Texas

Resilience System


You are here

Climate

Disastrous Sea Level Rise Is an Issue for Today's Public - Not Next Millennium's

             

huffingtonpost.com - by Dr. James Hansen - July 27, 2015

. . . 2°C global warming, rather than being a safe "guardrail," is highly dangerous. . . .

. . . My conclusion, based on the total information available, is that continued high emissions would result in multi-meter sea level rise this century and lock in continued ice sheet disintegration such that building cities or rebuilding cities on coast lines would become foolish. . . .

. . . A startling conclusion of our paper is that effects of freshwater release onto the Southern Ocean and North Atlantic are already underway and 1-2 decades sooner in the real world than in the model (Fig. 2). 

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

CLICK HERE - Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics - Earth's energy imbalance and implications

CLICK HERE - Ice Melt, Sea Level Rise and Superstorms: Evidence from Paleoclimate Data, Climate Modeling, and Modern Observations that 2°C Global Warming is Highly Dangerous

OR

Country / Region Tags: 
General Topic Tags: 
Problem, Solution, SitRep, or ?: 

Flood and Drought Risk to Cities on Rise Even with No Climate Change

sciencedaily.com - March 5, 2015

Source:  Texas A&M University

CLICK HERE - STUDY - Changing global patterns of urban exposure to flood and drought hazards

Summary:  A heads-up to New York, Baltimore, Houston and Miami: a new study suggests that these metropolitan areas and others will increase their exposure to floods even in the absence of climate change.  Their work is published in Global Environmental Change. . . .

. . . "Through land change, bank protection, channelization, and other means, urbanization can also alter the geomorphology of river channels and floodplains, which in turn may contribute to increased risk of flooding."

"Our findings suggest that future urban expansion in flood and drought prone zones will at least be as important as population growth and economic development in increasing their exposure," the researchers add.

"With climatic changes, this exposure is only expected to increase in the future. Thus, proper planning and financing in fast growing cities today will be critical in mitigating future losses due to floods and droughts."

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

 

Country / Region Tags: 
Problem, Solution, SitRep, or ?: 

Obama to Seek 40 Percent Cut in Federal Greenhouse Gases

      

Thinkstock

thehill.com - by Timothy Cama - March 19, 2015

President Obama signed an executive order Thursday to cut the federal government’s greenhouse gas emissions 40 percent over the next decade.

The effort will save taxpayers as much as $18 billion due to energy savings, the White House said. . .

. . . Obama will also push federal agencies to get 30 percent of their power from renewable sources like wind and solar energy.

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

Country / Region Tags: 
General Topic Tags: 
Problem, Solution, SitRep, or ?: 

Interaction of Atlantic and Pacific Oscillations Caused 'False Pause' in Warming

Ocean and sky (stock image) / Iakov Kalinin / Fotolia

CLICK HERE - RESEARCH - Atlantic and Pacific multidecadal oscillations and Northern Hemisphere temperatures

sciencedaily.com - February 26, 2015

The recent slowdown in climate warming is due, at least in part, to natural oscillations in the climate, according to a team of climate scientists, who add that these oscillations represent variability internal to the climate system. They do not signal any slowdown in human-caused global warming.

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

(ALSO SEE RELATED ARTICLE HERE)

Country / Region Tags: 
General Topic Tags: 
Problem, Solution, SitRep, or ?: 

Obama Vetoes Keystone XL Pipeline, Leaving it in Limbo

         

A depot used to store pipes for Transcanada Corp's planned Keystone XL oil pipeline is seen in Gascoyne, North Dakota November 14, 2014.  Credit: Reuters/Andrew Cullen

reuters.com - By Jeff Mason and Timothy Gardner - February 24, 2015

(Reuters) - President Barack Obama on Tuesday, as promised, swiftly vetoed a Republican bill approving the Keystone XL oil pipeline, leaving the long-debated project in limbo for another indefinite period.

The U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, after receiving Obama's veto message, immediately countered by announcing the Republican-led chamber would attempt to override it by March 3.

That is unlikely. Despite their majority, Republicans are four votes short of being able to overturn Obama's veto.

