More frequent, more powerful Super Typhoons, with climate change
Is not the push for nuclear reactors in East Asia (almost always located on coast) a dangerous trend, in view of increasing typhoons?
Super typhoons becoming more powerful and more frequent, new study finds, SMH, Peter Hannam 6 Sept 16 The most destructive categories of tropical storms to strike the heavily populated regions of east Asia are becoming more intense and increasing as much as four-fold in frequency because of climate change, according to new research by US-based scientists.
Since the late 1970s, typhoons making land in a region stretching from Vietnam and the Philippines to Korea and Japan have become 12 per cent to 15 per cent more intense.
Those hitting south-east Asia with a category 4 or 5 strength have more than doubled in number, with the increase even more for China and Taiwan and regions north, the paper published in Nature Geoscience on Tuesday found.
The increase in sea-surface temperature is key to providing extra energy to tropical storms, with the outcome for the megacities of the region looking grimmer……..
“The intensification is strongest for typhoons that tend to make landfall because of the stronger warming of the coastal waters near east and south-east Asia,” said Wei Mei, a researcher in the department of marine sciences at the University of South Carolina and co-author of the paper.
Additional warming is expected to intensify the storms, particularly in some of east Asia’s main economic centres, Dr Mei said: “The typhoons striking mainland China, Taiwan, Japan, and Korea will intensify further because of the faster warming of waters of 20 degrees north.”…….
The north-west Pacific basin has both the largest data set of super typhoon-strength storms and the clearest trend towards intensification as the planet warms, Steve Turton, an adjunct professor at the Central Queensland University, said.
This year has also been an active one for the region………http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/super-typhoons-becoming-more-powerful-and-more-frequent-new-study-finds-20160905-gr8rch.html
Flooding – a dire hazard to nuclear power stations
Nuclear Reactors and Flood Protection DAVE LOCHBAUM, DIRECTOR, NUCLEAR SAFETY PROJECT | SEPTEMBER 6, 2016 DISASTER BY DESIGN/ SAFETY BY INTENT #48 Safety by Intent Oconee Flood Protection Issue
In August 2006, NRC inspectors identified a deficiency in a flood protection measure at the Oconee Nuclear Station in South Carolina. Specifically, the inspectors discovered that workers removed a 6-inch by 10-inch panel in the 5-foot tall flood wall around the Standby Shutdown Facility (SSF) to allow temporary cables to be used during a modification. When the work was completed and the cables removed, the panel was not re-installed.
The SSF houses power supplies and emergency equipment that provide core cooling for all three Oconee reactors during certain accidents. The opening in the flood wall could have allowed water to enter the SSF and submerge the equipment, disabling it. The NRC’s preliminary determination was that the problem warranted a white finding.
The owner contested the white finding in October 2006 on grounds that the lower end of the opening is 4.71 feet above the ground and no credible flood could cause water to rise high enough to flow through the opening to threaten the equipment inside the SSF. The NRC considered the argument, then decided against it and issued the white finding in November 2006.
The owner appealed the white finding in December 2006 on largely the same grounds that the NRC had considered and rejected. The NRC formed a five-member panel to review the owner’s appeal. In February 2007, the NRC panel recommended that the appeal be denied. The NRC notified the owner on March 1, 2007, that the appeal was denied.
The owner appealed the denial of the first appeal in May 2007 on largely the same grounds that it had unsuccessfully trod twice before. Once again, the NRC formed another panel to handle the appeal.
The flood of appeals forced the NRC to closely examine the design basis flood event for Oconee. Included in the mix of things that could inundate the Oconee site was the failure of the Jocassee Dam, upriver about 20 miles. The NRC discovered that the owner made a mistake when calculating the probability of the dam’s failure—the dam’s failure was more than 10 times more likely than the owner had calculated. The NRC denied the second appeal in November 2007 to let the white finding stand.
But the owner’s failed appeals resulted in far more than a white finding. Along the way, the NRC discovered a larger problem than a 6-inch by 10-inch opening in a 5-foot tall flood wall. The NRC learned of a study completed in the early 1990s showing that Jocassee Dam’s failure could inundate the Oconee site up to 16.8 feet and cause the meltdown of all three reactors, rendering the presence or absence of a hole in a 5-foot tall flood wall somewhat moot. The NRC mandated in August 2008 that the owner respond, under oath or affirmation, with information explaining how Oconee is adequately protected against floods. The owner responded to the NRC’s mandate in September 2009.
