Global Warming/Climate Change Super Thread
- Thread starter Cdn Blackshirt
- Start date
daftandbarmy
Army.ca Dinosaur
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Meanwhile, down beside the seaside.... NTS: don't buy waterfront in Florida 
Climate Change Indicators: Oceans
Land Loss Along the Atlantic Coast
Covering about 70 percent of the Earth’s surface, the world’s oceans have a two-way relationship with weather and climate. The oceans influence the weather on local to global scales, while changes in climate can fundamentally alter many properties of the oceans. This chapter examines how some of these important characteristics of the oceans have changed over time.
Why does it matter?
As greenhouse gases trap more energy from the sun, the oceans are absorbing more heat, resulting in an increase in sea surface temperatures and rising sea level. Changes in ocean temperatures and currents brought about by climate change will lead to alterations in climate patterns around the world. For example, warmer waters may promote the development of stronger storms in the tropics, which can cause property damage and loss of life. The impacts associated with sea level rise and stronger storms are especially relevant to coastal communities.
Although the oceans help reduce climate change by storing large amounts of carbon dioxide, increasing levels of dissolved carbon are changing the chemistry of seawater and making it more acidic. Increased ocean acidity makes it more difficult for certain organisms, such as corals and shellfish, to build their skeletons and shells. These effects, in turn, could substantially alter the biodiversity and productivity of ocean ecosystems.
Changes in ocean systems generally occur over much longer time periods than in the atmosphere, where storms can form and dissipate in a single day. Interactions between the oceans and atmosphere occur slowly over many months to years, and so does the movement of water within the oceans, including the mixing of deep and shallow waters. Thus, trends can persist for decades, centuries, or longer. For this reason, even if greenhouse gas emissions were stabilized tomorrow, it would take many more years—decades to centuries—for the oceans to adjust to changes in the atmosphere and the climate that have already occurred.
Summary of Key Points
Ocean Heat. Three independent analyses show that the amount of heat stored in the ocean has increased substantially since the 1950s. Ocean heat content not only determines sea surface temperature, but also affects sea level and currents.
Sea Surface Temperature. Ocean surface temperatures increased around the world during the 20th century. Even with some year-to-year variation, the overall increase is clear, and sea surface temperatures have been consistently higher during the past three decades than at any other time since reliable observations began in the late 1800s.
Sea Level. When averaged over all of the world’s oceans, sea level has risen at a rate of roughly six-tenths of an inch per decade since 1880. The rate of increase has accelerated in recent years to more than an inch per decade. Changes in sea level relative to the land vary by region. Along the U.S. coastline, sea level has risen the most along the Mid-Atlantic coast and parts of the Gulf coast, where some stations registered increases of more than 8 inches between 1960 and 2015. Sea level has decreased relative to the land in parts of Alaska and the Pacific Northwest.
A Closer Look: Land Loss Along the Atlantic Coast. As sea level rises, dry land and wetlands can turn into open water. Along many parts of the Atlantic coast, this problem is made worse by low elevations and land that is already sinking. Between 1996 and 2011, the coastline from Florida to New York lost more land than it gained.
Coastal Flooding. Flooding is becoming more frequent along the U.S. coastline as sea level rises. Nearly every site measured has experienced an increase in coastal flooding since the 1950s. The rate is accelerating in many locations along the East and Gulf coasts. The Mid-Atlantic region suffers the highest number of coastal flood days and has also experienced the largest increases in flooding.
Ocean Acidity. The ocean has become more acidic over the past few decades because of increased levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide, which dissolves in the water. Higher acidity affects the balance of minerals in the water, which can make it more difficult for certain marine animals to build their protective skeletons or shells.
https://www.epa.gov/climate-indicators/oceans
Climate Change Indicators: Oceans
Land Loss Along the Atlantic Coast
Covering about 70 percent of the Earth’s surface, the world’s oceans have a two-way relationship with weather and climate. The oceans influence the weather on local to global scales, while changes in climate can fundamentally alter many properties of the oceans. This chapter examines how some of these important characteristics of the oceans have changed over time.
Why does it matter?
As greenhouse gases trap more energy from the sun, the oceans are absorbing more heat, resulting in an increase in sea surface temperatures and rising sea level. Changes in ocean temperatures and currents brought about by climate change will lead to alterations in climate patterns around the world. For example, warmer waters may promote the development of stronger storms in the tropics, which can cause property damage and loss of life. The impacts associated with sea level rise and stronger storms are especially relevant to coastal communities.
Although the oceans help reduce climate change by storing large amounts of carbon dioxide, increasing levels of dissolved carbon are changing the chemistry of seawater and making it more acidic. Increased ocean acidity makes it more difficult for certain organisms, such as corals and shellfish, to build their skeletons and shells. These effects, in turn, could substantially alter the biodiversity and productivity of ocean ecosystems.
Changes in ocean systems generally occur over much longer time periods than in the atmosphere, where storms can form and dissipate in a single day. Interactions between the oceans and atmosphere occur slowly over many months to years, and so does the movement of water within the oceans, including the mixing of deep and shallow waters. Thus, trends can persist for decades, centuries, or longer. For this reason, even if greenhouse gas emissions were stabilized tomorrow, it would take many more years—decades to centuries—for the oceans to adjust to changes in the atmosphere and the climate that have already occurred.
Summary of Key Points
Ocean Heat. Three independent analyses show that the amount of heat stored in the ocean has increased substantially since the 1950s. Ocean heat content not only determines sea surface temperature, but also affects sea level and currents.
Sea Surface Temperature. Ocean surface temperatures increased around the world during the 20th century. Even with some year-to-year variation, the overall increase is clear, and sea surface temperatures have been consistently higher during the past three decades than at any other time since reliable observations began in the late 1800s.
Sea Level. When averaged over all of the world’s oceans, sea level has risen at a rate of roughly six-tenths of an inch per decade since 1880. The rate of increase has accelerated in recent years to more than an inch per decade. Changes in sea level relative to the land vary by region. Along the U.S. coastline, sea level has risen the most along the Mid-Atlantic coast and parts of the Gulf coast, where some stations registered increases of more than 8 inches between 1960 and 2015. Sea level has decreased relative to the land in parts of Alaska and the Pacific Northwest.
A Closer Look: Land Loss Along the Atlantic Coast. As sea level rises, dry land and wetlands can turn into open water. Along many parts of the Atlantic coast, this problem is made worse by low elevations and land that is already sinking. Between 1996 and 2011, the coastline from Florida to New York lost more land than it gained.
