The 10 Most Ridiculous Things Media Figures Said About Climate Change And The Environment In 2017

Media Matters - Kevin Kalhoefer

Sarah Wasko / Media Matters

1. Breitbart’s James Delingpole claimed 400 new scientific papers show global warming is a myth.
Numerous studies have found near-unanimous scientific agreement on human-caused climate change, with perhaps the most well-known study on the matter finding that 97 percent of scientific papers taking a position on the cause of global warming agree that humans are behind it. And this year, a review of the 3 percent of papers that deny climate change found that they were all flawed. Nonetheless, Breitbart writer Delingpole claimed that 400 scientific papers published this year demonstrated that climate change is a “myth,” basing his article on a post on the denialist blog No Tricks Zone.The fact-checking website Snopes roundly debunked Delingpole’s article, giving it a “False” verdict after speaking with authors of some of the cited papers who said their work was grossly misinterpreted or misrepresented.

2. The Daily Mail claimed government researchers “duped” world leaders with "manipulated global warming data."
Daily Mail reporter David Rose alleged that climate scientists "rushed" to publish an "exaggerated" paper in an attempt to convince leaders to support the Paris agreement and spend billions to fight climate change. Rose, who has written his fair share of climate misinformation for the Mail, based his story on an “exclusive interview” with and a blog post by retired U.S. government scientist John Bates. The error-ridden article quickly made its way around right-wing media in outlets such as The Daily Caller, National Review, and Breitbart, and was even promoted by GOP members of the House science committee, including its chairman Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX). The story’s claims also received “at least 752,300 shares, likes, comments, or other interactions on social media,” according to a Buzzfeed analysis. But the claims in the article were widely discredited by climate scientists, including Bates’ former colleagues and even Bates himself. The errors in the Mail’s article were so significant that the Independent Press Standards Organization (IPSO), an independent media regulator in the U.K., issued a ruling that "the newspaper had failed to take care over the accuracy of the article ... and had then failed to correct ... significantly misleading statements." The Daily Mail was required to publish IPSO's reprimand.

3. Radio host Rush Limbaugh said he was "leery" of hurricane forecasts because they advance a "climate change agenda."
As Hurricane Irma barrelled toward Florida, Limbaugh spun conspiracy theories and told his listeners that hurricane warnings are part of a scheme to benefit retailers, the media, and people like Al Gore who want to "advance this climate change agenda." Notably, Limbaugh didn’t have any skepticism about the danger Irma posed when it came to his own well-being, as he fled from his Florida home to Los Angeles before Irma made landfall. It's not the first time Limbaugh has spouted irresponsible conspiracy theories about hurricane forecasts. He was criticized last year for doing the same thing during Hurricane Matthew, earning himself a spot on the 2016 edition of this list.

4. New York Times columnist Bret Stephens argued that because political operatives were wrong in predicting Hillary Clinton would win the election, people should be skeptical of climate science.
After Trump’s election, The New York Times launched an ad campaign billing itself as the antidote to Trumpian “alternative facts.” Shortly after that campaign, though, the Times hired Stephens as a columnist -- a serial misinformer who had called climate change a “sick-souled religion” during his time at The Wall Street Journal. In his inaugural column for the Times, Stephens encouraged skepticism of climate scientists and compared those who advocate climate action to Cold War-era authoritarians. Stephens’ column was short on actual facts and science; the one time he cited a scientific report, he got it wrong. The Times added a correction to the column, but numerous scientists pointed out that the correction wasn’t sufficient, and a number of scientists canceled their subscriptions over Stephens’ hiring, his problematic column, and the Times public editor’s dismissive defense of Stephens’ column. EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt later cited Stephens' column to defend the Trump administration's decision to pull out of the Paris agreement.

5. Conservative media commentator Stephen Moore claimed that Trump created tens of thousands of coal jobs in the first few months of his presidency.
Experts and journalists have repeatedly noted that President Donald Trump's campaign promise to bring back coal jobs is an empty one, since the decades-long decline in coal mining jobs has been driven much more by economic forces, such as increased automation and competition from natural gas and renewables, than by government regulations. But that didn’t stop Moore, a frequent Fox and CNN commentator and former Trump economic advisor, from proclaiming in op-eds in The Washington Times and Breitbart that Trump had already made good on his promise after just a few months in office. Moore cited jobs reports from March and April to claim that Trump had added tens of thousands of mining jobs, thereby restoring the coal industry. But Moore grossly misrepresented the data he cited, which actually included jobs in a number of sectors like oil and gas. Had Moore bothered to look at the actual coal mining jobs category, he would have seen that it had only grown by approximately 200 jobs through April, barely moving since Election Day.

6. Radio host Hugh Hewitt recommended appointing Rush Limbaugh to a national commission to study climate change.
In an op-ed for The Washington Post, Hewitt proposed creating a “national commission led by men and women of impeccable credentials” to determine whether and how the U.S. should address climate change, arguing that the country needs a group of “[d]iverse, smart non-scientists who are going to listen to the scientists -- all of them -- and report back on what ought to be done.” But Hewitt’s proposal instantly lost all credibility when he suggested including Rush Limbaugh as one of the commission members. Limbaugh has repeatedly called climate change a hoax, promoted dangerous climate-related conspiracy theories, misrepresented research in an attempt to dispute that global warming is happening, and even criticized a TV show for portraying climate change as a reality.

