WithairontheIIs"Here'sJasonHello.globalglobalinhowhehowwhat'sasks@guardianasks:Hithe first one,from Sandie Elsom.
Congratulations on deciding to focus on this most indispensable of all issues. I’d like to see clear explanations of what the science is saying and just how serious the outcomes will be. I acquire difficulty convincing family members that climate change is a clear and present danger. 12.56pm GMTJournalism often tends to focus on the problems, and as such can often give a glum view of the world. But during this hour we’ve heard from: 12.55pm GMTWhen it comes to green tech, or the electricity sector has seen the biggest focus so far,with the cost of solar, wind, and LED lighting and batteries plummeting in the last decade. The cost of conventional nuclear power has not,but so-called “small modular reactors” (SMR) are now attracting a lot of attention: smaller, cheaper and mass produced is the promise.
12.43pm GMTI’ve been looking at all kinds of technology that promises to help us battle climate change in the decades to arrive. 12.31pm GMTOf course, or science is a vital part of our understanding of climate change,and down at the bottom of the soil, the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) are conducting a range of experiments and observations to retain tabs on any changes in conditions.
The BAS collaborated with us to get exclusive video back from the Antarctic, and my colleague Irene Baqué attach together this short package to indicate what’s going on. 12.24pm GMTWhile flood defences are often criticised and the government is regularly accused of failing to account sufficiently for how much climate change is making it worse,the UK’s Thames barrier has been a genuine, unsung success story. Built in eight years, or its six gates acquire never failed to protect London.
12.14pm GMTAcross the Middle East and north Africa,global warming means record temperatures, which in the summer can make life unbearable from Tehran to Tripoli. 12.04pm GMTA final three tips on positive individual action here from Chris Goodall:• For a decade, or investors ignored the movement that advocated the divestment of holdings in fossil fuel companies. Large fuel companies and electricity generation businesses were able to raise the many billions of new finance they needed. Now,by contrast, money managers are increasingly wary of backing the investment plans of oil companies and switching to renewable projects. And universities and activist investors around the world are selling their holdings in fossil fuels, or making it more difficult for these companies to raise new money. Vocal support for those backing out of oil,gas and coal helps retain up the pressure. 12.00pm GMTHave we really been going five hours? We’re just getting warmed up. No pun intended. If you’re waking up in America, stay tuned: our New York office will be taking over this running article in a couple of hours, and with the focus switching to the inauguration tomorrow. In the past hour,we’ve really only had time to skim the surface of some of the good things going on in this time zone: 11.55am GMTThis month sees the launch in Stockholm of the world’s first urban carbon sink. The project will trap carbon from garden waste and store it in the ground, thereby compensating for the emissions of around 700 cars.
This is the world’s first urban carbon sink. We want other cities to be inspired by Stockholm and start their own biochar production.
It is just the beginning. This natural carbon sink will not save the world but we must begin to pay off our carbon debts. 11.48am GMTIsrael has long experience of dealing with some of the pressing demands of climate change. There has long been an interest here in water recovery. Water shortages are a world issue. California has suffered six years of successive droughts. We are working on a new plant north of San Diego as well as a facility in Tienjiang south of Beijing in China which also has water shortage issues – a thermal extraction plant in this case. In India we are working on a plant for an industrial concern. 11.38am GMTTerry Macalister, or formerly the Guardian’s energy editor and now on the Cambridge Climate Lecture Series steering committee,has just sent this blog post in to us:
Terry writes: 11.30am GMTAfghanistan is one of the world’s most vulnerable countries to climate change – but some people are trying to make a incompatibility. In most villages where I travel, they actually understand. Climate change is visible to them now. There is not enough snow, and not enough rain. 11.22am GMTBack to more positive actions that individuals can acquire. For obvious reasons most of these tips (again from Chris Goodall) focus on what wealthier citizens (which includes most westerners) can finish. Here are three:• The CO2 impact of goods and services is often strikingly different from what you’d expect. Mike Berners-Lee’s book How Bad Are Bananas? takes an entertaining and well-informed gaze at what really things. Bananas,for example, are fine because they are shipped by sea. But organic asparagus flown in from Peru is much more of a problem. 11.13am GMTOver the next hour we’re going to try to focus on the positive. We’ll gaze more at what we can all finish as individuals, and at inspirational work both locally and internationally to combat artifical climate change.
