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Climate Change Will Have Dire Consequences For US, Federal Report Concludes (cnn.com)
A new US government report delivers a dire warning about climate change and its devastating impacts on the health and economy of the country. From a report: The federally mandated study was released by the Trump administration on Friday, at a time when many Americans are on a long holiday weekend, distracted by family and shopping. Coming from the US Global Change Research Program, a team of 13 federal agencies, the Fourth National Climate Assessment was put together with the help of 1,000 people, including 300 leading scientists. It's the second of two volumes. The first, released in November 2017, concluded that there is "no convincing alternative explanation" for the changing climate other than "human activities, especially emissions of greenhouse gases."
The report's findings run counter to President Donald Trump's consistent message that climate change is a hoax. On Wednesday, Trump tweeted, "Whatever happened to Global Warming?" as some Americans faced the coldest Thanksgiving in over a century. But the science explained in these and other federal government reports is clear: Climate change is not disproved by the extreme weather of one day or a week; it's demonstrated by long-term trends. Humans are living with the warmest temperatures in modern history. Even if the best-case scenario were to happen and greenhouse gas emissions were to drop to nothing, the world is on track to warm 1.1 degrees Fahrenheit. As of now, not a single G20 country is meeting climate targets, research shows.
The costs of climate change could reach hundreds of billions of dollars annually, according to the report. The Southeast alone will probably lose over a half a billion labor hours by 2100 due to extreme heat. Farmers will face extremely tough times. The quality and quantity of their crops will decline across the country due to higher temperatures, drought and flooding. In parts of the Midwest, farms will be able to produce less than 75% of the corn they produce today, and the southern part of the region could lose more than 25% of its soybean yield. Heat stress could cause average dairy production to fall between 0.60% and 1.35% over the next 12 years -- having already cost the industry $1.2 billion from heat stress in 2010. Further reading: Climate Change Will Cost US Economy Hundreds of Billions of Dollars, Government Says in Sweeping Report (Reuters); Climate Change 'Will Inflict Substantial Damages on US Lives' (The Guardian); Climate Change Is Already Hurting U.S. Communities, Federal Report Says (NPR); Major Trump Administration Climate Report Says Damages Are 'Intensifying Across the Country' (The Washington Post); and Climate Impacts Grow, But U.S. Can Adapt, Says New Report (National Geographic).
The report's findings run counter to President Donald Trump's consistent message that climate change is a hoax. On Wednesday, Trump tweeted, "Whatever happened to Global Warming?" as some Americans faced the coldest Thanksgiving in over a century. But the science explained in these and other federal government reports is clear: Climate change is not disproved by the extreme weather of one day or a week; it's demonstrated by long-term trends. Humans are living with the warmest temperatures in modern history. Even if the best-case scenario were to happen and greenhouse gas emissions were to drop to nothing, the world is on track to warm 1.1 degrees Fahrenheit. As of now, not a single G20 country is meeting climate targets, research shows.
The costs of climate change could reach hundreds of billions of dollars annually, according to the report. The Southeast alone will probably lose over a half a billion labor hours by 2100 due to extreme heat. Farmers will face extremely tough times. The quality and quantity of their crops will decline across the country due to higher temperatures, drought and flooding. In parts of the Midwest, farms will be able to produce less than 75% of the corn they produce today, and the southern part of the region could lose more than 25% of its soybean yield. Heat stress could cause average dairy production to fall between 0.60% and 1.35% over the next 12 years -- having already cost the industry $1.2 billion from heat stress in 2010. Further reading: Climate Change Will Cost US Economy Hundreds of Billions of Dollars, Government Says in Sweeping Report (Reuters); Climate Change 'Will Inflict Substantial Damages on US Lives' (The Guardian); Climate Change Is Already Hurting U.S. Communities, Federal Report Says (NPR); Major Trump Administration Climate Report Says Damages Are 'Intensifying Across the Country' (The Washington Post); and Climate Impacts Grow, But U.S. Can Adapt, Says New Report (National Geographic).
These models are tested with far longer sets of data and against multiple sources of historic information e.g. tree rings, ice cores etc.
The facts are pretty clear, the climate is changing fast. It already entered a point of no return. Those are facts. Weather cycles show we should be in a cooling period but instead we are warming, so no that's not it.
