Climate Change/Mass Extinction Megathread

[Sheilbh]

Sure there are. But the problem is political, eastern Europe is the EU's GOP.

I don't think that's fair. The GOP deny climate change exists - eastern European countries accept it but will be disproportionately impacted by reducing reliance on carbon (Poland is still a big coal producer, for example). The question is how the costs for that are distributed and there needs to be really very significant burden sharing, I think it'd be unfair otherwise (and politically challenging). I think this is a fight that is going to happen repeatedly within countries and internationally. Civil servants in Brussels have admitted that current plans on carbon cost for cars and heating for example are basically regressive - but I think that is a challenge everyone globally is going to face (generally the people with the most energy efficient, old fashioned heating systems and cars are people who can't afford to upgrade them and will be hit hardest by any tax on them). I keep talking about it but I think the distribution of costs for the energy transition is probably going to be the biggest political issue for the next few decades (and is probably ripe for a populist revolt).

But I'd also add that German carbon emissions from energy production have also increased (they're using lignite burning coal plants) because of the respose to Fukushima - so maybe if eastern Europe is the GOP on this there is also a perhaps unrealistic (maybe Germany as California?) wing of European politics that because of their views on nuclear is making energy transition particularly difficult.

France, on the other hand, is a model to us all

[Valmy]

France, on the other hand, is a model to us all

May the impure blood of those responsible for global warming water our fields and plains.

[viper37]

France, on the other hand, is a model to us all

May the impure blood of those responsible for global warming water our fields and plains.

Formez vos bataillons!

[crazy canuck]

NYT has apparently published a nice tool.  It's a behind a paywall and my usual tricks don't work, but for subscribers or those who manage to access it:
How much hotter is your hometown since your birth year


Although not as precise as the other tool, this one shows a map of Earth with the relative temperature changes since 1894.  Blue is colder than 1894, red is warmer (duh!).
https://climate.nasa.gov/interactives/climate-time-machine

My hometown has already reached the range estimated for the number of very hot days that would be experience by the end of the century.

Another data point that this is all happening more quickly than anticipated by the climate models.

[viper37]

tornado in Barrie, ON, north of Toronto.  Massive floods in Belgium and Germany.

It's almost as if something weird was happening with Earth's climate.

[Zanza]

That's from the flood Viper mentioned. At least 60 dead, 1000s unaccounted for as some villages can only be reached with helicopters. Two dams are on the verge of breaking. And they expect extreme rain again today, up to 200 liters per square meter.

[Jacob]

That's devastating

1000s missing

Question: do you know what L/ square meter translate to in terms of mm or cm of rain?

[Syt]

1 l per square meter is one mm (since one cubic meter is 1000 liters).

[Syt]

But yeah, experts say these kind of events are made significantly more likely by the ongoing climate change. Even the CDU chancellor candidate said the efforts to fight climate change need to be increased. (In 2019 he said in a talk show "for some reason the climate change topic is suddenly a global topic" and has since not really been a proponent of even moderate measures against it.)

[Zanza]

The 1000s missing are most likely okay, but the phone network has gone down in some of those villages, so they can't be reached.

[Zanza]

Braunkohle-Achim will of course pay lip service in the face of this catastrophe. But there is no real conviction.

[Syt]

Braunkohle-Achim will of course pay lip service in the face of this catastrophe. But there is no real conviction.

Agreed, but he could also keep ignoring it, so I guess his advisers know what the people want (or want to hear, rather).

Someone posted a picture of a flooded open pit coal mine on Twitter, asking, "Maybe a good time to reflect on whether these two things are related."

[Maladict]

Sure there are. But the problem is political, eastern Europe is the EU's GOP.

I don't think that's fair. The GOP deny climate change exists - eastern European countries accept it but will be disproportionately impacted by reducing reliance on carbon (Poland is still a big coal producer, for example). The question is how the costs for that are distributed and there needs to be really very significant burden sharing, I think it'd be unfair otherwise (and politically challenging). I think this is a fight that is going to happen repeatedly within countries and internationally. Civil servants in Brussels have admitted that current plans on carbon cost for cars and heating for example are basically regressive - but I think that is a challenge everyone globally is going to face (generally the people with the most energy efficient, old fashioned heating systems and cars are people who can't afford to upgrade them and will be hit hardest by any tax on them). I keep talking about it but I think the distribution of costs for the energy transition is probably going to be the biggest political issue for the next few decades (and is probably ripe for a populist revolt).

But I'd also add that German carbon emissions from energy production have also increased (they're using lignite burning coal plants) because of the respose to Fukushima - so maybe if eastern Europe is the GOP on this there is also a perhaps unrealistic (maybe Germany as California?) wing of European politics that because of their views on nuclear is making energy transition particularly difficult.

France, on the other hand, is a model to us all

I don't really disagree with any of that, and mine was just a throwaway remark, but I do think the PiS and Fidesz of this world will object on principle, because it is a very lefty supranational EU type plan that triggers them immensely. They would veto anything called a climate plan even if what it contains actually benefits them.

[Maladict]

But yeah, experts say these kind of events are made significantly more likely by the ongoing climate change. Even the CDU chancellor candidate said the efforts to fight climate change need to be increased. (In 2019 he said in a talk show "for some reason the climate change topic is suddenly a global topic" and has since not really been a proponent of even moderate measures against it.)

It's pretty devastating, what's happening in Germany and Belgium. 
Lots of evacuations here and lots of flooding, but we seem to escape the worst of it.

But it gives plenty to think about. We just completed two decades of rebuilding river defenses to deal with once a century flood levels, and it already happened.

[Jacob]

1 l per square meter is one mm (since one cubic meter is 1000 liters).

So that's 200 mm in a day. That's intense.

Meanwhile we've had no rain at all for weeks