Florida’s GOP Leaders Opposed Climate Aid. Now They’re Depending on It. Hurricane Ian’s wrath made clear that Florida faces some of the most severe consequences of climate change anywhere in the country. But the state’s top elected leaders opposed the most significant climate legislation to pass Congress — laws to help fortify states against, and recover from, climate disasters, and confront their underlying cause: the burning of fossil fuels. Senators Marco Rubio and Rick Scott voted against last year’s bipartisan infrastructure law, which devotes some $50 billion to help states better prepare for events like Ian, because they said it was wasteful. And in August, they joined every fellow Republican in the Senate to oppose a new climate law that invests $369 billion in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, the largest such effort in the country’s history.
At the same time, Republican Gov. Mr. But none of the top Republicans in the state have supported legislation to curb the greenhouse gas emissions causing climate change. Mr. But Mr. Mr. But Ms. Mr. While Mr. Italy's plan to save Venice from sinking - BBC Future. In November 2019, Venice suffered its second-worst flooding event since records began almost 100 years ago. It created headlines around the world, with onlookers stunned by the incredible images of Saint Mark's Square, one of the city's lowest lying and most iconic areas, covered in feet of water. The tide reached a peak height of 187cm (6.1ft) above sea level, resulting in more than 80% of the city being under water.
A state of emergency was declared, and there was an estimated €1bn euros (£0.9bn/$1bn) worth of damage, according to the Mayor of Venice, Luigi Brugnaro. The worst ever flooding event, which happened in 1966, saw water levels rise to 194cm (6.4ft) above sea level, and is thought to have seriously damaged at least three quarters of the city's shops, businesses and studios. While a gap of over 50 years separated these events, recent trends suggest that we won't have to wait half a century to see another calamitous flood. You might also like: And it's set to continue. This 100% solar community endured Hurricane Ian with no loss of power and minimal damage | CNN. Anthony Grande moved away from Fort Myers three years ago in large part because of the hurricane risk.
He has lived in southwest Florida for nearly 19 years, had experienced Hurricanes Charley in 2004 and Irma in 2017 and saw what stronger storms could do to the coast. Grande told CNN he wanted to find a new home where developers prioritized climate resiliency in a state that is increasingly vulnerable to record-breaking storm surge, catastrophic wind and historic rainfall. What he found was Babcock Ranch — only 12 miles northeast of Fort Myers, yet seemingly light years away. Babcock Ranch calls itself “America’s first solar-powered town.” Its nearby solar array — made up of 700,000 individual panels — generates more electricity than the 2,000-home neighborhood uses, in a state where most electricity is generated by burning natural gas, a planet-warming fossil fuel.
The streets in this meticulously planned neighborhood were designed to flood so houses don’t. Nature: Sanibel Island - now lost to Hurricane Ian. Searching for survivors in Fort Myers Beach, Ian’s ground zero. Fort Myers Beach Pasco, a young black Labrador retriever on his first search and rescue mission, quickly picked up the scent on Anchorage Street. He led a Miami firefighter to the top of a rubble pile and jumped down the other side. ”Confirmed!” The firefighter shouted over the din of a helicopter passing overhead. “One deceased.” Pasco is trained to find live humans. As bright sunshine lit up the clear blue sky Friday, the firefighter grabbed a rain-soaked maroon bedspread and covered the body slumped on lumber from what used to be a bedroom or kitchen or bathroom.
The firefighters of Squad 6, Florida Task Force 2, radioed a medical unit to pick up the fourth body they’d found on their second day of searching, tied pink plastic tape around a palm tree and walked down the block to probe more ruins. Although Ian made first landfall at Cayo Costa and hit the mainland south of Punta Gorda, both just to the north, Gov. Lee County Sheriff Carmine Marceno announced 16 storm-related deaths. California Fog Is Vital, but Climate Change May Threaten It. Coastal fog isn’t unique to the California coast, but few places in the world are so deeply linked with the ghostly meteorological phenomenon.
Even the emoji for “foggy” shows what appears to be the Golden Gate Bridge shrouded in clouds. My colleague John Branch recently wrote about San Francisco’s fog and concerns that it may be fading as the world warms. A reduction in fog could harm California’s agriculture industry and its oldest trees, and could change the identity of the Bay Area. John spoke to me about his article from his home about 20 miles north of the Golden Gate Bridge, which he believes may be “the most famous foggy place on the planet.” We talked about why he wanted to report on fog, the role it plays in California’s ecology and what he believes is San Francisco’s soundtrack of the summer. Here’s our conversation, lightly edited for clarity: Soumya: How did you come to this story? John: I have a strange infatuation with the fog.
