'Australia in January, California in August': Aussies watch on in horror as wildfires ravage US west coast (excerpt): SBS

Australia and Oregon

Former NSW fire chief Greg Mullins says the wildfires ravaging the US are a 'direct reflection' of what happened in Australia last summer, and serve as another 'wake up call' to pay attention to climate change.

Fires in Australia (Pic from this blog)

Apocalyptic orange skies, mass evacuations, people fleeing blazes near the water, and fires visible from satellites.

With up to 100 wildfires burning across multiple states on the US west coast, the situation is is eerily reminiscent of Australia’s deadly bushfire event of 2019-20.

Ross Bradstock is from the Centre for Environmental Risk Management of Bushfires at the University of Wollongong. He says what Australia went through last summer "is repeating itself in places like California". 

“We’re seeing something similar play out over there as to what played out in our last season in terms of unprecedented fires, unprecedented area burnt, unprecedented drought and heat,” he told SBS News.

San Francisco, Pic from SBS story

Former NSW Fire and Rescue Commissioner Greg Mullins has helped to fight fires in California several times since the 1990s. 

He agrees the current wildfires are "a direct reflection" of what Australia faced.

"It's unprecedented," Mr Mullins told SBS News.

"The temperatures they're getting - you know, 49.4 (degrees) in the eastern suburbs of Los Angeles - nothing has ever come close." .................


Go to complete article By Rashida Yosufzai, Jodie Stephens

Related: Washington governor blames climate change for fires (excerpt): abc news

 Fires near Sydney, Pic from this blog

'Blown away': Safe climate niche closing fast, with billions at risk: SMH

By Peter Hannam

May 5, 2020

As much as one-third of the world's population will be exposed to Sahara Desert-like heat within half a century if greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise at the pace of recent years.

Scientists from China, the US and Europe found that the narrow

climate niche that has supported human society would shift more over the next 50 years than it had in the preceding 6000 years.

"As many as 3.5 billion people will be exposed to "near-unliveable" temperatures averaging 29 degrees through the year by 2070. Less than 1 per cent of the Earth's surface now endures such heat.

That heat compares with the narrow 11- to 15-degree range that has supported civilisation over the past six millennia, according to research published Tuesday in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences."

Xu Chi, a researcher at China's Nanjing University and one of the paper's authors, said: "We were frankly blown away by our own initial results. As our findings were so striking, we took an extra year to carefully check all assumptions and computations."

Read the complete SMH article

Can planting trees save our climate?

In recent weeks, a new study by researchers at ETH Zurich has hit the headlines worldwide (Bastin et al. 2019). It is about trees. The researchers asked themselves the question: how much carbon could we store if we planted trees everywhere in the world where the land is not already used for agriculture or cities? Since the leaves of trees extract carbon in the form of carbon dioxide – CO₂ – from the air and then release the oxygen – O₂ – again, this is a great climate protection measure. The researchers estimated 200 billion tons of carbon could be stored in this way – provided we plant over a trillion trees.

The media impact of the new study was mainly based on the statement in the ETH press release that planting trees could offset two thirds of the man-made CO₂ increase in the atmosphere to date. To be able to largely compensate for the consequences of more than two centuries of industrial development with such a simple and hardly controversial measure – that sounds like a dream! And it was immediately welcomed by those who still dream of climate mitigation that doesn’t hurt anyone.

Unfortunately, it’s also too good to be true. 

Read the RealClimate article

June was hottest ever recorded on Earth, European satellite agency announces: Independent

Independent video hottest June weather

Experts say climate change contributed to record-breaking temperatures across Europe

Last month was the hottest June ever recorded, the EU‘s satellite agency has announced.

Data provided by the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S), implemented by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts on behalf of the EU, showed that the global average temperature for June 2019 was the highest on record for the month.

The data showed European average ​temperatures were more than 2C above normal and temperatures were 6-10C above normal over most of France, Germany and northern Spain during the final days of the month, according to C3S.

The global average temperature was about 0.1C higher than during the previous warmest June in 2016.

Experts have said climate change made last week’s record-breaking European heatwave at least five times as likely to happen, according to recent analysis.

Read the full Independent article 

Related:  The Last Time The Globe Warmed: Video (EONS)

This is what happens to Australia if we don’t act: NEWS.com.au

"World leaders have been warned that civilisation could collapse

 

This year Australians have suffered through one of the worst droughts in living memory, bushfires and a heatwave that saw hundreds of flying foxes “boiled alive”. It also saw the publication of one of the most comprehensive reviews of climate science which delivered a “wildly alarming” report about where the world was headed.