Coastal Flooding. Flooding is becoming more frequent along the U.S. coastline as sea level rises. Nearly every site measured has experienced an increase in coastal flooding since the 1950s. The rate is accelerating in many locations along the East and Gulf coasts. The Mid-Atlantic region suffers the highest number of coastal flood days and has also experienced the largest increases in flooding.
Ocean Acidity. The ocean has become more acidic over the past few decades because of increased levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide, which dissolves in the water. Higher acidity affects the balance of minerals in the water, which can make it more difficult for certain marine animals to build their protective skeletons or shells.
https://www.epa.gov/climate-indicators/oceans
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I wonder what Obama's thoughts on this were when he bought his mansion on Martha's Vineyard?
daftandbarmy
Army.ca Dinosaur
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Shot, over
Why The Science Behind the UN/IPCC Climate Reports is “Unsettled” – David Yager
When it comes to climate change, the frequently repeated mantra is “The science is settled.” Those who dare raise questions are labelled climate change deniers. Everybody else just agrees with everything and keeps their views to themselves.
Except scientist and author Steven E. Koonin, who begs to differ. The title of his book is Unsettled – What Climate Science Tells Us, What It Doesn’t, and Why It Matters.
Climate science was again headline news on August 9 after the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) issued its latest report. Starting with the first report in 1990, the IPCC has concluded climate change is a growing problem with serious consequences. Subsequent reports in 1995, 2001, 2007 and 2013 were accompanied by increasingly stronger language to highlight the enormity of this growing threat.
In the 2021 version, the IPCC chose language that can be fairly described as histrionics. The IPCC’s AR 6 (Assessment Report) media release used descriptive wording you’d normally expect from radical environmental lobby groups pitching certain doom to terrify people into donating money and buying memberships.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called AR 6 a “code red for humanity” adding, “The alarm bells are deafening. This report must sound a death knell for coal and fossil fuels, before they destroy our planet.”
Does this sound like science? This is pure alarmist political hyperbole. Taken literally, even the rocks are not safe from the ravages of fossil fuels.
But the IPCC’s public communications are no longer about true climate science, nor have they been for some time. This is one of the key points in Unsettled, written by physicist/scientist Steven E. Koonin who was the former Undersecretary for Science under President Barack Obama in the US Department of Energy.
Koonin is a serious guy with serious reservations about the IPCC. While never suggesting that carbon dioxide does not trap heat in the atmosphere or that human activity is not a contributor to global warming and climate change, his issues are with the inner workings of the IPCC and the alarmist news coverage of everything related to the weather.
Because to Koonin, there is pure science – the academic process meant to underpin the IPCC’s research – and “The Science,” words used to justify lazy and misleading journalism, preach impending disaster, advocate for unworkable fossil fuel alternatives, and demand that the entire global energy complex be replaced immediately regardless of cost.
Since the IPCC was created in 1988, its ARs have been commonly considered the holy grail of climate modelling. After all, 97% of the scientists involved agree that CO2 emissions from fossil fuels are essentially a thermostat. The higher the CO2, the higher the temperature and more volatile the weather.
Except this isn’t true. The 97% agreement figure has been debunked multiple times in multiple places. But like any skepticism associated with the subject, it was drowned out by the crescendo of voices claiming that the world faces a climate emergency and that anyone who doesn’t agree is an enemy of the future of humanity.
But as a physicist and scientist, Koonin is concerned that many of the fundamental drivers behind public concerns and climate change policy do not have an unquestionable foundation in classic academic science.
So he wrote a book about it. Using the simplest words possible for such a complex subject and numerous graphs and charts that are quite understandable with a little study, Koonin explains where he believes The Science departs from established and accepted scientific methods.
Koonin states that the public communications about the IPCC’s work and the actual state of the world’s climate are “profoundly misleading.” He writes on the inside cover, “…core questions – about the way the climate is responding to our (human) influence and what the impacts will be – remain largely unanswered.”
He began his career building computer models to study atoms and nuclei using the same basic tools as the IPCC uses for its climate models. Before joining the Obama administration, he was a professor at Caltech and later the chief scientist at BP where he focused much of his work on renewable energy. In DC he writes, “I helped guide the government’s investments in energy technologies and climate science.”
But everything changed in 2013 and 2014 when Koonin was asked by the American Physical Society – the professional organization of America physicists – “to ‘stress test’ the state of climate science.” This included examining in detail the different climate modelling methodologies.
Koonin writes that he finished this process “not only surprised but shaken.” The models used insufficient input data to separate natural from human causes. Various climate models contradicted each other and therefore required non-scientific “expert judgement” to achieve the desired outcome. Government and UN pronouncements were so different from the contents of the reports that some climate experts were embarrassed. Koonin added, “the science is insufficient to make useful projections about how the climate will change over the coming decades.”
Wow. You don’t read that every day.
He starts by explaining the difference between climate and the weather, repeating an old saw dating back to 1901 which states, “Climate is what you expect; weather is what you get.” The most important part of the early pages of the book is that weather is not climate, and the highly publicized severe weather events experienced today are not the worst ever, nor are they occurring more frequently.
But thanks to the internet and profound changes in how news is created and distributed, today’s non-stop reporting of all global forest fires, floods and storms leads many to conclude that things are indeed getting worse. And thanks to the IPCC and thirty years of increasingly unquestioned repetition, fossil fuels and growing CO2 emissions are the primary causes.
Koonin indicates that severe weather events have been around for centuries and will be with us for centuries, no matter how successful the world’s attempt to quit using fossil fuels prove to be.
He also illustrates that while the world has indeed warmed 1oC since the start of the industrial revolution, it has not been a straight line. The world warmed steadily from 1910 to 1940, then levelled off until 1970. Warming then resumed. Koonin emphasizes that most of the current focus is on the past fifty years, not the 60 years before that.
The rate of rise of the oceans has been roughly the same for centuries, about a foot every hundred years. Ocean levels have undergone massive fluctuations in the past, increases and declines completely unrelated to the planet’s growing population and fossil fuel consumption.
Koonin then dives into the how climate models work, making this complex subject understandable. There are wide variations among the different computer programs and methodologies but what bothers the author most is that the models don’t accurately duplicate historical events, even from the 20th century.
Which means something is wrong with the methodology. Koonin’s point is if climate models can’t replicate the past, how can they predict the future? Of the 1910 to 1940 warming period Koonin writes, “…they’re saying that we’ve no idea what causes this failure of the models. They cannot tell us why the climate changed during those decades. And that’s deeply unsettling…”
Another major factor is the impact of clouds and aerosols (airborne particles and chemicals) which reduce warming by the sun. Koonin quoted one researcher who said, “Cloud-aerosol interactions are on the bleeding edge of our comprehension of how the climate system works, and it’s a challenge to model what we don’t understand.”