The NRC sat down with the owner in November 2008 about flood protection deficiencies at Oconee. The NRC informed the owner that its response to the NRC’s mandate was “insufficient.” The NRC seemed more than a little perturbed by the owner’s insistence that Oconee could not possibly be inadequately protected against flooding caused by failure of the Jocassee Dam, because Oconee did not legally have to be protected against dam failures.
The owner and the NRC discussed/debated the matter until they agreed upon 15 compensatory measures to be taken at Jocassee and Oconee to reduce the chances of the dam’s failure and increase the chances of Oconee surviving a flood……….
Fort Calhoun Flood Protection Issue
As described in an All Things Nuclear post, the NRC identified in July 2010 several deficiencies in protective measures against flooding at the Fort Calhoun nuclear plant (Nebraska). The owner attempted to justify the configuration as-is, largely on grounds that the plant had operated for over three decades without experiencing a flood requiring the protections the NRC deemed inadequate. The NRC considered that argument, then decided against it and issued a yellow finding in October 2010. (For context, the NRC issued 827 findings to plant owners during 2010 and only two were yellow in the green, white, yellow, and red hierarchy; it issued no red findings that year). The NRC pointed out that the flood barriers and related measures were installed for protection against the postulated failure of upriver dams, and the fact that the dams had not yet failed had little relevancy on the acceptability of deficient barriers.
The NRC’s identification of the flood protection deficiencies and their strong inducement for the owner to remedy them expeditiously came in handy when Fort Calhoun literally became an island in the Missouri River in June 2011.
Nationwide Flood Protection Issues
Prior to a flood in March 2011 causing three reactors at Fukushima Daiichi in Japan to melt down, the NRC discovered from Oconee, Bellefonte, and Fort Calhoun that protection against flooding hazards might not be as reliable and robust as necessary. On July 19, 2010, the NRC initiated Generic Issue 204 (GI-204), “Flooding of Nuclear Power Plant Sites Following Upstream Dam Failures.” The NRC was conducting due diligence for GI-204 (i.e., researching postulated floods and associated protections to assess which reactors might have what vulnerabilities) when Fukushima happened. The NRC finished its screening study for GI-204 in July 2011and accepted GI-204 as a generic issue in February 2012. The GI-204 effort helped inform the NRC’s decision-making about steps to be taken to reduce flooding vulnerabilities, the potential consequences of which had been vividly revealed by the Fukushima disaster………
Disaster by Design
Floods pose dire hazards to nuclear power plant safety for two reasons. First, flood waters can submerge and disable primary safety systems and their backups. Flooding can thus breach multiple barriers in the defense-in-depth approach to safety. Second, flood waters can impair efforts by workers to compensate for disabled systems and breached barriers.
The one-two punch of knocking out installed systems and impairing manual compensatory measures make floods a genuine risk to be reckoned with.
UCS’s Disaster by Design/ Safety by Intent series of blog posts is intended to help readers understand how a seemingly unrelated assortment of minor problems can coalesce to cause disaster and how effective defense-in-depth can lessen both the number of pre-existing problems and the chances they team up. http://allthingsnuclear.org/dlochbaum/nuclear-reactors-and-flood-protection
Australia, the Pacific pariah on climate change
It is the world’s largest coal exporter, and both major political parties are financially backed by the coal lobby. Rather than move away from coal, the government is seeking to expand exports dramatically, with public subsidies and taxpayer-funded infrastructure.
The contrast could not be starker. While Pacific leaders are praised for their efforts to develop global climate solutions, Australia faces ignominy. Unless Australia changes direction, it will continue to be seen as an irresponsible middle power – a rogue state undermining global efforts to tackle climate change.
Pacific pariah: how Australia’s love of coal has left it out in the diplomatic cold, https://theconversation.com/pacific-pariah-how-australias-love-of-coal-has-left-it-out-in-the-diplomatic-cold-64963 The Conversation, Wesley Morgan, 7 Sept 16, Australia’s Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull will have some explaining to do when he attends the Pacific Islands Forum leaders’ meeting in Pohnpei, Micronesia, this week.
