Lethal Heating: 05/14/17

14/05/2017

To Simulate Climate Change, Scientists Build Miniature Worlds

New York Times - Carl Zimmer

A researcher ran tests on a miniature ecosystem of sand, sea grass, algae, invertebrates and fish that was designed to simulate the impact of climate change. Credit University of Adelaide

Climate change will alter the ecosystems that humanity depends upon in the coming century. But given the complexity of the living world, how can you learn what may happen?

A team of Australian scientists has an answer: miniature ecosystems designed to simulate the impact of climate change. The experiments are already revealing dangers that would have been missed had researchers tried to study individual species in isolation.

“If you just take one fish and put it in a tank and see how it responds to temperature, you can imagine that’s a huge simplification of reality,” said Ivan Nagelkerken, an ecologist at the University of Adelaide who is leading the research effort.

Yet studying an entire ecosystem in nature, made up of thousands of species, has its own drawbacks. “In nature you have all this complexity, and you never know which factor is really causing the outcome you’re observing,” Dr. Nagelkerken said.

Between these two extremes, Dr. Nagelkerken and his colleagues have tried to create a happy medium. They filled 12 pools with 475 gallons of seawater apiece and built simple ocean ecosystems in each one.

They put sand and rocks on the bottom of the pools, along with artificial sea grass on which algae could grow. They stocked their small-scale ecosystems, called mesocosms, with local species of crustaceans and other invertebrates, which grazed on the algae.

For predators, they added a small fish known as the Southern longfin goby, which feeds on invertebrates.

The small-scale ecosystems, called mesocosms, contained sand and rocks on the bottom of the pools and artificial sea grass on which algae could grow. Crustaceans and other invertebrates were added to graze on the algae. Credit University of Adelaide

To test the effects of climate change, Dr. Nagelkerken and his colleagues manipulated the water in the pools. In three of them, the researchers raised the temperature 5 degrees — a conservative projection of how warm water off the coast of South Australia will get.

The scientists also studied the effect of the carbon dioxide that is raising the planet’s temperature.

The gas is dissolving into the oceans, making them more acidic and potentially causing harm to marine animals and plants. Yet the extra carbon dioxide can be used by algae to carry out more photosynthesis.

To measure the overall impact, Dr. Nagelkerken and his colleagues pumped the gas into three of the pools, keeping them at today’s ocean temperatures.

In three others, the researchers made both changes, heating up the water and pumping in carbon dioxide. The scientists left the remaining three pools unaltered, to serve as a baseline for measuring changes in the other nine pools.

On its own, Dr. Nagelkerken and his colleagues found, carbon dioxide benefited all three layers of the food web. Algae grew faster, providing more food for the invertebrates. The invertebrates, in turn, provided more food to the gobies.

But the combination of extra carbon dioxide with warmer water wiped out that benefit.

Even with extra algae to eat, the invertebrates failed to grow faster, perhaps because the algae provide less nutrition when they grow at higher temperatures. It is also possible that the invertebrates are under too much stress in warmer water to grow more.

The invertebrates also faced more pressure from their predators. The warm water sped up the metabolism of the gobies, making them hungrier. They devoured more invertebrates. Hammered from above and below, the invertebrate populations collapsed.

Mary I. O’Connor, an ecologist at the University of British Columbia who was not involved in the Australian research, praised it as an ambitious advance on earlier studies. “It’s showed us something we haven’t seen before,” she said.

Dr. Nagelkerken and his colleagues published initial results from these mesocosm studies last month in the journal Global Change Biology. In a separate report published in the February issue of the journal Oikos, Dr. Nagelkerken and his colleagues reported evidence that acidification can interfere with the ability of fish to hunt.

In that study, the researchers raised a species of sharks in warm, acidified seawater. They found that the sharks hunted more for sea urchins, one of the species they eat because of higher temperatures.

But they were less successful at detecting prey, most likely because the altered chemistry of the seawater interfered with their nervous systems.

Dr. Nagelkerken said these experiments had ominous implications for ocean ecosystems — as well as for the 3.1 billion people worldwide who depend on fish for 20 percent or more of their protein.

“As you go further higher up the food web, you get more of a mismatch between the need for food and the availability of food,” Dr. Nagelkerken said. And it’s the species high in the ocean’s food webs that we fish for.

Just how vulnerable fish will be depends on their individual ecosystems. Dr. Nagelkerken said he hoped the studies he and his colleagues are carrying out will prompt other researchers to replicate them with species and conditions from other parts of the world.

“These kinds of experiments are essential tools for understanding change in nature,” Dr. O’Connor, the University of British Columbia ecologist, said.

Dr. Nagelkerken’s research, she said, “is not a prediction of the future, but it is nice proof that we can expect food web reorganization with continued ocean warming and acidification.”

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Intelligence Community To Trump: When It Comes To Global Warming, You're Wrong

Mashable Australia - Andrew Freedman

Cyclone Debbie hits Queensland, Australia on March 28, 2017. Image: Newspix/REX/Shutterstock

Each year the intelligence community puts together a "Worldwide Threat Assessment" report, and it inevitably scares the hell out of Congress and the public by detailing all the dangers facing the U.S. (Hint: there are a lot of them.)

