GR: The temperature increases discussed in this article have drastic consequences for terrestrial species. Because temperature declines with altitude, a rise of 1.5 degrees Celsius is equal to a 500 ft increase in altitude. The change increases the optimum altitude for many plant and animal species. Making the climb in decades or even centuries is not possible for most plants and the animals that depend on them.
The average global temperature spiked to yet another record in March 2016.
By Bob Berwyn
VIENNA — One-half degree Celsius may barely register on a backyard thermometer, but when it comes to temperatures on a global scale, it can make all the difference in the world, according to a new study that examined the relative impacts of 1.5 degrees Celsius global warming versus 2 degrees Celsius.
At issue is the worldwide climate-change target set late last year in Paris under the COP21 agreement. The deal, now signed by more than 175 countries, aims to cap global warming somewhere between 1.5 and 2 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial level by drastically cutting greenhouse gas emissions. The new research shows why many scientists are pushing for the lower target.
A temperature increase of 2 degrees Celsius will have a much bigger impacts to…
Despite the urgency to cut greenhouse gas emissions as climate change bears down on the globe, fossil fuel use is not likely to change much in the coming decades. Though renewable energy will grow quickly though 2040, gasoline and diesel will still move most of the world’s vehicles, and coal will still be the largest single source of carbon emissions.
Those are the conclusions of a forecast released by the federal government on Wednesday for how the world will use energy and what its carbon dioxide emissions will be over the next 25 years.
Gasoline and diesel will likely remain the globe’s biggest transportation fuels in the coming decades.
Credit: Michael Kappel/flickr
Here are five things to know about the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s World Energy Outlook 2016 and what it might mean for the climate:
Global carbon emissions from energy consumption are expected to grow at an average rate of 1 percent per year between 2012 and 2040, growing a total 34 percent in that time as fossil fuels provide the world with more than three quarters of its energy.
“With existing policies and regulations, worldwide energy-related carbon dioxide emissions will go from about 32 billion metric tons in 2012 to something like 43 billion metric tons out to the year 2040,” EIA administrator Adam Sieminski said.
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Fossil Fuels to Dominate World Energy Use Through 2040
Developed countries are expected see their carbon emissions increase about 9 percent through 2040, but in the developing world, those emissions will spike 51 percent.
That’s because developing countries, particularly China and India, are likely to continue to rely mainly on fossil fuels for their energy. Those countries alone account for 59 percent of the growth in global carbon emissions.
Unless there are unexpected changes in global climate policy over the next 25 years, coal will still be the world’s king of carbon emissions in 2040.
Coal is expected to account for 38 percent of global carbon dioxide emissions in 2040, down from 43 percent in 2012. Annual growth of coal use by that time is expected to be about 0.6 percent. In 1990, coal was responsible for 39 percent of global carbon emissions. Natural gas, by comparison, will account for 26 percent of global carbon emissions in 2040, up from 20 percent in 2012.
China is the world’s leader in coal consumption. With recent announcements that the country will reduce its use of coal by closing down power plants and shuttering mines, the EIA expects the country’s coal use to peak by 2025 thanks to the its economic slowdown and pledge to cut emissions.
In a surprise ruling from the bench, King County Superior Court Judge Hollis Hill ordered the Washington Department of Ecology to promulgate an emissions reduction rule by the end of 2016 and, in consultation with the youth petitioners, to make recommendations to the state legislature on science-based greenhouse gas reductions during the 2017 legislative session.
Noting the extraordinary circumstances of the climate crisis, the judge said, “this is an urgent situation…these kids can’t wait,” and referenced catastrophic impacts of climate destabilization. Building on their earlier win in November where this court ruled that the youth have constitutional rights to their public trust resources and a safe climate, this decision takes another substantial step by setting specific dates in the near future for science-based action in the state of Washington.
GR: This second ruling in favor of the youths is great news. However, the situation is indeed urgent. The state legislature needs to respond now rather than wait until next year to consider the issue.
