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Extreme weather

New Climate Prediction: Likely To Reach 1.5C In The Next Five Years

May 30, 2021 World Meteorological Organization. , ,
Geneva - There is about a 40% chance of the annual average global temperature temporarily reaching 1.5°C above the pre-industrial level in at least one of the next five years – and these odds are increasing with time, according to a new climate update issued by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). There is a 90% likelihood of at least one year between 2021-2025 becoming the warmest on record, which would dislodge 2016 from the top ranking, according to the Global Annual to Decadal Climate Update, produced by the United Kingdom’s Met Office, the WMO lead centre for such predictions. Over 2021-2025, high-latitude regions and the Sahel are likely to be wetter and there is an increased chance of more tropical cyclones in the Atlantic compared to the recent past (defined as the 1981-2010 average).

Hawaii Is The First US State To Declare A Climate Emergency

April 30, 2021 Kate Yoder, Grist. , ,
The word “emergency” usually conjures images of ambulances with flashing lights, homes going up in flames, or tornadoes tearing through a town. But increasingly, governments are using the word to describe a slower-burning crisis: climate change. On Thursday, Hawaii became the first state to declare a “climate emergency,” joining 1,933 cities, town councils, and countries, including the European Union. According to The Climate Mobilization, a U.S.-based advocacy group, almost 13 percent of the global population now lives in a jurisdiction that has made a similar declaration. Perhaps it shouldn’t come as a surprise that the country’s only island state, and only one in the tropics, is signaling the need for more drastic action on climate change.

Saving Ourselves: Autonomous Disaster Relief In Texas

March 13, 2021 It's Going Down. , , ,
On this episode of the It’s Going Down podcast, we speak with participants in autonomous groups across Texas, including Cooperation Denton, Stop the Sweeps in Austin, Mutual Aid Houston, Houston Tenants Union, and North Texas Rural Resilience. The first in a two part series, this episode discusses the devastating storms which rocked Texas and the Southwest and the context that the “big freeze” happened within: from anti-Black police violence and attacks on the homeless community, to widespread neoliberal policies that left infrastructure and housing stock dilapidated and on the verge of collapse.

Atlantic Ocean Current At Weakest State In ‘Over A Millennium’

February 27, 2021 Daisy Dunne, The Independent. , ,
The Atlantic Ocean current that plays a major role in the world’s weather is at its weakest state in “over a millennium”, researchers have found. The research combines various lines of evidence to create a “consistent picture” of how the ocean current system, which is known as the “Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation” (AMOC), has changed over the past 1,600 years. Sometimes called the Atlantic’s “conveyer belt”, the AMOC is a vast ocean current system that moves warm, salty water from the tropics to regions further north, such as the UK. The gulf stream is part of the AMOC. As the AMOC carries warm water northward, it releases heat into the atmosphere. The release of ocean heat keeps countries warm – and without it, winters in the UK could be close to 5C colder.

Half Of Texas Without Clean Water

February 22, 2021 Chase Lawrence, WSWS. , , ,
More than 14.6 million Texans, about half of the population of the state, remained under a boil-water advisory Friday, according to Texas Commission on Environmental Quality spokeswoman Tiffany Young. This encompasses more than 1,225 water supply systems and 63 percent of Texas counties following the record winter storm which hit the state last weekend. In a press conference Austin Water Director Greg Meszaros stated that “we know that there are tens of thousands of leaks,” and that the Austin Fire Department responded to “thousands upon thousands of burst pipes.” In Houston, the fire department received almost 5,000 reports of burst pipes. Texas Republican officials are currently in the process of trying to pin the blame on each other for the disaster. Governor Greg Abbott blamed the state’s grid operator, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), claiming that it told state officials five days before the blackouts that everything would be under control.

Snowstorm + Capitalism = Disaster For More Than 100,000 In Mississippi

February 20, 2021 Bezaleel Jupiter and Satya Vatti, Liberation News. , , ,
This week, Mississippi is experiencing unprecedented freezing conditions resulting from ice storms that blasted through the U.S. South. In addition to being unaccustomed to the freezing rain, ice, and snow, thousands of Mississippians suffering rolling blackouts and power outages, unheated homes and water shutoffs, have been left to fend for themselves. Starting Feb 15, at least 250,000 Mississippians have lost power at some point during the week; counties in the southwest to east central Mississippi are primarily impacted. About 110,000 people were still without power on Feb. 19 in the morning. Almost all of the residents of the state’s capital city, Jackson, are without water. City officials have reported lacking the necessary chemicals to treat the water, and that the distribution system is overwhelmed.

