Top Climate Stories of 2012

Greg Laden, via Science blogs

A group of us, all interested in climate science, put together a list of the most notable, often, most worrying, climate-related stories of the year, along with a few links that will allow you to explore the stories in more detail. We did not try to make this a “top ten” list, because it is rather silly to fit the news, or the science, or the stuff the Earth does in a given year into an arbitrary number of events. (What if we had 12 fingers, and “10” was equal to 6+6? Then there would always be 12 things, not 10, on everyone’s list. Makes no sense.)
    We ended up with 18 items, but note that some of these things are related to each other in a way that would allow us to lump them or split them in different ways. See this post by Joe Romm for a more integrated approach to the year’s events. Also, see what Jeff Masters did here.

Scientists call for war on climate change, but who on earth is listening?

by David Spratt

When it's too late for half measures, the only option is to be really honest.  And that's what a number of brave climate scientists have just done.

Dr Daniel Pauly: time to prepare economy
for a climate change 'war':

It's been a week of startling news that has buried the idea that reasonable action will keep global warming to 2°C, with evidence that the world is now heading towards a 4–6°C warming this century, and as early as 2060. And we know that a safe climate is global warming of under 1°C degree!
    Releasing the Global Carbon Project's latest report on Monday,  executive-director Dr Pep Canadell of CSIRO reported:

Emissions trends over the past ten years are tracking consistently with the most carbon-intensive pathways of the four families of scenarios, leading to 4 to 6°C warming over pre-industrial times by the end of this century...
     It is clear that the type of transformation needed would required the world to wake up tomorrow and embrace a new green industrial revolution whereby new economic development is focused on establishing a large and rapidly growing non-polluting energy sector as the vehicle to meet new energy and jobs demand...In all cases, there is the need for high levels of technological, social, and political innovation, and the increasing likelihood of the need to rely on net negative emissions in future."

Systematic short-termism: Climate, capitalism and democracy

by Jorgen Randers

[Third of three parts]

• Plus 2°C in 2052. What to do?  
• Forty more years of slow growth

I am a climate pessimist. I believe (regrettably) that humanity will not meet the climate challenge with sufficient strength to save our grandchildren from living in a climate-damaged world. Humanity (regrettably) will not make what sacrifice is necessary today in order to ensure a better life for our ancestors forty years hence. The reason is that we are narrowly focused on maximum well-being in the short term. This short-termism is reflected in the systems of governance that we have chosen to dominate our lives: Both democracy and capitalism place more emphasis on costs today that on benefits forty years in the future.

Forty more years of slow growth

by Jorgen Randers

[Second of three parts]

• Plus 2°C in 2052. What to do?
• Systematic short-termism: Climate, capitalism and democracy

Will the rich world ever return to the high economic growth rates of the pre financial-crisis era? My answer is no, for the reasons given below. That is bad news for those who rely on GDP growth for increased prosperity and profit. But it is good news for those who worry about global resource shortages. A slow-growing world economy will consume less resources and give technology more time to evolve resource-efficient solutions. The human ecological footprint will remain lighter. The planet will fare better.
     Over the last forty years world GDP has grown by an average 3.5% per year. This growth can be seen as a combination of growth in a) the labour force and b) labour productivity. Since 1970 both have grown: the population by 1,5 % per year, and productivity by 2 % per year, when measured as annual output per person between 15 and 65 years of age.

Serious talk about geo-engineering better than pious hand-wringing about 2 degrees

Cambridge Professor and Arctic expert Peter Wadhams

ABC TV's Lateline programme is schedule to discuss climate geo-engineering tonight, a debate that is long overdue.
     Suggesting that climate geo-engineering – such as top-of-atmosphere sulfate injections to reduce incoming solar radiation as a temporary measure until the world gets its act together to avoid the big global warming tipping points – might be necessary is as popular in the environment and climate movements as farting in the middle of a slow movement at a concert.

• The Lateline story 
• Interview with Prof. David Keith

Almost everybody is keen to rail against it, such as Climate Authority member Clive Hamilton in The Philosophy of Geoengineering. I have yet to hear a climate or environment advocacy group in Australia even say that we should at least consider the issues on their merits.
      There's lots of reasons to be worried about the ideas – and reasons why we need to consider them – as has been canvassed recently in Nature, on the BBC, on NPR, in the Guardian, and in many scientific papers including here,  here, here and here, for example.

Plus 2°C in 2052. What to do?

