writeaboutwarming

December 22, 2019 Carbon lock-in: technological, economic, political and social forces that make use of fossil energy [seem] natural and taken for granted by households, cities, provinces and countries. The word "forces" might be replaced with the word "habits." Habits like driving half a mile to pick up a gallon of milk. Habits like setting the thermostat at 70 degrees, winter, summer, night and day. Habits like accepting the cost of gassing up your non-hybrid vehicle without a second thought. Habits like re-electing incumbent government officials who vote against environmentally beneficial legislation. Habits like forgetting to recycle your clothes, furniture, books and kitchen utensils. These habits eliminate the possibility of one day living decarbonized lives, i.e., lives that are not dependent upon fossil fuels. According to two University of Toronto researchers, seeking merely to reduce our carbon footprints will never get us a climate-change-free world. ...

December 12, 2019 It's important to remember that the European Union (EU) has the world's largest economy. It ranks third, behind China and the United States, in contributions to climate change. What the EU decides to do in order to combat climate change will affect every one of us, existentially and economically. Unveiled yesterday, the EU's Green Deal proposes a target of net-zero carbon emissions by 2050. Regulators will create standards for the manufacturing of goods that force recycling and the phasing out of plastic and other kinds of non-recyclable waste. Beginning in 2021, 40 percent of the agricultural budget will, assuming adoption of the plan, be devoted to mitigating climate change and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. In addition, 30 percent of fisheries subsidies would be used in a similar manner. Air quality standards will be more stringent, an essential element of the plan, given that 400,000 premature deaths a year can be attributed to air pollution in...

October 8, 2019 The Uninhabitable Earth: Life After Warming , by David Wallace-Wells, has a misleading title. Wallace-Wells is not at all sure that human life will continue post-warming. The point of his hard-to-read volume is that we need to act with the urgency a life-threatening situation demands. Action devoid of the mandatory intensity and intentionality will render us a footnote in history - a history no one will read. The author begins by telling us "It is worse, much worse, than you think," and goes on to list the ways in which we have chosen to delude ourselves. The bitter truth is that we are all in this together, though some will suffer more than others, with India and Pakistan leading the pack. Let us count the ways: heat death, hunger, drowning, wildfire, disasters no longer natural, freshwater drain, dying oceans, unbreathable air, plagues of warming, economic collapse, climate conflict, and "systems," or threat multipliers. Thus far we have incurr...

August 23, 2019 The Amazon is an enormous rainforest in South America. It covers forty percent of the South American continent, and can be found in eight countries. If it were laid over a map of the 48 contiguous states of the United States, it would encompass nearly two-thirds of it. Because trees breathe in carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, it is essential that we protect them, wherever they grow. In Brazil, where much of the Amazon is located, the president of that country has been encouraging farmers, ranchers, and loggers to exploit the riches that can be found there. That means clearing away the trees by incinerating them. So hellbent are farmers on enlarging their holdings and growing more food, they organized a "fire day" last week. In order to accommodate them, President Bolsonaro of Brazil has weakened regulations intended to protect forests and indigenous lands. His failure to halt deforestation, in keeping with the Paris Climate Accords, has caused Germany and...

August 16, 2019 The Trump Administration is proposing a freeze on federal fuel economy standards at 2020 levels. The state of California has reached an agreement with four automakers that would call for average fuel economy of 51 miles per gallon by 2026.  Automakers are siding with California, because they don't want to have to build two different cars to meet two different standards. In fact, 17 car companies informed Trump by letter in June that the weakening of fuel economy standards could destabilize the entire auto-making industry. The good news? More and more states support California's higher standards. States like New Jersey, Connecticut, Washington, Vermont, New York, Maine, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Delaware. The District of Columbia also backs California's clean air standards, and Colorado, an oil-producing state, has just joined this farsighted group. They are what is considered a "Section 177 state," in refe...

August 10, 2019 Did you know that, globally, farmers produce 1.5 times the amount of food consumers need? Because farmers must sink so much money into food production in the way of chemicals and seed, they have little choice but to overproduce, in order to recoup what they've overspent. As things stand, far too much of what farmers spend to grow food winds up in the hands of chemical and seed companies. Needless to say, farmers can't stay in business if they can't make money. Farmers in Iowa are grappling, not only with prices that are too low, but with flooded fields. In fact, farmers throughout the Plains and the South have dealt with the effects of spring floods and summer downpours this year. That's why the time is right for parity pricing. Did you know that the American agricultural economy contributes more greenhouse gases to the atmosphere than all forms of transportation combined? Stop overproduction of food and you limit production of these gases. Another ...

July 3, 2019 Last Friday, the temperature reached 115 degrees Fahrenheit in Gallargues-le-Montueux, France, a record for the entire country. France was not the only country in Europe suffering from record-setting heat: Germany, Poland, Spain, the Czech Republic, Italy, and others were sweltering. Why? Scientists have their eyes on the polar jet stream, the fast-moving flow of high-altitude air currents at the top of the world. When the jet stream wanders, cold Arctic air can spill southward, or hotter air from the middle latitudes can move north. These scientists theorize that the melting of Arctic ice, along with the decreased temperature difference between the Arctic and lower latitudes, is causing the jet stream to weaken, leading to its wobbly flow. Michael Mann, a climate scientist at Penn State, says a "meandering, slowed jet stream . . . favors stalled extreme weather regimes like the ones we are seeing right now." The hotter the Arctic, the weaker the jet stream. ...