Australia’s continued determination to dig up coal, while refusing to dig deep to tackle climate change, has put it increasingly at odds with world opinion. Nowhere is this more evident than when Australian politicians meet with their Pacific island counterparts.
It is widely acknowledged that Pacific island states are at the front line of climate change. It is perhaps less well known that, for a quarter of a century, Australia has attempted to undermine their demands in climate negotiations at the United Nations.
The Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) – organised around an annual meeting between island leaders and their counterparts from Australia and New Zealand – is the Pacific region’s premier political forum. But island nations have been denied the chance to use it to press hard for their shared climate goals, because Australia has used the PIF to weaken the regional declarations put forward by Pacific nations at each key milestone in the global climate negotiation process. Continue reading
Once Again, Australia is the laggard on climate change action
US-China ratification of Paris Agreement ramps up the pressure on Australia, The Conversation, Peter Christoff September 5, 2016, When President Barack Obama and President Xi Jinping announced their countries’ ratification of the Paris climate agreement ahead of last weekend’s G20 meeting in Hangzhou, they boosted its chances of coming into force by the end of this year, some 12 months after the deal was brokered last December.
To enter into force, the Paris Agreement requires ratification by at least 55 nations which together account for at least 55% of global greenhouse emissions. It will then become legally binding on those parties that have both signed and ratified it. These thresholds ensure that the deal has broad legitimacy among states, but are also low enough to limit the opportunities for blocking by states that may oppose its progress.
Aside from China and the United States – the world’s two largest emitters, which together produce 39% of the world’s emissions – another 24 countries have ratified the agreement.
To get over the threshold, it now only needs the support of a handful of major emitters like the European Union (a bloc of 27 countries producing some 10% of global emissions), India, Russia or Brazil. Ratification by countries such as Australia, South Africa and the United Kingdom (each of which contributes about 1.5% of emissions) would also contribute significantly to this momentum………
Australia left as a laggard
The US-China announcement not only increases the momentum for ratification, but also increases pressure on Australia. With the Kyoto Protocol, Australia loyally supported the United States and refused to ratify until 2007. This time, similar recalcitrance is likely to be met with strong international disapproval.
However, ratification is only the beginning. Australia will then be required to revise and toughen its targets for 2030 and beyond. Its weak 2030 mitigation target is accompanied by policies inadequate to meet this goal.
The Paris Agreement, once in force, will require a more robust Australian target to be announced by 2023 at the latest. This in turn will further highlight the gap between current and sufficient implementation measures.
The US-China ratification announcement is the next step along a path that must see Australia climb – or be dragged – out of its current climate policy torpor. https://theconversation.com/us-china-ratification-of-paris-agreement-ramps-up-the-pressure-on-australia-64821
Hypocrisy of big USA companies on climate change
U.S. companies tout climate policies, fund climate skeptics. Reuters, 6 Sept 16, By Richard Valdmanis and Grant Smith | BOSTON/NEW YORK
U.S. companies that have expressed the most fervent public support for President Barack Obama’s environmental agenda are also funding its biggest enemies – the scores of U.S. lawmakers who are climate change skeptics and oppose regulation to combat it, according to a Reuters review of public records.
Ahead of the Nov. 8 presidential and congressional elections, the donations from companies including PepsiCo, Dupont, and Google reveal a disconnect between how these companies present themselves to the public on environmental issues, and how they manage their political contributions to support business-friendly policy.
But inconsistency between a company’s environmental positions and its political giving may point up a need for better oversight, according to Jon Lukomnik, head of the Investor Responsibility Research Center Institute.
“There really needs to be a process that looks at these issues … at C-suite and board levels on a periodic basis,” Lukomnik said.
The Reuters review covered donations made during the 2016 election cycle by the political action committees (PACs) of 30 of the biggest publicly traded U.S. companies that signed Obama’s “American Business Act on Climate Change Pledge” in 2015, a public promise to enact climate-friendly corporate policies and support strong climate change oversight like the global climate accord signed in Paris.
The review found that 25 of the 30 companies are funding the campaigns of lawmakers featured on a “climate deniers” list that was put together by Organizing For Action, a non-profit created by former Obama campaign aides to advocate his agenda.
