Climate Crisis, Biosphere & Societal Collapse

https://www.saudigazette.com.sa/article/633809/SAUDI-ARABIA/215000-pilgrims-provided-healthcare-during-Hajj

Thousands of the people gathering at Mecca for Hajj this year were treated for heat stress during the event.
Temperatures were in the 40s for a week from what I can gather, and this year's Hajj was billed as "the largest in history" with over 2 million people gathering.

From the article:

To tackle the issue, the kingdom has put in place some measures to minimize the chances of heat stroke and other ailments. Worshippers at the Grand Mosque are being sprayed with water via automatic cooling systems, and free bottles and umbrellas are being distributed.

Temperatures in the Middle East are warming twice as fast as the rest of the world, meaning that it is becoming increasingly hotter than when the Prophet Muhammad first inaugurated the Hajj in the 7th century.

Starting this weekend, healthcare workers in Ontario will be required to report cases of three tick-borne diseases, anaplasmosis, babesiosis and Powassan virus, to their local health authorities.

From the article:

[Ontario Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. Kieran Moore says] “It’s absolutely expected that we’ll have greater incidence over the next several years because this is a known wave of infections that we’ve seen migrate up the coastline of northeast North America and anticipate them affecting Ontarians."

Over the last 20 years there has been a rise in the incidence of Lyme disease as ticks, particularly black-legged ticks, are able to survive the winters, Moore said. The United States has seen waves of anaplasmosis, babesiosis and Powassan virus come after cases of Lyme disease, Moore said, and he expects to see that in Ontario as well.

“It is simply from the ability of these ticks, that are now able to survive our winters and stay and breed over their two-year lifecycle,” Moore said.

Hopium or just plain hope?

This article quite pointedly does not frame geothermal wells as a solution to climate change or a way to save us all, stating that:

...it is not an excuse to avoid emissions cuts. Decarbonisation – society’s shift away from fossil fuels – remains essential, and we’re not doing it fast enough.
Atmospheric CO₂ removal – basically, negative emissions – can buy us time to decarbonise by walking back some of the centuries of build-up.

The critics are right to point out this is not a miracle technology. If we’re to undo the climate legacy of centuries of carbon-hungry activity, it’s going to take all kinds of carbon removal.
Other research projects are underway, including the use of a rock known as Dunite, which can be spread on farmland to lock up carbon as it weathers, direct capture of CO₂ from the air with the common mineral Olivine, and enhancement of the carbon-storage capacity of marine sediments.

What are your thoughts?

This model of the Earth and its atmosphere, released by NASA, would be beautiful if it weren't for the underlying implications.

The posted link from TIME includes a transcription of the video.

Credits and a more in-depth explanation of the data presented can be found here:
https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/5110#section_credits

From the article:

Mop up operations are being coordinated with municipalities across KwaZulu-Natal following heavy rains and flooding which has claimed the lives of seven people.
At least seven people have died after storms, including a tornado, battered the province.

A preliminary report indicated extensive damage to road infrastructure, electricity, sewer systems, and housing. Many houses also suffered roof damage, collapsed walls, and flooding.

The [provincial Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs in KwaZulu-Natal] said the environmental impact of the heavy rains has resulted in pollution at the Blue Lagoon Beach in Durban, caused by debris from the Umgeni River.

“As KwaZulu-Natal, we are experiencing firsthand the true effects of climate change during the winter season,” the department said.

Six days ago New Indian Express reported that:

“If there is rainfall by June end and in July also we get good rainfall, then by August all these dams would start overflowing and meet the drinking water demand of the city. This year, the situation seems to be grim since the beginning. The delay in monsoon has been worsening the situation. The depleting water and rise in dry coverage area resulted in major evaporation of the remaining water,” said a BMC(Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation) official.

However, it's now a week later, the monsoon has arrived and the India Times (article linked in post) says Mumbai will see water cuts anyway:

Despite the recent monsoon rains in Mumbai, city residents will face a 10% water supply cut. Reason: Inadequate water level in lakes supplying water to Mumbai due to delayed monsoon. Mumbai's civic body Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has also appealed to citizens to save water and use it judiciously.

