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<p><i><font size="+1"><b>July 18, 2021</b></font></i></p>
[Hot news]<br>
<b>‘No One Is Safe’: Extreme Weather Batters the Wealthy World</b><br>
Floods swept Germany, fires ravaged the American West and another
heat wave loomed, driving home the reality that the world’s richest
nations remain unprepared for the intensifying consequences of
climate change.<br>
- -<br>
The extreme weather disasters across Europe and North America have
driven home two essential facts of science and history: The world as
a whole is neither prepared to slow down climate change, nor live
with it. The week’s events have now ravaged some of the world’s
wealthiest nations, whose affluence has been enabled by more than a
century of burning coal, oil and gas — activities that pumped the
greenhouse gases into the atmosphere that are warming the world.<br>
- -<br>
That message clearly hasn’t sunk in among policymakers, and perhaps
the public as well, particularly in the developed world, which has
maintained a sense of invulnerability.<br>
<br>
The result is a lack of preparation, even in countries with
resources. In the United States, flooding has killed more than 1,000
people since 2010 alone, according to federal data. In the
Southwest, heat deaths have spiked in recent years.<br>
<br>
Sometimes that is because governments have scrambled to respond to
disasters they haven’t experienced before, like the heat wave in
Western Canada last month, according to Jean Slick, head of the
disaster and emergency management program at Royal Roads University
in British Columbia. “You can have a plan, but you don’t know that
it will work,” Ms. Slick said.<br>
<br>
Other times, it’s because there aren’t political incentives to spend
money on adaptation.<br>
<br>
“By the time they build new flood infrastructure in their community,
they’re probably not going to be in office anymore,” said Samantha
Montano, a professor of emergency management at the Massachusetts
Maritime Academy. “But they are going to have to justify millions,
billions of dollars being spent.”<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/17/climate/heatwave-weather-hot.html">https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/17/climate/heatwave-weather-hot.html</a>
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[more difficult to stay safe]<br>
<b>At least 70 large wildfires burning in US west as fears mount
over conditions</b><br>
Bootleg is now the largest US forest fire at 281,208 acres and just
22% contained as ‘excessive heat’ forecast<br>
Victoria Bekiempis -- 17 Jul 2021 <br>
At least 70 large wildfires are burning across the US west and
nearby states – engulfing more than 1m acres in flames – as fears
mount that shifting conditions can worsen an already dire situation.
Significant areas of these states are in the grips of drought
conditions that are considered “extreme” and “exceptional” – the
most severe categories.<br>
<br>
Authorities in Oregon have said that these arid, windy and unstable
conditions will continue fueling the 281,208-acre Bootleg fire,
which is just 22% contained, according to National Interagency Fire
Center and InciWeb. The smoke and heat have spurred giant “fire
clouds”, which are dangerous columns of ash and smoke that can
spiral up to six miles skyward.<br>
<br>
At least 2,106 firefighting personnel are battling Bootleg, which is
now the largest US forest fire. Officials have also worried that
this inferno might merge with the nearby Log fire, which totals at
least 4,830 acres...<br>
- -<br>
The extremely hot, dry conditions fanning these fires are linked to
human-caused climate change. The US west has grown much drier and
warmer over the past three decades and is expected to grow more
extreme which, in turn, is poised to create more frequent and
destructive wildfires.<br>
<br>
According to the National Interagency Fire Center, there have been
34,596 wildfires tallied from 1 January to 16 July, affecting
2,364,643 acres. Over the same period of 2020, there were 28,423
wildfires affecting 1,778,583 acres.<br>
<br>
The Associated Press contributed to this report<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jul/17/us-west-wildfires-bootleg-fire-oregon">https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jul/17/us-west-wildfires-bootleg-fire-oregon</a><br>
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[BBC reports - we must reduce carbon 7% per year]<br>
<b>Catastrophic flooding across western Europe as politicians blame
climate change - BBC News</b><br>
Jul 16, 2021- BBC News<br>
More than 120 people have died and hundreds are still missing after
record rainfall caused the worst flooding in parts of Western Europe
for many decades. <br>
<br>
In Germany dozens of people were unaccounted for, with the
Chancellor Angela Merkel describing the floods as a catastrophe.<br>
<br>
Torrential rain has also devastated parts of Belgium, the
Netherlands and Luxembourg. <br>
<br>
Survivors have described the terrifying speed at which water levels
rose.<br>
<br>
Some politicians in Germany say the extreme weather is the result of
global warming and they're calling for more urgent action to counter
climate change.<br>
<br>
Clive Myrie presents BBC News at Ten reporting - from Jenny Hill in
Erftstadt, Germany - Anna Holligan in the Dutch town of Valkenberg
- and chief environment correspondent Justin Rowlatt on the threat
posed by climate change.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8A65JzDltY4">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8A65JzDltY4</a><br>
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[is that from Monty Python? ]<br>
<b>Not dead yet: How Senate Democrats aim to pass climate policy
without Republicans</b><br>
Senate Democrats announced some of the climate measures in their
$3.5 trillion reconciliation plan.<br>
- -<br>
And it’s worth noting that the CES isn’t the only climate measure
under consideration. Democrats are also hoping to include funding
for a “Civilian Climate Corps,” similar to Franklin Delano
Roosevelt’s Civilian Conservation Corps but for jobs in climate