The list includes more than 130 members of Congress, nearly all Republicans, and is a who’s who of the biggest opponents of Obama’s plan to combat climate change. Some of those on the list dispute the label “denier” and describe themselves as climate change “skeptics”.
The list includes Republican Congressman Kevin Cramer of North Dakota, an energy advisor to presidential candidate Donald Trump who once argued the Earth was cooling not warming, and Republican U.S. Senator Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma, who last year held up a snowball on the Senate floor as evidence global warming does not exist.
Other signatories to the American Business Act on Climate Change Pledge that gave more than a third of their top political contributions to lawmakers on the list include Google, AT&T, GE, Verizon, and Mondelez, according to the review.
Those levels of donations given to climate skeptics are relatively high given that the list covers about a quarter of U.S. Congress members……… http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-climate-donations-idUSKCN11C0ED
Study: Future drought will offset benefits of higher CO2 on soybean yields
EurekAlert, 6 Sept 16 UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN, CHAMPAIGN, ILL. — An eight-year study of soybeans grown outdoors in a carbon dioxide-rich atmosphere like that expected by 2050 has yielded a new and worrisome finding: Higher atmospheric CO2 concentrations will boost plant growth under ideal growing conditions, but drought – expected to worsen as the climate warms and rainfall patterns change – will outweigh those benefits and cause yield losses much sooner than anticipated.
The new discovery, reported in the journal Nature Plants, contradicts a widely accepted hypothesis about how climate change will affect food production, said University of Illinois plant biology professor Andrew Leakey, who led the new research…….http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2016-09/uoia-sfd090116.php
USA and China formally ratify Paris climate agreement
US joins China in ratifying Paris climate agreement in ‘turning point’ for planet , ABC News 4 Sept 16 America and China have formally joined the Paris climate change agreement, with US President Barack Obama hailing the accord as the “moment we finally decided to save our planet”.
The move by the world’s two biggest polluters is a major step forward for the 180-nation deal, which sets ambitious goals for capping global warming and funnelling trillions of dollars to poor countries facing climate catastrophe.
Mr Obama and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping handed ratification document to United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon, who said he was now optimistic the agreement will be in force by the end of the year.
Mr Ban described the two leaders as far-sighted, bold and ambitious.
“China and the United States represent nearly 40 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions,” he said.
“Now by formally joining the Paris agreement your have added powerful momentum to the drive for the agreement to enter into force this year.”
Mr Obama said history would show that the Paris deal would “ultimately prove to be a turning point, the moment we finally decided to save our planet”……..http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-09-04/us-joins-china-in-ratifying-paris-climate-agreement/7812366
China ratifies Paris climate agreement
China has ratified Paris climate agreement, state media says, ABC News 3 Sep 16 China has ratified the Paris agreement on climate change, according to state media, a key move by the world’s biggest polluter that brings the deal a major step closer to coming into force.
The National People’s Congress legislature voted to adopt “the proposal to review and ratify the Paris Agreement”, the official Xinhua news agency said.
The Paris pact calls for capping global warming at well below two degrees Celsius, and 1.5C if possible, compared with pre-industrial levels.
China is responsible for about 25 per cent of global carbon emissions, with the US in second place on about 15 per cent, making their efforts crucial in the fight against warming.
The Paris deal will come into force 30 days after at least 55 countries, accounting for 55 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions, have ratified it……..http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-09-03/china-ratifies-paris-climate-agreement3a-xinhua/7811778?section=environment
30 Big City leaders join forces to make a stand on climate change action
Sadiq Khan and megacity mayors urge G20 climate change action, https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/sep/02/sadiq-khan-and-megacity-mayors-urge-g20-climate-change-action
30 mayors from cities including London, Paris, Tokyo, Sydney, New York, Cape Town and Rio de Janeiro call for rapid ratification of Paris climate deal, Guardian, 2 Sept 16, London Mayor Sadiq Khan has joined forces with city leaders from around the world to call on governments to take urgent action on climate change.
Ahead of a meeting of the G20 group of leading nations in Hangzhou, China, 30 mayors from cities including London, Paris, Tokyo, Sydney, New York, Cape Town and Rio de Janeiro called on national leaders to work with them to “build a low carbon, climate safe world”.
They welcomed government moves to secure the Paris Agreement, the world’s first comprehensive global deal to tackle climate change, in December last year, and efforts to ratify it as soon as possible so it could come into force rapidly.
