change were among the first groups they saw experiencing this 
type of anxiety, therapists said, and those groups are still struggling. 
Among the close to 300 people who responded to a Bloomberg Green 
readers’ survey about climate anxiety, just under one in five said they 
discuss the issue with a mental health professional.

One respondent, Natalie Warren, a 42-year-old UK expat living in Sydney, 
Australia, told us that while she isn’t in therapy, she had felt a 
strong urge to act. Climate anxiety felt different to a previous mental 
health challenge: it is external, rather than internal, she says.
“There’s nothing wrong with someone who’s suffering from climate 
anxiety,” she says. "It’s not them that needs fixing.”

*How Therapists Diagnose and Treat Climate Anxiety*
So what are therapists actually doing in their treatment rooms? The 
first point is they’re not making any diagnoses, as anxiety about 
climate change isn’t a disorder. “We consider it much more as an 
understandable response to a real and rational danger,” says Patrick 
Kennedy-Williams, a clinical psychologist based in Oxford, UK. Working 
with someone who has social anxiety or a phobia is partly about 
“recalibrating their sense of risk and threats,” he says — realigning 
the fear with the actual threat level. That isn’t usually the case with 
climate change, he says, because “the threat is real.”

*Also, there’s no “classic case” of climate or eco-anxiety.* Some 
patients may need to discuss direct experience with climate impacts, 
such as a flood or wildfire destroying a home, while others might, for 
example, want to talk about their guilt at watching others suffering, or 
struggles with friends or family who are dismissive or hostile. People 
might not even say they’re feeling “anxiety,” he says, instead using 
words like trauma, grief and depression. “It doesn’t fit neatly into our 
way of thinking about mental health,” Kennedy-Williams says, “probably 
because the climate crisis and our relationship with the climate crisis 
is a lot more multifaceted than that.”

Climate anxiety often ends up being linked to many other dilemmas in the 
normal course of a person’s life, including big choices like whether or 
not to have children, where to live or what to do for work. Many of 
these questions are already highly stressful and emotional. The problem 
of whether or not to have children, in particular, is one around which 
Kennedy-Williams has seen “huge amounts of distress” in the therapy 
room, he says.
Kennedy-Williams compares his experience with patients struggling with 
climate anxiety to working with people struggling with activity-limiting 
illnesses or medical difficulties, where clear solutions aren’t often 
available.*“You can't just say, ‘Actually I'm sure there's nothing to 
worry about. I’m sure everything will be fine,’”* he says. Instead, he 
tries to help patients “thrive and find joy in difficult circumstances.”

Some anxieties are linked to specific triggers, which can be directly 
addressed and resolved. But climate change is more wide-ranging. Global 
warming is also not resolvable by any one person, so it’s impossible to 
gain a sense of confidence and control over the problem. “You can’t 
personally resolve it,” says Hickman. “You can go off and do your 
recycling, and become an activist, or do X, Y, Z, but it’s a global 
problem. It's not personal.” Many patients also feel that those in power 
are asleep at the wheel, adding to a sense that no one is in control, 
she says.
Perhaps one of the most surprising aspects of anxiety over climate 
change: It can also be linked to climate denial. Experts said the two 
can be understood as different manifestations of the same feeling. “The 
conspiracy theorists are reassuring,” says Hickman. “If you can’t 
tolerate anxiety, you will then spin off into believing somebody who 
gives you false promises.”

Overcoming all of these feelings is key to action actually being taken 
to solve the climate crisis. Fear and disempowerment lead people to turn 
inward, focusing on self-preservation and survivalism, rather than the 
more collective means needed to actually address climate change as an 
issue, says Louise Edgington, a British educational psychologist 
specializing in climate psychology, who works primarily in schools.