Another phenomenon of modern climate research is looking backwards; an unpleasant weather event occurs then The Science determines if this was a recurring natural phenomenon or caused by human induced climate change. These are called “attribution studies.”
The IPCC’s 2012 Special Report on Extreme Events concludes, “Even if there were no anthropogenic (man-made) changes in climate, a wide variety of natural weather and climate extremes would still occur.”
The World Meteorological Organization adds, “…any single event, such as a severe tropical cyclone (hurricane or typhoon), cannot be attributed to human-induced climate change, given the current status of scientific understanding.”
Koonin matches modern with historical data. Tornadoes are a good example. Because of modern communications and satellites, even the smallest tornadoes are now recorded. This shows an upward trend since 1950. However, when Koonin sorts them out by size (big enough to be noticed and documented from 1954 to 2014), there is no average increase in higher strength tornadoes and a decline in the most powerful twisters.
On to droughts. Koonin reconstructs severe drops in the flow of the Colorado River dating back to AD 750 using tree rings. Another chart titled “California Drought Severity Index” dating back to 1900 shows multiple droughts in the past 120 years before the recent most recent dry period.
Forest fires? Koonin’s chart shows a steady average decline in the global burned areas since 2003. Human factors like clearing the land for agriculture are a far greater cause of forest fires than climate change.
He even takes the time to brand former Bank of Canada chief and UN climate envoy Mark Carney as a climate alarmist. While still head of the Bank of England in 2014, Carney said the previous winter was the “wettest since the time of King George.” Koonin’s rainfall chart from 2020 back to 1770 indicate that 2014 was hardly an anomaly.
On Carney Koonin wrote, “…it’s surprising that someone with a PhD in economics and experience with the unpredictability of financial markets and economics as a whole doesn’t show a greater respect for the perils of predictions…and more caution in depending upon models.”
Weather related deaths have continued to decline for the past 110 years. “Deaths from wildfires in any decade are too small to be visible on this chart.” Despite warnings about how climate change will cause food shortages, as the population grew by billions in the past 110 years, Koonin graphs how the inflation-corrected price of grain in 2000 was 90% lower than in 1910.
The media regularly repeats the predictions of dire economic consequences from a warming world, but all the climate models – even those with much higher temperatures – show steady economic growth for the rest of the 21st century.
Koonin is highly critical of modern media coverage writing, “…as the age of the internet advances, headlines become more provocative to encourage clicks – even when the article itself didn’t support the provocation…Whatever its noble intentions, news is ultimately a business, one that in this digital era increasingly depends upon eyeballs in the form of clicks and shares. Reporting on the scientific reality that there’s hardly been any long-term change in extreme weather events doesn’t fit the ethos of ‘If it bleeds it leads’.”
So nowadays almost every reported bad weather event quote somebody who claims that it was either caused or made worse by climate change. No research, no historical context.
After 205 pages of detailed explanation, Koonin switches to commentary. He concluded years ago that the CO2 emission reductions required to meet the agreed-upon temperature ceilings by 2030 and the increasingly repeated chant of Net Zero by 2050 were impossible.
Besides the enormity of replacing the existing energy infrastructure on a global scale, once people fully understand what the “energy transition” really means to their lifestyle and incomes, voter support tumbles. People don’t understand the degree to which fossil fuels have helped create and support the wealth and comforts of modern society.
Plastics, petrochemicals, fertilizers and the powerful energy sources required for heavy transportation and manufacturing of basic construction materials cannot be replaced with interruptible electricity.
Koonin highlights the recent phenomenon of OECD countries shutting down their carbon intensive industries to appear to be tackling the emissions problem. But voters continue to buy the same products from other countries like China which use low-cost coal as the primary energy source. This is politics and virtue signaling that does not change the chemical composition of the planet’s atmosphere.
While the wealthy west may be able to afford converting to low carbon energy, the developing world cannot and, unless forced, will not.
Therefore, Koonin also puts forward Plan B. If CO2 emissions are proven to be primary cause of warming but the people of the world choose not to replace fossil fuels because of excessive costs and disruption, the author sees two solutions, both expensive and unproven.
The first is Solar Radiation Management – blocking the sun’s radiant heat with materials placed in the upper atmosphere. The other is Carbon Dioxide Removal, which is taking CO2 out of the atmosphere in huge quantities.
As a scientist, Koonin feels the need to explain there are more scientific methods of altering the climate besides fear, sacrifice, taxes, politics and promoting fossil fuel substitutes that don’t work.
When it released AR6, the IPCC knew that declaring fossil fuels will destroy the planet would make headlines and grab eyeballs. But those who actually read the 4,000-page report discovered that the likelihood of very high temperature extremes have been downgraded.
A Wall Street Journal article on August 11 read, “…the IPCC has dialed back the probability of (without ruling out) more extreme changes in temperature. Such scenarios have been used to justify faster and costlier action to ban or limit fossil fuels.”
Which underpins Koonin’s points. There’s true climate science – complex and under continuous development – and there’s The Science, which spreads fear measured in decibels, not degrees Celsius.
Is Koonin right? He admits he could be wrong. Which is why he wants to fund research into blocking the sun’s heat with a giant chemical umbrella.
Is what you read about climate change in the news right? Absolutely not.
Why The Science Behind the UN/IPCC Climate Reports is “Unsettled” - David Yager - Energy News for the Canadian Oil & Gas Industry | EnergyNow.ca
Why The Science Behind the UN/IPCC Climate Reports is “Unsettled” – David Yager
When it comes to climate change, the frequently repeated mantra is “The science is settled.” Those who dare raise questions are labelled climate change deniers. Everybody else just agrees with everything and keeps their views to themselves.
Except scientist and author Steven E. Koonin, who begs to differ. The title of his book is Unsettled – What Climate Science Tells Us, What It Doesn’t, and Why It Matters.
Climate science was again headline news on August 9 after the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) issued its latest report. Starting with the first report in 1990, the IPCC has concluded climate change is a growing problem with serious consequences. Subsequent reports in 1995, 2001, 2007 and 2013 were accompanied by increasingly stronger language to highlight the enormity of this growing threat.
In the 2021 version, the IPCC chose language that can be fairly described as histrionics. The IPCC’s AR 6 (Assessment Report) media release used descriptive wording you’d normally expect from radical environmental lobby groups pitching certain doom to terrify people into donating money and buying memberships.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called AR 6 a “code red for humanity” adding, “The alarm bells are deafening. This report must sound a death knell for coal and fossil fuels, before they destroy our planet.”