resiliency, conservation, and other green industries. They may try
to tie in money to expand existing clean energy and electric vehicle
tax credits, funding to weatherize and electrify buildings, and
more. In the House, where Democrats have a wider majority,
progressives will likely try to tack on more climate-related
amendments. <br>
- -<br>
“We’re probably still only about a fifth of the way through this
process, but one of the most important thresholds was what’s the top
line and what’s the commitment to climate?” Democratic Senator Brian
Schatz from Hawaii told reporters on Wednesday. “And I feel very
good.”<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://grist.org/politics/not-dead-yet-how-senate-democrats-aim-to-pass-climate-policy-without-republicans/">https://grist.org/politics/not-dead-yet-how-senate-democrats-aim-to-pass-climate-policy-without-republicans/</a><br>
<p> - -</p>
[Gallows Humor - video clip 48 seconds]<br>
<b>Monty Python Not Dead Yet clip</b><br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBxMPqxJGqI">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBxMPqxJGqI</a><br>
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[Opinion]<br>
<b>It Seems Odd That We Would Just Let the World Burn</b><br>
July 15, 2021By Ezra Klein<br>
Opinion Columnist<br>
The good news is that the worst of the climate crisis seems less and
less likely. We are on track for 3 degrees of warming, measured in
Celsius, not 4 or 5. But 3 degrees is still a catastrophe of truly
incomprehensible proportions, visited primarily upon the world’s
poor by the world’s rich. We are engineering a world that is so much
worse than it need be and that will be lethal for untold millions.<br>
“I suspect that human beings will not go extinct from climate
change, but I have higher standards than that,” Kate Marvel, a
climate scientist at Columbia University, once told me. “I don’t
want to just not go extinct. And for me, there’s almost an
abdicating of responsibility by saying, ‘Well, we’re not going to do
anything about climate change unless it’s going to kill every last
one of us.’ Because the things that, for me, are really frightening
about climate change are the consequences for human social systems.”<br>
<br>
Humanity has spent thousands of years building the social
organizations and technological mastery to insulate itself from the
whims of nature. We are spending down that inheritance, turning back
the clock. I don’t believe this reveals our true preference for the
world our descendants will inhabit. I believe it reveals our deeply
human inability to take the future as seriously as we take the
present.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://static01.nyt.com/images/2021/07/15/opinion/15klein-lead/merlin_176070078_add6add6-d1e8-4299-950c-f55e597422d8-superJumbo.jpg?quality=90&auto=webp">https://static01.nyt.com/images/2021/07/15/opinion/15klein-lead/merlin_176070078_add6add6-d1e8-4299-950c-f55e597422d8-superJumbo.jpg?quality=90&auto=webp</a><br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/15/opinion/climate-change-energy-infrastructure.html">https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/15/opinion/climate-change-energy-infrastructure.html</a><br>
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[cartoon]<br>
<b>Why do we care about wet bulb temperature and could they have
given it a better name?</b><br>
First Dog on the Moon<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/16/why-do-we-care-about-wet-bulb-temperature-and-could-they-have-given-it-a-better-name">https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/jul/16/why-do-we-care-about-wet-bulb-temperature-and-could-they-have-given-it-a-better-name</a><br>
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[Tamino returns]<br>
<b>Northwest Heat Wave</b><br>
July 16, 2021 <br>
- -<br>
When extreme heat gripped the Pacific northwest recently, people
noticed. They noticed in Seattle, Washington, where they set an
all-time record high of 104°F on June 27th, only to break it the
next day at 108°F. They noticed in Portland, Oregon, where they set
the all-time record high of 112°F on June 27th, only to break it the
next day at 116°F. They noticed in Lytton, Canada, where they set
the all-time record high for all of Canada at 121°F, only to burn to
the ground the following day.<br>
- - <br>
Naturally this has led to speculation about the relationship of this
particular heat wave to man-made climate change (global warming).
One of the reasons we expect global warming to increase extreme
heat, is illustrated in this graph:
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://tamino.files.wordpress.com/2021/07/currydistribution.jpg">https://tamino.files.wordpress.com/2021/07/currydistribution.jpg</a><br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://tamino.wordpress.com/2021/07/16/northwest-heat-wave/">https://tamino.wordpress.com/2021/07/16/northwest-heat-wave/</a><br>
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[The news archive - looking back]<br>
<font size="+1"><b>On this day in the history of global warming July
18, 2002</b></font><br>
USA Today reports:<br>
<blockquote>"Democratic attorneys general from 11 states accused the
Bush administration Wednesday of ignoring global warming and
favoring energy policies that will boost greenhouse gas emissions.<br>
<br>
"White House spokesman Scott McClellan responded by saying the
president was working on a 'bipartisan, commonsense approach to
address climate change.'<br>
<br>
"In their letter to Bush, the attorneys general denounced the
administration's climate change policy, arguing that states have
been left to address a global problem with a patchwork of
inconsistent regulations. They said Bush has failed to create a
national plan to curb carbon dioxide emissions from automobiles
and power plants."<br>
</blockquote>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/science/climate/2002-07-18-states-climate.htm">http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/science/climate/2002-07-18-states-climate.htm</a>
<br>
<br>
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