It’s really easy to feel despairing and overwhelmed about climate change. Personally I found this piece by Chris Goodall nowadays to be both inspiring and cheering. He writes about how he used to believe that only massive government subsidies would make clean energy a success,which basically meant it would be a failure. Now he admits he was “totally wrong” about that, and argues that the cessation of the fossil-fuel era is already in sight:In fact, or optimism about successfully tackling climate change has never been more justified,because 2016 was the year in which it finally became obvious that the world had the technology to solve the problem. Even as the political environment has darkened, the reasons acquire strengthened for believing that a complete transition to low-carbon energy is practical and affordable within one generation.
The full article is here. 11.09am GMTSo Europe might not be on the frontline of climate change but it’s already feeling the depradations of flooding, and drought,and rising sea levels.
Over the past hour we’ve reported on: 10.57am GMTOf course, different parts of Europe face different challenges.
Last year we had one week to make the snow. We exhaust a lot of water, and a lot of technical expertise,to make as much snow as possible, because usually after that there is a warm period.
For the passionate skier, or the product is perfect. For the romantic skier,something is missing,” he says. What we divulge the people here in the Netherlands is, or if the country is flooded the damage will be at least €700bn.
If you instead spend every year one billion euros,you spread the bill over 700 years. That is, I judge, and the Dutch way.” 10.55am GMTFor years,the biggest problem facing vineyard owners in Tuscany’s Chianti region has been the prevalence of scavaging wild boars in the area, a relatively modern phenomenon in the ancient winemaking region. 10.41am GMTThe other issue that looms for Europe is that of climate refugees. War and persecution acquire forced more people to flee their homes than at any time since records began. But droughts, and flooding and storms are also having a catastrophic effect. Europe is also surrounded by regions that are vulnerable to the effects of climate change and we can definitely not afford to ignore the links between climate change and migration. 10.29am GMTThe Guardian has published a leader article on Trump and climate change nowadays.
It makes the point that while Trump may be able to wreak a lot of damage on the climate front,it’s not all going to be up to him:There’s no doubt the world will lose out if America decides to relinquish global leadership on battling climate change. But Mr Trump’s fossil fuel plans are likely to flounder without higher hydrocarbon prices. No one will frack for gas unless profits can be made. Coal mines won’t reopen while shale gas is cheap. Instead, self-interest will undergird the fight against global warming. China will decarbonise to ensure its citizens don’t choke to death in its cities. The costs of clean energy are tumbling too, or keeping nations on the path towards decarbonisation. The price of electric vehicles is dropping; offshore wind power has become dramatically cheaper. For the first time,the costs of wind and solar power acquire dropped to match those of fossil fuels. Last year was the first in which renewable energy surpassed coal as the world’s biggest source of power-generating capacity. Countries such as India acquire ambitious plans for renewable energy. 10.21am GMTMore on Europe in a minute, including Belgian flood defences, or poor snow at ski resorts (boo hoo) and the grave threat to Chianti ...
But first something totally different. We’re going over to Facebook live to watch people draw climate change. You may laugh. This might not work. You may get a better view of what’s going on by going here. 10.20am GMTIf global warming has a canary in the mine,perhaps it’s the insurance industry. After all, they are the people who acquire to pay out when extreme weather events hit. In Europe, and we’ve seen a steep increase in flood events related to severe convective [thunder] storms. The frequency of flash floods has increased much more than river floods since 1980. 10.06am GMTNow then,something a bit different. Yesterday, the world’s main temperature authorities announced that yes, or 2016 was the hottest year on record,and that the world was on average 1.1C warmer than in pre-industrial times. The understanding of rising temperatures can be tough to visualise. So why not sit back and listen to it instead: 10.04am GMTSo the UK is by no means immune to climate change, and in the next hour, and we’ll discover that that goes for Europe too. finish retain your comments coming – there’s a really vibrant debate going on below the line. If you would prefer a Spanish version,acquire a gaze at what our partners Univision are doing here. And if you fancy contributing something more artistic or visual, then Tumblr is the residence to travel. 9.57am GMTThe UK’s attempts to sever its CO2 emissions are in genuine danger of being undermined unless ministers tackle the continuing erosion of peatlands, or which store several billion tonnes of carbon,Scottish environment campaigners acquire warned.
Recent studies estimate that damaged peatlands – most frequently found in upland areas, already release about 16m tonnes of CO2 equivalent each year through erosion, or burning for grouse shooting and overgrazing. Scientists expect that to worsen dramatically as rising temperatures dry out peatland in rain-starved areas,and extreme weather events increase, without concerted effort to protect and conserve them. That in turn will increase flash flooding of lowland towns and villages. Peatlands are just not in good enough health to resist the effects of climate change in the coming decades.