Does this sound like science? This is pure alarmist political hyperbole. Taken literally, even the rocks are not safe from the ravages of fossil fuels.
But the IPCC’s public communications are no longer about true climate science, nor have they been for some time. This is one of the key points in Unsettled, written by physicist/scientist Steven E. Koonin who was the former Undersecretary for Science under President Barack Obama in the US Department of Energy.
Koonin is a serious guy with serious reservations about the IPCC. While never suggesting that carbon dioxide does not trap heat in the atmosphere or that human activity is not a contributor to global warming and climate change, his issues are with the inner workings of the IPCC and the alarmist news coverage of everything related to the weather.
Because to Koonin, there is pure science – the academic process meant to underpin the IPCC’s research – and “The Science,” words used to justify lazy and misleading journalism, preach impending disaster, advocate for unworkable fossil fuel alternatives, and demand that the entire global energy complex be replaced immediately regardless of cost.
Since the IPCC was created in 1988, its ARs have been commonly considered the holy grail of climate modelling. After all, 97% of the scientists involved agree that CO2 emissions from fossil fuels are essentially a thermostat. The higher the CO2, the higher the temperature and more volatile the weather.
Except this isn’t true. The 97% agreement figure has been debunked multiple times in multiple places. But like any skepticism associated with the subject, it was drowned out by the crescendo of voices claiming that the world faces a climate emergency and that anyone who doesn’t agree is an enemy of the future of humanity.
But as a physicist and scientist, Koonin is concerned that many of the fundamental drivers behind public concerns and climate change policy do not have an unquestionable foundation in classic academic science.
So he wrote a book about it. Using the simplest words possible for such a complex subject and numerous graphs and charts that are quite understandable with a little study, Koonin explains where he believes The Science departs from established and accepted scientific methods.
Koonin states that the public communications about the IPCC’s work and the actual state of the world’s climate are “profoundly misleading.” He writes on the inside cover, “…core questions – about the way the climate is responding to our (human) influence and what the impacts will be – remain largely unanswered.”
He began his career building computer models to study atoms and nuclei using the same basic tools as the IPCC uses for its climate models. Before joining the Obama administration, he was a professor at Caltech and later the chief scientist at BP where he focused much of his work on renewable energy. In DC he writes, “I helped guide the government’s investments in energy technologies and climate science.”
But everything changed in 2013 and 2014 when Koonin was asked by the American Physical Society – the professional organization of America physicists – “to ‘stress test’ the state of climate science.” This included examining in detail the different climate modelling methodologies.
Koonin writes that he finished this process “not only surprised but shaken.” The models used insufficient input data to separate natural from human causes. Various climate models contradicted each other and therefore required non-scientific “expert judgement” to achieve the desired outcome. Government and UN pronouncements were so different from the contents of the reports that some climate experts were embarrassed. Koonin added, “the science is insufficient to make useful projections about how the climate will change over the coming decades.”
Wow. You don’t read that every day.
He starts by explaining the difference between climate and the weather, repeating an old saw dating back to 1901 which states, “Climate is what you expect; weather is what you get.” The most important part of the early pages of the book is that weather is not climate, and the highly publicized severe weather events experienced today are not the worst ever, nor are they occurring more frequently.
But thanks to the internet and profound changes in how news is created and distributed, today’s non-stop reporting of all global forest fires, floods and storms leads many to conclude that things are indeed getting worse. And thanks to the IPCC and thirty years of increasingly unquestioned repetition, fossil fuels and growing CO2 emissions are the primary causes.
Koonin indicates that severe weather events have been around for centuries and will be with us for centuries, no matter how successful the world’s attempt to quit using fossil fuels prove to be.
He also illustrates that while the world has indeed warmed 1oC since the start of the industrial revolution, it has not been a straight line. The world warmed steadily from 1910 to 1940, then levelled off until 1970. Warming then resumed. Koonin emphasizes that most of the current focus is on the past fifty years, not the 60 years before that.
The rate of rise of the oceans has been roughly the same for centuries, about a foot every hundred years. Ocean levels have undergone massive fluctuations in the past, increases and declines completely unrelated to the planet’s growing population and fossil fuel consumption.
Koonin then dives into the how climate models work, making this complex subject understandable. There are wide variations among the different computer programs and methodologies but what bothers the author most is that the models don’t accurately duplicate historical events, even from the 20th century.
Which means something is wrong with the methodology. Koonin’s point is if climate models can’t replicate the past, how can they predict the future? Of the 1910 to 1940 warming period Koonin writes, “…they’re saying that we’ve no idea what causes this failure of the models. They cannot tell us why the climate changed during those decades. And that’s deeply unsettling…”
Another major factor is the impact of clouds and aerosols (airborne particles and chemicals) which reduce warming by the sun. Koonin quoted one researcher who said, “Cloud-aerosol interactions are on the bleeding edge of our comprehension of how the climate system works, and it’s a challenge to model what we don’t understand.”
Another phenomenon of modern climate research is looking backwards; an unpleasant weather event occurs then The Science determines if this was a recurring natural phenomenon or caused by human induced climate change. These are called “attribution studies.”
The IPCC’s 2012 Special Report on Extreme Events concludes, “Even if there were no anthropogenic (man-made) changes in climate, a wide variety of natural weather and climate extremes would still occur.”
The World Meteorological Organization adds, “…any single event, such as a severe tropical cyclone (hurricane or typhoon), cannot be attributed to human-induced climate change, given the current status of scientific understanding.”
Koonin matches modern with historical data. Tornadoes are a good example. Because of modern communications and satellites, even the smallest tornadoes are now recorded. This shows an upward trend since 1950. However, when Koonin sorts them out by size (big enough to be noticed and documented from 1954 to 2014), there is no average increase in higher strength tornadoes and a decline in the most powerful twisters.
On to droughts. Koonin reconstructs severe drops in the flow of the Colorado River dating back to AD 750 using tree rings. Another chart titled “California Drought Severity Index” dating back to 1900 shows multiple droughts in the past 120 years before the recent most recent dry period.
Forest fires? Koonin’s chart shows a steady average decline in the global burned areas since 2003. Human factors like clearing the land for agriculture are a far greater cause of forest fires than climate change.
He even takes the time to brand former Bank of Canada chief and UN climate envoy Mark Carney as a climate alarmist. While still head of the Bank of England in 2014, Carney said the previous winter was the “wettest since the time of King George.” Koonin’s rainfall chart from 2020 back to 1770 indicate that 2014 was hardly an anomaly.
