21/12/2016

Climate Change News That Stuck With Us in 2016

New York Times

As the year ends, The New York Times asked reporters who have focused on climate change, global warming and the environment to choose the news they reported on that was the most memorable. These are their selections, ranging from sea level rise to the phenomenon of "rolling coal" to local actions to confront a warming planet.

 From One Hottest Year Into the Next
Clockwise from top left: flooding in Alexandria, Va., in June; a house raised on temporary supports in Norfolk, Va.; flooding in Colombo, Sri Lanka, in May; drought conditions at Lake Purdy in Alabama in October. Clockwise from top left: Gabriella Demczuk for The New York Times; Eliot Dudik for The New York Times; Eranga Jayawardena, via Associated Press; Brynn Anderson, via Associated Press
The year in climate news began with a theme that is growing familiar: word that 2015 had been the warmest year on record, just beating out 2014.
The immediate cause in both cases was a powerful climate pattern, known as El Niño, in which the tropical Pacific Ocean poured an enormous amount of heat into the global atmosphere, disrupting weather patterns on every continent. But scientists said the back-to- back heat records would not have occurred without an underlying trend of global warming caused by human emissions of greenhouse gases.
That physical reality does not seem to be making much of an impression in the United States Congress, where a large number of lawmakers continue to claim that the warming trend is somehow not real, or is even the product of a global scientific hoax. But in the real world, the effects are starting to be felt as never before. As land ice melts the world over and heat absorption causes ocean water to expand, the sea level is rising. Coastal communities from Norfolk, Va., to Miami are being forced to reckon with the consequences.
A small detail: Tidal flooding is becoming so common that towns are posting "No Wake" signs on the streets, where vehicles driving a little too fast through a foot or two of seawater can send damaging waves crashing against nearby property.
The extreme burst of global temperature records waned late in the year as the cooler La Niña weather pattern replaced El Niño in the tropical Pacific. But even so, the World Meteorological Organization predicted in November that 2016 would most likely beat 2015 to become the record-warmest year, the first time such a global temperature record will have been set three years in a row. — Justin Gillis

 Countering Denial by Being Nice
Katharine Hayhoe, a climate scientist at Texas Tech University. Lexey Swall for The New York Times
How do you talk about climate change during a presidential administration that denies it's happening?
President-elect Donald J. Trump has called climate change a hoax, and he has declared he will try to reverse the Obama administration's environmental efforts on matters ranging from the 2015 Paris climate agreement to the landmark Clean Power Plan, intended to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
But while administrations change, one thing appears to be stable: Most Americans already know that climate change is real and that human activity since the Industrial Age is the major cause. Polls by the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication found that more than half of those surveyed said that global warming is real, and only one in five disagree. But these same surveys show that Americans tend to rank the issue rather low in their priorities of urgent need for action.
The question for those trying to fight climate change, then, is how best to build on the degree of agreement that already exists and to encourage action by governments, businesses and individuals. For a very long time, these issues have been hashed out in fiery arguments between those who deny the overwhelming scientific consensus on climate science and those who try to explain the science and the reasons for strong measures. I dealt with that important question in an article about Katharine Hayhoe, a climate scientist at Texas Tech University who uses a gentle approach to reach the large number of Americans who are in the potentially persuadable middle. There is room for every kind of discourse, from raucous to gentle, when it comes to telling Americans about warming. But I came away from that piece with a thought that initially seemed banal, but ended up feeling profound: niceness works. — John Schwartz

Local Responses to a Changing Global Climate
A house with solar panels in Ashton Hayes, England. Elizabeth Dalziel for The New York Times
Most people who think that climate change is really happening also acknowledge that humans have caused it. But getting people to actually do something about it may be the next phase in the battle to prevent catastrophic warming.
Over the course of the last year, I've spoken with people in different communities around the world who are trying to do what they can to make a difference, even if they can't see the effects.
In a small village in the English countryside, residents have been working for 10 years to make their community carbon neutral — they've insulated their homes, hung laundry out to dry and installed solar panels. Part of their success has been in their approach: This should be fun, and it should involve all of us, because all of us stand to benefit from staving off the worst effects of climate change.
They have tried to connect the global problem of climate change to normal life, because it's not always about the melting polar ice caps or apocalyptic drought. Yes, climate change is about those things, but it is also about the ways that life in the 21st century makes most people, especially those in the developed world, part of the problem.
How are your own habits connected to larger environmental problems? How much power are you still using even when you've switched off your devices? How many plastic bottles of water do you drink every week, and how does that affect the environment and other people around you?
In the wake of the Paris agreement, most countries are involved in the fight against climate change. And while governments and power companies may make the most difference, what the rest of us — all seven billion of us — are doing matters, too. — Tatiana Schlossberg