Intro: Jorgen Randers of the Norwegian Business School is the author of the just-published "2052: A Global Forecast for the Next Forty Years" and a co-author of the 1972 Club of Rome report on "Limits to Growth". Forty years on from its publication, it has proved to be very prescient. In his new book, Randers looks forward by uses a wide array of data and expert elicitations as the basis for dynamic economic-ecological modelling of the world as he thinks in will be in another 40 years. This is the first of three short articles by Randers which explore aspects of his 2052 prognosis.

by Jorgen Randers

[First of three parts]

• Forty more years of slow growth
• Systematic short-termism: Climate, capitalism and democracy

A year ago, I sat down to find out what will happen to my beloved world over the next 40 years. I’ve worked a lifetime promoting sustainability – sadly, with limited success – and I wanted to know whether I should continue worrying about the future during my final 20 to 25 years on planet Earth.

Gas Industry Attacks Scientists After Research Finds Triple The Normal Levels Of Methane At Australian Gas Fields

by Graham Readfearn via DeSmogBlog

Levels of the potent greenhouse gas methane have been recorded at more than three times their normal background levels at coal seam gas fields in Australia, raising questions about the true climate change impact of the booming industry.
     The findings, which have been submitted both for peer review and to the Federal Department of Climate Change, also raise doubts about how much the export-driven coal seam gas (CSG) industry should pay under the country's carbon price laws.
Southern Cross University (SCU) researchers Dr Isaac Santos and Dr Damien Maher used a hi-tech measuring device attached to a vehicle to compare levels of methane in the air at different locations in southern Queensland and northern New South Wales. The gas industry was quick to attack their findings and the scientists themselves.

Climate News

Week ending 12 November 2012

NOTE TO READERS

We are taking a break!  This will be the last weekly climate news for a little while, to allow me more time to see through some other projects. The blogs on this site will continue, in their irregular way.  So for 2012, a big thanks to Dave and Graeme and the others who have diligently fed in material for this service, and to all of you who have provided feedback. – David

PICKS OF THE WEEK

An interview with Kevin Anderson: “Rapid and deep emissions reductions may not be easy, but 4°C to 6°C will be much worse”
http://transitionculture.org/2012/11/02/an-interview-with-kevin-anderson-rapid-and-deep-emissions-reductions-may-not-be-easy-but-4c-to-6c-will-be-much-worse/
Transition Culture, 2 November 2012
We are talking here at best a steady-state economy. The analysis that I and colleagues in the Tyndall Centre have undertaken would suggest there probably has to be a reduction in our consumption and an economic contraction.

Study: Predicted 6ºC Rise by 2100 Should End "Business as Usual"
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2012/11/05-2
Common Dreams, November 5, 2012
'This isn't about shock tactics, it's simple maths' says global accounting firm.
AND
We’re Headed To 11°F Warming And Even 7°F Requires ‘Nearly Quadrupling The Current Rate Of Decarbonisation’
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/11/06/1144431/study-were-headed-to-11f-warming-and-even-7f-requires-nearly-quadrupling-the-current-rate-of-decarbonisation/

Did climate change contribute to Sandy? Yes

Dr Bob Corell, Dr Jeff Masters and Dr Kevin Trenberth, Politico, November 5, 2012

As Hurricane Sandy battered the East Coast this week, meteorologists and climate scientists were repeatedly asked to explain what role climate change played in amplifying the storm.
     We did our best to answer: We know that a warming climate puts more energy into storms, including hurricanes, loading them with more rainfall and the stronger winds pushing more of a storm surge. That makes flooding more likely. We also know that storm surge now rides higher on sea levels that have risen over the last century due to global warming, amplifying losses where the surge strikes. On the stretch of the Atlantic Coast that spans from Norfolk to Boston, sea levels have been rising four times faster than the global average.
     Overall, we know that climate change has stacked the deck so that this kind of event happens more frequently. That answer, however, prompts a deeper, more unsettling question that many want to know: is climate change worsening some recent extreme weather events like super storm Sandy?

A storm of stupidity? Sandy, evidence and climate change

By Stephan Lewandowsky via the Conversation

“It’s global warming, stupid” – Bloomberg’s Businessweek cover last week left little doubt about their opinion concerning “Frankenstorm” Sandy. The accompanying tweet anticipated that the cover might “generate controversy, but only among the stupid.”
   These frank words about the Frankenstorm are perhaps long overdue in light of the general failure of American politicians to show leadership on this issue.
      But is it really a matter of mere “stupidity” to deny the link between climate change and Sandy’s fury — a link that has been drawn carefully but quite explicitly by scientists around the world, including in Australia?
     No, it is not a matter of stupidity.

