writeaboutwarming

March 21, 2017 - Statements issued by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) yesterday are so alarming, they must be shared. What follows is not good news, so if you'd rather not know - and that is a legitimate response, though I hate to admit it - stop reading. No matter what, never forget: never give up, never give up, never give up. The WMO reports unprecedented heat across the globe, exceptionally low ice at both poles, and - perhaps most worrisome - surging sea-level rise. No longer are climate change's effects being felt in various places at various times. It's crazy hot everywhere. This year continues a trend begun in 2016: temperature records are being broken everywhere. Last month was off the charts here in the United States. In Australia, extreme heat has been a fact of life in many states for months. I hope you saw what I wrote about fires in the US yesterday. In fact, scientific research reveals that the last time our planet was this warm occurred about...

March 20, 2017 - Happy Spring, everybody. Today's post will be brief: the ten-year average for number of wildfires during January through mid-March is 8,687 fires that burned 216,894 acres per year in the United States. This year there have been 10,829 fires during that period, burning 2,062,012 acres. You read that right.

March 13, 2017 - Raise your hand if winter weather where you live has been abnormal. Here in the Pacific Northwest we have had record-setting amounts of rain. 2017 has been one of the fastest starting years on record in terms of the tornado count, which currently stands at 301 confirmed tornadoes. There is an historic blizzard taking place in the northeastern US as I write. When you see words like "record setting" and "historic," think climate change. Otherwise, there is no change; events fall within an average range, established over decades or centuries. The events and patterns just described fall outside that range; they are therefore symptomatic of climate change. Every passing year gets warmer - and worse, by which I mean the damage done by storms measured in dollars, and the number of injuries or deaths caused by storms. The warmer temperatures occur at night, by the way. Yes, daytime temperatures may also be hellishly hot, but they aren't at the cutt...

March 5, 2017 - China's coal consumption dropped for the third year in a row in 2016.  This, coupled with the country's shift away from heavy industry, could well portend cleaner air and water. As you know, cleaner air in China means cleaner air everywhere. With a population of 1.35 billion people, China currently produces twice as much carbon dioxide in the form of emissions as the United States. Given that the US has a population less than 1/4 the size of China's, their emissions would quadruple our own, if their standard of living matched ours. Thank goodness it doesn't. Be aware, however, that the government of China is transitioning to an economy based on consumer spending. That could spell trouble. In the meantime, China's National Bureau of Statistics indicates that China's coal consumption fell by 4.7 percent in 2016. Coal's share of total energy consumed fell to 62% in 2016, from 64% in 2015. In the United States, by contrast, the government ple...