7. Fox hosts attacked a journalist and called him "stupid" for asking a Trump official about the links between hurricanes and climate change.
2017 was a record year for hurricanes, as Harvey, Irma, and Maria wreaked havoc along their respective paths. A number of climate scientists have explained how climate change exacerbates some of the worst impacts of hurricanes. While CNN and MSNBC frequently aired segments discussing the link between climate change and hurricanes like Harvey and Irma, Fox News hosts almost exclusively covered the climate change-hurricane link by criticizing others who raised the issue. The September 11 episode of Fox's The Five, for example, featured a lengthy discussion in which hosts criticized CNN's Jim Acosta for asking Homeland Security Advisor Tom Bossert whether there's a link between climate change and powerful hurricanes. The hosts said that Acosta was “anti-science” and looked “stupid” and “dumb,” and they called his question was "politically opportunistic." Fox's Jesse Watters said concern about climate change stems from liberal “guilt” and a desire to control people’s lives. Likewise, on the radio show Breitbart News Daily, host Alex Marlow pushed EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt to deny the link between climate change and hurricanes, which Pruitt did, stating, “For opportunistic media to use events like this to, without basis or support, just to simply engage in a cause-and-effect type of discussion, and not focus upon the needs of people, I think is misplaced."

8. Rush Limbaugh argued that the historic BP oil spill caused no environmental damage.

Limbaugh cited an article in the right-wing Daily Caller headlined “Bacteria Are Eating Most Of The 2010 BP Oil Spill” and concluded, “The BP spill didn’t do any environmental [damage].” The Deepwater Horizon spill, which leaked oil for 87 days, was the largest accidental spill of oil into marine waters in world history. Researchers have documented a wide array of negative environmental impacts from the disaster. For example, a 2016 study found that the BP spill may have caused irreversible damage to one of the Gulf shore’s most important ecosystems. The spill is believed to have killed tens of thousands animals in 2010, and for years afterward, dolphins and other animals in the area continued to die at higher-than-normal rates.

9. Fox News’ Jesse Watters claimed, “No one is dying from climate change.”

During a discussion about Al Gore’s warnings on climate change, Watters, a co-host of Fox News’ The Five, declared, “People are dying from terrorism. No one is dying from climate change.” Rush Limbaugh also made the same assertion this year. But an independent report commissioned by 20 governments in 2012 concluded that climate change already kills more people than terrorism, with an estimated 400,000 deaths linked to climate change each year.

10. Radio host Alex Jones said it was "suspicious" that Hurricane Irma came along shortly before the release of a climate disaster movie.

Jones briefly speculated about the possibility that Hurricane Irma was “geoengineered” or created by humans before stating, “Meanwhile, though, right on time with these superstorms, we have the new film Geoengineering (sic) 2017, coming soon on October 20. Oh, just a little bit more than a month or so after Irma is set to hit. Isn’t that just perfect timing? Like all these race war films they’ve been putting out. This is starting to get suspicious. Here it is, Geostorm.” The action movie Geostorm featured satellites that controlled the global climate. Jones' speculation about the film is just one of the countless conspiracy theories he has promoted over the years.

Links

• 2017 was a terrible year of climate disasters -- and too many media outlets failed to tell the story
• Far-right media seize on flawed Bloomberg article to push bogus "deep state" theories
• CNN hosts a scientist to explain why Trump’s government agencies banning words is dangerous and anti-science
• Pruitt’s war on the press continues as EPA hires firm to create media-tracking "war room"
• Breitbart writer: Pope Francis supports the Paris climate agreement "because of his dislike of the First World, and particularly the United States"
• CNN shows the right way to report on hurricanes and climate change
• Highlighting Media Matters research, Al Jazeera calls out "gaping hole" in media coverage of climate change

Cabinet Papers: Keating MPs Considered Carbon Tax To Tackle Climate Change

The Guardian - Anne Davies

Cabinet debated how to cling on to government’s ‘no regrets’ policy while maintaining Australia’s influence at international bargaining table

Australia’s response to climate change and meeting international obligations proved difficult for Paul Keating’s government in 1994 and 1995, according to cabinet papers. Photograph: Getty Images

Australia’s response to climate change and the challenge of meeting its international obligations proved as difficult for the Keating government in 1994 and 1995 as it would for future governments.
Cabinet papers released by the Australian National Archives on Monday show that much of the debate in the Keating cabinet was about how to cling on to the government’s “no regrets” policy while maintaining Australia’s influence at the international bargaining table.
The “no regrets” policy meant Australia would consider only measures that involved cutting emissions without any adverse impact on the economy or trade competitiveness. That ruled out most measures to tax fossil fuels, which would increase the cost of electricity.
It meant Australia relied mainly on creating carbon sinks by limiting land-clearing and planting trees.
Australia had signed on to targets at an international conference in Toronto in 1990 on the basis that the convention would recognise Australia’s high dependence on fossil fuels.
But by September 1994 ministers were told Australia was falling woefully behind the implied target set in the Framework Convention on Climate Change and the interim planning target it had set itself.
The interim target involved stabilising greenhouse gas emissions at 1988 levels by 2000, with a 20% reduction by 2005.
The cabinet was told Australia would achieve only 54% of the target, mainly through the One Billion Trees program.
“Estimates of Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions and sink activity for 2000 indicate that Australia will not achieve either the implied target in the convention or the IPT,” the cabinet documents say.
The papers note the Australian government was under increasing pressure from Europe and Pacific island nations to take tougher steps to reduce carbon dioxide emissions.
The truth was that the “no regrets” policy made Australia’s efforts to cut emissions ineffectual, as officials acknowledged in the cabinet papers.
But instead of taking tougher measures, most of the discussion in cabinet was about how to manage Austalia’s “relatively poor domestic greenhouse gas response”.
The cabinet devised a two-pronged negotiating strategy for the next round of international meetings: advancement of the principle of “equitable burden sharing” and the “promotion of realistic and achievable means to to involve developing countries in emissions reductions”.
“Equitable burden sharing” was a nebulous idea that countries who were similarly dependent on fossil fuels should “share the burden” in the way the EU was doing across its member states. The cabinet identified Norway, Canada, the Russian Federation and Poland as possible allies, as well as Sweden and New Zealand.
But it warned there could be opposition from fossil fuel importers such as the EU – in particular Germany – and from Japan and Austria.
The second leg of the negotiating policy was to press for some type of commitment from developing countries. This was a theme that would continue throughout the negotiations of future agreements and was taken up with gusto by the US president, George W Bush, after 2001.
A 1994 cabinet paper included an option of withdrawing from future negotiations altogether but it warned that Australia faced a real risk that it could have bans placed on its exports as a result.
By December 1994, with a further conference looming in March 1995, the cabinet was again wrestling with Australia’s poor performance.
It began developing further “no regrets” policies.
Among the policy responses considered was a carbon or energy tax. But modelling by the Australian Bureau of Agriculture Resource Economics found the tax would be at about $US118 a tonne by 2000 compared with an average of $US24 for OECD countries.
The costs of meeting the IPT target with a carbon tax alone would be prohibitive, the papers warn. Again there was discussion of abandoning the target.
Instead the cabinet agreed to implement a voluntary program for industry called “Response to the Greenhouse Challenge”. The cabinet was told there was support for the voluntary approach from manufacturers and the mining and electricity sectors.
There was also discussion of a spending package to boost renewable energy and tree-planting, which ranged from $45m to $78m.
The finance department was highly critical, saying it “questioned the essentiality” of bringing the submission forward outside the 1995-96 budget. It described the spending as “mostly short-term” and said it would have little impact on the target gap.