There are other things besides cars/factories etc. such as the huge amount of livestock which increases methane emissions. Methane is far worse than most greenhouse gasses. There are a lot of things that need fixing to stop this disaster which is already showing its impact in droughts, wildfires and storms that are far more powerful than they should be.
Oil, gas and coal are heavily subsidized. Especially oil for which wars were fought and blood was spilled to keep its price ridiculously low. Green energy is already competitive even without government subsidies. Imagine what a pro-active push to green energy can do to the global economy... More people work in solar than in coal in the US today. There are only benefits to green policies.
It can't be reversed now even with major changes to carbon consumption (not that that would ever happen with both sides taking tons of cash from the energy lobbyists).
Nirvana fallacy. Just because a perfect solution doesn't exist doesn't mean reducing our CO2 emissions can't help.
It might be too late to avoid a 2C temperature raise. But let's avoid a 5C raise. And if it's too late, then let's avoid a 10C raise.
Is that supposed to be some sort of argument?
When the data is against you, science is against you and reason is against you, I guess that's all that's left. Global warming is happening. Climate change is the result. Inventing silly quotes will not change reality no matter how much your political inclinations tell you that reality is wrong.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Because it's expensive.
The costs of pollution outweigh the illusionary "savings" that you reap by not preventing or cleaning up the pollution.
Nobody gives a fuck about what's "natural." We care about the consequences to us. Comets colliding with the earth would be natural too, but if we saw one coming in, people would desperately want to Do Something about it, to minimize the damage. Fuck nature.
Bzzt. You can be responsible to yourself, as well as other humans too. No mysticism, supernatural belief or paranormalism phenomenon are needed. All you need is the the plain hard reality of not wanting people to get away with doing bad things to other, innocent, unconsenting people. Even if you don't believe in Thor or Jehova or Quetzalcoatl, you would have reason to object to me dumping sewage into your home. And if you were inclined to use such language, you might even say I was "morally culpable" for the sewage that I unilaterally chose to put into your home.
The Southeast alone will probably lose over a half a billion labor hours by 2100 due to extreme heat.
500 * 10^6 hours / 81 years = 6.173 * 10^6 hours/year
That's 6.173 * 10^6 / 52 = 1.187 * 10^5 hours/week.
Given 10 * 10^6 working age adults in the Southeast, that's...
0.012 hours per week per worker. Not a hell of a lot.
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
You only have insane extreme psychopathic fascist nutters, and batshit insane extreme psychopathic fascist nutters.
Look at the *actual* *actions* they both did. Not what they said. Not what anyone said. What they *did*.
In that case, Bush Sr, Clinton, W. Bush, and Obama are the same line. The same exact team.
US leaders really are the masters in their field: They don’t even need an external scapegoat. Even when dummy Bush goes, and empties the (conveniently always kept full) villain closet, they just hold their two arms ("parties") up in the puppet theater, make the hand puppets act like enemies, and you fall for it, hook, line, sinker, fishing rod, fisherman and boat.
Then they point at the cloth hand puppets, and make you blame the puppets for what they did. Seriously, the level of delusion here only compares to North Korea.
Oh an, fuck your convenient attitude of first going "it doesn't happen", and then when it does happen, go "now we can't do anything about it."! How fucking convenient for you, criminal! Nice try. You are literally* that guy in the restaurant from the South Park episode, when he violently gets eaten by ManBearPig, and it couldn’t possibly be more satisfying.
___
* Information for people with Aspergers: This is the hyperbolic use of the word.
... our pinhead politicians fail to understand the difference between climate and this afternoon's weather.
If only they have someone on staff who passed high school science instead of another hack whose specialty is oppo research.
CUR ALLOC 20195.....5804M
If you are arguing with me about basic facts like the clear trend of increasing global temperature year over year then you are not skeptical, you're just an idiot. That's the problem. Deniers are trying to deny the problem exists which flies in the face of all evidence. Many of the climate change mitigation techniques should be done for a whole host of reasons. Getting rid of coal energy production and reducing radiation exposure while reducing acid rain sure is hard to honestly argue against and yet you have deniers decrying lost jobs despite new energy options actually producing more jobs.