Climate News

Week ending 4 November 2012

PICKS OF THE WEEK

Note: The impact of Superstorm Sandy is the biggest climate story of the year. What happened corresponds with much of the scientific research, and it has changed the political landscape. Our picks of the week focus on this agenda-changing event

SUPERSTORM SANDY: SCIENCE

Hurricane Sandy and the Climate Connection
http://www.skepticalscience.com/news.php?n=1693
Given the unprecedented nature of this event, many people are asking whether it was caused by or its impacts amplified by global warming, and many others are of course trying to deny any hurricane-climate links.  There is actually a fairly simple answer to this question: human-caused climate change amplified the hurricane's impacts.

How Global Warming Made Hurricane Sandy Worse
http://www.climatecentral.org/news/how-global-warming-made-hurricane-sandy-worse-15190
Andrew Freedman, Climate Central, October 31, 2012
As officials begin the arduous task of pumping corrosive seawater out of New York City’s subway system and try to restore power to lower Manhattan, and residents of the New Jersey Shore begin to take stock of the destruction, experts and political leaders are asking what Hurricane Sandy had to do with climate change.

Climate of doubt as superstorm Sandy crosses US coast

by Graham Readfearn via Readfearn.com

A 30-year-old man has just become the first New Yorker to be killed by the destructive force of the super-charged storm Sandy which, as I type, is moving across the eastern side of the United States.
     The New York Times reported how the man died when a tree fell on his house in Queens. The former-Hurricane Sandy has already claimed more than 60 lives in Caribbean countries.
     There are something like 50 million Americans currently in the storm’s path. It seems inevitable that more people will lose their lives in the coming hours.
     Whatever transpires we no doubt all hope that the number of fatalities is low. But neither good fortune nor any god will decide. The death toll will be what it is, and families will grieve.
It seems insensitive to mention the billions of dollars of damage the storm will cause. It might, to some, seem insensitive to mention human-caused climate change at a time like this.

Connecting the dots between 'Frankenstorm' and global warming as extreme weather becomes the new norm

Courtesy: AP

“It's a freakish and unprecedented monster,” says Associated Press science writer Seth Borenstein of a super storm heading towards the US east coast “threatening 60 million Americans in the eastern third of the nation in just a couple of days with high winds, drenching rains, extreme tides, flooding and probably snow.”
     As Hurricane Sandy heads towards the east coast, it is likely to merge with an Arctic jet steam cold front to transform into an “unprecedented” “super storm”, the likes of which has not been seen over the eastern US in many decades, with sea surges of 1 to 2 metres.
     This storm is dangerous and unusual because it comes at the tail end of hurricane season and beginning of winter storm season, "so it's kind of taking something from both — part hurricane, part nor'easter, all trouble," says Jeff Masters of Weather Underground.

Scientific consensus shifts public opinion on climate change

By Sunanda Creagh, 30 October 2012, via The Conversation

People are more likely to believe that humans cause global warming if they are told that 97% of publishing climate scientists agree that it does, a new study has found.
     Despite overwhelming evidence showing that human activity is causing the planet to overheat, public concern is on the wane, said the study, titled The pivotal role of perceived scientific consensus in acceptance of science and published in the journal Nature Climate Change on Monday.
     “One reason for this decline is the ‘manufacture of doubt’ by political and vested interests, which often challenge the existence of the scientific consensus. The role of perceived consensus in shaping public opinion is therefore of considerable interest,” the study’s authors said.

Climate News

Week ending 28 October 2012

PICKS OF THE WEEK

'Frankenstorm': Worse than sum of its parts
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iOe_VgN1vO9ESj6xq4BIGUOlvmKw?docId=0a01f70bfe9143c0ade2296cecd08af2
Seth Borenstien, AP, 28 October 2012The storm that is threatening 60 million Americans in the eastern third of the nation in just a couple of days with high winds, drenching rains, extreme tides, flooding and probably snow is much more than just an ordinary weather system. It's a freakish and unprecedented monster.
AND
Connecting the dots between 'Frankenstorm' and global warming as extreme weather becomes the new norm
http://www.climatecodered.org/2012/10/connecting-dots-between-frankenstorm.html

Renewables: Australia's a land of plenty
http://www.theage.com.au/business/carbon-economy/renewables-australias-a-land-of-plenty-20121026-28ai7.html
Peter Hannam, the Age, 26 October 2012
When feisty UN climate change chief Christiana Figueres swept into Sydney this week, she mocked suggestions Australia is alone in cutting greenhouse gas emissions.