On Carney Koonin wrote, “…it’s surprising that someone with a PhD in economics and experience with the unpredictability of financial markets and economics as a whole doesn’t show a greater respect for the perils of predictions…and more caution in depending upon models.”
Weather related deaths have continued to decline for the past 110 years. “Deaths from wildfires in any decade are too small to be visible on this chart.” Despite warnings about how climate change will cause food shortages, as the population grew by billions in the past 110 years, Koonin graphs how the inflation-corrected price of grain in 2000 was 90% lower than in 1910.
The media regularly repeats the predictions of dire economic consequences from a warming world, but all the climate models – even those with much higher temperatures – show steady economic growth for the rest of the 21st century.
Koonin is highly critical of modern media coverage writing, “…as the age of the internet advances, headlines become more provocative to encourage clicks – even when the article itself didn’t support the provocation…Whatever its noble intentions, news is ultimately a business, one that in this digital era increasingly depends upon eyeballs in the form of clicks and shares. Reporting on the scientific reality that there’s hardly been any long-term change in extreme weather events doesn’t fit the ethos of ‘If it bleeds it leads’.”
So nowadays almost every reported bad weather event quote somebody who claims that it was either caused or made worse by climate change. No research, no historical context.
After 205 pages of detailed explanation, Koonin switches to commentary. He concluded years ago that the CO2 emission reductions required to meet the agreed-upon temperature ceilings by 2030 and the increasingly repeated chant of Net Zero by 2050 were impossible.
Besides the enormity of replacing the existing energy infrastructure on a global scale, once people fully understand what the “energy transition” really means to their lifestyle and incomes, voter support tumbles. People don’t understand the degree to which fossil fuels have helped create and support the wealth and comforts of modern society.
Plastics, petrochemicals, fertilizers and the powerful energy sources required for heavy transportation and manufacturing of basic construction materials cannot be replaced with interruptible electricity.
Koonin highlights the recent phenomenon of OECD countries shutting down their carbon intensive industries to appear to be tackling the emissions problem. But voters continue to buy the same products from other countries like China which use low-cost coal as the primary energy source. This is politics and virtue signaling that does not change the chemical composition of the planet’s atmosphere.
While the wealthy west may be able to afford converting to low carbon energy, the developing world cannot and, unless forced, will not.
Therefore, Koonin also puts forward Plan B. If CO2 emissions are proven to be primary cause of warming but the people of the world choose not to replace fossil fuels because of excessive costs and disruption, the author sees two solutions, both expensive and unproven.
The first is Solar Radiation Management – blocking the sun’s radiant heat with materials placed in the upper atmosphere. The other is Carbon Dioxide Removal, which is taking CO2 out of the atmosphere in huge quantities.
As a scientist, Koonin feels the need to explain there are more scientific methods of altering the climate besides fear, sacrifice, taxes, politics and promoting fossil fuel substitutes that don’t work.
When it released AR6, the IPCC knew that declaring fossil fuels will destroy the planet would make headlines and grab eyeballs. But those who actually read the 4,000-page report discovered that the likelihood of very high temperature extremes have been downgraded.
A Wall Street Journal article on August 11 read, “…the IPCC has dialed back the probability of (without ruling out) more extreme changes in temperature. Such scenarios have been used to justify faster and costlier action to ban or limit fossil fuels.”
Which underpins Koonin’s points. There’s true climate science – complex and under continuous development – and there’s The Science, which spreads fear measured in decibels, not degrees Celsius.
Is Koonin right? He admits he could be wrong. Which is why he wants to fund research into blocking the sun’s heat with a giant chemical umbrella.
Is what you read about climate change in the news right? Absolutely not.
Why The Science Behind the UN/IPCC Climate Reports is “Unsettled” - David Yager - Energy News for the Canadian Oil & Gas Industry | EnergyNow.ca
Colin Parkinson
Army.ca Myth
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Be careful D&B the EV crowd will be after you with pitchforks and kale based drinks.
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I’m hedging my bets, CP…I’ll get an EV to sit beside my diesel SUV!
daftandbarmy
Army.ca Dinosaur
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We’ve kinda always known that…notwithstanding the demonization from pacifists who don’t mind getting solar power from the Mother of All H-Bombs…
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The language in the IPCC reports has changed through time as a representation of the increasing statistical probability or certainty as it applies to the collective science on global warming and the purpose of the various reports in communicating that to it's audience. Most people are reading or quoting from one of the many reports issued by the IPCC and don't go much deeper usually the Summary to Policymakers or if you are lucky one on the science or the synthesis. It's dense reading either way and it's been a while since I've attempted it.Shot, over
Why The Science Behind the UN/IPCC Climate Reports is “Unsettled” – David Yager
When it comes to climate change, the frequently repeated mantra is “The science is settled.” Those who dare raise questions are labelled climate change deniers. Everybody else just agrees with everything and keeps their views to themselves.
Except scientist and author Steven E. Koonin, who begs to differ. The title of his book is Unsettled – What Climate Science Tells Us, What It Doesn’t, and Why It Matters.
Climate science was again headline news on August 9 after the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) issued its latest report. Starting with the first report in 1990, the IPCC has concluded climate change is a growing problem with serious consequences. Subsequent reports in 1995, 2001, 2007 and 2013 were accompanied by increasingly stronger language to highlight the enormity of this growing threat.
In the 2021 version, the IPCC chose language that can be fairly described as histrionics. The IPCC’s AR 6 (Assessment Report) media release used descriptive wording you’d normally expect from radical environmental lobby groups pitching certain doom to terrify people into donating money and buying memberships.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called AR 6 a “code red for humanity” adding, “The alarm bells are deafening. This report must sound a death knell for coal and fossil fuels, before they destroy our planet.”
Does this sound like science? This is pure alarmist political hyperbole. Taken literally, even the rocks are not safe from the ravages of fossil fuels.
But the IPCC’s public communications are no longer about true climate science, nor have they been for some time. This is one of the key points in Unsettled, written by physicist/scientist Steven E. Koonin who was the former Undersecretary for Science under President Barack Obama in the US Department of Energy.
Koonin is a serious guy with serious reservations about the IPCC. While never suggesting that carbon dioxide does not trap heat in the atmosphere or that human activity is not a contributor to global warming and climate change, his issues are with the inner workings of the IPCC and the alarmist news coverage of everything related to the weather.
Because to Koonin, there is pure science – the academic process meant to underpin the IPCC’s research – and “The Science,” words used to justify lazy and misleading journalism, preach impending disaster, advocate for unworkable fossil fuel alternatives, and demand that the entire global energy complex be replaced immediately regardless of cost.