 Engines of Environmental Backlash
An Illini State Pullers event at the McHenry County Fair in August in Woodstock, Ill. David Kasnic for The New York Times
If there is one phenomenon that epitomizes the contempt for regulations — particularly those designed to protect the environment — among some Americans, it might be "rolling coal."
It's a fad among some diesel truck owners who soup up their engines and remove their emissions controls to belch black smoke at pedestrians, cyclists and even unsuspecting Prius drivers.
And depending on whom you ask, the fad is a juvenile prank, a health hazard, a stand against rampant environmentalism or a brazen show of American freedom. I've seen rolling coal called the "open carry" of the anti-environmentalism movement.
"Why don't you go live in Sweden and get the heck out of our country. I will continue to roll coal anytime I feel like and fog your stupid eco-cars," one angry Illinois voter wrote to a local state representative who has proposed a $5,000 fine on anyone who removes or alters emissions equipment.
At its core, rolling coal seems to me to be a symptom of a backlash against the notion that we should seek to minimize the human footprint on earth, for the sake of the environment.
It is not the only such act. Since 2007, activists have drawn attention to the environment with a call to switch off appliances worldwide during an annual Earth Hour. But since 2009, the libertarian Competitive Enterprise Institute — home base of Myron Ebell, who Trump tapped for the transition at the Environmental Protection Agency — has countered with Human Achievement Hour, a call to spend that same hour keeping things on in defense of humankind's "basic human right to use energy."
Still, rolling coal goes too far even for some at the institute. Coal rollers who use their trucks for harassment, as opposed to celebration, "aren't being rebellious," said Michelle Minton, who is a fellow there. "They are just being jerks." — Hiroko Tabuchi

A Costly Effort to Make Coal Cleaner 
The Kemper County coal power plant in Mississippi. Josh Haner/The New York Times
In  the deeply poor, rural county of Kemper, Mississippi, there is a project to build a first-of-its-kind power plant using technology that has been heralded as the answer to many of our climate change woes.
A poster child for the promise of so-called clean coal, the troubled plant has occupied a central role in the Obama administration's plans to counter climate change. The technology the plant is supposed to showcase is also at the center of President-elect Trump's vision for many of our energy and environmental challenges.
Producing roughly 45 percent of the emissions that cause climate change, coal is a dirty fuel source. Yet the world still relies on it for power. The Kemper project was supposed to provide a model for a new version of carbon-capture technology that could be replicated around the world.
But the Kemper power plant is more than two years past deadline and more than $4 billion over budget. The plant's owner faces credit downgrades, multiple lawsuits and an investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission.
The investigation of this project unveiled an almost Shakespearean tale. In one arc we followed the prevailing public perception of the project as it shifted from hope to skepticism. In another arc we saw an engineer's personal journey from project pitchman to plant whistle-blower. Along the way, we watched a steady upward creep in the project's cost, shifting explanations the company and regulators gave for delays, and a growing intensity in the warnings from workers on site.
It all added up to more questions than answers: Did the plant's owner intentionally mislead the public, investors and regulators about the cost and timetable of the project? Why have 23 of the poorest counties in the country been saddled with costs connected to the most expensive power plant in American history? Can clean coal be replicated and built affordably and quickly enough to make it worth the investment? These questions remain. — Ian Urbina

 California's Drought Is Not Over
Erin Stacy was among the scientists measuring the snowpack in Yosemite in California in April. Jim Wilson/The New York Times
Parts of California were relatively wet last winter, leading to a much larger snowpack in the Sierra Nevada than the year before, along with rising optimism that the state might eventually see an end to severe drought conditions that have lingered for four years.
But when I visited Yosemite National Park in April for an article about the snowpack, high spring temperatures were already melting it quickly. And there were other worrisome signs of the effects of climate change — more rain and less snow at higher elevations.
Since then, California has seen some improvement. Only 21 percent of the state is in "exceptional" drought, down from 45 percent a year ago, as reported by the U.S. Drought Monitor, and there are even areas in the northwestern part of the state that are drought free.
But California is still in the grip of a prolonged drought, and the outlook — for the state and more broadly for the Southwest — is not promising. Forecasters say that in the short term, drier conditions may return this winter because of the weather phenomenon called La Niña. But it is the long-term situation that should be sobering for anyone who lives, or is thinking of living, in the region. Scientists say climate change has increased the risk of megadroughts, long dry periods that could make the current drought seem mild by comparison. — Henry Fountain