But they warned “this is only the first step along the road towards our low carbon, climate safe future”.
In an open letter, the mayors from the C40 group of cities championing climate action said: “To limit the global temperature increase to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels, global greenhouse gas emissions need to peak by 2020.
“Achieving such a rapid shift is probably one of the greatest political, economic and practical challenges faced by every national leader, but you do have great allies in this task: we, the mayors of the megacities of the world.”
They said they were already dealing with the consequences of climate change in their cities, battling floods to heatwaves.
But city leaders were also taking action such as banning the most polluting cars, rolling out fleets of electric buses and improving energy efficiency, which also had benefits for health, well-being and economic growth, they said.
“For the major cities of the world it is already clear that the faster we move to a low carbon economy, the greater will be the improvement in urban citizens’ standards of living, and the stronger and more sustained will be the economic development that makes that possible.”
The leaders have committed to setting out concrete plans for how they will deliver the greenhouse gas cuts in their cities needed to help meet the goals of the Paris Agreement to avoid dangerous climate change.
“We want our citizens, markets and other political leaders to know that we are serious about making the Paris Agreement a reality. We call on the heads of states from our respective nation states to do the same,” they said.
Polarisation on climate change – now worse than ever in America
global warming has joined God, guns, gays, and abortion as core elements of Republican identity, and this will be hard to change.
Americans Now More Politically Polarized On Climate ChangeThan Ever Before, Analysis 
Finds http://www.skepticalscience.com/americans-more-polarized-on-climate-change.html
American voters and politicians are now more polarized than ever before across all aspects of climate change — from the cause, to the science and the impacts — a major new analysis has found.
Campaigns funded by vested fossil fuel interests and pushed by a network of ideological think tanks, many linked to the oil billionaire Koch brothers, have helped to widen the gap, pushing Republican politicians, elites and voters away from action ongreenhouse gas emissions.
Tracking Gallup opinion poll surveys going back to 2001 and congress voting patterns from 1970 onwards, the analysis authors warn that as the November election approaches, Americans are faced with a stark political choice.
The analysis is published in the respected journal Environment and comes from sociologists Associate Professor Aaron McCright of Michigan State University, Professor Riley Dunlap of Oklahoma State University, and PhD researcher Jerrod Yarosh also at Oklahoma.
The researchers found the widest gaps between Democrats and Republicans come when they are asked about the causes of climate change and if the media exaggerates the seriousness of the issue.
While virtually all climate scientists and the world’s leading scientific academies have long agreed that the burning of fossil fuels is causing climate change, only about half Republicans accept the science.
A Republican controlled Congress, the article says, would be a “huge step backward in our nation’s efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions” and could also undermine international cooperation, especially if Republican nominee Donald Trump won the Presidency.
“Whether, and how, individual Americans vote this November may well be the most consequential climate-related decision most of them will have ever taken,” the authors conclude.
Stark Choices
Dunlap told DeSmog the choice facing US voters was glaring.
“Looking back, Gore versus Bush was stark, although Bush hid his denial for a bit. But now the partisan differences on climate change are out in the open, and the choices from the top down are stark.”
The Koch brothers had led a network of “conservative mega-donors” that had created a “shadow GOP” that had managed to reduce the influence of the Republican National Committee, the analysis argues.
These efforts, the article explains, have blocked legislation, limited international negotiations and made rejection of climate science “normative” among Republican elites and activists.
Widening Gaps
Dunlap, McCright and Yarosh looked at how elected Democrats and Republicans had voted on environment and climate bills in both houses of Congress since 1970, using data from the League of Conservation Voters. The researchers found:
What was once a modest tendency for Congressional Republicans to be less pro-environmental than their Democratic counterparts has become a chasm—with Republicans taking near-unanimous anti-environmental stances on relevant legislation in recent years, especially 2015.
Since 2001 polling company Gallup has been asking US voters for their views on aspects of climate change, such as if they think it’s happening, if it’s caused by humans and if they are concerned about it.
In 2001, 53 percent of Republican voters agreed that global warming was caused by humans, compared with 70 percent of Democrats — a gap of 17 percentage points. But by 2016, this gap had blown out to 41 percentage points, with only 43 percent of Republican voters accepting climate change is human-caused.