Links

• Cabinet Papers
• 'We didn't know exactly what we needed to do': The climate change battle in 1994
• Cabinet papers 1994-95: Keating’s climate policy grapples sound eerily familiar
• Cabinet papers: emissions reduction targets plagued Keating
• It’s 30 years since scientists first warned of climate threats to Australia
• Government infighting over old growth forest logging revealed in 1995 cabinet papers

The Growing Movement To Take Polluters To Court Over Climate Change

New Republic - Emily Atkin

As climate liability lawsuits rise, industry forces are fighting back.

Peter Macdiarmid/Getty

There’s a vast conspiracy afoot to decimate American manufacturing.
Wealthy environmentalists and greedy attorneys are trying to stuff their already-fat pockets by suing defenseless companies over their contributions to global warming.
They allege that energy manufacturers create a “public nuisance” by emitting greenhouse gases and are liable for the damages this causes.
Worse, they disguise themselves as do-gooders: They represent plaintiffs like Alaska Native American tribes who are losing their frozen land to warming temperatures, and communities impacted by sea-level rise.
But these con artists aren’t really trying to save the planet. They’re trying to put American companies out of business.
That’s the core message of a new trade group quietly formed last month by the National Association of Manufacturers, the largest industry trade group of its kind and a powerful lobbying force in Washington.