Unaware of the consequences of its behavior, the growing human population is erasing sixty-five million of years of biodiversity recovery since the massive extinction that eliminated dinosaurs and most other species. This is without doubt the greatest issue of our time, perhaps of all time. In the article below, Quentin Wheeler points out that biodiversity is not even being mentioned by our current presidential candidates.
Saguaro, the iconic species of the Sonoran Desert, blooming in April, two months earlier than usual (Rogers, 2016).
Global warming, deforestation, desertification, environmental pollution, and ocean acidification are familiar labels for human-caused destruction of biodiversity and stability of Earth ecosystems. They are all connected to the attempt by our billions of people to satisfy their desires for food, reproduction, safety, and convenience. Allowed uncontrolled expansion, any one of them can achieve planet-wide destruction of biodiversity. Consider that even if this year’s great climate-change treaty achieves a sudden shift to safe energy and stops global warming, it will not save life on Earth. No single-issue approach can.
“It’s unlikely that presidential candidates will ever utter the word “biodiversity” while campaigning this year.
“Yet among emerging environmental challenges, none has fewer facts or more enduring threats than the large-scale loss of biodiversity. That’s why we need a visionary investment in fundamental exploration to create knowledge and options.
“And our elected representatives should lead vigorous discussions about what we can and should do about it. From Jefferson to Kennedy, from the Northwest Territory to the depths of space, presidents of vision have opened new frontiers to exploration.
“Serious environmental problems are a bipartisan challenge that deserves to be in every presidential platform. While scientific questions should be firewalled from politics, what we do with scientific knowledge should not. The best solutions should emerge from the rough and tumble of public debate.
“Biodiversity belongs in our public discussion because we have so much to learn from the Earth’s species – both what it means to be human and the knowledge encapsulated in nature – as we plot our future in a time of great change.”
“This is not the first time that earth has weathered such a mass extinction event. There have been five previously, the most recent occurring 65 million years ago, marked by the disappearance of the great dinosaurs.
“In each case, evolutionary processes have restored high levels of species diversity, but this should give us little comfort. Biodiversity recovery takes place over tens of millions of years. And in the meanwhile, there can be enormously chaotic consequences for ecosystems.
“It’s estimated that 10 million more species could be described or redescribed in greater detail.andreaskay/flickr, CC BY-NC-SA”
“Our knowledge of the species with which we share planet Earth is dangerously limited, meaning that we make decisions and policies in near complete ignorance of basic facts. Our best guess is that there are 10 million living species, more or less, excluding the single-celled bacteria and Archaea.
“Of these, fewer than two million are known to science. And of documented species, most are known by little more than a few diagnostic features and a name. While the rate of species extinction has greatly increased, the pace at which we are exploring species has not.
“In one of the original “big science” ideas, the Swedish naturalist Linnaeus set out in the mid-18th century to complete a global inventory of all the kinds of animals and plants. That inventory continues today, but at an unacceptably slow pace. We discover about 18,000 species each year, a rate unchanged since the 1940s in spite of technological advances.
“This need not be so. Given appropriate technical support and coordinated teamwork, it has been estimated that 10 million species could be described or redescribed in greater detail in no more than 50 years.
“As global environments are stressed, we need reliable knowledge of species diversity upon which to detect and measure changes. Ironically, we have mapped the rocky surface of Mars in greater detail than the living biosphere of our own planet.
“Unless we know what species exist and where, how are we to recognize invasive species, measure rates of extinction or even know whether our conservation strategies are working or not? How are we to understand or restore complex ecosystems when we are ignorant of the majority of their functioning parts? And how much are we willing to risk losing by not undertaking a comprehensive biodiversity moon shot?”
Half the Earth?
“Three major benefits would accrue from a NASA-scale mission to explore the biosphere.
“First would be baseline documentation of the species that exist early in the 21st century, including how they assemble into complex networks in ecosystems. Such baseline data would be transformative for ecology, conservation biology, and resource management, and establish a detailed point of comparison for whatever changes come in the future.