Mumbai gets 3,800 MLD (millions of litres per day) water from seven reservoirs located in Mumbai, Thane and Nashik districts: Bhatsa, Upper Vaitarna, Middle Vaitarna, Tansa, Modak Sagar, Vihar and Tulsi.

According to a BMC report, the seven lakes had 7.26% stock at 6 am on Wednesday as compared to water 9.04% and 16.44% in 2022 and 2021 respectively.

That's not enough info to know if this is a pattern historically. This snapshot doesn't look great, though. Does anyone know how normal water cuts in summer in Mumbai are?

Times of India reports that Panaji, Goa has experienced its tenth wettest June day in 50 years, receiving 34% of its annual rainfall in "a short time".

The unusual events this year coincide with the commencement of the El Nino year. “This (Wednesday’s rainfall) fits very well with the rise in the extreme rainfall events in the state over the years,” said Rajiv K Chaturvedi, a faculty member at BITS Goa and a UN expert in greenhouse gas emissions in ventory. Chaturvedi added, “Rising extreme rainfall events too fit well with the climate change scenario. Rainfall projections for Goa based on the state-of-the-art climate models suggest extreme rainfall events to further rise in the future."

From the article:

At least 1,559 people received medical treatment for temperature-related problems in the same period, the report also said.

Over the past ten days in particular, Mexico has seen record-breaking temperatures, with some locations seeing monthly or even all-time records: temperatures have topped 45 degrees Celsius in places (113 degrees Fahrenheit).

The heat domes that drive record-setting temperatures are expected to become more frequent – and hotter – due to the climate crisis.

By Matt McGrath & Mark Poynting
BBC News Climate & Science

Wind and solar power are booming in China and may help limit global carbon emissions far faster than expected, according to a new study.

Solar panel installations alone are growing at a pace that would increase global capacity by 85% by 2025.

The report says the country's green energy targets for 2030 look set to be exceeded five years ahead of schedule.

But coal plants are also increasing, partly as backup for all the new wind and solar farms, the authors say.

China is often seen as the key to the world's efforts to rein in the carbon emissions that are the root cause of climate change.

The country is the world's biggest user of coal, mainly for making electricity. The use of coal is responsible for around 69% of China's emissions of carbon dioxide.

Graph: China's greenhouse gas emissions still rising

But this new study shows that China is fast building up capacity to generate power from wind and solar, which could have a significant impact on limiting the impacts of rising temperatures.

The research has been carried out by Global Energy Monitor (GEM), an independent research group whose work is often used by the World Bank, the International Energy Agency and governments.

The report looks at China's current installed green energy capacity, but also makes projections on what's been announced and in construction over the next two years.

It finds that right now China has more solar panels installed in large-scale projects than the rest of the world combined. On wind energy, the country has doubled its capacity since 2017.

Graph: Coal dominates China's power supply, but solar and wind capacity now rising more quickly

But this appears to be only the start. According to GEM, China is expanding this sector rapidly and will more than double its capacity for wind and solar by the end of 2025.

This would see China increase the global wind turbine fleet by 50%, and increase the world's large-scale solar installations by 85% compared to current levels.

This current surge is the end-product of plans dating back over two decades.

In that time China has become the world's leading supplier of solar panels, driving down costs all across the supply chain. That has helped make solar and wind installations in China economically competitive.

Subsidies have played their part, as have regulations requiring each province to hit green energy targets.

While over half a trillion dollars was spent worldwide on wind and solar last year, China accounted for 55% of that.

Graph: China is expected to more than double its large-scale solar and wind capacity in the next few years

Back in 2020, President Xi Jinping said that China would install over 1,200 gigawatts of solar and wind power by 2030. This new report says this target will be surpassed five years ahead of schedule.

"We believe that the surge in building renewables certainly provides a basis for peaking [China's] carbon emissions earlier than 2030," said Martin Weil, one of the report's authors.

But while this could be significant news for limiting global warming, China's coal use remains a major challenge.

