And the climate news gets worse
New Jersey is now considered 鈥楪round Zero鈥� for sea level rise, according to new data as reported in the USA Today. The report comes from Rutgers University and is intended to help New Jersey communities prepare for changing coastal conditions. Sea levels along the coast have already risen one and a half feet since 1911; while global sea level rises have been closer to just half a foot. The New Jersey rise is aggravated by the tectonic plate that supports the Mid-Atlantic region which is sinking.
Another recent story from BuzzFeed News reports that the climate crisis is already here and only getting worse. In the last 10 years, six extremely depressing climate records have been broken. They include carbon dioxide levels surpassing 400 parts per million. The last time this level was reached humans did not exist and the planet was warmer than it is today. Scientists believe this time around that it蘑菇视频 humans not nature who are responsible for the unprecedented rise.
Next is the temperature that keeps going up. The decade kicked off with 2010 being the hottest year on record but was broken in 2014, 2015 and 2016.
The third record event is the Arctic sea ice disappearing. Greenland has lost 3.8 trillion metric tons of ice. This melting is producing another event in the rising of seas. Sunny day flooding is a regular occurrence especially in Florida. Seventeen states have spent $16 billion due to coastal property damage caused by flooding from rising seas and storms. In the Pacific Ocean, multiple islands have shrunk and some have disappeared entirely. Our coral reefs are dying across the world. The Great Barrier Reef, the world蘑菇视频 largest and longest lost about half its coral following warm waters in 2016 and 2017.
The sixth event of the decade was the number of billion dollar disasters. This was the decade of Hurricane Sandy which brought the country蘑菇视频 largest city, New York, to a standstill. Hurricane Harvey brought record rains and flooding to Texas in 2017. Maria devastated Puerto Rico and the fires out west were unprecedented and now seem to be an annual event.
Around the world typhoons killed thousands and many were killed in Europe蘑菇视频 record-breaking heatwave. Severe droughts in Africa left millions hungry and record rains are increasing in India.
At the beginning of the century, scientists were only just starting to link the changing climate to individual disasters, mostly droughts and heatwaves. Today there is new field of study called 鈥渁ttribution science鈥� allowing scientists to increasingly identify how climate change contributes to certain disasters.
But there is some good news as reported in the Washington Examiner last week that a thriving humanity is capable of innovating to tackle environmental challenges. The production of low-carbon and even zero carbon electricity has been made possible because fracking has opened up enormous clean natural gas deposits. Research is underway of removing and making use of carbon. And then there蘑菇视频 research into fusion a completely carbon-free source of energy which may soon be at the point of economic feasibility.
Let蘑菇视频 hope we have the courage and conviction to continue the debate that this is a serious issue and more important we can do something about the ever unfolding climate crisis enveloping our planet.