“Second is unleashing the full potential of biomimicry. For 3.8 billion years natural selection has maintained favorable adaptations and weeded out unworkable ones. Among the millions of such adaptations, engineers and innovators can find inspiration for entirely new designs, materials, products and processes.
“The extent to which we succeed creating a truly sustainable future – from renewable energy to degradable materials to cities that function like efficient ecosystems – may well depend on how much knowledge we gather from other species, including those about to go extinct.
“Last, but not least, is knowledge of our origins. Anthropologists continue to fill gaps in our knowledge of the emergence of modern humans, but that is only the most recent chapter in our story. Every attribute that we think of as uniquely human was modified from characteristics of earlier mammals. And features supposedly unique to mammals were similarly modified from even earlier ancestors and so forth, all the way back to the first single-celled species from which the diversity of life around us evolved.
“We can no more understand what it is to be human without exploring this whole history than we could account for why Earth is as it is in the absence of knowledge of the universe.
“We stand a much better chance of slowing the rate of extinction and reducing the percentage of species ultimately lost if we complete a planetary species inventory. And by preserving evidence and knowledge of those species that are lost, we can continue to learn from them.
“New tools, such as those from information science and molecular genetics, can help speed species exploration, but are most powerful when used in combination with detailed descriptive studies of species that reveal their evolutionary novelties.
“E.O. Wilson’s new book, “Half Earth,” proposes that half our planet be reserved for all the other species. His suggestion has unassailable common sense and is perhaps the most workable solution holding promise for millions of other species.
“If we accelerate species exploration, we can add value to “their” half of the world by better understanding and appreciating its residents while finding nature-inspired solutions to sustainably meet our needs in the confines of our half.
“The sooner we act, the greater our chances to avoid a sixth extinction event and preserve nature’s vast library of clues to better ways to meet human needs in an era of rapid global environmental change.”
It’s a hard, tough thing to consider. One of those possibilities people justifiably do not want to talk about. This notion that a creature we’re fond of and familiar with — a glorious living being along with all its near and distant relatives — could be entirely removed from the web of existence here on Earth.
Our aversion to the topic likely stems from our own fear of death. Or worse — the notion that the entire human race might eventually be faced with such an end. But extinction is a threat that we’ll see arising more and more as we force the world to rapidly warm. For species of the world now face existential crisis with increasing frequency as atmospheric and ocean temperatures have risen so fast that a growing number of them have simply become unable to cope with the heat.
“The aversion to talking about climate change during the election campaign reflects a wider problem: our concern for this issue has fallen even while it has become larger and more urgent.” From: www.abc.net.au
GR: During Friday’s Democratic Presidential debate, Sanders said we needed climate action “yesterday.” He received huge applause. I’d say that keeps the topic on the radar. Unfortunately, more familiar concerns–economy, war, and human problems–receive more media presentation. We need more organizations like The Guardian to help keep critical issues out front.
“From Syria to Kidapawan: time to look at climate change as a peace issue
“On April 1, the Philippines was shocked by violence in Kidapawan City, the capital of Cotabato Province, where police opened fire on farmers protesting and asking for rice, killing three and injuring 116.
“Eighty-seven were listed as missing in the incident, which erupted over frustrated farmers experiencing an intense drought brought on by the El Nino climate phenomenon who felt the government was doing nothing for them. The Philippines is an island nation frequently battered y weather, often typhoons. Now it is drought.
GR: According to the MIT computer model commissioned by the Club of Rome (Limits to Growth, 1974), the collapse of human civilization begins around 2020 (https://garryrogers.com/2014/09/03/limits-to-growth/). The collapse results from our growing population’s use of the planet’s limited resources, and the environmental pollution accompanying use of those resources. The severity of climate-change impacts may have moved up the beginning of the collapse. To this year.
However, the collapse will be gradual. Many people will not feel the shocks of our failing civilization for another 10-20 years.
The average global temperature spiked to yet another record in March 2016. 
GarryRogers Nature Conservation 