Climate Change Will Cause Beer Shortages and Price Hikes, Study Says (vice.com)

A new study from Nature Plants has identified the one climate-related issue that can unite people from myriad political backgrounds -- beer. From a report: Led by Wei Xie, an agricultural scientist at Peking University, the paper finds that regions that grow barley, the primary crop used to brew beer, are projected to experience severe droughts and heat waves due to anthropogenic climate change. According to five climate models that used different projected temperature increases for the coming century, extreme weather events could reduce barley yields by 3 to 17 percent. Barley harvests are mostly sold as livestock fodder, so beer availability could be further hindered by the likely prioritization of grain yields to feed cattle and other farm animals, rather than for brewing beer.

The net result will be a decline in affordable access to beer, which is the most commonly imbibed alcoholic beverage in the world. Within a few decades, this luxury may be out of reach for hundreds of millions of people, including those in affluent nations where breweries are a major industry. Price spikes are estimated to range from $4 to over $20 for a standard six-pack in nations like the US, Ireland, Denmark, and Poland.

Comments

100% backwards

[SuperKendall]

The idiots that keep claiming global warming will result in more arid regions are ignoring the actual effect of warmer overall global temperatures - greater evaporation from the oceans. Global warming means GREATER agricultural range, not less. Deserts are not caused by heat so much as by rain shadowing from geologic features.

You can easily see this is true with a quick trip to any jungle, which is both hotter and wetter than most other place on Earth, yet also has the greatest abundance of vegetation...

This refutation is also verified by the medieval warming period, where agriculture greatly expanded in Europe.

So the projected global warming we see currently will result in a greater range of beer, not reduced.

Re:Main concern

[DogDude]

So many people (in the US, mainly Republicans), don't care unless it affects *them* in *their wallet*, that it's not a bad idea to throw this kind of stuff out there, in the hopes that maybe a few of those self-centered assholes will wake up. If telling dummies that their beer will get more expensive is what it takes for some of them to be concerned about climate change, so be it (as sad as that may be).