Greenhouse gases
Siberia’s Hot Streak
Global warming in Siberia is on a hot streak! It was +6°C last year. In like manner, if the entire planet hit +6°C above pre-industrial, it would be lights out, life snuffed out, sayonara.
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Direct Air Capture and Big Oil
There’s something cagey going on with the world’s biggest corporations, over-weighted by oil producers, now feigning green.
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Approaching a Risky 1.5°C Global Overshoot
A recent UN Assessment, as of February 26th 2021, regarding progress or lack thereof by the 195 nations to the Paris 2015 climate agreement is starting to look like a big bust.
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A Troubling Discovery in the Arctic
A notable satellite-telephonic call to colleagues in late October from Swedish scientist Örjan Gustafsson of Stockholm University briefly described a haunting discovery: “This East Siberian slope methane hydrate system has been perturbed and the process will be ongoing.”
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Large-Scale Permafrost Thawing
Twenty-five percent (25%) of the Northern Hemisphere is permafrost. By all appearances, it is melting well beyond natural background rates, in fact, substantially!
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Boundless Dying Trees
Global warming is ravaging forests throughout the world.
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The Climate Inertia Bugaboo
A new study reveals details about climate change inertia, a sobering study that speaks to the absolute necessity of herculean efforts to stop emissions, full stop, now, not tomorrow
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Climate Models for Upcoming UN Report Show ‘Incredibly Alarming’ Risk of Runaway Warming
The climate community and the general public are in for some “incredibly alarming” worst-case scenarios as modelling for the United Nations’ next major climate risk assessment takes shape.
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The Wet-Bulb Peril Has Arrived… Way Too Early
The human body has limits. If “temperature plus humidity” is high enough, even a healthy person seated in the shade with plentiful water to drink will suffer severely or likely die. It’s the Wet-Bulb Temperature (TW) effect.
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Why ‘Carbon-Cycle Feedbacks’ Could Drive Temperatures Even Higher
New research indicates that parts of the Amazon and other tropical forests are now emitting more CO2 than they absorb. Some scientists are concerned this development, which is not yet incorporated into climate models, could put the temperature goals set by the Paris Agreement out of reach.
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The IPCC’s Worst Case Scenario
A recent landmark study of massive ice loss in Antarctica and Greenland fulfills the “worst case” prognosis, as outlined by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). It’s a nightmare come true, as the impact of global warming on the planet’s most significant/biggest masses of ice multiplied six-fold in only 30 years. It wasn’t supposed to happen so unexpectedly, so suddenly.
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Ignoring Climate Catastrophes
The planet is coming apart at the seams right before the eyes of scientists at work in remote fringe areas of the North where permafrost crumbles and collapses. It’s abrupt climate change at work in real time, but the governing leaders of the world either don’t care or don’t know.
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Methane SOS
Global warming is on speed, especially in northern latitudes where an international team of scientists recently made a startling discovery aboard the Academic Mstislav Keldysh (see photo above), the kind of discovery that sends chills down the spine, i.e., “methane bubbles boiling in water.”
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Sixty Scientists Sign Open Letter Calling for Less Meat and Dairy in Schools and Hospitals
‘Mayors are in charge of millions of meals every day – they should do everything in their power to create a healthy future for the planet,’ these scientists say.
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The Natural World Can Help Save Us From Climate Catastrophe
To prevent a full-spectrum catastrophe, we need not only to decarbonise our economy in the shortest possible time, but also to draw down carbon dioxide that has already been released.T But how? The greatest potential identified so far is in protecting and restoring natural forests and allowing native trees to repopulate deforested land.
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Climate Crisis: CO2 Levels Rise to Highest Point Since Evolution of Humans
The Mauna Loa Observatory, which has measured the parts per million (ppm) of CO2 in the atmosphere since 1958, took a reading of 415.26ppm in the air on 11 May – thought to be the highest concentration since humans evolved.
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Can We Blame Global Warming On Sun Cycles?