They have vowed to attach language approving the pipeline to a spending bill or other legislation later in the year that the president would find difficult to veto.

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

 

Country / Region Tags: 
Problem, Solution, SitRep, or ?: 

US faces worst droughts in 1,000 years, predict scientists

Cattle roam dirt-brown fields on the outskirts of Delano, in California’s Central Valley. Scientists predict future droughts will be far worse than the one in California. Photograph: Frederic J Brown/AFP/Getty Images

Image: Cattle roam dirt-brown fields on the outskirts of Delano, in California’s Central Valley. Scientists predict future droughts will be far worse than the one in California. Photograph: Frederic J Brown/AFP/Getty Images

theguardian.com - February 12 2015 - Suzanne Goldenberg

The US south-west and the Great Plains will face decade-long droughts far worse than any experienced over the last 1,000 years because of climate change, researchers said on Thursday.

The coming drought age – caused by higher temperatures under climate change – will make it nearly impossible to carry on with current life-as-normal conditions across a vast swathe of the country.

Country / Region Tags: 
Problem, Solution, SitRep, or ?: 

White House Moves to Rein In Methane Emissions

       

New EPA standards will aim to significantly cut methane emissions from oil and gas sites in the U.S.

The Obama administration makes its latest move to take on climate change.

usnews.com - by Alan Neuhauser - January 14, 2015

In the Obama administration’s latest use of executive authority to address climate change, the White House announced plans Wednesday to impose new regulations on the oil and gas industry that would nearly halve methane emissions from wells, drill sites and pipelines in 10 years.

The new standards, to be developed by the Environmental Protection Agency under the Clean Air Act, would aim by 2025 to cut methane emissions by up to 45 percent from levels recorded in 2012. They would also slash the spread of volatile organic compounds, or VOCs, key components of ground-level smog that have been linked to cancer, neurological conditions and other illnesses.

Country / Region Tags: 
General Topic Tags: 
Problem, Solution, SitRep, or ?: 

Climate Change Threatens Health - Extreme Heat: More Intense Hot Days and Heat Waves

      

nrdc.org

Across the nation, climate change is making hot summer days hotter and stretching their numbers into heat waves that never seem to end. And the heat is causing more than just discomfort - as temperatures rise, so are the number of illnesses, emergency room visits, and deaths.

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

Country / Region Tags: 
General Topic Tags: 
Problem, Solution, SitRep, or ?: 

Climate Mission Impossible: Scientists Say Fossil Fuels Must Go Untapped

The UCL study used an economic model to determine what percentage of each region's fossil fuel reserves should be left untouched in order to meet climate goals. Reserves are defined as fuels that could be developed given current technology and economic conditions.
EMILY M. ENG, NG STAFF. SOURCE: C. MCGLADE AND P. EKINS. NATURE

New study says vast amounts of coal, oil, and gas must be left untouched to limit global warming.

CLICK HERE - STUDY - NATURE
The geographical distribution of fossil fuels unused when limiting global warming to
2 °C

Nature 517, 187–190 (08 January 2015) doi:10.1038/nature14016

nationalgeographic.com - January 7, 2015
by Christina Nunez

Canada's tar sands need to stay in the ground, the oil beneath the Arctic has to remain under the sea, and most of the world's coal must be left untouched in order to prevent global temperatures from rising more than 2°C, a study released Wednesday says.

Country / Region Tags: 
General Topic Tags: 
Problem, Solution, SitRep, or ?: 

Surging Seas - Risk Finder: Texas

(CLICK HERE - INTERACTIVE MAP - Surging Seas - Risk Finder: Texas)

(CLICK HERE - Surging Seas - Risk Finder: Texas)

Searchable interactive map of sea level rise & flood risk areas

Climate Central - An independent organization of leading scientists and journalists researching and reporting the facts about our changing climate and its impact on the American public.

(CLICK HERE - Climate Central)

Country / Region Tags: 
General Topic Tags: 
Problem, Solution, SitRep, or ?: 

Pages

Subscribe to Climate
howdy folks