TeenageArchipelago posted:

to be clear, 5 in this case means 5C

quote:

A satellite that measures methane leaks from oil and gas companies is set to start circulating the Earth 15 times a day next month. Google plans to have the data mapped by the end of the year for the whole world to see.
The partnership between Google and the Environmental Defense Fund, which in March is expected to launch its satellite known as MethaneSAT, marks a new era of global climate accountability. Methane is a potent greenhouse gas estimated to be responsible for nearly a third of human-caused global warming. Scientists say slashing emissions is one of the fastest ways to slow the climate crisis because methane has 80 times the warming power of carbon dioxide over a decade

bawfuls posted:

365 days, we did it!

https://twitter.com/WxNB_/status/1765065264109101393

Cold on a Cob posted:

this owns but the only chart i want is the one that shows when civilization hits that tipping point and falls off a cliff so i can liquidate my meager savings before then

Cold on a Cob posted:

i heard about this on the radio this morning

https://www.businessinsider.com/google-map-methane-leaks-world-can-see-2024-2

i'm actually looking forward to seeing this map

Salt Fish posted:

I'm confused about if you like the chart or not.

Cold on a Cob posted:

i heard about this on the radio this morning

https://www.businessinsider.com/google-map-methane-leaks-world-can-see-2024-2

i'm actually looking forward to seeing this map

this owns but the only chart i want is the one that shows when civilization hits that tipping point and falls off a cliff so i can liquidate my meager savings before then

Cold on a Cob posted:

it's not that i don't like the chart, my chart needs are just getting hyper-specific now

err posted:

the earth can support 8 billion western lifestyles I BELIEVE

Dokapon Findom posted:

Nobody look into the weird tariffs that are enforced against sugar cane producing countries to safeguard domestic sugar production

err posted:

the earth can support 8 billion western lifestyles I BELIEVE

Cold on a Cob posted:

it's not that i don't like the chart, my chart needs are just getting hyper-specific now

Hubbert posted:

Anyone who agrees with this assessment should be probated or banned; it's a clearly malthusian and ecofascist position that must not be tolerated in CSPAM.

Argentum posted:

The earth can support as many humans as we want, as long as we build enough plants to offset them.

SixteenShells posted:

we need to engineer fantasy mega-trees to soak up all our carbon.

Argentum posted:

The earth can support as many humans as we want, as long as we build enough carbon recycling plants to offset them.

TeenageArchipelago posted:

err posted:

U.S. per capita fossil CO₂ emissions have fallen by more than 25 percent since 1990.

Methane emissions decreased by 16 percent since 1990.

The Oldest Man posted:

March 5 for 5C

Hubbert posted:

That's right.

In fact, the Earth can support as many humans as we can ever possibly dream of creating. As more minds in existence allows for more ideas to be created and shared, this ever-growing capacity and potential for innovation should be able to address any future perils without issue. Resource depletion and pollution is no match for the boundless potential of human imagination.

3.5 degrees C by 2100, and 4.0 degrees C by 2150 have also been determined to be optimal targets by Nobel Prize winning economists. If we're to have any chance for generating prosperity and financing climate adaption efforts in the present and future, and if economic growth is a tide that raises all boats without unduly robbing someone of their hardearned wealth, then all of those minds are going to need the wealth (and incentive!) to do what it takes to make a better world for all of us!

Otherwise, individual action is paramount, and consumer choice is one of the best ways to help the environment. If you're worried that you cannot donate enough money to carbon sequestration efforts, then you should try to reduce your carbon footprint by making better purchasing choices, flying economy rather than business, teaching your kids to recycle, and eat a little less meat than usual.

And most importantly, you live in a democracy, so don't forget to exercise your fundamental right to vote.

Hubbert posted:

That's right.

In fact, the Earth can support as many humans as we can ever possibly dream of creating. As more minds in existence allows for more ideas to be created and shared, this ever-growing capacity and potential for innovation should be able to address any future perils without issue. Resource depletion and pollution is no match for the boundless potential of human imagination.

3.5 degrees C by 2100, and 4.0 degrees C by 2150 have also been determined to be optimal targets by Nobel Prize winning economists. If we're to have any chance for generating prosperity and financing climate adaption efforts in the present and future, and if economic growth is a tide that raises all boats without unduly robbing someone of their hardearned wealth, then all of those minds are going to need the wealth (and incentive!) to do what it takes to make a better world for all of us!

Otherwise, individual action is paramount, and consumer choice is one of the best ways to help the environment. If you're worried that you cannot donate enough money to carbon sequestration efforts, then you should try to reduce your carbon footprint by making better purchasing choices, flying economy rather than business, teaching your kids to recycle, and eat a little less meat than usual.