Our sun is reaching the end of it’s normal 11 year cycle and is now approaching a period of minimum solar activity. This one’s being dubbed the Grand Solar Minimum. Some say it’s the real cause of climate change and that it’s going to wreak havoc with our weather systems for years to come, possibly even tipping us into a mini ice age. But the numbers tell a very different story…
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Global Climate Strike Aims to Spur Transformative Change
The world’s youth have infused a new urgency into the global fight against climate change. Through movements like Fridays for Future and Extinction Rebellion, millions of young people have gathered in public squares and busy streets, senate chambers and assembly rooms, to call on government leaders to curb greenhouse gas emissions and enact meaningful environmental policies.
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Germans Want a Meat Tax to Save the Planet
Germany is considering a meat tax for environmental reasons. As well as sustainability, some politicians are urging the tax for animal welfare reasons.
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Planting Trees Is Good. Eliminating Deforestation is Better.
Planting more trees is one way to offset deforestation. But now, a report from the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change finds that to have a shot at combatting the climate crisis, among other efforts, we’ll need to cut down fewer trees to begin with.
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We Can’t Keep Eating as We Are – Why Isn’t the IPCC Shouting This from the Rooftops?
The new report on land by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) shies away from the big issues and fails to properly represent the science. As a result, it gives us few clues about how we might survive the century.
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How the World’s Dirtiest Industries Have Learned to Pollute Our Politics
The tragedy of our times is that the gathering collapse of our life support systems has coincided with the age of public disservice. Just as we need to rise above self-interest and short-termism, governments around the world now represent the meanest and dirtiest of special interests.
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Animal Agriculture Is Major Threat to Koalas
Koalas in Australia are at risk of becoming extinct. The key threat to koala survival is land clearing, both past and continuing, and the key driver for tree-clearing is the production of animal products.
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Drastic Changes to Food Production and Consumption Needed to Save Planet From Catastrophic Warming, IPCC Reveals
When some of the world’s top scientists conclude an international summit in Geneva next week, they are expected to call for a major shift to vegetarian diets around the world in order to keep the warming of the globe under 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.
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Arctic Wildfires: How Bad Are They and What Caused Them?
Wildfires are ravaging parts of the Arctic, with areas of Siberia, Alaska, Greenland and Canada engulfed in flames and smoke. Satellite images show how the plumes of smoke from the fires, many caused by dry storms in hot weather, can be seen from space.
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12 Years to Save the Planet? Make That 18 Months
Do you remember the good old days when we had “12 years to save the planet”? Now it seems, there’s a growing consensus that the next 18 months will be critical in dealing with the global heating crisis, among other environmental challenges.
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‘Unprecedented’ Wildfires in Arctic Have Scientists Concerned
So many wildfires are burning in the Arctic, they’re visible from space, new images from NASA’s Earth Observatory show. The satellite images reveal huge plumes of smoke wafting across uninhabited lands in Siberia, Greenland and Alaska, as CNN reported.
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Heatwave: Think It’s Hot in Europe? the Human Body Is Already Close to Thermal Limits Elsewhere
It is by now very well established that hot extremes are more likely in the changed climate we are living in. Yet there is a seemingly unquenchable thirst for this story to be retold every time the UK sweats. Narratives around such acute, local events detract from critical messages about the global challenges from extreme heat.
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Earth Overshoot Day is July 29, the Earliest Ever
It’s official. We’ve exhausted Earth’s natural resources for the year… and it’s only July. According to the Global Footprint Network, July 29 is Earth Overshoot Day this year, the date that human demand for ecological resources and services has surpassed what the Earth can regenerate in a year.
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Amazon Deforestation Accelerating Towards Unrecoverable ‘Tipping Point’
Deforestation of the Brazilian Amazon has surged above three football fields a minute, according to the latest government data, pushing the world’s biggest rainforest closer to a tipping point beyond which it cannot recover.