These “partisan gaps” had widened across all areas since 2008, except when voters were asked if they thought global warming had already started, where the gap remained at 34 percentage points.
Bridging the Gap?
Alongside the analysis, the authors look at various attempts to bring Republicans closer to accepting the realities of climate change, such as changing communication strategies. The writers claim:
Does any persuasive framing strategy hold special promise for penetrating Republicans’ partisan/ideological identities? The evidence so far gives little basis for optimism.
The sociologists say one major reason why attempts to better communicate the realities of climate change to conservatives have failed is down to “motivated cognition” — described as the tendency for people to only accept information that reinforces their existing political beliefs and their views on the world.
Even when Republicans experience extreme weather events, there was little evidence that this was enough for those voters to change their views. Dunlap told DeSmog:
“I fear polarization will be difficult to overcome because Republican reluctance to accept the reality and seriousness of human-caused climate change is in a self-reinforcing loop.
There are top-down cues from Republican political elites and their supporters from conservative think tanks to conservative media — especially the Murdoch media— that influence voters, as well as bottom-up pressure from party activists such as Tea Party supporters who act as ‘enforcers’ of party principles, especially in primary elections to select Republican candidates.
The result is that global warming has joined God, guns, gays, and abortion as core elements of Republican identity, and this will be hard to change.”
Since 2001 polling company Gallup has been asking US voters for their views on aspects of climate change, such as if they think it’s happening, if it’s caused by humans and if they are concerned about it.
In 2001, 53 percent of Republican voters agreed that global warming was caused by humans, compared with 70 percent of Democrats — a gap of 17 percentage points. But by 2016, this gap had blown out to 41 percentage points, with only 43 percent of Republican voters accepting climate change is human-caused.
These “partisan gaps” had widened across all areas since 2008, except when voters were asked if they thought global warming had already started, where the gap remained at 34 percentage points.
Bridging the Gap?
Alongside the analysis, the authors look at various attempts to bring Republicans closer to accepting the realities of climate change, such as changing communication strategies. The writers claim:
Does any persuasive framing strategy hold special promise for penetrating Republicans’ partisan/ideological identities? The evidence so far gives little basis for optimism.
The sociologists say one major reason why attempts to better communicate the realities of climate change to conservatives have failed is down to “motivated cognition” — described as the tendency for people to only accept information that reinforces their existing political beliefs and their views on the world.
Even when Republicans experience extreme weather events, there was little evidence that this was enough for those voters to change their views. Dunlap told DeSmog:
“I fear polarization will be difficult to overcome because Republican reluctance to accept the reality and seriousness of human-caused climate change is in a self-reinforcing loop.
There are top-down cues from Republican political elites and their supporters from conservative think tanks to conservative media — especially the Murdoch media— that influence voters, as well as bottom-up pressure from party activists such as Tea Party supporters who act as ‘enforcers’ of party principles, especially in primary elections to select Republican candidates.
The result is that global warming has joined God, guns, gays, and abortion as core elements of Republican identity, and this will be hard to change.”
Climate change is affecting the marine ecosystem – krill disappearing from Antarctic waters
Whales, seals and penguins could be hurting as this tiny creature–fundamental to the food web–declines, Scientific American By Andrea Thompson, Climate Central on August 29, 2016
They may be small, but krill—tiny, shrimp-like creatures—play a big role in the Antarctic food chain. As climate change warms the Southern Ocean and alters sea ice patterns, though, the area of Antarctic water suitable for krill to hatch and grow could drop precipitously, a new study finds.
Most Antarctic krill are found in an area from the Weddell Sea to the waters around the Antarctic Peninsula, the finger of land that juts up toward South America. They serve as an important source of food for various species of whales, seals and penguins. While those animals find other food sources during lean years, it is unclear if those alternate sources are sustainable long-term.
Over the past 40 years, populations of adult Antarctic krill have declined by 70 to 80 percent in those areas, though researchers debate whether that drop is due to the effects of climate change, a rebound in whale populations after the end of commercial whaling or some combination of those pressures.
Because of its key role in the regional food chain, scientists are concerned about the impacts that future climate change may have on the krill population and the larger Antarctic ecosystem.
In the new study published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, Andrea Piñones and Alexey Fedorov examined how expected changes in ocean temperatures and sea ice coverage might affect krill during their earliest life stages when they are most vulnerable to environmental conditions.
