8/22/21: Despite the fact that the Afghan
collapse has been dominating the news, the really big story continues to be
climate change. And so long as conservative types refuse to admit we have a
problem – and so long as Trump fans continue to adore a man who calls the
existential crisis for humanity a “hoax” – this liberal blogger will gladly
remain a liberal, heart and soul.
 |
Melting on the Greenland ice sheet. |
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An
average global temperature 1.67° F above historic norms.
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While you might have been focused on the debacle in Southwest
Asia, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced that July was the hottest month, globally, ever
recorded, with an average temperature 1.67° F above historic norms. June was
“only” the fifth warmest June in 142 years of records. And, because
right-wingers like to find nuggets of information and argue the whole story of
climate change is drummed up so liberals can knock hamburgers out of their
mitts, NOAA also notes that sea ice in the Antarctic actually increased.
Otherwise, the news so far this month has been grim. The Dixie Fire in
bone-dry Northern California has reduced 721,298 acres of forest, homes, and entire
towns to ash. It’s only 37% contained. That’s one fire – burning up an area
the size of Rhode Island. Last week, the town of Susanville, with 15,000
residents, was endangered by the flames and had to be evacuated.
The picture is black across much of the U.S. The Bootleg Fire
in Oregon burned up another 400,000 acres before it was contained.
The National Interagency Fire Center reported on Saturday that 96
large fires, as far east as Minnesota, were burning. More than 2.4 million
acres had gone up in smoke. Montana, with 22 large fires, Idaho, with 21, and
Washington State, with 19, have the most blazes to combat. Fires burning in other
states: California (11), Oregon (11), Utah and Wyoming (3 each) and Alaska (2),
Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, and Minnesota (1 each).
On the other end of the climate change spectrum, scientists
note that for the first time, on August 14, it rained for hours at the highest
point in Greenland, a development heretofore unknown. On that day, temperatures
remained above freezing for nine hours, also unheard of, according to scientists at the U.S. National Snow
and Ice Data Center. A U.S. agency I am sure most Trump-lovers did not realize
existed.
(Or Trump. Who can
forget that immortal day when he suggested the U.S. buy Greenland from the Danes?)
“That’s
not a healthy sign for an ice sheet,” Indrani Das, a glaciologist with Columbia
University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory explained – although it’s not
hard to grasp. “Water on ice is bad. … It makes the ice sheet more prone to
surface melt.” A melting ice sheet in Greenland, would be bad for humanity, itself.
“This alarming rain at the summit of Greenland is not an
isolated event,” said Twila Moon, deputy lead scientist with the U.S. National
Snow and Ice Data Center.
Along with rising floods, fires, and other extremes, it is one
of many “alarm bells” signaling the need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions,
she said.
“We really have to stay laser-focused on adapting, as well as
reducing the potential for those to become truly devastating.”
According to Martin
Stendel, a senior researcher at the Danish Meteorological Institute, ,
relying on ice-core samples, above-freezing temperatures have occurred at the Greenland
summit only six times in 2,000 years. Now, there have been three
events in just the last decade: 2012, 2019 and 2021.