This year's report, published Thursday and discussed at a congressional hearing, makes for particularly disquieting reading.
While it focuses on the increasing danger that North Korea's nuclear weapons program poses as well as cyberterrorism threats, one environmental concern stands out on the list: climate change.

According to the new report, delivered to the Senate Intelligence Committee by Dan Coats, the director of national intelligence (DNI), warns that climate change is raising the likelihood of instability and conflict around the world.
This is surprising given the Trump administration's open hostility to climate science findings.
"The trend toward a warming climate is forecast to continue in 2017," the report states, noting that 2016 was the hottest year on record worldwide. Climate scientists have firmly tied this to human-caused emissions of greenhouse gases, though the report does not make that link.

Norfolk Naval Base, the largest in the world, is experiencing flooding from sea level rise. Image: US NAVY HAND/REX/Shutterstock

"This warming is projected to fuel more intense and frequent extreme weather events that will be distributed unequally in time and geography. Countries with large populations in coastal areas are particularly vulnerable to tropical weather events and storm surges, especially in Asia and Africa," the report states.

The report also cites worsening air pollution in urban areas around the globe, potential water resources conflicts in places like the Middle East. Interestingly, the intelligence report also says that biodiversity losses from pollution, overexploitation and other causes is "disrupting ecosystems that support life, including humans."
"The rate of species loss worldwide Is estimated at 100 to 1,000 times higher than the natural background extinction rate, according to peer-reviewed scientific literature," the report states.
The findings in this report are surprising considering the Trump administration's hostility to mainstream climate science findings and policies aimed at cutting emissions of greenhouse gases that are warming the planet. Some agencies, such as the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Interior Department, have gone so far as to take down pages devoted to peer-reviewed scientific reports on climate change.
For example, EPA administrator Scott Pruitt has said he does not believe that carbon dioxide is the main driver of global warming. This view goes against thousands of peer reviewed climate studies, as well as findings from his own agency.
However, there is a caveat in the intelligence community's assessment that lets Coats avoid being accused of aligning himself with the administration's critics in the environmental community.
"We assess national security Implications of climate change but do not adjudicate the science of climate change," the report states. In other words, "We're just telling you what's happening, not why it's happening."

Waves batter the sea wall and the lighthouse at Porthcawl, south Wales as storm Doris hits the UK in February 2017. Image: Huw Evans/REX/Shutterstock

"In assessing these Implications, we rely on US government-coordinated scientific reports, peer reviewed literature, and reports produced by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which Is the leading International body responsible for assessing the science related to climate change."
Past intelligence and Defense Department assessments have also warned of potentially severe blowback from global warming. For example, a 2016 report from the National Intelligence Council (NIC), which advises the DNI, found that extreme weather events have growing implications for humans, which “suggest[s] that climate-change related disruptions are well underway."
That report also stated that climate change will cause growing security risks for the U.S. during the next several years. It was the first major intelligence review to cast climate change as a present-day security challenge, rather than a distant, far-off threat.
The military is already experiencing global warming impacts at its bases, particularly the Navy, which is dealing with sea level rise at its facilities.
WATCH: 2016 was Earth's warmest year on record, continuing a three-year streak

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Climate Change A Major Mental Health Threat, Experts Warn

Medscape - Alicia Ault

Climate change is a major threat to mental health, the American Psychiatric Association (APA), warns. The association has joined the growing ranks of physician groups that are sounding the alarm about the multifactorial effects that rising seas, temperature extremes, and changing environments are having on individuals' physical and mental health.
In a new position statement, the APA focuses on the profound impact of climate change on mental health, which may include the development or exacerbation of mental illnesses such as anxiety, depression, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), or substance abuse.
"Those with mental health disorders are disproportionately impacted by the consequences of climate change. APA recognizes and commits to support and collaborate with patients, communities, and other healthcare organizations engaged in efforts to mitigate the adverse health and mental health effects of climate change," the APA statement said.
Climate change and its weather-related consequences are occurring more frequently, becoming more destructive, are are occurring in places where they were not as common before, Joshua C. Morganstein, MD, the lead author of the position statement, told Medscape Medical News.
The APA began working on its climate change response in 2015. After review by various committees, the association's assembly approved the statement in November 2016 and submitted it to the board, which gave its backing in March of this year.
The statement is supported by a growing body of scientific evidence on the damaging effects of climate change, said Dr Morganstein. "There's a relatively robust body of literature about the adverse psychological and behavioral health effects of weather-related disasters," he said.
Dr Morganstein and coauthor Robert Ursano, MD, who are both members of the APA's Psychiatric Dimensions of Disaster Committee and are practicing psychiatrists in Bethesda, Maryland, also contributed to the chapter on mental health in a recent key federal report on climate change, The Impacts of Climate Change on Human Health in the United States: A Scientific Assessment. The report was issued by the US Global Change Research Program in April 2016.
Among the report's main findings for mental health:

Exposure to disasters results in mental health consequences, some chronic.
Children, the elderly, people with preexisting mental illness, the economically disadvantaged, and first responders are at higher risk for distress and other adverse mental health consequences from climate- or weather-related disasters. Communities that rely on the natural environment for sustenance and livelihood, as well as populations living in areas most susceptible to specific climate change events, are at increased risk for adverse mental health outcomes.
Just the threat of climate change can cause some people to experience adverse mental health outcomes, and media and popular representations of climate change can influence stress responses and mental well-being.
Extreme heat can put people with mental illness at higher risk for poor physical and mental health.