If you move the argument into what we're going to do about it such as this article tries to do you end up with a constructive argument with plenty of room for actual skeptics which actually doesn't devolve in religious fanaticism.
Just because everyone is entitled to their opinion doesn't mean they are all equally weighted for any specific subject. I am not a rocket scientist so I have no business trying to launch actual rockets. Much like Presidents should have some actual governing experience before they try to govern an entire country. Both Clinton and W made the government actually DO a lot. Clinton with Republicans in the house actually balanced a budget and the Republicans somehow managed to convince the military that all the base closures were Clinton's fault! Haha. I digress because anti-intellectualism is actually celebrated these days. Greed is no longer a sin much less a mortal sin as you have prosperity preachers all over the country obvious perverting the intent of the bible and Christianity as a whole. Why do you think so many climate deniers are also right wing religious nutjobs? They think God will swoop in and rapture them. That is not a realistic way to run a country.
you can choose to live a life not lived in fear
Well I think you're confounding finding with "fear". Science isn't here to make us feel great or feel fear, it is what it is. The total volumetric thermal energy in the atmosphere is increasing. The amount of energy that strikes the Earth from the Sun and reflects back into space is decreasing. This isn't a new feature, Example This increase was observed in 1949. The first order derivative of that change has been a positive one over the course of the last one hundred years and if the rate of change continues it will lead to a total average energy increase in the atmosphere of two degrees Celsius.
We were supposed to see that exponential growth in heating many years ago
We do see it. Heat waves that hit the middle east, rising sea levels, heat waves in Australia, receding ice shelf, decreased insect populations, ever increasing invasion of spices into regions where previous temperatures would not have allowed them to go. Heck I distinctly remember a year in December where I slapped a mosquito off my arm. It's just difficult to pinpoint any one particular affect of increasing temperatures because all of them are slow to see.
An especially clear example of this is todays NYT feature on Scary Global Warming
I distinctly remember the NYT graph, however it does give range and if you do look over at the website that provided data you'll see that there's a ton of assumptions that we could sit here for days picking apart. My particular region shows an increase anywhere between (min) 8 days and (max) 40 days of 90+ temperatures. But looking at the actual site that provided the data, you'll get a sense that it is indeed conjecture based on methods they feel are appropriate. But that doesn't negate the fact that temperatures will increase even in conservative readings of their data. Again, that's not a fear thing, that's a these are the numbers, this is what the trend looks like, deal with how you so please. But you do have to realize that NYT is obviously going to place some sort of "point" to their story.
We were supposed to see that exponential growth in heating many years ago, maybe even a decade at at this point
We are seeing it. For example, in my area falling numbers within wheat yields have impacted to a small degree acre to pound of flour numbers. Nothing massive here, maybe about 0.2% decrease in yields. However, thinking in terms of joules of energy versus the multitude of acres of wheat, it would take a significant increase in atmospheric energy to change the massive number of acres of wheat to change a 0.1% much less a 0.2%. Again, in the end product flour, it's difficult to see that translation because it's spread all over the place. And it is very, very important that I point out that FN is just one measure and not the end all be all of any debate. So I'm not saying that "Ah-Ha! I got'cha!" All I am saying is that it is "interesting" to see that. But I think that's also the insidious part of climate change is that it can change factors ever so slightly because the effect of climate are very wide ranging. So while exponential energy accumulation may not always in turn evolve into full on heat waves, it can also deposit the excess energy in other ways that in aggregate are near impossible to foresee, but they happen none-the-less.
I would LOVE to see a serious discussion on climate at some point
I'm not sold on that point. I feel you've made your mind up about the debate and rather just yell at how people are wrong rather than show where they are wrong. I'm even typing this and wondering what the hell is the point here con
Actually, they do.
No, we're not supposed to be underwater right now. That was never predicted. No, there was nothing about the ice caps melting by 2015, that's far too specific. Individuals might have gone out on a limb, but then individuals will believe almost anything.
If you want to accuse it of being a far left conspiracy, you can join the New World Order brigade, the antivaxxers and the ancient aliens nuts. Because those are the people who dispute global warming. And they're essentially the only people who do. So if you don't want to be in that crowd, think.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
The following is not science:
Whether climate change is driven (in part or in full) by human activities is a science question and will ultimately be decided by scientific criteria (exactly when such a reliable decree comes down the pike remains open to debate, though increasingly less open, year over year, year after year, on current trends).
