It’s Thursday @ KTK, which means an update on the latest news about climate change. But of course, this is an open thread...
In a Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences study, researchers estimate that the survival of billions worldwide is endangered if global temperatures increase by 1 degree C (1.8 degrees F) from current high records, Axios reports.
The most devastated regions would be South Asia and the Middle East; "potentially lethal combinations of heat and humidity could spread" to U.S. Midwest.
“In the future, moist heat extremes will lie outside the bounds of past human experience and beyond current heat mitigation strategies for billions of people."
A climate researcher reports that his refusal to fly has caused him to lose his job conducting fieldwork near Papua New Guinea. He begins his return to Germany this week via ship, ferry, trains, and coaches to stay true to his “moral commitment to avoid flying, Aviation is the biggest contributor to climate change of all forms of transport, a major factor in the rise in temperatures and the extreme weather events that we are witnessing more and more frequently all around the world.”
A trip by plane from Papua New Guinea to Germany produces, in 32 hours, 5.3 tonnes of CO2 per passenger. Slow travel produces approximately 12 times less (420kg). In the current state of climate emergency, wasting 4.9 tonnes of CO2 – about how much the average person in the world emits in one year – to expedite my return to Europe is not morally acceptable to me.
Google's Expanded 'Flood Hub' Uses AI to Help Us Adapt to Extreme Weather
Google announced Tuesday that a tool using artificial intelligence to better predict river floods will be expanded to the U.S. and Canada, covering more than 800 North American riverside communities that are home to more than 12 million people. Google calls it Flood Hub, and it's the latest example of how AI is being used to help adapt to extreme weather events associated with climate change.
"We see tremendous opportunity for AI to solve some of the world's biggest challenges, and climate change is very much one of those," Google's Chief Sustainability Officer, Kate Brandt, told Newsweek in an interview.
At an event in Brussels on Tuesday, Google announced a suite of new and expanded sustainability initiatives and products. Many of them involve the use of AI, such as tools to help city planners find the best places to plant trees and modify rooftops to buffer against city heat, and a partnership with the U.S. Forest Service to use AI to improve maps related to wildfires.
Editorial: California’s transportation spending doesn’t match its climate promises
California leaders talk a good game on fighting climate change. But when it comes to cutting the state’s biggest source of planet-warming emissions — cars, trucks, airplanes and other modes of transportation — the spending doesn’t match the rhetoric.
Two recent reports highlight the discrepancy. Regulators have warned that the state needs to slash the amount of miles people drive 25% below 2019 levels to help meet 2030 emission reduction targets. But traffic and car dependence has increased in recent years, according to a report from the progressive advocacy group NextGen Policy.
Did American Car Makers Make a Mistake with EV Pickups?
Over the next few months, the electric pickup truck lineup in the United States will double. Chevrolet, Ram, Tesla, and GMC are all set to release competitors to the three electric pickups already on the market: the Ford F-150 Lightning, the Rivian RT1, and the GMC Hummer EV.
That automakers are excited by the idea of electrifying one of their most lucrative gas-powered segments is hardly surprising. But what might be more surprising is how little pickup buyers seem to share their enthusiasm.
A recent survey from automotive market analytics firm Auto Pacific shows that pickup truck buyers may be the most hesitant of all market segments to go electric. Only 12% of full-sized and 8% of mid-sized pickup buyers surveyed are interested in fully electric trucks. Yikes.
Statement on NAM Commitment to Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions
The National Academy of Medicine (NAM) is fully committed to the reduction of emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases as the single most important step all organizations must take to slow the pace of climate change. The vast majority of CO2 emissions stems from the combustion of fossil fuels and deforestation (see Climate Change Evidence & Causes: Update 2020).
The 2024-2028 NAM Strategic Plan (forthcoming in January) calls for the Academy to address climate change as an urgent, existential threat to human life, health, and well-being as a top priority. The NAM’s internal organizational commitment is to reduce emissions by 50 percent by 2030 and achieve net zero emissions by 2050. Accordingly, the Academy is working with the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, the broader organization of which it is a part, to reduce the organization’s scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions and divest from fossil fuel interests.
CALIFORNIA REQUIRES COMPANIES TO DISCLOSE CLIMATE CHANGE RISKS, GHG EMISSIONS
California Governor Gavin Newsom signed into law two watershed climate bills on October 7, 2023 that will require companies with significant revenue to make climate-related disclosures starting in 2026. The stated purpose of the new laws is to enhance transparency, standardize disclosures, align public investments with climate goals, and raise the standards for businesses to drive action on addressing climate change.
The bills—the Climate Corporate Data Accountability Act (SB 253) and Climate-Related Financial Risk Act (SB 261)—lay out new requirements that share similarities with federal rules proposed by the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and apply to essentially every large company operating in California.
Beer faces unbitter future due to climate change: study
Climate change threatens the cultivation in Europe of aromatic hops which gives beer its bitterness, according to a study published Tuesday in Nature Communications.
European varieties of hops are prized and used by brewers around the world, but rising temperatures and less rain are reducing yields and the concentration of the compounds that provide beer its refreshing tartness.
Oil giants unveil ‘game-ending’ strategy to kill climate cases
The legal battle over whether cities, counties and states can hold fossil fuel companies financially accountable for heat waves, flooding and other effects of climate change is entering a critical new phase.
Since 2017, parties in the cases have squabbled over whether the lawsuits should be heard in federal or state courts. Now that federal appeals courts have agreed the cases belong before state judges — and the Supreme Court has so far declined to say otherwise — oil companies are pushing for the lawsuits to be scrapped altogether.
Kitchen Table Kibitzing is a community series for those who wish to share a virtual kitchen table with other readers of Daily Kos who aren’t throwing pies at one another. Drop by to talk about music, your weather, your garden, or what you cooked for supper…. Newcomers may notice that many who post in this series already know one another to some degree, but we welcome guests at our kitchen table and hope to make some new friends as well.