Is Global Warming becoming unstoppable?

[macca]

We seem to be closing our coal power stations, as fast as we can.
Maybe us consumers need to just reduce our usage?

Aemo warns coal-fired power plants could drop off before replacements are ready

Solar and windfarms will need to triple by 2030 to 57GW and expand seven-fold by 2050 to 126GW

www.theguardian.com

Unfortunately, nothing we do here is going to make much difference to the world

Consumerism is rampant throughout the world and Asia is happy to oblige, pollution from manufacturing is not something they care about

 

[sptrawler]

Vale leading the way in cleaning up iron ore mining?

https://www.mining.com/vale-operations-in-brazil-now-100-renewable-energy-powered/

 

[basilio]

I don't know what it will take to get people to reassess their view that CC is not that real or not that significant or just a hoax. As I have discovered in discussions on AF with some posters they have made it clear there is no evidence that will cause them to reassess.

2023 has been a turning point with the climate. A step change if you like.

Astounding’ ocean temperatures in 2023 intensified extreme weather, data shows​

Record levels of heat were absorbed last year by Earth’s seas, which have been warming year-on-year for the past decade


Damian Carrington Environment editor
@dpcarrington
Thu 11 Jan 2024 19.00 AEDTLast modified on Thu 11 Jan 2024 19.02 AEDT


“Astounding” ocean temperatures in 2023 supercharged “freak” weather around the world as the climate crisis continued to intensify, new data has revealed.

The oceans absorb 90% of the heat trapped by the carbon emissions from the burning of fossil fuels, making it the clearest indicator of global heating. Record levels of heat were taken up by the oceans in 2023, scientists said, and the data showed that for the past decade the oceans have been hotter every year than the year before.

The heat also led to record levels of stratification in the oceans, where warm water ponding on the surface reduces the mixing with deeper waters. This cuts the amount of oxygen in the oceans, threatening marine life, and also reduces the amount of carbon dioxide and heat the seas can take up in the future.

Reliable ocean temperature measurements stretch back to 1940 but it is likely the oceans are now at their hottest for 1,000 years and heating faster than at any time in the past 2,000 years.

‘Astounding’ ocean temperatures in 2023 intensified extreme weather, data shows

Record levels of heat were absorbed last year by Earth’s seas, which have been warming year-on-year for the past decade

www.theguardian.com

What happens when ocean temperatures across the globe experience steep increases in temperatures with no return to a previous norm ?

The ecosystems that were accustomed to last years temperatures start to die. Coral Reefs around the world are suffering mass bleaching.

'Everyone should be angry' scientist says, as climate agency calls a historic global coral bleaching a tragedy​

After a year of record-breaking heat, a devastating story has been playing out in the world's oceans. Scientists working along the most breathtaking reefs show what led to climate agency NOAA calling a global bleaching event for only the fourth time in history.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-04...event-called-by-climate-agency-noaa/103649728

 

[basilio]

The effect of extreme weather conditions on food production in Europe,

UK facing food shortages and price rises after extreme weather​

Heavy rain likely to cause low yields in Britain and other parts of Europe, with drought in Morocco hitting imports

• Which UK foods are at risk?

Helena Horton, Sarah Butler and Jack Simpson
Tue 16 Apr 2024 20.00 AESTLast modified on Tue 16 Apr 2024 20.44 AEST



The UK faces food shortages and price rises as extreme weather linked to climate breakdown causes low yields on farms locally and abroad.
Record rainfall has meant farmers in many parts of the UK have been unable to plant crops such as potatoes, wheat and vegetables during the key spring season. Crops that have been planted are of poor quality, with some rotting in the ground.

The persistent wet weather has also meant a high mortality rate for lambs on the UK’s hills, while some dairy cows have been unable to be turned out on to grass, meaning they will produce less milk.

Agricultural groups have said the UK will be more reliant on imports, but similarly wet conditions in European countries such as France and Germany, as well as drought in Morocco, could mean there is less food to import. Economists have warned this could cause food inflation to rise, meaning higher prices at supermarkets.

UK facing food shortages and price rises after extreme weather

Heavy rain likely to cause low yields in Britain and other parts of Europe, with drought in Morocco hitting imports

www.theguardian.com

 

[basilio]

Vale leading the way in cleaning up iron ore mining?

https://www.mining.com/vale-operations-in-brazil-now-100-renewable-energy-powered/

Certainly a very impressive achievement in that area.

Probably overshadowed financially and environmentally however by the disastrous tailings dam collapse in 2019 which devastated the community, the environment and their business. The effects and consequences of that disaster were off the wall.

Brumadinho dam disaster - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[sptrawler]

Certainly a very impressive achievement in that area.

Probably overshadowed financially and environmentally however by the disastrous tailings dam collapse in 2019 which devastated the community, the environment and their business. The effects and consequences of that disaster were off the wall.