Dialing Down the Stress
The report helped solidify the idea that mental health is just as important as physical health, especially when it comes to weather-associated disasters caused by climate change, said Dr Morganstein. "For some disasters, the mental health effects can vastly exceed the economic costs or other health effects," he said.
Often, the mental impact of a natural disaster is lost in the shuffle, he said. Having an understanding of the potential short- and long-term fallout on mental well-being is key to preventing worse outcomes, said Dr Morganstein.
ndividuals with existing anxiety or depression or PTSD could see a worsening of symptoms. Individuals may develop these disorders as a result of the stress of the event. Distress reactions may also occur in the form of risky behaviors, such as increased alcohol or drug use, he added.
Many individuals will show up in the emergency department or primary care physician's office first — that's why it's important for psychiatrists to collaborate with other specialties to help prepare for these disasters, he said.
For many individuals, just the thought of climate change is enough to produce severe anxiety and/or depression, and perhaps a sense of hopelessness. For others, it gives rise to a strong denial reaction.
Dr Morganstein said psychiatrists can help dial down stress in patients —especially those who are more vulnerable because of existing mental disorders — by giving them pragmatic steps, such as asking them to determine and understand their child's school emergency plan or their own workplace emergency plan.
"Feeling like you can help yourself and feeling like you can help others is a really important piece of how people can respond to disasters," said Dr Morganstein.
Another recommendation, especially for people already prone to anxiety, is to limit exposure to media, he said. For some, repeated ingestion of climate change news can increase stress and negative reactions. "We encourage people to be very cautious about this," said Dr Morganstein.
A sense of preparedness can help ease stress, at least on a population level, he said. "We can't control when disasters will occur," he said. But physicians can help patients "control how well prepared they feel" for a disaster, said Dr Morganstein.

"Climate Change Is a Fact"
Some of the Trump administration's appointments and policies — such as pledging to renegotiate the landmark 2015 Paris agreement to fight climate change that was backed by the United States and some 200 countries — have caused concern that the public's health will be put at risk during the next 4 years.
But the APA's statement was not issued as a rebuke to the new administration, said Dr Morganstein, noting that it had been in the works for several years.
The American College of Physicians issued a position statement on climate change in May 2016.
"The issue of climate change is not political," Nitin Damle, MD, MACP, immediate past president of the ACP, told Medscape Medical News. "Climate change is a fact," he said. "It's occurring now, and it's affecting our patients' health from an individual and a public health standpoint."
Dr Damle cites increases in respiratory illness, asthma, and allergies from increased pollution and longer pollen seasons, heat waves that put people at risk for heat-related illnesses, and an increase in vector-borne diseases such as Lyme disease, dengue, West Nile virus, and chikungunya. Forced migration due to environmental changes such as drought or flooding are leading to a strain of social relationships, depression, and PTSD, he said.
The time to take action is now, said Dr Damle.
The ACP is part of the Medical Society Consortium on Climate and Health, which released a report in March, Medical Alert! Climate Change Is Harming Our Health.
The consortium includes the American Academy of Family Physicians, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, and the Society of General Internal Medicine, among other medical and scientific groups.
The American Psychological Association is also a member of the consortium. It, too, released a massive report on the mental health effects of climate change in March.

Not Politically Motivated
The report's release was not politically motivated, said Howard Kurtzman, PhD, the American Psychological Association's acting executive director for science.
Mental Health and Our Changing Climate: Impacts, Implications, and Guidance, was an update of a 2014 report, he said. In fact, when the American Psychological Association started the update, there was a sense of optimism in the wake of the Paris accord, Dr Kurtzman told Medscape Medical News.
The 2017 report — which incorporated more and newer evidence — has received more attention, likely in part because of the concerns about the Trump administration, Dr Kurtzman said. But, he also said, "I think people are ready to hear this message."
The message? That climate change has effects not only on physical health —through the spread of disease and the reemergence of old disease, for example — but also on mental health and that certain communities are at higher risk for damage from climate change because of where they live or because they have preexisting mental health issues or live in poverty, said Dr Kurtzman. "On the other hand, there are ways people and communities can address this challenge," he said.
That includes taking political action, and also supporting each other and learning how to prepare. "We need to find ways to help people and communities obtain a sense of control," Dr Kurtzman said.
Psychologists can help patients build resilience and learn how to adapt, he said. They should also work together with other colleagues in the health field, said Dr Kurtzman.
"There's much more to be done in terms of us working together, but I'm sure we'd all agree on the importance of that," he said.

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