Krill has a complex, regimented life cycle that requires a delicate balance of conditions. …..
While warmer ocean temperatures help the krill hatch faster, declines in sea ice area, delayed sea ice formation, and a drop in phytoplankton populations meant that overall, the habitat suitable for young krill could decline by up to 80 percent, they found………http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/krill-are-disappearing-from-antarctic-waters/
Report finds Australia worst on climate change, among G20 nations
The report notes that if every country emulated Australia’s level of ambition, global warming would likely exceed 4C.
It also said that Australia’s currently implemented policy measures were not set to achieve even those inadequate targets and instead would rise to about 27% above 2005 levels by 2030, rather than the targeted 26 to 28% below 2005 levels.
Australia worst among G20 when it comes to action on climate change, report finds
Australia the only country to receive a rating of ‘very poor’ in a majority of categories in Climate Transparency scorecard, Guardian, Michael Slezak, 1 Sept 16, Australia is the worst country among the G20 when it comes to action on climate change, according to a comprehensive assessment before the G20 summit in China.
Under China’s leadership, this weekend’s G20 in the eastern city of Hangzhou has had a strong focus on climate-related issues.
By analysing the policies and actions of each of the 20 countries, which together produce 75% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions, Climate Transparency produced a report, scorecard and series of country profiles detailing their findings, revealing Australia was not pulling its weight.
On the scorecard, Australia was the only country to receive a rating of “very poor” in a majority of categories.
Australia was given the worst possible rating of “very poor” for its performance on emissions trends, carbon intensity, share of renewables in its energy supply and overall climate policy.
It was rated as “poor” in every other category: for its energy intensity, share of coal in energy supply and electricity emissions intensity.
Alvaro Umaña, co-chair of Climate Transparency and a former Costa Rican environment minister, said: “The G20 has proven that it can be nimble and take action on economic issues, so we are looking to these countries to do the same for the climate.”
Along with half the other G20 nations, Australia’s 2030 emissions reduction targets committed to at Paris – making up Australia’s intended nationally determined contribution – were given the worst possible rating of “inadequate”.
However, none of the 20 nations’ commitments were labelled as “sufficient” or “role model”, with the remaining 10 scored as “medium”.
The report notes that if every country emulated Australia’s level of ambition, global warming would likely exceed 4C.
It also said that Australia’s currently implemented policy measures were not set to achieve even those inadequate targets and instead would rise to about 27% above 2005 levels by 2030, rather than the targeted 26 to 28% below 2005 levels.
The report comes one day after Australia’s Climate Change Authority produced its long-awaited “special review”, recommending that the country should institute two emissions trading schemes…..
Last week international investors controlling $13tn worth of fundsurged the G20 to accelerate investment in clean energy, saying countries that ratified the Paris agreement early would benefit by attracting investment in low-carbon technology.
Those calls were particularly timely, coming as the the Australian parliament considers the effective abolition of the Australian Renewable Energy Agency, and one day after Guardian Australia revealed that new uncertainty had already caused at least two renewable energy projects to be suspended. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/sep/01/australia-worst-among-g20-when-it-comes-to-action-on-climate-change-report-finds
Unprecedented pace of global climate change – NASA
Nasa: Earth is warming at a pace ‘unprecedented in 1,000 years’ Records of temperature that go back far further than 1800s suggest warming of recent decades is out of step with any period over the past millennium, Guardian, Oliver Milman, 30 Aug 16, The planet is warming at a pace not experienced within the past 1,000 years, at least, making it “very unlikely” that the world will stay within a crucial temperature limit agreed by nations just last year, according to Nasa’s top climate scientist.
This year has already seen scorching heat around the world, with the average global temperature peaking at 1.38C above levels experienced in the 19th century, perilously close to the 1.5C limit agreed in the landmark Paris climate accord. July was the warmest month since modern record keeping began in 1880, with each month since October 2015 setting a new high mark for heat.
But Nasa said that records of temperature that go back far further, taken via analysis of ice cores and sediments, suggest that the warming of recent decades is out of step with any period over the past millennium.