NASA climate chief demolishes denialist claims on sea levels

NASA climate chief James Hansen has three great attributes: his research is impeccable and pertinent, he is politically courageous, and he communicates with great clarity to lay audiences.
     Reading his presentation on 5 September — when he stepped in the deniers’ lion’s den at a meeting organised by the climate-denialist lobbyist Grover Norquist to rebut arguments previously presented by Pat Michaels — all three features of Hansen’s work were on display.
     Hansen shows how Michaels uses the denials’ favourite method – cherry-picking data over a particular range – to prove that black is white.
     Last week in Deniers cherry-pick in vain effort to prove up is down, we looked at how that technique had been used to falsely claim that “Global warming stopped 16 years ago”.

After the Arctic big melt: (1) A hotter planet

by David Spratt

The Arctic is a place of seasonal climate extremes, and it will become more extreme as the planet warms. “In the most dramatic reconfiguration of the map of the world since the end of the last Ice Age”, wrote John Gibbons recently in the Irish Times, “the Arctic ice cap is now committed to accelerated collapse”. There are global consequences.
    In the first of a series, we look at how Arctic melting, in a self-perpetuating positive feedback, is leading to more global warming and a hotter future.
    
Day and night

For almost six months a year in winter, it is dark 24-hours-a-day at the North Pole as the Earth’s northern axis tips away from the sun. The sun sets around 25 September each year and does appear over the horizon again until 17 March, when it then stays in sight all day, every day, for the next six months. 
     Almost 2600 kilometres further south, around the Arctic Circle, there is sunlight 24-hours a day for a month around the summer solstice, but only two hours a day of sun at the December winter solstice.

Climate News

Week ending 21 October 2012

Rank of hottest years to coldest. Courtesy UK Met Office

PICKS OF THE WEEK

UN warns of looming worldwide food crisis in 2013
http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/2012/oct/14/un-global-food-crisis-warning
John Vidal, The Observer, 13 October 2012
Global grain reserves hit critically low levels; Extreme weather means climate 'is no longer reliable'; Rising food prices threaten disaster and unrest
AND
Empty Promise
http://www.monbiot.com/2012/10/15/empty-promise/
By George Monbiot, Guardian, 16 October 2012
Could scientists have got the impacts of climate change on food supply wildly wrong? I believe we might have made a mistake: a mistake whose consequences, if I am right, would be hard to overstate. I think the forecasts for world food production could be entirely wrong.

Deniers cherry-pick in vain effort to prove up is down

It's spring, but today was cooler than yesterday. The trend is obvious, it's getting cooler and winter is coming?
     That's the cherry-picking method at the heart of climate denial, and it's at work again in a story by David Rose first published by the Mail on Sunday claiming that "Global warming stopped 16 years ago, reveals Met Office report quietly released... and here is the chart to prove it".  It's doing the rounds.
   Whilst the UK Met Office was reported as the source of the figures, they were in fact quick to issue a rebuttal, noting that it is "the second article Mr Rose has written which contains some misleading information, after he wrote an article earlier this year on the same theme".

Climate News

Week ending 14 October 2012

Extreme Weather Photo Contest Winner: Ormond Shelf, by Jason Weingart

FEATURED

Climate change behind rise in weather disasters
http://www.usatoday.com/story/weather/2012/10/10/weather-disasters-climate-change-munich-re-report/1622845/
USA Today, 10 October 2012
The number of natural disasters per year has been rising dramatically on all continents since 1980, but the trend is steepest for North America where countries have been battered by hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, searing heat and drought, a new report says. The study being released today by Munich Re, the world's largest reinsurance firm, sees climate change driving the increase and predicts those influences will continue in years ahead, though a number of experts question that conclusion.

PICKS OF THE WEEK

The food security risk index – map
http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/graphic/2012/oct/10/food-security-risk-index-map
Guardian, 10 October 2012
The index has been developed by the risk analysis company Maplecroft for governments, NGOs and business to use as a barometer to identify those countries which may be susceptible to famine and societal unrest stemming from food shortages and price fluctuations. This map shows the results of evaluating the availability, access and stability of food supplies in 197 countries, as well as the nutritional and health status of populations
AND
UN warns of rising food costs after year's extreme weather
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/oct/10/un-rising-food-costs-weather
John Vidal, Rebecca Smithers and Shiv Malik, Guardian, 10 October 2012
Warning comes as shops struggle to fill shelves and farmers' union reports wheat yields are at lowest level since 1980s.