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Everything is going really well, considering….
Just past half-time in the great game of 2022, the 50th consecutive successful year of the War on Climate Change. And as in every one of those other years, we have racked up many achievements so far this year — so many that we thought it best to review them at half time lest the list be too long and unwieldy at year’s end. So far this year;
- Last weekend, in two days, the heat wave in Greenland melted eight billion tons per day of water from the northern ice sheets and sent it coursing in great rivers into the ocean — enough water to cover the state of West Virginia to a depth of one foot.
- Our steady global contribution of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere — primarily by burning fossil fuels –continues apace, with the result that levels of the primary greenhouse gas are higher than they have been at any time in human history. One of the authors of a new NOAA report says, “we are still racing at top speed towards a global catastrophe.” Another asked, “what is it going to take for us to wake up?” It was a rhetorical question.
- Much of the world, the United States included, is returning to coal as a fuel for generating electricity, much like a smoker who tries to quit for ten days and then gives up. (Think Germany and China.) Excuses are multiple — war in Ukraine, supply chain problems, spiking prices for natural gas. Bottom line? It’s just so damn easy.
- Life-threatening, electric-grid-straining, record-shattering heat waves have so far this year stifled the following regions: several countries in South America; Australia; central and southern California; India and Pakistan; the Midwestern, Western and Southeastern United States; the United Kingdom and central Europe; South Asia; the Horn of Africa; and China. So far. This year.
- The institutions of the U.S. government rose to the challenge — the Supreme Court took away much of the power the EPA had to regulate the emissions of coal-burning power plants, and Senator Joe Manchin single-handedly scuttled the efforts of the Biden administration to spend more money on mitigating climate change.
- On July 12, there were 94 active wildfires raging in 15 states. On that date they had burned over 2.23 million acres. This year to that date there have been 37,583 wildfires, which burned over 5.5 million acres. Much of Europe, Africa, and Asia are similarly affected. In this country, every year the wildfire season starts earlier and ends later, affects wider swaths of the country, and drives more people from their homes.
- Epic flooding (some of it originating on forest land burned over by wildfires) struck Yellowstone Park, Arizona, Colorado, Virginia and the New York City subway system.
- The sea level around Florida has risen eight inches since 1950, and is accelerating, now rising an inch every three years. Salt water is infiltrating inland ecosystems and freshwater aquifers. It is flooding city streets without benefit of any storm. At the same time, much of the coastal urban land is sinking because of heavy development and heavy depletion of underground aquifers. Every coastal city and town is suffering some or all of these effects.
- Ten U.S. states were lashed by catastrophic tornadoes this spring, an above average number over a wider than normal expanse, shifting southeastward from the traditional “tornado alley.”
So it’s been a very busy year so far and we still have the hurricane season to look forward to. Not hard to see how Joe Manchin — and 60% of U.S. voters — concluded that climate change is not worth our government’s attention or money. It’s just bad weather, people!
Informative article, though daunting! But covering the state of West Virginia with a foot of water? An odd illusion. I mean, there’s mountains and valleys and all. I haven’t done the math, but maybe seven inches in Kansas or four feet in Delaware…just sayin’.
Yeah, if I was going to try tp cover a state with a foot of water I wouldn’t pick West Virginia. They probably should have said “cover an area equal to the state of West Virginia….”
Do you think that might indicate a piss-poor vocabulary, utterly absent communication skills and an abject disregard/ignorance of specifics and details? A combination I refer to as WTMSP, a condition that will kill all of us.
Yup. See “The Bonfire of the Inanities,” my previous post.
Thanks for the article Tom and congratulations on surviving the easy half of 2022!
Tom, can you please design an economic system that can not only deal with human overshoot but actually profit from it? Oh wait, we already have one, don’t we. Enjoy the unraveling if you can.
I think the horses have long since bolted and it’s much too late to close the stable doors. Some blogger, I can’t remember who it was, coined the phrase: ‘We have now entered the age of consequences.’
I couldn’t agree more.
Here is a link to another excellent article on climate change, this one focussing on the idea of ‘adaptation’…:
http://resourceinsights.blogspot.com/2022/07/the-well-just-adapt-to-climate-change.html
greetings
Frank
Great article, Frank, but I fear that adaptation is all we have left. It’s too late for mitigation. We’ve got no choice but to adapt to the inevitable, and to do so with the greatest deliberation. I live in the Great Lakes region – supposedly a future destination for refugees from the parched Southwest.
I don’t want those vagrants invading my turf…I mean, I just don’t! We need to make comprehensive adaptation plans now and begin to work on logistics to carry out such plans. Otherwise, it’s going to be hell-bent-for-leather chaos; you know, classic Darwinian shit. Climate change isn’t going away.
PS: Would someone please tell me what WTMSP means? Thank you.
Have to say I was a bit surprised to learn that temperatures in a place like the UK — so far away from the Equator — could escalate into the 40s. (I’m using the Celsius scale.) Here in a tropical country like Singapore where I live the weather is currently mild and the temperature hovers only around 30 to 32. (Can only hope it stays that way…)
Last year north of the 49th parallel we had temperatures to 50C. The Great White North was the Red Hot Tinder. And then the forest fires started. Burned down most of Lytton which is about 150 km from my place. Ironically, right next to the Thompson and Fraser rivers which are substantial, but the part that burned was up on the valley hill near the highway.
Then we got the Atmospheric Rivers in November and they wiped out three of the four major highways connecting Vancouver and turned the Sumas Prairie (valley east of Vancouver) back into Sumas Lake.
To quote Kramer, “Oh ya, its real alright!”.