Today is the first day of fall. Wildfire Smoke Is Erasing Progress on Clean Air. Smoke from wildfires has worsened over the past decade, potentially reversing decades of improvements in Western air quality made under the Clean Air Act, according to research published Thursday from Stanford University. The new analysis reveals a picture of daily exposure to wildfire smoke in better geographic detail than ever before. Researchers found a 27-fold increase over the past decade in the number of people experiencing an “extreme smoke day,” which is defined as air quality deemed unhealthy for all age groups. In 2020 alone, nearly 25 million people across the contiguous United States were affected by dangerous smoke. Where Wildfire Smoke Pollution Increased Over the Past Decade Micrograms per cubic meter of PM2.5 Note: Map shows increase in average wildfire smoke from 2006-2010 to 2016-2020. Annual average PM2.5 from smoke Dr. Filling in that gap was a long and arduous process.
Particulate pollution causes more than short-term irritation. World heading into ‘uncharted territory of destruction’, says climate report | Climate science. The world’s chances of avoiding the worst ravages of climate breakdown are diminishing rapidly, as we enter “uncharted territory of destruction” through our failure to cut greenhouse gas emissions and take the actions needed to stave off catastrophe, leading scientists have said. Despite intensifying warnings in recent years, governments and businesses have not been changing fast enough, according to the United in Science report published on Tuesday. The consequences are already being seen in increasingly extreme weather around the world, and we are in danger of provoking “tipping points” in the climate system that will mean more rapid and in some cases irreversible shifts. Recent flooding in Pakistan, which the country’s climate minister claimed had covered a third of the country in water, is the latest example of extreme weather that is devastating swathes of the globe.
The world was also failing to adapt to the consequences of the climate crisis, the report found. Megadrought in the American south-west: a climate disaster unseen in 1,200 years | Climate crisis. When the Nasa climatologist James Hansen testified before Congress in June 1988 about a warming planet, the temperature in Washington DC hit a record 100F. It was a summer of unprecedented heatwaves, and 40 states were grappling with drought. His warning was seen as a historic wake-up call – but instead of heeding the existential smoke alarm, the US removed the batteries and kept on cooking. Nearly four decades later, the consequences of a sweltering Earth are hitting home in the US south-west and mountain west – comprising states from California to Colorado.
Over the past two decades, extreme heat and dwindling moisture levels have converged to create a “megadrought” deemed the driest period in 1,200 years. The west is now in uncharted territory, as once singular conditions become the norm. Its mightiest reservoirs – Lake Mead and Lake Powell – are at record low levels and steadily shriveling. ‘More severe than any previous drought’ ‘Earth is our source of life and not a resource’
The Olive Oil Capital of the World, Parched. The landscape has inspired some of Spain’s greatest poets (Miguel Hernández, Antonio Machado), singers (Juanito Valderrama) and painters (Rafael Zabaleta). Now the groves are turning up on social media. One Jaén farmer who has 1.7 million followers on TikTok makes gargantuan sandwiches, all generously slathered with olive oil. With a nudge from the local government, a nascent olive oil tourism industry, dubbed oleoturismo, is starting to grow. There are spas with olive oil treatments and specialty shops, like Panaderia Paniaceite, that sell dozens of varieties of olive oil. One almazara, as traditional mills are known, offers olive oil tastings like wine tastings at a vineyard.
Visitors can also spend a day working and living as an olive farmer, meals included, for 27 euros. “It was a surprise to us, the amount of interest there is in seeing how we produce olive oil,” said José Jiménez, co-owner of the mill, Oleícola San Francisco, in a village called Baeza. World on brink of five ‘disastrous’ climate tipping points, study finds | Climate crisis. The climate crisis has driven the world to the brink of multiple “disastrous” tipping points, according to a major study. It shows five dangerous tipping points may already have been passed due to the 1.1C of global heating caused by humanity to date. These include the collapse of Greenland’s ice cap, eventually producing a huge sea level rise, the collapse of a key current in the north Atlantic, disrupting rain upon which billions of people depend for food, and an abrupt melting of carbon-rich permafrost. At 1.5C of heating, the minimum rise now expected, four of the five tipping points move from being possible to likely, the analysis said.
Also at 1.5C, an additional five tipping points become possible, including changes to vast northern forests and the loss of almost all mountain glaciers. In total, the researchers found evidence for 16 tipping points, with the final six requiring global heating of at least 2C to be triggered, according to the scientists’ estimations. Temperatures smash records in US west as brutal heatwave continues. A brutal heatwave enveloping the US west smashed records on Tuesday, as high temperatures and historic energy use strained California’s grid to the brink of its capacity and spurred fire behavior across the state.