Since the IPCC was created in 1988, its ARs have been commonly considered the holy grail of climate modelling. After all, 97% of the scientists involved agree that CO2 emissions from fossil fuels are essentially a thermostat. The higher the CO2, the higher the temperature and more volatile the weather.
Except this isn’t true. The 97% agreement figure has been debunked multiple times in multiple places. But like any skepticism associated with the subject, it was drowned out by the crescendo of voices claiming that the world faces a climate emergency and that anyone who doesn’t agree is an enemy of the future of humanity.
But as a physicist and scientist, Koonin is concerned that many of the fundamental drivers behind public concerns and climate change policy do not have an unquestionable foundation in classic academic science.
So he wrote a book about it. Using the simplest words possible for such a complex subject and numerous graphs and charts that are quite understandable with a little study, Koonin explains where he believes The Science departs from established and accepted scientific methods.
Koonin states that the public communications about the IPCC’s work and the actual state of the world’s climate are “profoundly misleading.” He writes on the inside cover, “…core questions – about the way the climate is responding to our (human) influence and what the impacts will be – remain largely unanswered.”
He began his career building computer models to study atoms and nuclei using the same basic tools as the IPCC uses for its climate models. Before joining the Obama administration, he was a professor at Caltech and later the chief scientist at BP where he focused much of his work on renewable energy. In DC he writes, “I helped guide the government’s investments in energy technologies and climate science.”
But everything changed in 2013 and 2014 when Koonin was asked by the American Physical Society – the professional organization of America physicists – “to ‘stress test’ the state of climate science.” This included examining in detail the different climate modelling methodologies.
Koonin writes that he finished this process “not only surprised but shaken.” The models used insufficient input data to separate natural from human causes. Various climate models contradicted each other and therefore required non-scientific “expert judgement” to achieve the desired outcome. Government and UN pronouncements were so different from the contents of the reports that some climate experts were embarrassed. Koonin added, “the science is insufficient to make useful projections about how the climate will change over the coming decades.”
Wow. You don’t read that every day.
He starts by explaining the difference between climate and the weather, repeating an old saw dating back to 1901 which states, “Climate is what you expect; weather is what you get.” The most important part of the early pages of the book is that weather is not climate, and the highly publicized severe weather events experienced today are not the worst ever, nor are they occurring more frequently.
But thanks to the internet and profound changes in how news is created and distributed, today’s non-stop reporting of all global forest fires, floods and storms leads many to conclude that things are indeed getting worse. And thanks to the IPCC and thirty years of increasingly unquestioned repetition, fossil fuels and growing CO2 emissions are the primary causes.
Koonin indicates that severe weather events have been around for centuries and will be with us for centuries, no matter how successful the world’s attempt to quit using fossil fuels prove to be.
He also illustrates that while the world has indeed warmed 1oC since the start of the industrial revolution, it has not been a straight line. The world warmed steadily from 1910 to 1940, then levelled off until 1970. Warming then resumed. Koonin emphasizes that most of the current focus is on the past fifty years, not the 60 years before that.
The rate of rise of the oceans has been roughly the same for centuries, about a foot every hundred years. Ocean levels have undergone massive fluctuations in the past, increases and declines completely unrelated to the planet’s growing population and fossil fuel consumption.
Koonin then dives into the how climate models work, making this complex subject understandable. There are wide variations among the different computer programs and methodologies but what bothers the author most is that the models don’t accurately duplicate historical events, even from the 20th century.
Which means something is wrong with the methodology. Koonin’s point is if climate models can’t replicate the past, how can they predict the future? Of the 1910 to 1940 warming period Koonin writes, “…they’re saying that we’ve no idea what causes this failure of the models. They cannot tell us why the climate changed during those decades. And that’s deeply unsettling…”
Another major factor is the impact of clouds and aerosols (airborne particles and chemicals) which reduce warming by the sun. Koonin quoted one researcher who said, “Cloud-aerosol interactions are on the bleeding edge of our comprehension of how the climate system works, and it’s a challenge to model what we don’t understand.”
Another phenomenon of modern climate research is looking backwards; an unpleasant weather event occurs then The Science determines if this was a recurring natural phenomenon or caused by human induced climate change. These are called “attribution studies.”
The IPCC’s 2012 Special Report on Extreme Events concludes, “Even if there were no anthropogenic (man-made) changes in climate, a wide variety of natural weather and climate extremes would still occur.”
The World Meteorological Organization adds, “…any single event, such as a severe tropical cyclone (hurricane or typhoon), cannot be attributed to human-induced climate change, given the current status of scientific understanding.”
Koonin matches modern with historical data. Tornadoes are a good example. Because of modern communications and satellites, even the smallest tornadoes are now recorded. This shows an upward trend since 1950. However, when Koonin sorts them out by size (big enough to be noticed and documented from 1954 to 2014), there is no average increase in higher strength tornadoes and a decline in the most powerful twisters.
On to droughts. Koonin reconstructs severe drops in the flow of the Colorado River dating back to AD 750 using tree rings. Another chart titled “California Drought Severity Index” dating back to 1900 shows multiple droughts in the past 120 years before the recent most recent dry period.
Forest fires? Koonin’s chart shows a steady average decline in the global burned areas since 2003. Human factors like clearing the land for agriculture are a far greater cause of forest fires than climate change.
He even takes the time to brand former Bank of Canada chief and UN climate envoy Mark Carney as a climate alarmist. While still head of the Bank of England in 2014, Carney said the previous winter was the “wettest since the time of King George.” Koonin’s rainfall chart from 2020 back to 1770 indicate that 2014 was hardly an anomaly.
On Carney Koonin wrote, “…it’s surprising that someone with a PhD in economics and experience with the unpredictability of financial markets and economics as a whole doesn’t show a greater respect for the perils of predictions…and more caution in depending upon models.”
Weather related deaths have continued to decline for the past 110 years. “Deaths from wildfires in any decade are too small to be visible on this chart.” Despite warnings about how climate change will cause food shortages, as the population grew by billions in the past 110 years, Koonin graphs how the inflation-corrected price of grain in 2000 was 90% lower than in 1910.
The media regularly repeats the predictions of dire economic consequences from a warming world, but all the climate models – even those with much higher temperatures – show steady economic growth for the rest of the 21st century.
Koonin is highly critical of modern media coverage writing, “…as the age of the internet advances, headlines become more provocative to encourage clicks – even when the article itself didn’t support the provocation…Whatever its noble intentions, news is ultimately a business, one that in this digital era increasingly depends upon eyeballs in the form of clicks and shares. Reporting on the scientific reality that there’s hardly been any long-term change in extreme weather events doesn’t fit the ethos of ‘If it bleeds it leads’.”