“In the last 30 years we’ve really moved into exceptional territory,” Gavin Schmidt, director of Nasa’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, said. “It’s unprecedented in 1,000 years. There’s no period that has the trend seen in the 20th century in terms of the inclination (of temperatures).”……..https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/aug/30/nasa-climate-change-warning-earth-temperature-warming
USA govt urged by California to adopt a carbon tax
California has urged President Obama and Congress to tax carbon pollution Skeptical Science 29 August 2016 by dana1981 Last week, the California state senate passed Assembly Joint Resolution 43, urging the federal government to pass a revenue-neutral carbon tax:
WHEREAS, A national carbon tax would make the United States a leader in mitigating climate change and the advancing clean energy technologies of the 21st Century, and would incentivize other countries to enact similar carbon taxes, thereby reducing global carbon dioxide emissions without the need for complex international agreements; now, therefore, be it Resolved by the Assembly and the Senate of the State of California, jointly, That the Legislature hereby urges the United States Congress to enact, without delay, a tax on carbon-based fossil fuels; and be it further Resolved … That all tax revenue should be returned to middle- and low-income Americans to protect them from the impact of rising prices due to the tax
Copies of the Resolution were sent to President Obama, Vice President Biden, House Speaker Ryan, Senate Majority Leader McConnell, and to all members of Congress representing California. The document specifically calls for the type of revenue-neutral carbon tax advocated by the grassroots organization Citizens’ Climate Lobby. Studies have shown that a rising carbon tax with all revenue returned to taxpayers would have a modestly beneficial impact on the economy, while cutting carbon pollution at faster rates than current policies.
California exerts its climate leadership
California has become the US leader in tackling global warming. 10 years ago, the state passed the Global Warming Solutions Act, requiring that its greenhouse gas emissions in 2020 be no higher than 1990 levels. California achieved that goal in 2010, 10 years early, and is among the lowest per-capita carbon polluting states.
On the same day last week, the state legislature also passed a bill expanding the Global Warming Solutions Act, requiring a 40% cut in California’s carbon pollution from 1990 levels by 2030. In other words, California isn’t just calling on the federal government to take action on climate change; the state is leading the way…….http://www.skepticalscience.com/ca-urged-federal-carbon-tax.html
“State of the Climate 2016” – the 10 most startling facts
The 10 most startling facts about climate in 2015 — the warmest year on record [excellent maps and graphs] WP, By Jason Samenow August 2 Last year was unequivocally the warmest year on record for Earth. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Tuesday released a 300-page report documenting the historic warmth as well as scores of other aspects of 2015’s climate.
The hefty report, State of the Climate in 2015, was produced by more than 450 scientists from 62 countries around the world — more than any previous edition.
Every single direct indicator of temperature described in the report leaves no doubt that 2015’s global surface temperature towered over any year preceding it. Numerous other climate indicators related to temperature exhibited characteristics consistent with such historic warmth.
2015’s exceptional warmth was fueled by a record-challenging El Niño event, in which warmer-than-normal tropical Pacific Ocean waters infused heat into the atmosphere, and by record-setting concentrations of heat-trapping gases from human activity.
Here are the 10 most impressive findings from this report:
1. The global temperature was the highest on record…….
2. The average ocean surface temperature was warmest on record…..
3. Upper ocean heat content was highest on record…..
4. Global sea level was highest on record…..
5. The El Niño event was among the strongest on record……
6. Greenhouse gases were highest on record……
7. Record number of major tropical cyclones in Northern Hemisphere…….
8. Arctic sea ice had its lowest maximum extent……
9. Glaciers continued shrinking….
10. Extreme temperatures were most extreme on record……
The report is available online and will be published by the Bulletin of the America Meteorological Society. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/capital-weather-gang/wp/2016/08/02/the-10-most-startling-facts-about-climate-in-2015-the-warmest-year-on-record/
1 This Month
Protect Sazan Island from the Trump family! https://secure.avaaz.org/campaign/en/protect_sazan_island_from_the_trump_family_loc/?bqFCVab&v=174511&cl=22707147157&_checksum=5e9dde668860e8231c33699735e16a1fbf22ab2cb01da50c999fe8732b9775ef&utm_source=email&utm_medium=blast_email&utm_campaign=174511
Cuba Is Not a Failed State – It Is a Besieged State
PETITION: “Global Appeal to Endorse Palestinian Right of Return of Refugees”
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