Brumadinho dam disaster - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Gosh don't be so negative, they are doing a better job than FMG of going renewables and FMG don't have a dam to worry about. LOL
Have you got an EV yet?

 

[Smurf1976]

Certainly a very impressive achievement in that area.

Probably overshadowed financially and environmentally however by the disastrous tailings dam collapse in 2019 which devastated the community, the environment and their business. The effects and consequences of that disaster were off the wall.

Dams are the ultimate double edged sword.

Disaster if they fail and wipe out everything downstream.

Absolutely critical to renewable energy. And yep, hydro is key to what Vale have done on that front.

I'll argue though that if we exclude poorly built dams or those which were deliberately blown up etc or which were built in places that wiped out species and so on, since rationally we wouldn't build them improperly, blow them up or put them in places where it sends something extinct, then overall the track record of the rest is pretty good and certainly more than enough to be considered acceptable when compared to the alternatives.

 

[basilio]

Smurf I accept your analysis of large water dams and the very small risk of disaster caused by failure.

However the tailings dams of mining companies are a totally different barrel of fish. Regulations are often poor, not followed or non existent. The over riding economic imperative of mining means that doing a proper job on constructing a tailings dam is not part of the equation. And that doesn't take into account external catastrophes like extreme rainfall events

There is abundant evidence for this situation.

Introduction
Tailings dams are some of the largest earth structures geotechnical engineers construct. These embankments are often built with steep slopes using the coarse fraction of the tailings thereby saving on cost. To keep such impoundments standing is one of the most challenging
tasks in mine waste management.
Generally, these containment facilities are vulnerable to failure because of the following reasons:
(i) dyke construction with residual materials from the mining operations;
(ii) sequential dam raise along with an increase in effluents;
(iii) lack of regulations on design criteria, especially in developing countries;and
(iv) high maintenance cost after mine closure (Rico et al., 2007).

For a world inventory of 18401 mine sites, the failure rate over the last one hundred years is estimated to be 1.2%. This is more than two orders of magnitude higher than the failure rate of conventional water retention dams that is reported to be 0.01% (ICOLD, 2001)
https://web.archive.org/web/2013112...ne.com/library/publications/docs/Azam2010.pdf

Tailings dam failure​

Brumadinho dam disaster in 2019


The structural failure of tailings dams and the ensuing release of toxic metals in the environment is a great concern. The standard of public reporting on tailings dam incidents is poor. A large number remain completely unreported, or lack basic facts when reported. There is no comprehensive database for historic failures.[1] According to mining engineer David M Chambers of the Center for Science in Public Participation, 10,000 years is "a conservative estimate" of how long most tailings dams will need to maintain structural integrity.[2]

Tailings dam failure - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[sptrawler]

Ranked: The Countries With the Most Air Pollution in 2023

South Asian nations are the global hotspot for pollution. In this graphic, we rank the world’s most polluted countries according to IQAir.

www.visualcapitalist.com

 

[Knobby22]

Ranked: The Countries With the Most Air Pollution in 2023

South Asian nations are the global hotspot for pollution. In this graphic, we rank the world’s most polluted countries according to IQAir.

www.visualcapitalist.com

Gee, I knew Bangladesh was a very lousy place to live but didn't realise that the air was the worst in the world also.

 

[Knobby22]

Record floods in Dubai, airport flooded. Climate change blamed.
I have been there.
Normally dry as a pub with no beer. Average years rain is 80mm ( 3 inches).
142mm fell in two days!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/04/17/uae-historic-rain-storm-flooding-dubai-airport-disruption/d185238e-fc8c-11ee-87ac-20f7e67cbe29_story.html

 

[basilio]

As the Northern Hemispehere moves towards summer Europe is reflecting on the changes that global heating has already inflicted on the continent. One interesting observation from this story is that Europe has seen the biggest increase in temperatures of all the continents in the past 30 years.

Europe baked in ‘extreme heat stress’ pushing temperatures to record highs​

Europeans are dying from hot weather 30% more than they did two decades ago, report finds

Ajit Niranjan
Mon 22 Apr 2024 12.00 AEST



Scorching weather has baked Europe in more days of “extreme heat stress” than its scientists have ever seen.
Heat-trapping pollutants that clog the atmosphere helped push temperatures in Europe last year to the highest or second-highest levels ever recorded, according to the EU’s Earth-watching service Copernicus and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).

Europeans are suffering with unprecedented heat during the day and are stressed by uncomfortable warmth at night. The death rate from hot weather has risen 30% in Europe in two decades, the joint State of the Climate report from the two organisations found.
“The cost of climate action may seem high,” said WMO secretary-general Celeste Saulo, “but the cost of inaction is much higher”.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/apr/18/plastic-production-emission-climate-crisis
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/apr/18/plastic-production-emission-climate-crisis
The report found that temperatures across Europe were above average for 11 months of 2023, including the warmest September since records began.