Read MoreHow the Pentagon’s Forever Wars Are Killing the Planet
Brown University released a report revealing that the Department of Defense is “the world’s largest institutional user of petroleum and correspondingly, the single largest producer of greenhouse gases (GHG) in the world.” According to the report, the DOD released approximately 1.2 billion metric tons of greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide, between 2001 and 2017.
Read MoreBritain Becomes First Major Country to Commit to Legally Binding Zero Emissions Target
Theresa May will make the UK the first economy in the G7 to legislate for zero emissions. The CCC report also confirmed that even if other countries followed the UK by setting a zero emissions target, there was still just a 50/50 chance that the planet would remain below the recommended temperature of 1.5 degrees Celsius by 2100. Anything above that guarantees a shift in climate that will threaten human life.
Read MoreIn the Fight Against Climate Change, Humans and Wildlife Are Allies
Climate change is accelerating at a breakneck pace, already affecting about half of all threatened mammal species and a quarter of threatened birds. And according to a study published in Science last year, if nothing is done to curb our carbon emissions, nearly 50 percent of the planet’s insects, which make up the foundation of food webs all over the globe, could disappear by the end of the century.
Read MoreMaking the Leap to Electric
In Europe, the transport sector is currently responsible for over one-quarter of Europe’s CO² emissions — with 45% of that coming from road transport alone — putting it dead center in our climate emergency. It’s choking our communities with air pollution while rapidly heating our planet.
Read MoreAnimal Production: What Techniques Can Reduce Carbon Footprints?
A study of four farms in Spain used a variety of methods to discern the environmental advantages and disadvantages of both intensive and extensive production systems.
Read MoreIf We Want Antibiotics to Work, Consumers Have to Put Big Pressure on Factory Farms
On March 1, Denny’s stopped purchasing chicken treated with medically important antibiotics for its U.S. restaurants. Many consumers might expect to see such promises at Whole Foods or their local farm-to-table restaurant, but why is a chain like Denny’s (i.e., one that is enjoyed more for its assortment of inexpensive breakfast foods than its moral standards) joining the trend to reduce antibiotics in meat?
Read MoreHow Green Party Gains Could Make Europe a Leader Again on Climate
In recent years, Europe’s role as a global environmental leader has been jeopardized by rising nationalism and populism. But spurred by young climate activists, the Green Party fared well in the latest European Union elections and is now well-positioned to advance bold climate initiatives.
Read MoreClimate Plan
The Climate Plan advocates measures that can be taken in efforts to improve the situation regarding the climate, as well as regarding the health, prospects and wellbeing of people and life in general. These measures can and should be implemented immediately, in line with the current climate crisis.
Read MoreLet’s Be Clear, Says Mexico Environment Minister, ‘Parasitic and Predatory Neoliberalism’ to Blame for Climate Crisis
In a scathing rebuke to the elite capitalists and politicians who largely control the global economic and energy systems, Mexico’s newly-appointed environment secretary on Wednesday pointed a stern finger at the “parasitic and predatory neoliberals” for being the key culprits behind the planetary climate crisis.
Read MoreThere’s a Climate Crisis – but Trump’s Cabinet Continues to Backtrack on Science
With Donald Trump at their helm, Republicans will keep denying climate change because it represents a dire threat to their fossil fuel donors’ bottom lines. Democratic leadership would do well to follow the lead of their party’s insurgent progressive wing, and take the climate threat as seriously.
Read MoreNew Report Warns Planet May Be Warming Twice as Fast as Expected
New earthshaking science will be coming out in the 2021 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report that could nearly double future warming predictions. We have a window into this new science now, and if we thought the spate of apocalyptic climate reports last year was bad, our near-term future will create a plausible scenario that is far worse than the worst-case scenario we have come to fear.
Read MoreGlobal Warming: Human Activity Is the Cause
Fresh studies have again confirmed a vital fact about global warming: human activity is its cause. Science questions its own findings, which is why we should trust it.