So nowadays almost every reported bad weather event quote somebody who claims that it was either caused or made worse by climate change. No research, no historical context.
After 205 pages of detailed explanation, Koonin switches to commentary. He concluded years ago that the CO2 emission reductions required to meet the agreed-upon temperature ceilings by 2030 and the increasingly repeated chant of Net Zero by 2050 were impossible.
Besides the enormity of replacing the existing energy infrastructure on a global scale, once people fully understand what the “energy transition” really means to their lifestyle and incomes, voter support tumbles. People don’t understand the degree to which fossil fuels have helped create and support the wealth and comforts of modern society.
Plastics, petrochemicals, fertilizers and the powerful energy sources required for heavy transportation and manufacturing of basic construction materials cannot be replaced with interruptible electricity.
Koonin highlights the recent phenomenon of OECD countries shutting down their carbon intensive industries to appear to be tackling the emissions problem. But voters continue to buy the same products from other countries like China which use low-cost coal as the primary energy source. This is politics and virtue signaling that does not change the chemical composition of the planet’s atmosphere.
While the wealthy west may be able to afford converting to low carbon energy, the developing world cannot and, unless forced, will not.
Therefore, Koonin also puts forward Plan B. If CO2 emissions are proven to be primary cause of warming but the people of the world choose not to replace fossil fuels because of excessive costs and disruption, the author sees two solutions, both expensive and unproven.
The first is Solar Radiation Management – blocking the sun’s radiant heat with materials placed in the upper atmosphere. The other is Carbon Dioxide Removal, which is taking CO2 out of the atmosphere in huge quantities.
As a scientist, Koonin feels the need to explain there are more scientific methods of altering the climate besides fear, sacrifice, taxes, politics and promoting fossil fuel substitutes that don’t work.
When it released AR6, the IPCC knew that declaring fossil fuels will destroy the planet would make headlines and grab eyeballs. But those who actually read the 4,000-page report discovered that the likelihood of very high temperature extremes have been downgraded.
A Wall Street Journal article on August 11 read, “…the IPCC has dialed back the probability of (without ruling out) more extreme changes in temperature. Such scenarios have been used to justify faster and costlier action to ban or limit fossil fuels.”
Which underpins Koonin’s points. There’s true climate science – complex and under continuous development – and there’s The Science, which spreads fear measured in decibels, not degrees Celsius.
Is Koonin right? He admits he could be wrong. Which is why he wants to fund research into blocking the sun’s heat with a giant chemical umbrella.
Is what you read about climate change in the news right? Absolutely not.
Why The Science Behind the UN/IPCC Climate Reports is “Unsettled” - David Yager - Energy News for the Canadian Oil & Gas Industry | EnergyNow.ca
Reports — IPCC
www.ipcc.ch
It doesn't look like Koonin is offering anything new under the sun as far as criticisms go and like many on this issue appears to mix up his criticism of science and policy.
Weinie
Army.ca Veteran
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So G2G, you are sitting on the (electric) fence on this issue.I’m hedging my bets, CP…I’ll get an EV to sit beside my diesel SUV!
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Meanwhile, down beside the seaside.... NTS: don't buy waterfront in Florida
Climate Change Indicators: Oceans
Land Loss Along the Atlantic Coast
Covering about 70 percent of the Earth’s surface, the world’s oceans have a two-way relationship with weather and climate. The oceans influence the weather on local to global scales, while changes in climate can fundamentally alter many properties of the oceans. This chapter examines how some of these important characteristics of the oceans have changed over time.
Why does it matter?
As greenhouse gases trap more energy from the sun, the oceans are absorbing more heat, resulting in an increase in sea surface temperatures and rising sea level. Changes in ocean temperatures and currents brought about by climate change will lead to alterations in climate patterns around the world. For example, warmer waters may promote the development of stronger storms in the tropics, which can cause property damage and loss of life. The impacts associated with sea level rise and stronger storms are especially relevant to coastal communities.
Although the oceans help reduce climate change by storing large amounts of carbon dioxide, increasing levels of dissolved carbon are changing the chemistry of seawater and making it more acidic. Increased ocean acidity makes it more difficult for certain organisms, such as corals and shellfish, to build their skeletons and shells. These effects, in turn, could substantially alter the biodiversity and productivity of ocean ecosystems.
Changes in ocean systems generally occur over much longer time periods than in the atmosphere, where storms can form and dissipate in a single day. Interactions between the oceans and atmosphere occur slowly over many months to years, and so does the movement of water within the oceans, including the mixing of deep and shallow waters. Thus, trends can persist for decades, centuries, or longer. For this reason, even if greenhouse gas emissions were stabilized tomorrow, it would take many more years—decades to centuries—for the oceans to adjust to changes in the atmosphere and the climate that have already occurred.
Summary of Key Points
Ocean Heat. Three independent analyses show that the amount of heat stored in the ocean has increased substantially since the 1950s. Ocean heat content not only determines sea surface temperature, but also affects sea level and currents.
Sea Surface Temperature. Ocean surface temperatures increased around the world during the 20th century. Even with some year-to-year variation, the overall increase is clear, and sea surface temperatures have been consistently higher during the past three decades than at any other time since reliable observations began in the late 1800s.
Sea Level. When averaged over all of the world’s oceans, sea level has risen at a rate of roughly six-tenths of an inch per decade since 1880. The rate of increase has accelerated in recent years to more than an inch per decade. Changes in sea level relative to the land vary by region. Along the U.S. coastline, sea level has risen the most along the Mid-Atlantic coast and parts of the Gulf coast, where some stations registered increases of more than 8 inches between 1960 and 2015. Sea level has decreased relative to the land in parts of Alaska and the Pacific Northwest.
A Closer Look: Land Loss Along the Atlantic Coast. As sea level rises, dry land and wetlands can turn into open water. Along many parts of the Atlantic coast, this problem is made worse by low elevations and land that is already sinking. Between 1996 and 2011, the coastline from Florida to New York lost more land than it gained.
Coastal Flooding. Flooding is becoming more frequent along the U.S. coastline as sea level rises. Nearly every site measured has experienced an increase in coastal flooding since the 1950s. The rate is accelerating in many locations along the East and Gulf coasts. The Mid-Atlantic region suffers the highest number of coastal flood days and has also experienced the largest increases in flooding.
Ocean Acidity. The ocean has become more acidic over the past few decades because of increased levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide, which dissolves in the water. Higher acidity affects the balance of minerals in the water, which can make it more difficult for certain marine animals to build their protective skeletons or shells.