Climate Change and NASA's Mission on Earth
Participants during NASA's Icescape mission in the Arctic Ocean in 2011. NASA/Reuters
It  is not easy to find out what's happening in the Arctic Ocean. If you have a few months to spare, you can board an icebreaker and chug across a small section of the sea, taking measurements. Alternatively, you can pore through the images of the North Pole that have been captured by satellites over the past few decades.
Those images tell a startling story. While month-to-month measurements can be jumpy, the overall trend has been clearly heading down. Last month, satellites measured the lowest extent of Arctic sea ice for November since satellites started keeping records in 1979.
Global warming is a driving force behind this change. As we pump more carbon into the atmosphere, scientists warn that the Arctic will lose even more ice. In a matter of decades, scientists estimated this year, the Arctic Ocean may become ice-free in the summer.
The disappearance of Arctic ice is already having a huge impact on the ocean's ecosystem. In November, a team of scientists published a new analysis of satellite data, finding that the ocean has been increasing its production of algae by some 47 percent since 1997. Scientists suspect that the size and timing of this bloom is altering the entire Arctic food web, and they're now gathering data to find out what exactly is happening.
This study was carried out as part of NASA's Earth Science program, using data largely supplied by NASA's satellites. Shortly after the it was published, reports came out that President-elect Trump's advisers are pushing to shut down NASA's study of our own planet.
If we let our Earth-monitoring satellites wink out, the planet will not stop changing. The only thing that will change is our own ability to understand the Earth. — Carl Zimmer

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The Guardian View On Climate Change Action: Don’t Delay

The Guardian - Editorial

Arctic temperatures have been 20C above normal. The ice cap is shrinking. And Trump and Putin may see it as an advantage
A fisherman drives a boat near the Arctic Circle in Ilulissat, Greenland. 'Sea ice has shrunk to levels that scientists describe as 'off the scale'. Photograph: Evan Vucci/AP
Temperatures in the Arctic in the last two months have hit more than 20C above normal for the time of year. Temperatures that unusual in the UK and Europe would produce 45C summers. As a result, sea ice has shrunk to levels that scientists describe as "off the scale". Mapping the changes to the extent of sea ice over the last 40 years confirms that: on a graph, the lines are clustered together like threads in a hank of silk, warming and cooling in line with each other – until this year. This year's line drops down like a thin thread dangling into the void.
Extrapolating data from a single year must be done with caution. When El Niño boosted global temperatures to make 1998 the hottest year on record, a position it held until 2014, deniers claimed that this showed that global warming had "paused". In fact, several years after 1998 came within 0.3C of the record. The rise of a huge 20C over normal in the Arctic, the region that acts as one of the most important regulators in the global climate system, means that all expectations must now be rewritten.
Arctic snow and ice reflect heat back into space – the albedo effect. When there is less ice, less sunlight is reflected and the sea, newly exposed, absorbs more heat, which melts more ice, and so on in a cycle. This is of vital importance: it could represent a tipping point, beyond which the Arctic ice cap, by some projections, might soon disappear altogether in summer. This is not the only crucial climate role the Arctic plays. Sea and air currents swirling over and under the ice cool the globe and affect weather systems on the other side of the world, sometimes in ways that are still not fully understood.
Arctic sea ice extent shrank to its second lowest record this year, and is unusually low this winter. Guardian graphic Source: National Snow & Ice Data Center
Arctic sea ice has recovered in extent from previous lows. But that does not tell the whole story. When temperatures are less volatile, sea ice forms in layers over multiple years to a thick and solid mass. Ice that forms under this year's conditions is likely to be thinner and less stable than what it replaces, more vulnerable to another year's warming and less effective as a temperature regulator. For these reasons, the current drastic melting of the Arctic cannot be regarded merely as an outlier. While the effects of an ice-free Arctic on global weather systems are still in the realm of known unknowns, it is a known known that they will be disruptive. The current Arctic temperature and sea ice charts look like the beginning of a whole new trend, one that could change the global climate system for ever.
The imperative for action is therefore overwhelming. Reducing carbon dioxide is vital, and it is encouraging that annual emissions have been flat for three years. But now it is necessary to move further, faster. Some experts advocate cutting the amount of black, unburnt carbon – soot – as a matter of urgency. Much of this soot is borne by air currents to the Arctic, depositing it on pristine snow that turns black, and so more heat-absorbent. Some measures to stop soot, like capping coal-fired power stations and banning agricultural burning, are relatively easy. Others – cleaner vehicles and spreading the use of solar cookers in developing countries – might take longer.

Getting rid of potent hydrofluorocarbon gases, commonly used in refrigeration, has the broad backing of governments and industry, and will buy time. Methane, often a byproduct of fossil fuel exploration, should be used as an energy source, or at least flared, which is less harmful. Cutting these "short-lived climate pollutants" could prevent 0.5C of warming over the next 30 years, the research suggests. These are opportunities that must be taken; they are necessary, though not sufficient. So governments should also convene an Arctic council to explore other ways of protecting the region.
Driving progress demands just the kind of leadership that looks very much to have disappeared from the global scene. Vladimir Putin's Russia has been laying claim to vast Arctic areas, anticipating the realms of new possibility for commerce – new shipping lanes, cutting thousands of miles from current journeys – as well as oil and gas exploration that an ice-free Arctic would open up. For Donald Trump, such an unfrozen Arctic might allow the US to control key shipping routes, and find new oilfields and gas fields. Mr Trump's choice of Rex Tillerson, former head of Exxon Mobil and cheerleader for Mr Putin, as secretary of state is deeply worrying. Two friendly world leaders facing one an other across a vanishing Arctic ice cap. The thawing of the cold war is no longer a metaphor.