“Wellbeing is not just about nice hugs and feeling good,” she says. 
“It’s a crucial part of actually making the changes we need to make.”
- -
So how to address it? Leslie Davenport, a Washington state-based 
therapist, co-developed a course for other professionals seeking ways to 
treat patients struggling with climate-related mental health issues. She 
highlights two broad types of coping strategies: internal and external.
She likens climate anxiety to holding a ball under water. Eventually, 
your arm will get tired, and it will pop up — it can’t be suppressed 
forever. Internal strategies can include learning to calm your nervous 
system down, taking conscious breaks and focusing on your mental 
narratives. External strategies include finding ways to take action in 
whatever way is most appropriate, whether that’s donating money or 
joining a local community group for clean air.

“I’d say as much as half of our climate anxiety has to do with the 
feeling of not being efficacious to do something about it,” says Ray, 
who is also a professor and chair of environmental studies at California 
State Polytechnic University, Humboldt. Doing something in a group 
rather than alone can be helpful. “The thing that reduces the climate 
anxiety is being part of a collective…where people care as much as you 
do. You’re not the only one.”

Channeling anxiety in this way can turn into serious action. Opposition 
to the Dakota Access Pipeline and groups like Pacific Climate Warriors 
were motivated — in part — by their anxiety to do something radical, Ray 
says. It can also motivate others to run for public office. Warren, the 
survey respondent from Sydney, who has two young children and works in 
finance, ran for and represented the Greens on her local council between 
2017 and 2021.

One of the many parents who responded to Bloomberg Green’s survey, 
Warren says that what drives her now is the inevitable conversation she 
will one day have with her boys. When they ask "How did you let it get 
so bad?” and “Why weren't people doing anything?" she wants to have 
something real to tell them: "I need to be able to tell them that I 
tried.”...

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2024-02-16/how-therapists-treat-anxiety-stress-over-climate-change?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=294867631&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-9MhpAhGnxeHIH6N_ageRrOQHGpZdzRmk5BUNpfcC2tI4x7XcZL4ecJ3WwT-NsbWGTwBMSbNISzlmdJbzL0dUqXr3AVMg&utm_content=294867631&utm_source=hs_email 

/[ Yes, important to know]/
*Heatwaves: how hot can it get?*
The Economist
  May 25, 2023
Heatwaves are becoming more frequent, more intense and more deadly. But 
what is a heatwave, why are they so dangerous and how are they affected 
by climate change?

    00:00 - What are heatwaves?
    01:40 - How do heatwaves form?
    05:28 - How heatwaves kill
    08:40 - How to prepare for heatwaves
    10:17 - What is the impact of climate change?

Sign up to The Economist’s daily newsletter: https://econ.st/3QAawvI

Can Kolkata’s street life survive India’s record-breaking heatwaves? 
https://econ.st/3BufiFh

How to predict record-shattering weather events: https://econ.st/3Og1juG

Cell block hot: how prisoners are facing rising temperatures: 
https://econ.st/3Ol0QY9

Heatwaves and floods around the world may be a taste of years to come: 
https://econ.st/3IhJzLz

Heatwaves kill more Americans than hurricanes, tornadoes and floods: 
https://econ.st/3MxdHoM

In art, as in life, boundaries blur when a heatwave strikes: 
https://econ.st/457QgcC

A changing climate is bad news for a continent that doesn’t like change: 
https://econ.st/3Myima3

July’s heatwave may have killed thousands of Britons: 
https://econ.st/44ZcJc5

A rising share of people are exposed to dangerously high temperatures: 
https://econ.st/3MvKBWy

Our hottest hour: sweat, toil, tears and more sweat: 
https://econ.st/3W7HmYy

The increase in simultaneous heatwaves: https://econ.st/3IfYpSI

Some don’t like it hot: melting roads, raging wildfires and an energy 
crunch: https://econ.st/3MukorE

Heat and humidity are putting millions of Indians in peril: 
https://econ.st/41BQsy4

How can India cope with heatwaves?: https://econ.st/3o0HlcC

Parts of Antarctica have been 40°C warmer than their March average: 
https://econ.st/42GSKNK

Debate over air conditioning in American prisons will heat up: 
https://econ.st/3W8w9Hi