A handy app for those interested in beachfront property
Here's what The North Sea looks like with the water rising 5m
Half of Jylland is under water. Frisia is under water. The Nederlands are under water. The Somerset Levels, Porstmouth Marshes, Romney Marsh, the Thames estuary, the Broads, the Fens and Holderness is under water.
Which is to say it looks much like the same area when the Romans left Britain and the Anglo-Saxons moved in.
According to the archaeologists the Romans, who settled Britain when the sun shone during the Roman Climatic Optimum, lived in the valleys. The Frisians, Angles, Saxons, Danes and Jutes who followed them when the weather turned cold and wet, opted to live on the tops of hills.
The Tudor Navy was built on the shoreline in Romney Marsh - an area that is high and dry 15 miles from the shore now.
One other thing. The Nederlands are still under water.
Brad Sallows
Army.ca Legend
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At 3.5 mm a year, the locals have some time to react.
FJAG
Army.ca Legend
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You can tell how worried Americans and Canadians are about fossil fuel emissions by virtue of the fact that the F150 series of trucks continues to top the list of most units sold (nearly 900,000 in the US and 128,649 in Canada) - Silverado and RAM are right up there as well.
Sure hope none of you earthhuggers are wailing for an electric vehicle from VW. There are literally hundreds of them going up in smoke in the Atlantic right now. Those darn lithium batteries are making it impossible to gain control although to be totally open they may not have been the cause of the fire in the first place (no one knows or if they do they are not saying)
daftandbarmy
Army.ca Dinosaur
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Well done Greta et al...
As researchers set out to surveil the growing toll climate change is having on the mental health of Canadians, some in B.C. are warning climate distress is already leading to suicide attempts.
Salmon Arm had been blanketed in wildfire smoke for days. A record heat dome had killed nearly 600 people across the province only weeks earlier.
When the town of Lytton, B.C., set a Canadian temperature record of 49.6 C — a day later burning to the ground — the evacuees added to the steady stream of patients at the Shuswap Lake General Hospital.
Emergency room doctor Lori Adamson remembers stretchers lined up in the hallway. The number of patients suffering heat illness and smoke inhalation meant her unit was running out of available beds and nurses.
Then came the suicides.
“A lot of the youth that I was seeing were attempting to commit suicide because of climate distress,” she told Glacier Media.
“They're fearing that they'll never outlive the climate disasters and global warming… they overtly expressed that.”
Adamson says at least three young patients she saw tried to end their life through a drug overdose because they feared climate change. Some were transferred to hospitals that could provide higher levels of care.
The doctor does not know how or if all the patients survived.
There is emerging evidence that government inaction on climate change is impacting young people's health in severe ways. Last September, a global survey of 10,000 young people across 10 countries found nearly half of those between 16 and 25 reported psychological distress over climate change.
In some of the most telling signs, 58 per cent of respondents said governments were betraying future generations; 75 per cent said “the future was frightening.”
In B.C., ER doctor says patients are attempting suicide over climate anxiety
As researchers set out to surveil the growing toll climate change is having on the mental health of Canadians, some in B.C. are warning climate distress is already leading to suicide attempts.
Salmon Arm had been blanketed in wildfire smoke for days. A record heat dome had killed nearly 600 people across the province only weeks earlier.
When the town of Lytton, B.C., set a Canadian temperature record of 49.6 C — a day later burning to the ground — the evacuees added to the steady stream of patients at the Shuswap Lake General Hospital.
Emergency room doctor Lori Adamson remembers stretchers lined up in the hallway. The number of patients suffering heat illness and smoke inhalation meant her unit was running out of available beds and nurses.
Then came the suicides.
“A lot of the youth that I was seeing were attempting to commit suicide because of climate distress,” she told Glacier Media.
“They're fearing that they'll never outlive the climate disasters and global warming… they overtly expressed that.”
Adamson says at least three young patients she saw tried to end their life through a drug overdose because they feared climate change. Some were transferred to hospitals that could provide higher levels of care.
The doctor does not know how or if all the patients survived.
There is emerging evidence that government inaction on climate change is impacting young people's health in severe ways. Last September, a global survey of 10,000 young people across 10 countries found nearly half of those between 16 and 25 reported psychological distress over climate change.
In some of the most telling signs, 58 per cent of respondents said governments were betraying future generations; 75 per cent said “the future was frightening.”
In B.C., ER doctor says patients are attempting suicide over climate anxiety
As researchers set out to surveil the growing toll climate change is having on the mental health of Canadians, some in B.C. are warning climate distress is already leading to suicide attempts.
www.timescolonist.com
In B.C., ER doctor says patients are attempting suicide over climate anxiety
As researchers set out to surveil the growing toll climate change is having on the mental health of Canadians, some in B.C. are warning climate distress is already leading to suicide attempts.
www.timescolonist.com
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No No No: they're just doing the most they canto save the environment!Well done Greta et al...
In B.C., ER doctor says patients are attempting suicide over climate anxiety
As researchers set out to surveil the growing toll climate change is having on the mental health of Canadians, some in B.C. are warning climate distress is already leading to suicide attempts.
Salmon Arm had been blanketed in wildfire smoke for days. A record heat dome had killed nearly 600 people across the province only weeks earlier.
When the town of Lytton, B.C., set a Canadian temperature record of 49.6 C — a day later burning to the ground — the evacuees added to the steady stream of patients at the Shuswap Lake General Hospital.
Emergency room doctor Lori Adamson remembers stretchers lined up in the hallway. The number of patients suffering heat illness and smoke inhalation meant her unit was running out of available beds and nurses.
Then came the suicides.
“A lot of the youth that I was seeing were attempting to commit suicide because of climate distress,” she told Glacier Media.
“They're fearing that they'll never outlive the climate disasters and global warming… they overtly expressed that.”
Adamson says at least three young patients she saw tried to end their life through a drug overdose because they feared climate change. Some were transferred to hospitals that could provide higher levels of care.
The doctor does not know how or if all the patients survived.
There is emerging evidence that government inaction on climate change is impacting young people's health in severe ways. Last September, a global survey of 10,000 young people across 10 countries found nearly half of those between 16 and 25 reported psychological distress over climate change.
In some of the most telling signs, 58 per cent of respondents said governments were betraying future generations; 75 per cent said “the future was frightening.”
In B.C., ER doctor says patients are attempting suicide over climate anxiety
As researchers set out to surveil the growing toll climate change is having on the mental health of Canadians, some in B.C. are warning climate distress is already leading to suicide attempts.
But seriously, I was really hoping that a pandemic and WWIII would have culled a lot more of the population.
#thanoswasright
Darwin's theory proven once again
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