Western states are struggling through one of the hottest and longest September heatwaves on record. Temperatures began soaring last week and reached records in various parts of the region. California’s state capital of Sacramento on Tuesday hit an all-time high of 116F (46.7C), breaking a 97-year-old record. Six places in the San Francisco Bay Area and central coast set all-time record maximum temperatures, including Santa Rosa, with 115F (46C). In neighboring Nevada, Reno’s 106F (41C) on Tuesday was its hottest day ever recorded in September and smashed the previous record for the date, 96F (35.5C) in 1944. The National Weather Service (NWS) warned that dangerous heat could continue through Friday.
By 2080, climate change will make US cities shift to climates seen today hundreds of miles to the south. This article was originally published in 2019. The climate of North American cities will change to that of areas hundreds of miles to the south, a study reports — and it’ll happen within a single generation. In a bid to make people understand just how dire of a problem climate change is, a team of researchers developed an interactive app to showcase expected future conditions in every US city just one generation down the line. The app ties each city with a different location, whose current climate reflects what’s in store for the future. Down south “Under current high emissions the average urban dweller is going to have to drive more than 500 miles to the south to find a climate like that expected in their home city by 2080,” said study author Matt Fitzpatrick of the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science.
The team looked at 540 urban areas — encompassing about 250 million people — in the United States and Canada. How Pakistan floods are linked to climate change. As the world warms, glacial ice is melting. Glaciers in Pakistan's Gilgit-Baltistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa regions are melting rapidly, creating more than 3,000 lakes, the the UN Development Programme told BBC News. Around 33 of these are at risk of sudden bursting, which could unleash millions of cubic meters of water and debris, putting 7 million people at risk.
As the world warms, glacial ice is melting. Glaciers in Pakistan's Gilgit-Baltistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa regions are melting rapidly, creating more than 3,000 lakes, the the UN Development Programme told BBC News. As the world warms, glacial ice is melting. Is THIS the Real Reason More Homes Are Burning in Wildfires? Is THIS the Real Reason More Homes Are Burning in Wildfires? As Heat Waves Worsen, THIS Policy Predicts Where People Will Die. THIS Is the Safest Place to Live in the US as the Climate Changes. What the Colorado River Water Shortage Means for the U.S. ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power. Sign up to receive our biggest stories as soon as they’re published.
The western United States is, famously, in the grips of its worst megadrought in a millennium. The Colorado River, which supplies water to more than 40 million Americans and supports food production for the rest of the country, is in imminent peril. The levels in the nation’s largest freshwater reservoir, Lake Mead, behind the Hoover Dam and a fulcrum of the Colorado River basin, have dropped to around 25% of capacity. I recently sat down with Jay Famiglietti, the executive director of the Global Institute for Water Security at the University of Saskatchewan, to talk about what comes next and what the public still doesn’t understand about water scarcity in the United States. Our conversation has been edited for length and clarity. Let’s start with the Colorado River because it’s in the news. It’s going to be really hard. Remind us how that happens. Greenland ice sheet set to trigger nearly a foot in sea level rise.
Comment Human-driven climate change has set in motion massive ice losses in Greenland that couldn’t be halted even if the world stopped emitting greenhouse gases today, according to a study published Monday. The findings in the journal Nature Climate Change project that it is now inevitable that 3.3 percent of the Greenland ice sheet will melt — equal to 110 trillion tons of ice, the researchers said. That will trigger nearly a foot of global sea-level rise. The predictions are more dire than other forecasts, though they use different assumptions.
While the study did not specify a time frame for the melting and sea-level rise, the authors suggested much of it can play out between now and the year 2100. “Every study has bigger numbers than the last. One reason that new research appears worse than other findings may just be that it is simpler. A one-foot rise in global sea levels would have severe consequences. Just last year, the U.N. In general, the models have produced modest figures. These Groups Want Disruptive Climate Protests. Oil Heirs Are Funding Them. 200-year-old tree explodes in Portland due to heatwave. How Is Climate Change Affecting Floods? Scientists say the world needs to think about a worst-case "climate endgame" ‘Soon it will be unrecognisable’: total climate meltdown cannot be stopped, says expert | Climate crisis. Freezing point climbs to record high above Swiss Alpine summits | Climate crisis. Heat in the U.S.: Where It Could Be Dangerously Hot.