Texas’s Independent Electric Grid Leaves Millions Without Power

February 18, 2021 Sharon Zhang, Truthout. , , ,
On Tuesday, millions of Texans woke up to find themselves without power as unusually cold conditions for the state knocked out the state’s power grid. The blackouts began on Monday when the state grappled with a winter storm and record low temperatures. Over 4.3 million people in Texas remain without power as the state’s power grid struggles to keep up with high demand. The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), which operates the state’s grid, had originally announced 45-minute rolling blackouts starting around 1:25 a.m. in order to conserve energy. But the blackouts instead extended throughout the day and into Tuesday, and there is still uncertainty about when they will end.

Destabilized By US Imperialism, Central America Faces Climate Catastrophes

November 21, 2020 Giovanni Batz, The Red Nation. , , ,
At the moment, Central America is suffering from the acceleration of climate change fueled natural disasters. On the heels of the recent Hurricane Eta and a raging pandemic, Hurricane Iota has hit the region, predominantly impacting Indigenous, Afro-descendant, and black communities. The situation has been made worse by violent and corrupt governments supported by the United States. Indigenous and Afro-descendant communities in Central America have long warned against climate change and environmental destruction caused by foreign-owned and operated extractivist projects.

Record 7 Million People Displaced By Extreme Weather Events In First Half Of 2019

September 16, 2019 By Olivia Rosane, Ecowatch.com , , ,
In another sign of the climate crisis, a record seven million people were displaced from their homes by extreme weather events during the first half of 2019, The New York Times reported Thursday. The number comes from the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC), which has been using data from governments, UN humanitarian agencies and news accounts to publish annual reports since 2003. Their mid-year figures for 2019, published Thursday, marked the highest number of disaster displacements the organization has ever recorded by this point in the year.

Killer Heat In The United States: Climate Choices And The Future Of Dangerously Hot Days (2019)

July 18, 2019 Staff, Ucsusa.org , ,
Extreme heat is poised to rise steeply in frequency and severity over the coming decades, bringing unprecedented health risks for people and communities across the country. The United States is facing a potentially staggering expansion of dangerous heat over the coming decades. This analysis shows the rapid, widespread increases in extreme heat that are projected to occur across the country due to climate change, including conditions so extreme that a heat index cannot be measured. The analysis also finds that the intensity of the coming heat depends heavily on how quickly we act now to reduce heat-trapping emissions.

Incarcerated Workers Are Bearing The Brunt Of Extreme Weather

February 3, 2019 Michael Arria, In These Times. ,
On January 28, an image of Cook County Jail prisoners shoveling snow went viral after it was posted on the  La Villita community Facebook page and then shared by the Chicago Community Bond Fund. The city of Chicago was preparing for an arctic blast and the prisoners were seen working in cold temperatures wearing orange jumpsuits. Thousands of people shared the image and expressed concern about the well-being of the prisoners. This scenario is yet another example of how incarcerated workers—toiling for little or no pay—are on the frontlines of extreme weather.

What Does ‘Clean Energy Access For All’ Mean?

July 23, 2016 Rachel Cleetus, www.blog.ucsusa.org ,
By Rachel Cleetus for UCSUSA - Yesterday the White House announced a series of actions to help advance clean energy access for all Americans. Meanwhile, the National Weather Service warned of a major heat wave across much of the country this week and NOAA released data showing that June set another global temperature record. All of which is a good reminder that there’s lots we can and must do to address climate change, and we’ve got to keep equity at the heart of our solutions.

Earth Enters New Era Of Climate Change

March 20, 2016 Sharmini Peries, www.therealnews.com , , ,
By Sharmini Peries for The Real New - Last week storms battered the Southwest in the United States and in Louisiana, which was the hardest hit state, three people lost their lives and thousands lost their homes and businesses. The Sabine River on the border of Louisiana and Texas hit the highest water level on record, surpassing the previous record set in 1999 by over 5 feet. Climate scientists are saying we are not only in a period of global warming, we are now entering a global climate change emergency. As NOAA recently confirmed, February surpassed all records in terms of temperatures. January 2016 also broke all-time records for above average temperatures, but the extent to which February broke temperature records alarmed many scientists, the month was more than 0.2°C warmer. Now many scientific studies have linked extreme weather events to climate change.
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