In 2022, China built approximately two new coal fired power stations every week - many of these were located on new solar and wind parks, often to provide back up power and to ensure continuity of energy supply.

"The big issue going forward is how will these coal plants actually be deployed," Mr Weil said.

"One hopes that they're deployed in a way that that puts the ratio of renewables to coal as high as possible."

Other key indicators will be the development of battery storage and the growth of hydrogen - both will be important in helping China transition successfully away from coal.

Two dead, three missing, over 400 homeless, and over 1000 people evacuated due to extreme weather in Chile this week.

The towns of Valparaiso and Biobio have declared a state of emergency.

Climate change is increasingly driving extreme weather. The rains come months after a period of wildfires and severe drought that destroyed hundreds of homes and left dozens of people dead in Chile.

This interactive graphic includes some beautiful and moving photographs documenting the extremely hot weather throughout the world.

German health minister Karl Lauterbach is working on a federal plan to prevent illness and death from the heat.

The plan may include a warning system, education about preventing heatstroke, and more public shaded spaces or cooling rooms, and water dispensers.

Lauterbach plans to meet with representatives from various sectors to work towards a national heat protection plan in the coming weeks.

2022 was Europe's hottest year since 2003, according to Copernicus Climate Change Service.
From the article:

Burgess says the level of greenhouse gases produced in the European region last year makes it unlikely it will reach the 2015 Paris Agreement when countries globally agreed to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

[She] warns we should not expect a return to more temperate weather in the future.

Data from the past five years shows Europe’s climate was 2.2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.

The health cost to Ontario residents from forest fires between June 4 and June 8 was $1.28 billion, according to calculations by Dave Sawyer, principal economist with the Canadian Climate Institute.
...
He looked at Health Canada information about the health impacts and costs of air pollution, including high levels of fine particulate matter in the air.
...
That research was done before the current increase in forest fires, which have been more severe early in the season this year than in the past and which, because of wind conditions, have sent smoke into highly populated areas in southern Ontario and the northeastern United States.

Even in Northern Europe, the threat of contracting tropical diseases like malaria, dengue fever, yellow fever, zika and West Nile virus increase in likelihood as regions warm and conditions become favourable for disease-carrying insects like mosquitoes.

North America is not safe either, as it recently detected the first locally contracted malaria cases in decades.

Wake up bitches, new positive feedback loop just dropped.

Generally, the nitric oxide in lakes has not been considered a major forcing factor in air quality or climate models compared to human sources, but new research reported in Nature Geoscience focused on remote lakes on the Tibetan Plateau ... has challenged this understanding.

Within these lakes, particular bacteria thrive in the anoxic (low oxygen) environments, converting nitrogen from natural sources, agricultural runoff and sewage into ammonia, which is then converted into nitrites (nitrification) and subsequently nitrogen gas (denitrification), the latter of which creates nitric oxide as a by-product.

The formation of nitric oxide in such large quantities is problematic as it contributes to the depletion of the ozone layer, which forms a positive feedback mechanism for climate change. As the ozone layer becomes further damaged, more solar radiation can penetrate through down to Earth's surface, warming the planet. When the planet emits heat, the ever-growing greenhouse gas layer traps this heat, so rather than it escaping back out to space, it warms the planet further, creating a positive feedback loop.

Cross-posted from https://slrpnk.net/post/552642

Here we find that to meet our climate targets, global emissions would have to reach zero in:

• 1.5C with a 66% chance – 2030
• 1.5C with a 50% chance – 2035
• 2C with a 66% chance – 2069
• 2C with a 50% chance – 2079

Farmers in Ireland are experiencing the effects of drought, heat, changing frost dates, and unpredictable weather.

“The winters have just become a blurring of the seasons. Everyone will tell you we don’t see frosts any more,” he said. “In the summers there’s this level of just not getting any rain for ages and then getting these monsoon-like downpours.”

Meanwhile the Met Éireann issued a potato blight warning, which are described here as "common for this time of year" - however, it is also added that:

"The showery, warm, and humid conditions that we are experiencing across the country in recent weeks are the ideal conditions for blight to develop and spread. "...We have warm temperatures now, 20C and above, and once you get rain with those temperatures, those are the conditions that favour blight."