Extrapolating the economic cost of heat stress ventures deep into the dark, unreliable heart of economics (which is referred to as "the dismal science" for a good reason) is a mug's game.
Even glib, prognosticating economists can't make these projections without taking into account future human ingenuity. Economics with a side-order of futurology—what could possibly go wrong?
I'm getting ever more grumpy about this constant bait and switch: we're really, really, really confident of our climate model this time, so let us now describe with infinite confidence the future we envision using our entirely non–Magical 8 Ball (this involving two additional academic fields, one barely respected, the other openly derided; moreover, the vast majority of the dignified-to-a-fault, hard-science authors of this publication have any specific training—or tainting—in either of these shabby fields, and that's why you should believe every word we write).
Well I think you're confounding finding with "fear". Science isn't here to make us feel great or feel fear, it is what it is.
That is what science is supposed to do, but in modern times is often "goal oriented science" to be done just to back up a desired selling point.
The thought that I am confounding anything ignores the headline here: "Climate Change Will Have Dire Consequences For US, Federal Report Concludes"
How is that not obviously meant to instill fear?
Even if the worst things in the report this article talks about come to pass, I find none of them dire. Lets look at just one of them:
The Midwest alone, which is predicted to have the largest increase in extreme temperature, will see an additional 2,000 premature deaths per year by 2090.
How is that dire? Do you know how many people live in the midwest?
It also is pretty transparent just from this thingle sentence that the target of the report are the people in flyover country who do not yet embrace the global warming faith, yet another indicator the report is far more marketing than science.
I feel you've made your mind up about the debate and rather just yell
How am I yelling? I am merely revealing motives to alarmism, in quite a calm way. I think you'll find my use of capital letters to be grammatically correct and not of the current fashion to impart drama.
You mention psychology in your post. Is calling people things like deniers going to convince anyone of veracity? That leads to a very obvious negative response from most people. The fact such hyperbole is used so often indicates to me the people using it are not truly serious nor concerned, as do so many actions from those proclaiming the loudest there is cause for great concern.
Science isn't an absolute
We are often told it is in the case of global warming. The very people that question it are called "deniers" as if asking questions about science is forbidden; the fact that climate science is an absolute is implied a thousand times a day. (by the way, yes of course that is hyperbole on my part, as I find it amusing, and as the old saying goes - they started it).
I think this part really underscores your feelings of climate change. A fear of being told what to do...Clearly it isn't having the impact you so fear.
I find this paragraph very interesting; as I said quite explicitly a number of times, I choose not live in fear. I find it interesting you wish to convince others into the idea they feel fear even thought they state categorically they do not. Puzzling.
You are right about one thing, people will do what they will do. What I do, is help people understand what is, when others are trying to obscure the matter, so they can make truly informed choices. How is that a philosophy based in fear? Myself, I find information is the gateway to living the least fearful life, because what you understand well you can adapt for properly. Nothing is so calming as being prepared and informed.
Currently I see the prediction of warming to be be pretty fuzzy - it will probably warm some, but that may yet be counteracted by things like deep solar minimums, or other environmental reaction we have not yet thought of or understood, or even just a few fairly large volcanos implementing the "blocking the sun" idea for us for some time. Also of course we are near a cusp of very rapid alternative energy uptake, especially solar heating and electric cars in much wider use - so CO2 use will very naturally reduce a great extent anyway without any extra effort.
What does seem pretty clear though is that the thing we were all supposed to worry about the most - runaway warming from CO2 - is simply not occurring, nor will it occur. Since that will not happen the need for immediate action is eliminated and we can adapt to whatever changes may occur on a more leisurely timescale.
If you read a lot of actual papers on climate study instead of just reading dramatic head
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
No you don't remember because it never happened. Nobody with any scientific credibility said NYC would be underwater by 2022. The might have said that they will be washed over by a storm surge like that which Sandy gave them but not that it would remain underwater. Mostly where you get that is some hyperbolic statement by someone trying to whip up fools like you who buy it lock. stock and barrel.