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The Manufacturers’ Accountability Project was formed to “highlight the concerted, coordinated efforts made by trial lawyers, public officials, deep-pocketed foundations and other activists” to undermine manufacturing—but with a specific focus on lawsuits that seek to hold corporations financially responsible for their role in the climate crisis. No other trade association has ever undertaken such an effort. “We are the first group out there,” a spokesperson told the Washington Examiner.
MAP is a novel effort because climate liability cases are, too. In the last year, an increasing number of plaintiffs and attorneys general have attempted to use the courts to punish big polluters, seeking punitive damages or other penalties against companies that contribute to climate change. And we know who those companies are: Earlier this year, a peer-reviewed study asserted that just 90 companies were responsible for as much as 50 percent of the increase in global temperature and 32 percent of sea level rise since 1880. The study also said investor-owned companies like BP, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, and ExxonMobil have caused 16 percent of the global average temperature increases and 11 percent of global sea level rise.
But are climate liability lawsuits and investigations an effective strategy for fighting climate change? That’s up for debate, since few cases have been successful. But the fact that the National Association of Manufacturers is taking up arms against this strategy suggests that they see a legitimate threat. With multiple cases pending, 2018 may be the year that corporate polluters are finally held responsible for what they’ve done to the planet.
Climate-related court cases have skyrocketed in the last three years. A May study by the United Nations and Columbia University found that the number of lawsuits filed across the world has tripled since 2014; out of nearly 900 cases, 654 were filed in the United States. Most of these suits seek to punish governments, not corporations, for not taking sufficient action to fight climate change—usually by arguing that public officials have denied citizens’ rights to a clean and healthy environment.
Some of these lawsuits have succeeded in other countries. In 2015, the Dutch government was forced to lower the country’s greenhouse gas emissions in response to a class action lawsuit from its citizens. A judge in Ireland recently ruled that citizens have a constitutional right to a safe climate and environment. And last month, a climate liability lawsuit against Germany’s largest power company was allowed to move forward.
“Judicial decisions around the world show that many courts have the authority, and the willingness, to hold governments to account for climate change,” said Michael Burger, executive director of Columbia’s Sabin Center for Climate Change Law. He cited a 2007 lawsuit that forced the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to regulate greenhouse gas emissions. “Similar litigation all over the world will continue to push governments and corporations to address the most pressing environmental challenge of our times.”
The success of Massachusetts v. Environmental Protection Agency keeps corporate attorneys up at night. In that case, the Supreme Court ruled that greenhouse gases are an air pollutant that cause harm, a legal precedent that is “being used as the support for climate-change-related lawsuits against companies,” reads a recent report from the corporate law firm Anderson Kill.
That report warns of a “coming flood” of tort lawsuits that allege corporations are liable for climate change–related damages, as well as shareholder lawsuits that allege public companies aren’t doing enough to warn investors about the financial risks of climate change and climate lawsuits.
“Although we have yet to see any significant number of governmental actions or shareholder suits against corporations or their [executives] in relation to climate-change-related disclosure failures,” the report reads, “the seeds for the future growth of such actions are being sown.”
The Manufacturers’ Accountability Project recognizes this, and focuses on the cases that have the biggest chance of succeeding in 2018. New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman is investigating whether Exxon Mobil intentionally misled shareholders about the impact of climate change on company profits, thereby committing securities fraud.
Court filings from Schneiderman’s office in June stated that “evidence suggests not only that Exxon’s public statements about its risk management practices were false and misleading, but also that Exxon may still be in the midst of perpetrating an ongoing fraudulent scheme on investors and the public.”
MAP’s website calls the investigation “politically motivated” and alleges, without evidence, a “web of collaboration” between Schneiderman and “anti-manufacturing advocates.” (Exxon has sued to block the Schneiderman’s investigation, though without success thus far, and still no charges have been filed.)
MAP’s site also sharply criticizes Matt Pawa, an attorney who, according to a 2010 profile by InsideClimate News, has been “working tirelessly to establish global warming as a ‘public nuisance’ under tort law, holding corporations accountable for their greenhouse gas pollution and forcing them to face their victims in court.” (MAP also targets InsideClimate over its Pulitzer Prize-nominated investigation into Exxon.)
Pawa’s most recent cases are in California, where he’s representing the cities of San Francisco and Oakland in suits against ExxonMobil, BP, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, and Shell. The lawsuits are trying to make the oil giants pay for seawalls and other structures “to protect about $49 billion in public and private property sitting within six feet of the current sea level,” according to Climate Liability News. Both cities are extremely at risk from sea level rise.
MAP attacks Pawa for partnering “with wealthy donors, activists and other profit-seeking plaintiffs lawyers to attack the energy industry,” adding, “He knows he will be handsomely compensated at many points on his legal marathon.” Reached by phone, Pawa laughed for approximately 30 seconds, then declined to comment on the accusations. He did, however, speculate why his cases were targeted by the group. “Maybe it’s a sign that these lawsuits are considered to have merit,” he said. “And so they’re concerned.”
Cases like Pawa’s have many hurdles. For instance, as a MAP spokesperson rightly pointed out to the Washington Examiner, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously in 2011 that corporations can’t be sued for greenhouse gas emissions under federal law because the EPA already has rules to regulate those emissions. But Pawa’s California cases, for example, are based on state law instead of federal law, and use a legal strategy that’s already been successful in one California case against a lead paint manufacturer: arguing that the companies create a “public nuisance,” a centuries-old legal doctrine that is broader in California than in most other states.
There are also limitations to how impactful these lawsuits can be. As Ketan Jha argues at Slate, litigation “is typically an inefficient method of achieving policy reform.” The lead paint case that Pawa is replicating is still in court 17 years after it was brought, because of appeals.
And while punishing companies for damage they’ve already done to the planet may feel satisfying, it does little to reverse the problem. But climate lawsuits and investigations don’t have to save the world to be worthwhile. In fact, they don’t even necessarily have to end in victory to make an impact. The world’s polluters see what’s happening to Exxon, and they just might clean up their act to avoid the same fate.

Links

• The Criminal Dimension Of Climate Change
• On The Boil: Five Climate Lawsuits To Watch In 2018
• Climate Change Cases Predicted To Make A Legal Splash In 2018
• Meet The Lawyer Trying To Make Big Oil Pay For Climate Change
• How Trump’s Reckless Climate Policy Invites A Judicial Backlash
• World’s First Human Rights Investigation Into Corporate Responsibility For Climate Change Intensifies
• Young People Suing Trump Administration Over Climate Change To Get Day In Court
• Environment: A Legal Milestone
• German Court To Hear Peruvian Farmer's Climate Case Against RWE 

The Article That Changed My View … Of How Civil Disobedience Helps The Planet

The Guardian - Suganshi Ropia, as told to Sophie Zeldin-O'Neill

Suganshi Ropia says a piece she read after the signing of the Paris Climate Agreement helped her realise we shouldn’t wait to make our voices heard

Protesters close Ffos-y-Fran opencast coalmine in Merthyr Tydfil, Wales, in 2016. Photograph: Natasha Quarmby/Rex Shutterstock

Suganshi Ropia, 21, is a law student from Pune, India

I try to keep in touch with news related to climate change, and am particularly interested in environmental law.
My compulsion to do something positive about climate change was one of the reasons I decided to study law.
When I read the opinion piece Civil disobedience is the only way left to fight climate change, by Kara Moses, in spring 2016, it crystallised my feelings about the responsibility we have as a community of humans to do more.
The article made me realise that having a legal framework in place is not the only solution to a problem this complex.
More than ever, we need to be proactive in our resistance, whether that takes the form of a quiet or a very vocal protest.
This piece was written days after 1,000 people successfully closed the world’s largest coal-exporting port in Newcastle, Australia and just two weeks after the Paris Climate Accord was signed.
It was written mainly from a British perspective, but really resonated with me.

Anti-coal activists in kayaks and boats block the entrance to Newcastle harbour on Sunday, May 8, 2016. Photograph: 350.org Australia

In India, where I live, smog pollution is a major problem.
Moses discusses how this problem also affects those living in Beijing, and explains the double-edged benefit to employing people in jobs that improve the state of our environment as well as the quality of life for the majority of people on the planet.
“The choice between clean, safe, democratic and sustainable energy/jobs or dirty, dangerous and undemocratic energy/jobs is a no-brainer,” she writes.

Moses implores us not to wait for treaties to be drawn up and politicians to agree on changes they would like to implement, but to work from the ground up, in small ways.
She asks us to “take it upon ourselves to do more if we really want climate justice” and “support rather than denounce those willing to put themselves on the line, since we all benefit from their actions”.
I found her words urgent, clarifying and emboldening.
I shared the article with friends, many of whom were similarly moved by it, and when we were asked to complete an internship as part of our course, I chose to work at a law firm that has an environmental focus.
When I graduate I hope to work in this field and become someone bringing about positive change both professionally and personally.