Alarm as fastest growing US cities risk becoming unlivable from climate crisis | US weather. Over 100m Americans under heat warnings as wildfires rage in 12 states | US weather. What Joe Manchin Cost Us. Heat Waves Around the World Push People and Nations ‘to the Edge’ Rescue teams scan mountains for missing after Italian glacier collapse. Japan: Tokyo swelters amid worst June heatwave since 1875 | Weather News. Sweltering streets: Hundreds of homeless die in extreme heat | AP News. Heat Wave Scorches Central U.S.: Latest Weather Updates. Yellowstone gateway communities to feel impact of park closure | Wyoming Public Media.
Yellowstone flooding is a sign of climate crises to come at America’s national parks – Chicago Tribune. The Health Effects of Extreme Heat. Record-breaking US Pacific north-west heatwave killed almost 200 people | US weather. Physicists predict Earth will become a chaotic world, with dire consequences. Climate Change Has Made Deadly Heat Waves Normal. This Flood-Savaged Hamlet Proves Climate Change Isn’t Just a Coastal Concern. Scientists Warn That Climate Change Could Spark the Next Major Pandemic. Insects have declined by 50% in parts of world because of human activity, study shows | CNN. ‘Historic’: global climate plans can now keep heating below 2C, study shows | Climate crisis. Blistering June heat, unprecedented April snow: Climate change makes extreme weather more likely in Oregon. As Climate Fears Mount, Some Are Relocating Within the US. 8 Endangered Places We Can Still Save From Climate Change.
By 2500 earth could be alien to humans – Guardian Mag. Heat waves, storms, floods: Climate change being felt in North America. Climate Change Enters the Therapy Room. More than 40 percent of Americans live in counties hit by climate disasters in 2021. Climate Change’s Effects on 193 Countries. The Antarctic Is Signaling Big Climate Trouble. Earth Is Getting a 'Black Box' Because of Climate Change.
Oregon wildfires, drought: Will one-two punch change its forest good? Capitalism is killing the planet – it’s time to stop buying into our own destruction | Climate crisis. Climate change now the main driver behind wildfire weather: study. Sequoia National Park, General Sherman threatened by KNP Complex fire. The U.S. just had its hottest summer on record. Western Drought: Carson River is dry, Nevada ranchers without water. To Save Lake Tahoe, They Spared No Expense. The Fire Came Over the Ridge Anyway. ‘Like a scene from Titanic’: Man plays violin for California wildfire evacuees stuck in traffic | Trending News,The Indian Express. What We Know About Climate Change and Hurricanes. On the Move With Mongolia’s Nomadic Reindeer Herders.
Earth Temperature Timeline. The Colorado River Drought Is A Crisis For The West. IPCC report shows ‘possible loss of entire countries within the century’ | Pacific islands. World’s climate scientists to issue stark warning over global heating threat | Climate change. A world of hurt: 2021 climate disasters raise alarm over food security. In Photos: The Vanishing Glaciers of Europe's Alps.
Wildfires Continue to Rage Across Turkey. Why Extreme Heat Is So Deadly. Bootleg Fire in Oregon grows; Dixie, Tamarack Fires grow in California. Is this the end of forests as we've known them? - SOCAN - Confronting Climate Change. Photos Show How the California Drought Has Dried up Lakes, Reservoirs. Aerial photos capture the devastation of the California drought that's shriveling vegetation and drying up reservoirs - Opera News.
Heat-Related Deaths Increase as Temperatures Rise in the West. In California’s interior, there’s no escape from the desperate heat: ‘Why are we even here?’ | California. Why Record-Breaking Overnight Temperatures Are So Concerning. In Karachi, hot weather is normal … but 44C feels like you’re going to die | Talaiha Chugtai. ‘We thought it wouldn’t affect us’: heatwave forces climate reckoning in Pacific north-west | Seattle. Nordic countries endure heatwave as Lapland records hottest day since 1914 | Environment. Yellowstone’s most famous geyser could shut down, with huge ramifications | National parks. Water crisis reaches boiling point on Oregon-California line. Sixty years of climate change warnings: the signs that were missed (and ignored) | Climate change.
Health officials investigate 12 possible heat-related deaths in Marion County, 1 in Polk County. Family remembers Oregon farmworker who died in record heat. Wildfire Devastates Canadian Town That's Broke Heat Record. Pacific Northwest Extreme Heat: Hundreds Sent To Hospitals. US-Canada heatwave: Visual guide to the causes. Unprecedented heat wave set to roast Pacific Northwest. Potentially Historic Northwest Heat Wave Likely to Bring Dangerous, Record-Breaking Temperatures | The Weather Channel - Articles from The Weather Channel. Heat Waves 2021: Why Air-Conditioning Is a Climate Change Nightmare. Climate change by state: An interactive map of the U.S.
How Climate Change Has Battered the West Before Summer Even Begins.