Cyclone Idai: rich countries are to blame for disasters like this – here's how they can make amends. The tropical cyclone rampaging south-eastern Africa has been described as one of the worst disasters ever to strike the southern hemisphere, with up to 2.6m people potentially affected in Mozambique, Malawi and Zimbabwe.
East Antarctica's glaciers are stirring. Image copyright Michael Studinger/Nasa/Icebridge Nasa says it has detected the first signs of significant melting in a swathe of glaciers in East Antarctica.
Climate change: Arctic reindeer numbers crash by half. Image copyright KAJ R.
SVENSSON/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY The population of wild reindeer, or caribou, in the Arctic has crashed by more than half in the last two decades. A new report on the impact of climate change in the Arctic revealed that numbers fell from almost 5 million to around 2.1 million animals. The report was released at the American Geophysical Research Union meeting.
Facts – Climate Change: Vital Signs of the Planet. › en español Earth's climate has changed throughout history. Climate change: Oceans 'soaking up more heat than estimated' Image copyright Getty Images The world has seriously underestimated the amount of heat soaked up by our oceans over the past 25 years, researchers say.
Their study suggests that the seas have absorbed 60% more than previously thought. They say it means the Earth is more sensitive to fossil fuel emissions than estimated. This could make it much more difficult to keep global warming within safe levels this century. Weather and climate change. It's a fact: climate change made Hurricane Harvey more deadly. What can we say about the role of climate change in the unprecedented disaster that is unfolding in Houston with Hurricane Harvey?
There are certain climate change-related factors that we can, with great confidence, say worsened the flooding. Sea level rise attributable to climate change – some of which is due to coastal subsidence caused by human disturbance such as oil drilling – is more than half a foot (15cm) over the past few decades (see here for a decent discussion). That means the storm surge was half a foot higher than it would have been just decades ago, meaning far more flooding and destruction. Earth Temperature anomalies data animation. Hurricane Harvey: The link to climate change. Image copyright Getty Images When it comes to the causes of Hurricane Harvey, climate change is not a smoking gun.
However, there are a few spent cartridge cases marked global warming in the immediate vicinity. Hurricanes are complex, naturally occurring beasts - extremely difficult to predict, with or without the backdrop of rising global temperatures. Short Answers to Hard Questions About Climate Change - The New York Times. 3. Is there anything I can do about climate change?
Fly less, drive less, waste less. You can reduce your own carbon footprint in lots of simple ways, and most of them will save you money. You can plug leaks in your home insulation to save power, install a smart thermostat, switch to more efficient light bulbs, turn off the lights in any room where you are not using them, drive fewer miles by consolidating trips or taking public transit, waste less food and eat less meat. Perhaps the biggest single thing individuals can do on their own is to take fewer airplane trips; just one or two fewer plane rides per year can save as much in emissions as all the other actions combined. If you want to offset your emissions, you can buy certificates, with the money going to projects that protect forests, capture greenhouse gases and so forth. Leading companies are also starting to demand clean energy for their operations. What will Earth look like if all its land ice melts? Here's your answer.
Mapped: How climate change affects extreme weather around the world. ATTRIBUTION | April 15. 2020. 16:30 Mapped: How climate change affects extreme weather around the world In the early 2000s, a new field of climate-science research emerged that began to explore the human fingerprint on extreme weather, such as floods, heatwaves, droughts and storms.
The social causes of ‘natural’ disasters. Sep 15, 2017 Storms do not discriminate, but they make landfall on societies that do, argues Daniel Macmillen Voskoboynik The last months have seen remarkable episodes of environmental upheaval.
Almost every day has brought news of monsoons and mega-storms, droughts and wildfires, record temperatures and damning reports of ecological fragility. Antarctic sea ice levels hit record low, but experts are not sure why. Sea ice levels in Antarctica dropped to a record low this year, but experts say there is not a clear link to climate change.
More than 60 meteorologists and scientists from around the world are holding a week-long meeting in Hobart, Tasmania, to better understand sea ice changes on the frozen continent. Dr Jan Lieser from the Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems Cooperative Research Centre said sea ice levels had experienced a “massive increase” in variability over the past few years. Climate tipping points. The most effective individual steps to tackle climate change aren't being discussed. Governments and schools are not communicating the most effective ways for individuals to reduce their carbon footprints, according to new research.
Published today in the journal Environmental Research Letters, the study from Lund University, found that the incremental changes advocated by governments may represent a missed opportunity to reduce greenhouse gas emissions beneath the levels needed to prevent 2°C of climate warming. The four actions that most substantially decrease an individual's carbon footprint are: eating a plant-based diet, avoiding air travel, living car-free, and having smaller families.
The research analysed 39 peer reviewed papers, carbon calculators, and government reports to calculate the potential of a range of individual lifestyle choices to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. This comprehensive analysis identifies the actions individuals could take that will have the greatest impact on reducing their greenhouse gas emissions. Climate's magic rabbit: Pulling CO2 out of thin air. There's so much CO2 in the atmosphere that planting trees can no longer save us. The three-degree world: cities that will be drowned by global warming. When UN climate negotiators meet for summit talks this month, there will be a new figure on the table: 3C. Until now, global efforts such as the Paris climate agreement have tried to limit global warming to 2C above pre-industrial levels. However, with latest projections pointing to an increase of 3.2C by 2100, these goals seem to be slipping out of reach.
Global temperature change compared to pre-industrial levels. North Pole surges above freezing in the dead of winter, stunning scientists. Climate Change Is Messing With Your Dinner. A fisherman cleans his catch offshore from Newlyn, U.K. Credit: Annie Sakkab/Bloomberg The world’s dinner tables are seeing the impact of climate change. As cold regions become warmer, and warm places hotter still, farming and fishing are shifting. An evolving climate means big changes for people who grow, catch and rear for a living, and everyone else who buys and eats what they produce.