Links

• Civil disobedience is the only way left to fight climate change
• May 3–15, 2016: On six continents, thousands of people took bold action to Break Free from Fossil Fuels
• Dozens arrested as anti-fossil fuel protesters join Australian coal blockade
• The article that changed my view … of humanity's impact on the planet

10 Incredible Things Climate Change Will Do

Deutsche Welle - Ineke Mules

Climate change will bring some surprising effects: Bumpy plane rides, greater mood swings and more volcanic eruptions are just a few of the things we can expect over the decades to come. And yes, even more lightning.

We're already familiar with some of the more evident effects of global warming such as melting glaciers and more extreme weather events. But few people are aware of some of the other, less obvious - and completely surprising - impacts of our changing climate, which could have a serious impact on the way we live.

1. Airplane turbulence will get worse 

Unfortunately, we can expect air travel to become even more stressful - thanks to the effects of climate change.
A recent study by researchers at the University of Reading in the United Kingdom looks into the relationship between clean-air turbulence and anthropogenic climate change. Using the popular flight corridor between Europe and the United States as an example, they examined various strengths of turbulence and how each will change in the future if carbon dioxide levels were to double.
The results showed that severe turbulence is likely to dramatically increase by up to 149 percent as a result of stronger wind shears within the Earth's jet streams. These are narrow, fast-flowing, meandering westerly currents found near the tropopause, which are frequently used by commercial airlines as a means of saving time and fuel.

2. Icebergs will clog up shipping lanes 

No ship has been struck by an iceberg in the North Atlantic Ocean since the Titanic sunk in 1912 and the International Ice Patrol was subsequently formed. But patrol workers are likely going to get a lot busier soon.
In early April, more than 400 icebergs clogged up shipping lanes in the North Atlantic, forcing ships to take detours of up to 400 nautical miles - wasting significant time and fuel in the process.
While icebergs are common in these waters, their number and timing is unusual. Experts say climate change could be to blame. The icebergs begin their journey after breaking off a glacier in Greenland, which is influenced largely by winter weather, especially storms accompanied by strong winds. Rising temperatures also lead to the melting of ice sheets, causing more chunks of ice to break off and float into the open ocean.

3. Lightning will strike more frequently 

Heat energy acts as a form of fuel for storm clouds. So as global temperatures continue to rise, we can also expect more active thunderstorms.
Although there are a number of downsides to this phenomenon - including a probable increase in wildfires - lightning actually produces a powerful chemical reaction that can be beneficial for Earth's atmosphere.
Lightning creates a special form of a greenhouse gas called nitrogen oxide, which indirectly regulates other potentially harmful greenhouse gases, like ozone and methane.

4. Volcanic activity could increase

You would be forgiven for thinking that climate change and volcanic activity are completely unrelated phenomena. But the workings of our planet are interconnected in suprising ways.
In places like Iceland, volcanoes and glaciers have coexisted for thousands of years. However, as glaciers melt due to rising temperatures, the pressure on the Earth's mantel decreases, which in turn increases magma amounts while reducing stress on a volcano's magma chambers. This leads to higher volcanic activity, along with the travel chaos that often follows.
There is a historic precedent to this prediction: 12,000 years ago, Iceland was covered by a glacier as thick as 2 kilometers. When that glacier abruptly melted due to a warming trend, a huge surge in volcanic activity followed.

5. We'll become angrier 

Even our mood isn't immune from climate change. Researchers in social psychology have long highlighted the link between warmer climates and higher levels of impulsive behavior and even violence.
This has been shown in regions closer to the equator - if global temperatures continue to rise as expected, we could also begin to see behavioral changes in areas further north.
In addition to having to contend with warmer weather, there is also evidence that climate change will further fuel global conflict by adding stress on natural resources like food and water.

6. The ocean will get darker 

We can expect our oceans to gradually become murkier as the effects of climate change become more apparent over time.
While climate change is often associated with higher temperatures and drought, it is also expected to increase annual rainfall in some areas of the world. This will create faster-flowing rivers, which in turn churns up more silt and debris before this water meets the ocean.
This phenomenon has already been observed along the coast of Norway, where the ocean water has become increasingly darker due to an increase in precipitation and melting snow.

7. Allergies will worsen 

As if getting angrier wasn't enough: If you're one of the many people who suffer from springtime allergies, you should probably start stockpiling your medication.
Warmer temperatures also mean longer and earlier blooming seasons for allergy-triggering plants like dandelions and ragweed. Pollen counts are likely to double over the next three decades in the United States - and "sneezing season" will also kick off in the future as soon as the first week of April.

8. Animals will shrink

This one may take a bit longer to become apparent - but the development of smaller mammals has been a common evolutionary response to past global warming events.
During the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum, around 50 million years ago, mammals were "dwarfed" after global temperatures rose 5 and 8 degrees Celsius.
Like all examples of evolution, the reason for this shrinking comes down to basic survival: As nutrients become more scarce due to rising temperatures and drought, larger animals struggle more than their smaller counterparts to fulfill their nutritional needs.

9. Desert soil may erode 

Believe it or not, deserts are actually teeming with life - also in the form of bacterial colonies. These colonies grow so large, in fact, that they form strong layers known as "biocrusts" that prevent soil erosion.
But different kinds of bacteria thrive in different temperature ranges. So as the climate continues to change quickly, these bacteria could find it difficult to adapt. If desert soil could becomes more prone to erosion, it would not be fertile enough to support plants and feed animals.