Read MoreAfter Years of Abuse, the Earth Has Sent Its Bill Collectors
This planet’s macro-ecological system does have an undeniable sense of accounting … and it keeps a running tally. From alpha-gal syndrome to herbicide resistance, from rising seas to superstorms, we’re watching Mother Nature’s accounting system repeatedly expose the fatal flaw driving economic growth during the Anthropocene era. That flaw is the fallacy of externalities.
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Why Natural Cycles Only Play a Small Role in Rate of Global Warming
This latest study further reinforces the theory that despite certain natural process affecting global temperatures and climate change, it is human activity that has had by far the most impact over the past 150 years.
Read MoreFood In The Anthropocene: The EAT-Lancet Commission Report
The EAT-Lancet Commission, a collaboration between 37 experts from 16 countries, examines five major Earth systems and the health outcomes associated with various diets.
Read MoreClimate Change: ‘We’ve Created a Civilisation Hell Bent on Destroying Itself – I’m Terrified’, Writes Earth Scientist
To understand you are in a prison, you must first be able to see the bars. That this prison was created by humans over many generations doesn’t change the conclusion that we are currently tightly bound up within a system that could, if we do not act, lead to the impoverishment, and even death of billions of people.
Read MoreBeef Industry Takes the Biggest Bite Out of Earth’s Natural Resources
Earlier this month, faced with its involvement in the planet’s environmental crisis, the U.S. Roundtable on Sustainable Beef put together a voluntary framework to “assess” and “encourage” sustainability and hand out recognition certificates. But it’s totally inadequate. This framework lacks accountability, transparency and, above all, truth about beef’s impacts.
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The Zero Carbon Bill Through the Eyes of an Everyday Activist
The Zero Carbon Bill was released by the New Zealand Government on the 8th May, 2019 and everyone has an opinion on it. Will it be any good for us, the biodiversity we cherish and the planet? The jury is definitely out on that one as scientists, academics, economists, politicians and everyday activists like me try to figure out what it will mean. Its intention is to get New Zealand on a pathway of no more than 1.5C warming, in a way which includes all sectors.
Read MoreCosta Rica Set To Become The Worlds First Plastic-Free And Carbon-Free Country By 2021
Costa Rica is in the top 5 of countries that are leading the way into renewable resources. It might seem small but it has a really big environmental impact. Since 2014 the country’s energy has been coming from 99% renewable sources, and it has been running on 100% renewable energy for over two months twice in the last two years.
Read MoreGreenhouse Gas Levels Keep Accelerating
Posted by Sam Carana / Arctic News Carbon Dioxide Weekly CO₂ levels at Mauna Loa, Hawaii, in May, 2019, reached 415.39 ppm, as above image shows. An ominous trendline points at 420 ppm in 2020. The daily average CO₂ level...
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Big Win! Washington Passes Clean Energy Bill!
New Mexico, Maryland, California, and Hawaii have all set 100 percent clean energy deadlines. The latest state to join this list, with the most impressive legislature of them all, is Washington.
Read MoreThe Blue Ocean Event and Collapsing Ecosystems
Sometime in the near future it is highly probable that the Arctic will no longer have sea ice, meaning zero ice for the first time in eons, aka: the Blue Ocean Event.Surely, the world is not prepared for the consequences of such an historic event, which likely turns the world topsy-turvy, negatively impacting agriculture with gonzo weather patterns, thus forcing people to either starve or fight. But, the problem may be even bigger than shortages of food.
Read MoreMelting Permafrost Releasing High Levels of Nitrous Oxide, A Potent Greenhouse Gas
Thawing permafrost in the Arctic may be releasing 12 times as much nitrous oxide as previously thought, according to a new study published in the journal Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics. Nitrous oxide, a powerful greenhouse gas 300 times more potent than carbon dioxide, can remain in the atmosphere for up to 114 years, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
Read MorePolar Warning: Even Antarctica’s Coldest Region Is Starting to Melt
East Antarctica is the coldest spot on earth, long thought to be untouched by warming. But now the glaciers and ice shelves in this frigid region are showing signs of melting, a development that portends dramatic rises in sea levels this century and beyond.
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