In this bone-chilling report, it is explained that at this point over a million people on this planet have been forced out of their homes and obliged to seek refuge elsewhere.
For some of them, this is a direct result of climate-related disasters like drought and flooding.
For others this is a result of war, but it can be argued that war may be exacerbated by climate change events:

“Historically, levels of armed conflict over time have been heavily influenced by shocks to, and changes in, international relations among states and in their domestic political systems,” said James Fearon, professor of political science and co-author on the study. “It is quite likely that over this century, unprecedented climate change is going to have significant impacts on both, but it is extremely hard to anticipate whether the political changes related to climate change will have big effects on armed conflict in turn. So I think putting nontrivial weight on significant climate effects on conflict is reasonable.”

When homes, infrastructure, and food production are affected, and healthcare, maintenance and emergency services become overwhelmed, it stands to reason that increasing unrest and discontent is likely, mass immigration is inevitable, and that that will affect politics.

Far-right parties are gaining traction in Europe where anti-immigration policy is high on their agenda.

The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD)...is polling 17-19% nationwide, around a record high for the party that now vies with Chancellor Olaf Scholz's Social Democrats for second place in some surveys, up from fifth in the 2021 election when it secured 10.3% of the vote.
...
Far-right parties have gained ground across Europe. In France, the far-right has become a stronger rival at the ballot box, while in Italy and Sweden, they are now are in government.

As well as this:

The AfD, which disputes that human activity is a cause of climate change, has also tapped into concerns among some voters about the cost of the transition away from fossil fuels.

Tragic irony.

I'm not sure how people feel about this kind of post here, so please share your opinion if you have one.

As summer begins in the northern hemisphere and heatstroke deaths are making the news, here is some useful information provided by Health Canada about how to prevent, recognise and respond to heatstroke in yourself and others.

If anyone can find similar infographics in other languages, I would be glad to share them in this thread as well.

Stay safe out there!

Today (23.06.2023) is Beijing's hottest day on record as temperatures rose above 40deg C for the first time in nearly a decade.

The national weather bureau in China issued an alert for heatstroke last week, almost two weeks earlier than is typical from previous years.
...
The high temperatures have also led to increased pressure on the power grid, with a more than 20% increase in demand reported in Tianjin on 15 June compared with last year.

Power usage increase during an extreme weather event isn't a natural positive feedback loop, but it may as well be. As hotter, colder, wetter, drier days arrive, I can't blame people for blasting the a/c or heat in order to function and survive. However, it's certainly not going to help things in the long run.

A man in Texas succumbed to the heat and passed away during his work shift. Rest in peace.

A woman in Louisiana was left without power for an extended time during extremely hot weather, and was also found deceased. Rest in peace.

I wonder what the post office is doing to ensure the future health & safety of its workers, because the heat waves sure as hell aren't going to subside anytime soon, and summer just started yesterday.

In this disheartening but informative report, conservation researchers express their concerns that "green" farming methods can, counterintuitively, have net undesirable effects on food production and costs.

As a society, we are "addicted" to fertilizers and pesticides in agriculture - that is to say, in order to continue producing enough food to feed everyone, we are obliged to contine using them or risk starving.

They explain how rewilding, pesticide and fertilizer reduction, and organic farming practices can mean benefits for local biodiversity, while still having a net negative impact on the world overall, due to the resulting increased demand for food production elsewhere in the world.

The article apparently calls for "land sparing" as the most promising farming technique. It involves intensively farming some land, while leaving the rest completely alone as a nature preserve.

Extreme weather events are become stronger, more frequent, more damaging and harder to predict.

Described as "an unusually early and aggressive start" to hurricane season, Tropical Storm Bret threatens Caribbean islands with flooding.

To me, it sounds like the professionals in charge are throwing their hands up in the air when it comes to predictions about the coming storm season:

"We all know the uncertainty with forecasting intensity, movement and impact of weather systems,” said Fitzroy Pascal at Dominica’s office of disaster management.