10. Ant behaviour will change 

Ants play a more important role in the planet's ecosystem than you may realize. In spite of their status as a pest, ants helps plants by controlling other insects, circulating vital nutrients and turning over the soil, among other things.
But ants appear to be ill-equipped to handle the rising tempertatures caused by climate change. A study carried out at Harvard Forest in Massachusetts revealed a susceptibility of ants to even slight temperature increases, with the most important seed-dispersing species essentially shutting down and retreating to their underground nests until conditions improved.

This is what climate change looks like (11 images)

Flaming inferno. Some 10,500 firefighters were called to tackle forest fires in California in 2015. They were unable to prevent 1,400 homes from destruction. The blaze was fueled by hot and dry weather - as a result of climate change.

Links

• Climate change taking big bite out of alpine glaciers 
• Climate change makes weather extremes the new normal 
• Being 'prepared for surprises' - climate change increases hurricane impact in unexpected ways 
• Saving Canada's only desert 
• How climate change fuels conflict 
• Five arresting images of climate change that are impossible to ignore 
• Most of Europe's airspace remains shut down 
• This is what climate change looks like

The Criminal Dimension Of Climate Change

Media Monitors Network - Andrew Glikson

A review of a new book by P. Carter, E. Woodworth and J. Hansen

“We’re simply talking about the very life support system of this planet.”
Professor Joachim Schellnhuber, Director of the Potsdam Institute of Climate Impacts.

The extreme rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) since the onset of the industrial age, reaching ~403 parts per million in 2017, and the corresponding rise in mean global temperature to +1.3 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial temperature (Figure 1), pose an existential risk for the future of civilization and nature.

Figure 1. A plot of mean global temperature since vs CO2 levels since 200 AD (after Steffen, 2012)

A new book titled “Unprecedented Crime: Climate Science Denial and Game Changers for Survival“, by Dr Peter Carter and Dr Elizabeth Woodworth, with a forward by the leading climate scientist Professor James Hansen outlines the criminality of those who actively promote the continuing emission of carbon gases into the atmosphere with full knowledge of the consequences, including the breakdown of the large ice sheets, sea level rise and intensification of extreme weather events such as hurricanes, floods and fires around the world.
The book highlights the collusion of a large part of the media with climate change denial and cover-up, stating: “There is no benign explanation for a full media blackout of a significant global development that was heralded by the United Nations Secretary-General. This blackout goes far beyond ignorance or negligence. It is a wilful obstruction of public knowledge of the extraordinary extent of global efforts to combat the greatest existential threat of all time by changing business-as-usual. We define this wilful, methodical blocking of vital survival information as an unprecedented crime against life on the planet.”
The book cites the US writer Tom Engelhardt (Terracide and the Terrarists: Destroying the Planet for Record Profits): “The fossil-fuel companies are guilty of the ultimate crime, because they are earning their “profits directly off melting the planet, knowing that their extremely profitable acts are destroying the very habitat, the very temperature range that for so long made life comfortable for humanity.”… “However, Big Carbon could never have been able to continue its polluting ways – long after the scientific community had reached consensus about the connection between fossil-fuel emissions, global warming, and climate change – without the assistance of the media“.
According to James Hansen, NASA’s former chief climate scientist (2012), “Burning all fossil fuels would create a different planet than the one that humanity knows. The palaeoclimate record and ongoing climate change make it clear that the climate system would be pushed beyond tipping points, setting in motion irreversible changes, including ice sheet disintegration with a continually adjusting shoreline, extermination of a substantial fraction of species on the planet, and increasingly devastating regional climate extremes“.
Following the presentation of definitive evidence of anthropogenic climate change, a plethora of websites has emerged reporting the views of non-scientists or of scientists known to receive funding from the fossil fuel industry. These views, in breach of the basic laws of physics and of direct observations, ignore the peer-reviewed published climate and paleoclimate science, misrepresent observed atmosphere and ocean processes and trends, fabricate evidence and conduct personal attacks against the climate scientists.
Examples abound:

• Climate change deniers claim CO2 is not a factor driving global warming, contrary to the rise of CO2 by more than 40 percent since the onset of the industrial age and the laws of black body radiation of Stefan-Boltzmann, Planck and Kirchhof.

• Where the average global temperature has been rising sharply since about 1975, a relative lull pertained during 2000–2014 mainly due to (1) albedo increase from heavy sulphur aerosol emission, and (2) lower sunspot numbers, with high warming rates resuming from 2015. Climate change deniers claim this transient period represents a cessation of global warming.

• Where large Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets have been melting at a rate of more than 500 billion ton per year, the cold ice meltwater flowing off these glaciers cooled adjacent ocean regions, resulting in transient extension  of circum-Antarctic sea ice, claimed by climate change deniers to represent global cooling

Virulent attacks on climate scientists followed, for example, as cited in the book: “a climate change denier who has argued that the “demonization of CO2 really differs little from the Nazi persecution of the Jews, the Soviet extermination of class enemies or ISIL slaughter of infidels.”
Large parts of the conservative press have taken strong exception to the evidence of anthropogenic global warming, as reported in Robert Manne’s essays “Diabolical” and “Bad News“
The manifest paralysis of the political and media classes in the face of the climate impasse, evidenced by the failure of a succession of UN Framework Conventions on Climate Change to undertake meaningful steps to reduce CO2 emissions (since 2009: Copenhagen, Cancun, Doha, Durban, Warsaw, Paris) requires a search for alternative avenues to limit the deleterious consequences of continuing carbon emissions on the biosphere,  as reported by the IPCC Working Group II (Climate Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability) and  the report by Working Group III (WGIII – Climate Change 2014: Mitigation of climate change).
Traditionally political and economic negotiations aim at a compromise. Unfortunately, no negotiation is possible with the basic laws of physics and chemistry and with processes in the atmosphere-ocean-cryosphere system.
Is there anything in international and national laws which can avert the ongoing carbon emissions? Do global and national legal systems offer any possibilities in this regard? In exploring potential restrictions on carbon emission, the following international and national laws and conventions are relevant:

• Crimes against humanity, as defined by the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court Explanatory Memorandum. Such crimes are particularly odious offenses in that they constitute a serious attack on human dignity or grave humiliation or a degradation of one or more human beings. They are not isolated or sporadic events, but are part either of a government policy (although the perpetrators need not identify themselves with this policy) or of a wide practice of atrocities tolerated or condoned by a government or a de facto authority…”

• United Nations International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights Part III Article 6: states, among other: “Every human being has the inherent right to life. This right shall be protected by law. No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his life. When deprivation of life constitutes the crime of genocide, it is understood that nothing in this article shall authorize any State Party to the present Covenant to derogate in any way from any obligation assumed under the provisions of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.“

• Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, 17 July 1998: Article 7 Crimes against humanity “Extermination” – includes the intentional infliction of conditions of life, inter alia the deprivation of access to food and medicine, calculated to bring about the destruction of part of a population. Australian Commonwealth and State laws regarding air quality standards: and prohibition of pollution Crimes against humanity, as defined by the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court Explanatory Memorandum. Such crimes are particularly odious offenses in that they constitute a serious attack on human dignity or grave humiliation or a degradation of one or more human beings. They are not isolated or sporadic events, but are part either of a government policy (although the perpetrators need not identify themselves with this policy) or of a wide practice of atrocities tolerated or condoned by a government or a de facto authority…”

• Recently a successful challenge has been raised in the US in this regard, as in the statement by Professor James Hansen.

In the following, I list some of the consequences of the above:

1. Since the onset of the industrial age and in particular following WWII an abrupt rise  in the temperature levels of the atmosphere was driven by an increase in concentration of greenhouse gases arising from release of 600 billion ton of carbon (GtC) to the atmosphere is leading to an extreme shift in state of the atmosphere-ocean system, such has no precedence in the recorded geological history, with the exception of events which resulted in the mass extinction of species, including massive volcanism, extra-terrestrial impacts and large-scale release of methane.
2. As a direct consequence of the above mean global temperatures have risen since by about 1.3 degrees Celsius and, had it not been for emitted sulphur the aerosols, by near-2 degrees Celsius, reaching levels similar to those of the Pliocene period (~2.6 – 5.3 million years ago).
3. The shift is occurring at the fastest rate recorded by paleoclimate studies. Whereas many species can adapt to gradual environmental changes, the current temperature rise rate resulting from ~2-3 parts per million (ppm) CO2/year may not be sustained.
4. The current change is manifested by an increase in the rate of melting of the major ice sheets, accelerating sea level rise and a rise in the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events, reflecting elevated energy level of the atmosphere-ocean system.
5. The consequences of continuing carbon emissions and consequent rise of mean global temperatures would render large parts of the Earth’s land surfaces uninhabitable, due to extreme temperatures, droughts, storms and flooding of coastal, deltas and lower river regions by sea level rise – estimated as about 25+/- 12 meters under Pliocene-like conditions, constituting an existential calamity for civilization and nature.
6. Excepting injection of transient short residence-time sulphur aerosols, the arrest of current climate trend would require (A) a meaningful reduction in current rate of carbon emission (~9 GtC/year) and (B) application of CO2 draw-down technologies such as large-scale seagrass farming, biochar, CO2 capture by air streaming through basalt and serpentine et, aimed at reducing atmospheric greenhouse gas by at least 50 ppm.
7. Enough reserves of conventional and unconventional (oil shale, tar sands, coal seam gas) fossil fuel exist whose combustion would raise the temperature of the atmosphere and oceans to levels which existed during the early Eocene and the Cretaceous, excluding most current forms of advanced life on Earth (Figure 2).

Figure 2. Fossil fuel reserves and equivalent CO2 emissions. 1 Gigaton carbon = 0.5ppm CO2

As stated by Robert Manne: “Unless by some miracle almost every climate scientist is wrong, future generations will look upon ours with puzzlement and anger – as the people who might have prevented the Earth from becoming a habitat unfriendly to humans and other species but nonetheless failed to act” and “Our conscious destruction of a planet-friendly to humans and other species is the most significant development in history”. The carbon-oxygen cycle of the atmosphere-ocean-land constitutes the lungs of the biosphere. The consequences of burning the vast carbon reserves buried in sediments can only result in a demise rivaling the five great mass extinctions of species in the history of the Earth. Survivors of the Sixth mass extinction of species may hold responsible those who promoted carbon emissions, turning a blind eye to the unfolding tragedy: the fossil fuel barons, the political classes and their media mouthpieces.

Links

• Global Warming
• Potsdam Institute of Climate Impacts
• Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court Explanatory Memorandum
• The criminal dimension of climate change
• UN Framework Conventions on Climate Change
• United Nations International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights

2017 Brought Another Year Of Weather Extremes As Drought And Heat Took Its Toll

Fairfax - Peter Hannam

Australia is set to finish one of its hottest years on record, leaving fire authorities pinning their hopes a La Nina in the Pacific will bring soaking rains before heatwaves build through the summer.
Sydney is on track to post its fourth warmest December on record, according to Weatherzone. For the year, the city's mean, maximum and minimum temperatures will be in the top five warmest on records going back to 1858, the Bureau of Meteorology said.

Farmers race the front of a fast grassfire ahead of the huge Sir Ivan fire in NSW in February. Photo: Nick Moir

For Melbourne, very warm spells in March and November will likely place the city among its 10 hottest years for maximums.
Most of the nation will post another year above average – with Sydney notching its 25th in a row – as warming from climate change gradually bumps background temperatures higher regardless of the fluctuating influences of El Nino and La Nina events.