Watch the first episode in our ‘Weather Essentials’ series: 
https://econ.st/40OkEW6

Watch the second episode in our ‘Weather Essentials’ series: 
https://econ.st/3ByYld3
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTNrtArLJJw

/[ political discussions ]/
*Is this the end of the current world order? | Fiona Hill, Michael 
Clarke, Peter Hitchens, and more!*
The Institute of Art and Ideas
Western sanctions: a sign of lasting unity? | Michael Clarke
Jun 29, 2023  #RussiaUkraineWar
Fiona Hill, Michael Clarke, Peter Hitchens and Malcolm Rifkind discuss 
Western moral authority, foreign policy, diplomatic sanctions and how 
the Russia-Ukraine war is ending the world order as we know it.

    00:00 Introduction
    00:37 Has the West lost its moral authority? | Fiona Hill
    04:22 How is the war in Ukraine reverberating on Chinese foreign
    policy | Malcolm Rifkind
    07:54 Western sanctions: a sign of lasting unity? | Michael Clarke
    12:10 Is there a future for Western intervention in global politics?
    | Peter Hitchens

Is Western hegemony over? Watch our latest debate on the future of the 
new global order at https://iai.tv/video/new-powers-and-fading-forces
- -
#GlobalWorldOrder #RussiaUkraineWar #WesternIntervention
- -
The Institute of Art and Ideas features videos and articles from cutting 
edge thinkers discussing the ideas that are shaping the world, from 
metaphysics to string theory, technology to democracy, aesthetics to 
genetics.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MkgrFe52jOg

/[The news archive - when did the GOP go astray? ]/
/*February 21, 2010*/

    February 21, 2010: Minnesota Governor/one-time cap-and-trade
    supporter/alleged moderate Republican Tim Pawlenty morphs into a
    climate-change denier on NBC's "Meet the Press."
    Tim Pawlenty appeared with Janet Napolitano, then the Democratic
    governor of Arizona, in a nationwide radio ad criticizing Congress
    for not addressing climate change. On NBC's Meet the Press last
    month, Pawlenty, considered a likely presidential hopeful in 2012,
    said, "Cap-and-trade ... would be a disaster."Mar 25, 2010 [ taken
    down, this event lead to a discovery of important transition moment
    described below ]

*How Republicans Learned To Reject Climate Change - NPR*
MARCH 25, 20107
By  Alan Greenblatt
As climate change emerged as a top issue on the national scene a few 
years ago, it had one unusual quality: The response to it showed 
surprising signs of bipartisan support.

Two or three years ago, Republicans such as Sen. John McCain and Govs. 
Arnold Schwarzenegger and Charlie Crist played nearly as prominent a 
role as Al Gore in advocating a robust regulatory response.

No more. Climate hasn't yet become as partisan an issue as, say, health 
care and taxes. But it's getting there.

*Growing Partisan Divide*
Some Republicans who advocated tough environmental measures are leaving 
the scene, such as Schwarzenegger, who signed a landmark California law 
capping carbon emissions in 2006 but is term-limited out of office as 
governor this year.
Others have switched their positions, advocating more of a market 
response and shying away from strict governmental controls. That's 
especially true of Republicans reaching for higher office — including 
the presidency.
Insisting on caps on energy usage has become something of a nonstarter 
for GOP candidates. The public in general is growing more skeptical 
about climate change, but a recent Gallup poll showed that more than 
twice as many Republicans as Democrats say the seriousness of global 
warming is "greatly exaggerated."

"You see growing sentiment that climate change has been exaggerated," 
says Karlyn Bowman, a polling expert at the American Enterprise Institute.

Still, she adds, she is struck by the growing partisan divide on the issue.

"The Republican-Democrat and conservative-liberal differences are quite 
large," Bowman says.

*Skepticism: Practically The Party Line?*
"Republicans tend to be the party of limited government," says James M. 
Taylor, a senior fellow at the Heartland Institute, a conservative think 
tank in Chicago. That makes them more skeptical of energy policies that 
he says will cost average households a good deal of money.