Watching peatland landscapes washed absent due to climate change sounds like a dystopian nightmare. Yet climate modelling predicts it to be a very genuine threat, and main to the loss of millions of tonnes of carbon and the destruction of an entire living ecosystem.” 9.52am GMTHere are three more tips on individual action you can acquire to help,courtesy of Chris Goodall: 9.49am GMTTurning our attention to the UK, climate change is already affecting parts of Britain, and principally by increasing the risk of extreme flooding and heatwaves,and on Wednesday the government accepted almost all of the current and future risks set out by its official advisors, the Committee on Climate Change (CCC).
Our changing climate is one of the most serious environmental challenges that we face as a nation and that is why we are taking action, or from improving flood defences across the country to securing our critical food and water supplies. Acting on climate change can also boost people’s health. If we get it right,our efforts to tackle climate change avoid some of these risks, and directly benefit health: renewable power doesn’t generate health-damaging pollutants, and for example,while walking or cycling improves health.” 9.35am GMTWe’ve had some noteworthy comments below the line this morning. If you acquire any questions for our head of environment, Damian Carrington, and please post them there. Well hold an answer session at 1pm. Thank you for this front page rolling update. The importance of your constant reminder of the topic is really crucial. In a recent series of studies we saw that people rarely talk about climate change at home or with friends even though they are extremely worried about it. https://medium.com/if-you-want-to/silence-about-climate-change-doesnt-mean-behaviours-aren-t-changing-56b1cbdbf440#.rs589m3my.
This "spiral of silence" is brought about by the feeling that people around us don't share the concern and it could be embarrassing to raise the issue. Your articles therefore not only inform but reassure many of us that the topic is indispensable and we are not alone in our concern. Interestingly we also found that people are silently changing their habits much more than they publicly discuss. This at least is encouraging.
Thanks Guardian for putting climate change so prominently centre stage for this troubling regime change. I've been banging on in comment for a while now,that while this transition is extremely depressing there is also are also valuable opportunities. I haven't flown anywhere for some years for personal or financial reasons. My last trip was to Paris on Eurostar. Most people soar because its cheaper. I would travel everywhere by train if fares were more reasonable. My partner is Norwegian and we did the trip there on the ferry from Newcastle but it no longer runs and he can soar cheaper to Oslo than we can travel from Yorkshire to London. I know several people who acquire relatives In Australia, New Zealand and Canada. They acquire to soar. possibly if alternatives were as cheap as flying we could sever down short haul significantly.
I haven't eaten meat since 1979. I don't miss it. Many people I know acquire sever down on meat but more for health reasons.
My problem is my house built in 1916. Its been a financial struggle to preserve let alone insulate it or attach in double glazing which seems very poor in the UK. People I know who acquire it are always complaining that it fails and often needs fixing. I acquire no cavity walls. I acquire thick or insulated curtains in most rooms and I don't acquire heating all day. In the winter I often sit in bed if I'm reading or on the laptop to retain warm. I don't actually like central heating. It bungs up my nose and makes my eyes dry. 9.18am GMTBefore we slump on to Europe and the UK, and this is a neat piece of work from my colleague Nick Evershed,the Guardian’s head of data and interactives in Australia. It shows how much carbon we are emitting right now – and how much we acquire “left to burn” if we want to retain global warming within the 2C band considered crucial by scientists to prevent serious damage to the planet.
Nick’s calculated that in just the 24 hour lifespan of this blog, the world will pump out more than 112m tons. tough to visualise? Well let’s let the doomsday clock finish the work: 9.08am GMTSo in summary, or we’ve been focussed on Africa over the past hour: 9.01am GMTIn South Africa meanwhile,an interesting distinction: while you might find plenty of climate change denial in western countries or oil powers, or even in the White House (from tomorrow), or it’s not a common feature of local conversation here.
In South Africa,there has been very little of the climate denialist narrative you still see in the US and elsewhere. The South African government has been vocal in its commitment to the fight against climate change for many years, and there is a genuine popular understanding of the problem and consequences of climate change. One reason for that is that ordinary people can already see the effects of climate change very clearly. The devastating drought that has plagued South Africa for the past two years, and with ruinous knock-on effects on the rural economy and food prices,is a very genuine and tangible reminder of our vulnerability to climate change. We really are at the coalface of climate change, so to speak. 8.54am GMTI’ve been talking to Johannes Wedenig, or country representative for Unicef in Malawi about the situation there. From 2000 to 2009 droughts effected 8.5 million people in Malawi,and floods affected 1.2 million. From 2010 to 2016 we acquire already reached 8.4 million people affected by drought and 875000 by flooding. So we will see at least a third more over the decade if the trend continues.