And most importantly, you live in a democracy, so don't forget to exercise your fundamental right to vote.

Hubbert posted:

That's right.

In fact, the Earth can support as many humans as we can ever possibly dream of creating. As more minds in existence allows for more ideas to be created and shared, this ever-growing capacity and potential for innovation should be able to address any future perils without issue. Resource depletion and pollution is no match for the boundless potential of human imagination.

3.5 degrees C by 2100, and 4.0 degrees C by 2150 have also been determined to be optimal targets by Nobel Prize winning economists. If we're to have any chance for generating prosperity and financing climate adaption efforts in the present and future, and if economic growth is a tide that raises all boats without unduly robbing someone of their hardearned wealth, then all of those minds are going to need the wealth (and incentive!) to do what it takes to make a better world for all of us!

Otherwise, individual action is paramount, and consumer choice is one of the best ways to help the environment. If you're worried that you cannot donate enough money to carbon sequestration efforts, then you should try to reduce your carbon footprint by making better purchasing choices, flying economy rather than business, teaching your kids to recycle, and eat a little less meat than usual.

And most importantly, you live in a democracy, so don't forget to exercise your fundamental right to vote.

quote:

The Arctic Ocean could be ‘ice-free’ within the decade, researchers warn

quote:

The loss of Arctic sea ice has long been a graphic measure of human-caused climate change, with wrenching images of suffering polar bears illustrating a worsening planetary crisis. Now, new research has found that Arctic Ocean sea ice is shrinking even faster than previously thought — and that the Arctic may start to see its first “ice-free” days within the current decade.

That troubling milestone could occur before the end of the decade or sometime in the 2030s — as many as 10 years earlier than previous projections, according to a study published Tuesday in the journal Nature Reviews Earth and Environment. The study defines “ice-free” as when the Arctic Ocean has less than 1 million square kilometers, or 386,000 square miles, of ice.

“It’s no longer a remote possibility that might happen at some point,” said Alexandra Jahn, the study’s lead author and an associate professor of atmospheric and oceanic sciences at the University of Colorado Boulder. “Unfortunately, it basically occurs under all the emission scenarios in our climate models, so it seems like it’s going to happen, and so we need to be ready for that.”

By midcentury — 2035 to 2067 — the Arctic could see consistent ice-free conditions in September, the month when sea ice concentrations are typically at their minimum, the study found.

The precise timing of such losses depends on how soon humanity is able to reduce fossil fuel emissions that are contributing to global warming. Under a high-emission scenario in which fossil fuel use continues unabated, the Arctic would be ice-free between the months of May and January by 2100, the study says.

Even under a low-emission scenario, the Arctic would still be ice-free between August and October by that same year.

Climate models dating to the 1970s have long predicted the possibility of reaching ice-free summer conditions in the Arctic under sufficient warming, but the latest research has helped nail down just how quickly it may happen, Jahn said.

The consequences of such a change are not yet fully understood, but considerable effects on ecological systems, wildlife and local and global climates are likely.

“The more emissions the world puts into the atmosphere, the more months we could see an ice-free Arctic,” Jahn said. She added that even in a reduced emissions scenario, “children born today will see ice-free conditions at least in September, and every couple of years in October and August.”

The study paints a vivid picture of a changing planet where the formerly “white Arctic” defined by its ice is transformed into a “blue Arctic” characterized by open water.

Yet the decline of Arctic sea ice has been well documented since at least 1979, when continuous satellite observations began. Since then, there has been a roughly 40% loss in surface area and a 50% loss in thickness, according to Walter Meier, a senior researcher with the National Snow and Ice Data Center, who was not involved with the study.

Meier said the study’s assessments are plausible, although the most urgent finding involving an ice-free day within the decade “may be a little aggressive.”

Still, he said, “given the emission scenarios that we’re following, it’s really a matter of when, not if, we’ll get ice-free conditions.”

Indeed, the study comes as the planet continues to experience unprecedented heating driven by climate change and this year’s El Niño, with January becoming the eighth month in a row to experience record warmth, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

February data were not yet available, although early findings point to continued heating, including the warmest meteorological winter in the United States.

The global surface temperature in January was 2.29 degrees above the 20th century average of 54 degrees, NOAA found. Global sea ice extent was the seventh-smallest in the 46-year record at 6.90 million square miles, or 440,000 square miles below the 1991-2020 average, for the winter month.