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El Niño On A Warming Planet May Have Sparked The Zika Epidemic, Scientists Report

Washington Post - Chelsea Harvey

A female Aedes aegypti mosquito in the process of acquiring blood from a human host. (James Gathany/Centers for Disease Control and Prevention via AP)
In  a world characterized by rising temperatures, deforestation and other human influences on the environment, the spread of infectious disease is a hot topic. Many recent studies suggest that environmental changes can affect the transmission of everything from malaria to the Zika virus — and it’s increasingly important to understand these links, scientists say.
This week, a new study has provided new evidence that environmental changes can increase the threat of disease. It concludes that unusually warm temperatures caused by 2015’s severe El Niño event — probably compounded by ongoing climate change — may have aided in the rapid spread of the Zika virus in South America that year. And while there are many complex factors at play in the spread of mosquito-borne diseases, the study may help scientists better prepare for the kinds of future effects we might see in our warming world.
“The start of the mission was simple — trying to address where the risk will be, where is it going to move next, where could Zika happen on the planet on a global scale,” said Cyril Caminade, a research fellow at the University of Liverpool and the new study’s lead author. To that end, the authors designed a study that would help them determine how climatic changes have impacted the mosquito-borne transmission of Zika.
There are two main species of mosquito known to carry the Zika virus — Aedes aegypti, or the yellow fever mosquito, which is widespread in the tropics; and Aedes albopictus, or the Asian tiger mosquito, which lives in both tropical and temperate regions of the world. Scientists also believe Zika can be sexually transmitted, but the new study focused only on mosquito transmission.
For the study, the researchers collected published information on the distribution of these two mosquito species and how temperature variations can affect them. Studies suggest, for instance, that up to a certain point, rising temperatures can cause mosquitoes to bite more frequently. The researchers also collected global historical climate data from the past few decades and used all the information to build a model of Zika transmission worldwide.
The model produced an unusually high disease transmission potential in the tropics for the year 2015, including in Colombia and Brazil, the countries hit hardest by Zika. Similar results occurred between 1997 and 1998, one of the only other times on record to experience such a brutal El Niño event.
“[O]ur model indicates that the 2015 El Niño event, superimposed on the long-term global warming trend, has had an important amplification effect,” the researchers note in the paper.
The model also helped the researchers identify the ideal seasonal climate conditions for Zika transmission around the world. In South America, for instance, the model suggests that the potential for transmission should peak in the winter and spring.
In the southeastern U.S., on the other hand, summer is ideal. In fact, the model suggests this region has a high potential for disease transmission during this time, due partly to the high temperatures and partly to the fact that both mosquito species are found there.
That said, reports of Zika have been limited in the U.S. so far — and this speaks to the complexity of vector-borne disease transmission, Caminade said. Climate can certainly play a significant role in setting up the right conditions for an outbreak, but epidemics also depend on many other factors, including population density, access to healthcare and the use of pesticides and other anti-mosquito interventions in any given location. Some of these factors — which were not accounted for in the new study — can probably explain why there hasn’t been much Zika transmission in the U.S. so far.
Caminade also pointed out that after a population has been exposed to a mosquito-borne disease like Zika, a phenomenon called “herd immunity” often occurs — this happens when so many people have already been exposed, and developed an immunity, that there aren’t enough new people left to infect to continue the epidemic. This is the probably part of the reason we didn’t see Zika epidemics in other tropical parts of the world in 2015, despite the new study’s results. And some experts have suggested that herd immunity will likely cause the current situation in South America to burn itself out within a few more years.
But Caminade cautions that there’s still the potential for Zika outbreaks in other parts of the world where the conditions are right, including the United States and even southern Europe. The result would likely be milder than what’s been experienced in South America in the past year, but there’s “still risk,” he said.
According to Caminade, one of the study’s major takeaway points is that extreme climate conditions can lead to all kinds of unusual events — droughts, floods and wildfires are only a few examples — and disease outbreak is just one more potential disaster scientists should be looking out for when these conditions occur.
And such events may only be exacerbated by future climate change. Some studies have suggested that the kinds of “monster” El Niño events seen in 1997 and 2015 may be more likely in a warmer world, Caminade pointed out. But he added that scientists wishing to make more precise predictions about the future spread of disease must take a wide variety of factors into account — climate is just one of them.
“I won’t overplay the role of climate for the future,” he said. “It’s still a disease, and there are still parameters which are going to be very important.”

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