Cooling off was a popular pastime for many in Victoria and NSW from spring onwards. Photo: Brook Mitchell

"2017 will be recorded as one of Australia's five warmest years on record, with the national mean temperature between 0.8 and 0.9 degrees warmer than the mid-20th century average," Karl Braganza, head of climate monitoring at the bureau, said.

"This happened despite the absence of an El Nino in the Pacific, which is normally associated with very much warmer than average conditions over Australia."
While international media might be focused this week on the break-out of Arctic chill over much of eastern North America, average land and sea temperatures will rival the past three years of consecutive record annual global temperatures.

Riding high in an early morning surf session at Bells beach in Victoria in April. Photo: Joe Armao

With a continent as large as Australia's – and with a naturally varied climate, particularly for rainfall – every year is going to have its contrasting weather.
For NSW and Victoria, the year was largely one marked with a wet start, a long dry spell in the middle, before a mix of unseasonably warm conditions and some welcomed return of rain.
An unusually quiet cyclone season meant little northern penetration of rain until ex-tropical Cyclone Debbie dumped huge amounts of flooding rains along coastal Queensland and NSW.
The storm did, however, help bring an end to a second highly damaging bout of bleaching to the Great Barrier Reef in as many summers that has left as much as half the corals dead in the worst back-to-back event recorded.

Record heat
It may seem a long time ago, but last summer was Sydney and NSW's hottest, with many records broken and the electricity network brought to the brink of large-scale blackouts in February.
The heat was particularly persistent in north-east NSW, with Moree experiencing 54 consecutive days above 35 degrees – the longest such spell on record anywhere in NSW.
Sydney's reading of 36.5 degrees at 9am on January 18 was the warmest since records for that time of day began in 1955, the bureau said.
Victoria's summer was more moderate, with Melbourne failing to notch a 40-degree day for the first summer since the 2004-05 summer.
Autumn got off to a wet beginning for Sydney, with the city posting its wettest March since 1975 – before the heavens started to dry up. The extra cloud around that month helped give Sydney its hottest March for minimum temperatures on record – as it was also for NSW as a whole.

Sydney went from its wettest March since 1975 to its driest April-May in 11 years. Photo: Peter Rae

Victoria went the other way, setting its second-warmest March on record for maximum temperatures, with the mercury an average of 3 degrees above the norm.
Oddly, both Victoria and Tasmania were warmer in March than the previous month.

Bumper snow
Winter brought its range of alpine treats, with a slow start to the snow season ending up with the best since 2000 for many ski resorts.
By late September, snow depths at Spencers Creek in the Snowy Mountains peaked at 240 centimetres, the deepest at any time of year since 2000, the bureau said. Resorts kept their ski lifts running longer as a result.

Thredbo and other resorts had their best snowfalls since 2000. Photo: Alex Ellinghausen

The good snowfalls, though, weren't matched by rain in many areas. Victoria had its driest June on record, and ended up with its driest winter since 2006.
For NSW, it was the driest winter since 2002, with half the usual rainfall. It was also the state's third-warmest for maximum temperatures.

Early fire season
Spring began somewhat ominously for fire authorities, particularly in NSW, with the state posting its driest September. Sydney's meagre 0.2 millimetres of rain could hardly have been less.
For Victoria, spring was most notable for its heat, coming in as the state's fourth-warmest on record for mean temperatures.
Melbourne (and Tasmania) sweltered in November as a blocking high in the Tasman Sea kept temperatures high in the south of the continent and mild for most of the east coast, including Sydney.
Melbourne's Olympic Park collected 15 days of at least 30 degrees in spring – three more than in the previous record spring of 2009 and almost four times the long-run average of four such days in the season.
The combination of above-average temperatures and rainfall deficiencies had fire authorities bracing for a dangerous season.

Rain reprieve
Decent rain in December, though, helped ease the threat across Victoria, while days of storms have all but eliminated the near-term risk in north-eastern NSW.
"It's a more positive outlook when it's compared to the original fire potential," Ben Shepherd, senior spokesman for the NSW Rural Fire Service, said.
Still, significant rainfall deficiencies exist in the state's west, and for a region stretching from north of Nowra on the coast to Sydney and into the Hunter.

Late spring heat brought people to beaches in Melbourne while Sydney will likely post its fourth-warmest December. Photo: Janie Barrett

Since July, the RFS had dealt with 9200 bush, grass and scrub fires, up from 7700 fires at the same time a year ago, Inspector Shepherd said.
Craig Lapsley, Victoria's Emergency Management Commissioner, said those December rains gave crews a reprieve: "If we didn't have that we'd be in a serious fire season."
So far this year, Victorian authorities have dealt with 2668 fires compared with 4898 for the entire 2016-17 year, he said.
Areas including Warburton, the Yarra Valley and the Dandenongs around Melbourne remain a concern, and another spell of persistent heat could again elevate the fire threat.
"Seven hot days in a row can change the environment dramatically," he said.

Links

• Cyclones and extreme weather intensifying with changing climate, BOM says
• Want a better forecast? Farmers encouraged to 'do it yourself' 
• What El Nino and La Nina actually mean for Australian weather 
• Unravelling the mystery of fire whirls 
• BOM launches heatwave service early after record temps 
• Resources companies get ready ahead of cyclone season 
• Hard and fast rain swamps Queensland's Wide Bay farms 
• Vegetable prices set to rocket as heat stress wilts east coast crops 
• Southern WA rain leaves inland farmers relieved but coastal crops soaked 
• Dam levels across NSW continue to hold despite dry winter 
• Australia's southern winters are drying out. Here's why 
• ABC Weather launches to explore the science of weather events 
• Australia facing above-normal bushfire risk
• Just as we suspected — winter was hot, dry and a record 
• Indigenous weather knowledge helps us understand