Jahn said some research has found there is still a 10% to 20% possibility of avoiding an ice-free Arctic altogether if the global temperature stays below 1.5 degrees Celsius of warming on a 20- to 30-year mean. The 1.5-degree benchmark is an internationally agree-upon threshold for reducing the worst effects of climate change.

“If we were to stop all emissions tomorrow — which physically isn’t possible, but if we could — then we could still avoid it,” Jahn said. “It’s not a guarantee, but there’s a possibility.”

But even that possibility appears to be slipping away. In January, the global average temperature measured 1.66 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial reference period, according to the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service.

The implications of an ice-free Arctic Ocean — which spans an area roughly equivalent to the size of the lower 48 United States — are worrisome. According to the study, the loss of sea ice would contribute to increased wave heights, and greater coastal erosion in the region, among other things. It would also threaten the survival of ice-dependent animals such as polar bears and seals, and trigger the migration of some fish and other species.

“There’s going to be a big shift in what kind of species we see where, and which ones end up being the dominant ones and surviving,” Jahn said. The outlook for polar bears is especially grim because they primarily hunt on sea ice, and “if there is an open-ocean season for several months of the year, then polar bears just can’t survive anymore.”

For better or worse, the loss would also increase economic activity in the Arctic by opening up more shipping routes and areas for resource exploration, the study says.

Other potential outcomes include reductions in albedo — or the amount of light reflected by the ice — which would accelerate human-caused warming by creating an amplifying feedback loop. More controversial research argues that a decrease in Arctic sea ice could affect the jet stream and its associated weather patterns, and even lead to more favorable fire conditions in the western U.S.

Many changes are already underway, said Meier of the NSIDC.

“It’s not like flipping a switch where it’s one type of Arctic Ocean environment, and then it’s ice-free and suddenly it’s something else,” he said. “We’ve already seen a lot of changes in the Arctic Ocean and the region around it.”

It also would not be the first time the Arctic has been ice-free, geologically speaking. Evidence shows the Arctic was ice-free between 80,000 and 150,000 years ago, and possibly after the last Ice Age 8,000 to 10,000 years ago.

“If we’re not in uncharted territory, we’re getting toward uncharted territory — and we’re certainly in uncharted territory in the history of human civilization,” Meier said. “We’re seeing something that is quite extraordinary and is a really important climate signal, and pretty iconic.”

The good news is that the potential loss of Arctic sea ice is not irreversible, Jahn said. Sea ice comes back every winter and may be able to revert to its previous conditions in as quickly as seven years. That’s a key difference between sea ice and ice on land, such as glaciers or ice sheets in Greenland, which take thousands of years to grow.

Still, the very likely possibility of an ice-free Arctic within the coming decades is an important reminder that humanity should strive to reduce emissions and keep warming below the limit of 1.5 degrees Celsius, she said.

“While everybody can reduce their individual carbon footprint — and that can have positive impacts — we really need the big policy decisions to reduce emissions globally to make an impact,” Jahn said.

How quickly those decisions are made and implemented can mean the difference between limited future losses, or five or more months of guaranteed ice-free conditions, she added.

“These are really completely different potential Arctics that we’re looking at by the end of the century,” she said. “And it’s really in our hands to try and go for the least bad option.”

quote:

The study defines “ice-free” as when the Arctic Ocean has less than 1 million square kilometers, or 386,000 square miles, of ice.

inchworm posted:

a restaurant nearby had a tree cut down, presumably because one branch slightly messed up their fence around their extremely important dumpster, or they just felt like it

this is the A Sound of Thunder moment that compounds our beautiful number, sorry everybody

Microplastics posted:

It's years out from happening and I'm already bracing for the relentless inundation of THEY CALL IT ICE-FREE BUT I CAN SEE ICE IN THE PHOTOS, THEY'RE LYING TO US

Dog Case posted:

I got this ad while checking the weather the other day

Rectal Death Alert posted:

I posted an anecdote awhile ago on my other account.

There was this big beautiful oak tree, easily 100 years old, in my old suburban neighborhood. It was in the front yard of a starbucks karen stereotype. I saw her harassing the people she brought in to have it cut down one day.

She put up some lovely black "ornate" light fixture in that corner of the yard and it was rusting almost immediately and looked extremely out of place and lovely. It was one of those lovely quality fixtures Lowe's will order for you off Grainger.

I had an occasion to go back to that neighborhood recently after having not been there for a few years and the light fixture is gone. The house has been flipped multiple times.

Stereotype posted:

it should be illegal to cut down any tree ever

500excf type r posted:

Nah

(USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)

500excf type r posted:

Nah

(USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)