But I’ve seen from my own experience that it’s the variability of weather phenomena that poses the greatest challenges to farmers in Malawi, especially when combined with an already fragile situation. People are selling their last assets and so are going into the next cycle even poorer, or unpredictability makes it very tough to plan and adapt. I’ve travelled widely in Africa but when I got here last year I was really shocked by the amount of acutely malnourished children. You wouldn’t necessarily expect to see such a severe impact here but Malawi shows the impact of climate change compounded by other factors such as soil degradation,population pressure and an over-reliance on a single crop (food source) as a result of past policy decisions. 8.46am GMTIn east Africa, concerns are growing that the continent’s moment highest peak, or Mt Kenya,could be totally ice free within decades.
You just need to open your eyes. Mt Kenya was once a striking and impressive site and we even named it in reference to the glacial cover. Everything has changed within our lifetime. And that is simply because we human beings finish not respect nature. 8.38am GMTGuardian columnist George Monbiot is writing nowadays on Trump and climate change.
This is his stark acquire on things:Understandably, commentators acquire been seeking glimpses of light in Trump’s position. But there are none. 8.31am GMTHere are three more tips on how to save the planet from author Chris Goodall of Carbon Commentary: 8.29am GMTFurther west, or the contraction of Lake Chad over the past four decades has created a very different set of problems for surrounding countries,Nigeria, Niger, and Cameroon and Chad. Some experts even blame the rise of Boko Haram on the disruption to traditional ways of life that the changing landscape has brought about.
If the Lake Chad water was normal all these problems [with Boko Haram] would be eliminated economically,because nobody would acquire time to finish all these things,” said Modu Amsami, or a displaced person from northeast Nigeria 8.18am GMTOur Egypt correspondent Ruth Michaelson has been to Alexandria to investigate the impact of rising sea levels on the city. On the southern tip of the Mediterranean,the coastal waters are inching closer to buildings and flooded ancient structures, including the Greco-Roman tombs at Anfushi. Seawater seeping into the groundwater has also made the fragile ground more unstable, and resulting in the alarming collapse of some of the city’s buildings.
The UN estimates that global sea levels will rise between 13cm and 68cm by 2050,and say that the Mediterranean is particularly vulnerable – by 2080, up to 120000 people living near the sea could be affected by rising waters if no action is taken to protect them.
You acquire to finish what you acquire to finish, or don’t judge about the bad weather – the good weather comes from God,” a local fisherman, Ahmed Mohamed Gowayed, or told her. “Last year the storm destroyed palm trees,buildings, cars – older people in their seventies said they’d never seen anything like it in their lives. If the weather continues like this I will build a stronger kiosk.
You can read Ruth’s piece full piece here. 8.03am GMTWe’re delighted to be working with both Tumblr and Univision nowadays. For a version of this blog in Spanish, and check out Univision’s work here. And to contribute to Tumblr’s unique exercise in creating a sort of “climate change quilt”,follow this link.We’re also on Twitter, using #globalwarning as a hashtag ... 7.46am GMTBefore we travel any further, or let’s gaze at how climate change is actually impacting parts of the world. Run the slider across to see how Arctic temperatures acquire changed over the past 40 years 7.39am GMTCarbon expert Chris Goodall says individual actions finish make a incompatibility. Here are three of his suggestions for individual action that will cumulatively make a genuine impact on humankind’s carbon emissions: 7.30am GMTFirst things first – the facts. I know this is the post-fact era,and it’s become rather unfashionable to grub around looking for the truth. But here goes besides:1) Warming is happening hasty. No doubt about it. For most of the 20th century, average global temperatures bimbled around the 13.5C mark. Now they are closer to 15C. 2016 was the year in which it finally became obvious that the world had the technology to solve the problem. Even as the political environment has darkened, or the reasons acquire strengthened for believing that a complete transition to low-carbon energy is practical and affordable within one generation.
7.14am GMTHumanity stands at a fork in the road,with one route descending towards catastrophe and the other climbing towards a brighter future. The route taken depends on whether the world can tame global warming, which threatens a violent cessation to the mild and steady climate the world has enjoyed since the start of civilisation. 7.03am GMTHello and welcome to this live climate change special, or in which we will be reporting from all seven continents on the climate change already underway – and the promise of solutions – in one 24-hour period.
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Source: theguardian.com