 

Go to video

Yet Australia still does not have a climate change or energy policy.

This week there was an extraordinary act of rebellion from NSW Liberal Energy Minister Don Harwin, who used an opinion piece in the Australian Financial Review to accuse the Morrison Government of being “out of touch” on climate and energy policy.

Perhaps some of the doom and gloom from recent reports into the world’s changing climate is finally starting to filter through?

Climate change is certainly being taken seriously by many Australians, with the Climate of the Nation report this year showing the number of Australians concerned about it had reached a five-year high.

The report produced by The Australia Institute found 73 per cent of 1756 Australians surveyed were concerned about climate change, up from 66 per cent in 2017.

But Federal Energy Minister Angus Taylor has hit back at pressure from Mr Harwin and other states and territories who want higher emissions reduction targets, suggesting they need to “get back to reality”.

So what is the reality on climate change? Here are some facts.

AUSTRALIA HAS WARMED BY 1 DEGREE

On Thursday a new report was released that confirmed Australia had already warmed by 1C since records were first kept in 1910, according to the State of the Climate, a joint analysis released by Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology and CSIRO.

As well as a spike in the number of extreme heat days, oceans around Australia seem to be warning and this is contributing to a rise in sea levels, CSIRO director of the Climate Science Centre Helen Cleugh said.

The report confirms the findings of the “wildly alarming” Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report, which also noted the world had warmed by 1C.

WE’RE ON TRACK FOR 3 DEGREES 

The IPCC report has been hugely influential because it looked at 6000 peer-reviewed studies and involved 91 authors and review editors from 40 countries.

It found current pledges made by countries around the world — including Australia’s target to reduce emissions by 26 to 28 per cent on 2005 levels by 2030 — would see temperatures rise by 3C by the end of the century.

Scientists and climate activists have called on countries to ratchet up their carbon-cutting pledges as soon as possible.
Actions taken in the next 12 years until 2030 will be critical in order to have a chance of keeping global warming to 1.5C.
Temperatures are likely to rise by 1.5C between 2030 and 2052 if they continue to increase at the current rate.

WE’LL LOSE THE GREAT BARRIER REEF

The future is bleak for one of Australia’s biggest tourist attractions, which is estimated to be worth $56 billion to the country."



Read the complete News.com.au article and see the video

#climateheating  #animalextinction  #greatbarrierreef  #coralbleaching  #jobs

Related:

Power cuts hit ahead of heatwave

"Victoria braces for hottest day since Black Saturday

Melbourne is expected to swelter through the hottest day since Black Saturday a decade ago. Records are set to tumble across the state."

 

New Zealand's Prime Minister discusses climate change: ABC

Gore, Attenborough and Ardern

NZ PM addresses combating climate change

New Zealand PM Jacinda Ardern discusses climate change alongside David Attenborough at a World Economic Forum in Switzerland.

'being on the right side of history'

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and naturalist David Attenborough have issued a strong message to world leaders who do not believe in climate change while appearing together at the annual World Economic Forum meeting in Davos.

Key points:

• Ms Ardern said combating climate change is "about being on the right side of history'
• Attenborough said "it's difficult to overstate the climate change crisis"

Joining a panel hosted by former US vice president Al Gore, Ms Ardern, a long-time supporter of efforts to combat climate change, said leaders do not have to cede power by acting on the matter.

"There's nothing to fear about your individual political status," she said.

"Actually, this is about being on the right side of history.

"Do you want to be a leader that you look back in time and say that you were on the wrong side of the argument when the world was crying out for a solution?

"It's as simple as that, I think."

ABC article 

#newzealand  #Davos  #climateheating  #climatechange  #worldeconomicforum  #DavidAttenborough

ABC Story: Scientists are playing Fortnite to talk to kids about climate change

Spread the word by gaming

"It’s a strange mix, but by creating the ClimateFortnite Twitch channel Henri is hoping to use the games popularity to explain global warming and climate policy to a wider audience. 

He’s not going it alone, there’s other scientists either playing with him or just hanging around to answer the questions thrown out by viewers. Scientists like Chris, a masters student at Boston University, who is on hand to field a question about the Paris climate agreement thrown out at the start of one game."

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"I get a lot of kids who are scared about what climate change means for their future, they come on and like being able to ask their question directly to an expert."

Read the original