Opposition to cap-and-trade legislation nearly became official 
Republican Party dogma. It was one of 10 items on a list some members of 
the Republican National Committee wanted candidates to be required to 
take a stand on. They would only receive party backing if they agreed to 
at least eight.

The RNC rejected the idea of a purity test in January. But party 
candidates have needed no such official sanction to express their 
disapproval to cap-and-trade.

Sarah Palin has always expressed skepticism that climate change was 
man-made, but as governor of Alaska, she thought her state should 
prepare for its effects.

"The point is, it's real, we need to do something about it," she said in 
an interview during her vice presidential run in 2008.

Last December, she tweeted that climate science was "bogus."

Two years ago, Minnesota Republican Gov. Tim Pawlenty appeared with 
Janet Napolitano, then the Democratic governor of Arizona, in a 
nationwide radio ad criticizing Congress for not addressing climate 
change. On NBC's Meet the Press last month, Pawlenty, considered a 
likely presidential hopeful in 2012, said, "Cap-and-trade ... would be a 
disaster."

"With Tim Pawlenty, I guess he sees that there's a need to talk about 
climate change in a more skeptical frame to make himself more appealing 
in a Republican primary," says Jim DiPeso, vice president for policy and 
communications at Republicans for Environmental Protection.

*Changes Of Heart*
Climate change has turned into a point of attack in several GOP Senate 
primary races this year. In Arizona, former Rep. J.D. Hayworth has 
frequently castigated McCain for his past climate-change efforts. McCain 
has been keeping mum on the issue of late, both at home and in Washington.

Other GOP politicians seem to have experienced their own changes of 
heart. As a state senator, Scott Brown voted two years ago in support of 
Massachusetts participating in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, 
the Northeast's regional cap-and-trade program.

During his successful campaign for the U.S. Senate this winter, however, 
Brown expressed doubts about the science underpinning global warming 
theories. He explained his new position by saying that RGGI hadn't worked.

Similarly, Marco Rubio, as speaker of the Florida House, declared in 
2007 that "this nation — and ultimately the world — is headed toward 
emission caps." He backed the idea of creating a state cap-and-trade 
program the following year.

In his current campaign for the U.S. Senate, though, Rubio has blasted 
Crist, his primary opponent, for having pushed the cap-and-trade idea. 
Last month, Rubio said that he doesn't believe the scientific evidence 
for human-influenced climate change.

*Money Talks*
It's true that Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham continues negotiating with 
Massachusetts Democrat John Kerry and independent Joseph Lieberman of 
Connecticut in hopes of crafting a climate change bill, which will very 
likely be released next month. But Graham has attracted no other 
Republicans who support the effort publicly and has been widely 
castigated back home in South Carolina. The Charleston County GOP passed 
a resolution condemning Graham for undermining "Republican leadership 
and party solidarity for his own benefit."

This leads straight to the chicken and egg question. Are many Republican 
leaders growing more skeptical about climate legislation owing to 
concerns raised by their political base? Or are GOP voters following a 
shift among top officials and conservative media?

"Many ordinary citizens take their cues on complex political issues from 
leaders of the political party that they identify with," says DiPeso, 
from the GOP environmental group.

But Daniel J. Weiss, senior fellow and director of climate strategy at 
the Center for American Progress Action Fund, which is a Democratic 
organization, says that it's public opinion that is leading the leaders 
in this case.

He cites the frequent attacks against global warming efforts launched by 
Rush Limbaugh and commentators on Fox News Channel. "That has really 
riled up their highly conservative base," Weiss says.

He also notes that elected officials are well aware of the opposition to 
congressional climate change legislation led by energy companies and the 
U.S. Chamber of Commerce — a group that has already announced it will 
spend $50 million seeking to influence this year's elections.

"If you're a Republican, would you really stand up to them and risk 
getting on their wrong side," Weiss says, "when they have so much money 
to spend?"

https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=125075282

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