Europe baked in ‘extreme heat stress’ pushing temperatures to record highs

Europeans are dying from hot weather 30% more than they did two decades ago, report finds

www.theguardian.com

 

[sptrawler]

China can't quit coal by 2040, researchers say, despite global climate goals

China's coal consumption will fall by just one-third by 2040, according to a report by a European consultancy published on Tuesday, threatening climate targets that call for phasing out much of global coal use by 2040.

www.reuters.com

 

[basilio]

Came across this article recently from The Age.

Anyone want to guess when it was written ?

Worried about climate change? You're living in it by Claire Miller Environmental Reporter

IF YOU have ever wondered what to expect from climate change as the planet warms up, consider the roll-call of natural disasters over last week.​ In the United States, the West is ablaze in the worst fire season since, well, since anyone can remember, really. Some 350,000 hectares across 11 states are burning out of control, with no relief in sight. Billions of dollars of property and priceless forests have been reduced to ash. The legacy of erosion, damaged water catchments and wildlife loss will be felt for decades.​ The fires follow a hot, dry spring preceded by the warmest winter on record and a scorchingly dry summer before that. In fact, according to the US Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, a series of warmer-than-average seasons has been drying out the continent since 1997.​ Meanwhile, in far eastern Russia, a typhoon dumped the equivalent of three months of rain over several days. As floods sweep away bridges, power lines and homes around Vladivostok and Khabarovsk, on the Chinese border, a new typhoon is forming in the Pacific Ocean. At the same time in north-eastern Brazil, ``killer'' mudslides are crushing towns after days of torrential rain. In Canada, remote settlements were evacuated on Saturday as out-of-control fires laid waste to 14,000 hectares in the north of the central province of Manitoba.​ And in northern Bangladesh and north-eastern and northern India, monsoonal floods have cost millions their homes and dozens their lives since the start of August; the floods are bigger and faster than ever with too little vegetation and soil left in the Himalayan foothills to soak up the rain.​ Looking back over the year, record floods drowned Mozambique in February. Severe drought in Mongolia is finishing off the few livestock that survived a cruel winter and the drought before that. Crops are failing in the fourth year of drought gripping East Africa. Floods from unseasonal rain in Kazakhstan in May destroyed crops and livestock and left 3000 people homeless.​ Closer to home, Victoria's four-year big dry has broken records and shows no sign of breaking. In the south-western corner of Western Australia, a 30 to 40 per cent drop in average rainfall has persisted for 20 years - so long there are fears it may be permanent.​ On the face of it, there is no obvious link between all these regional, disparate natural disasters born of severe storms and unseasonal seasons.​ But they are the latest incidents in an ominous, emerging global pattern of more frequent, more extreme weather events. Munich Re, the German insurance giant, keeps count: 755 natural disasters last year alone - well up from the previous record of 702 in 1998 and the long-term average of 600. Insured losses cost Munich Re $US22 billion, second only to 1992 when Hurricane Andrew alone cost it $US17 billion.​ In its annual report on natural hazards, the company says there is no sign of abatement: ``If we compare the last 10 years of the 20th century with the 1960s, we will see that the number of great natural catastrophes increased by a factor of three, with economic losses - taking into account the effects of inflation - increasing by a factor of more than eight and insured losses by a factor of no less than 16.''​ The question facing the international scientific community is whether this is the start of the predicted greenhouse effect in which rising carbon dioxide concentrations in the upper atmosphere lead to climate change and a higher probability of ``freak'' weather events.​ Given the natural variability of weather, the chief of CSIRO atmospheric research, Graeme Pearman, said it was too early yet to say definitely whether climate change was under way. But ``I think maybe it is,'' he said.​ ``It might be a decade of variability that might go away, but it is the kind of pattern we might see in climate change, in that certain regions might be affected differently ... It is the kind of change we would anticipate.​ '' Earth is almost one degree warmer than a century ago; scientists predict it will be two to three degrees warmer by 2100. Small variations drive big changes: the planet was only five degrees cooler during the last Ice Age when glaciers kilometres thick buried Europe and much of North America.​ Since the end of the Ice Age 10,000 years ago, the global average has been stable at about 15 degrees with minor fluctuations either way of only half a degree at most. In this climate, human civilisation was born and flourished.​ Anna Reynolds of Climate Action Network Australia said what is new today compared with past climate change is the speed of the warming and the existence of six billion people, their cities and agriculture. Much more is at stake: the Red Cross says the world already has 25 million ``environmental refugees'' driven from their homes and land by natural disasters and ecological degradation.​ Dr Pearman said scientists began collecting climate data in 1985, saying it would take until 2000 to determine whether the rising greenhouse concentrations and apparent changes in climate were due to natural variability or human activity.​ Their verdict will be presented in an Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report to the November round of the United Nations climate negotiations in The Hague. ``It is becoming such a big change that this is unlikely to be natural,'' Dr Pearman hinted. ``This is likely to be the greenhouse effect that people have been talking about for more than 100 years."​ ''Professor Hans-Joachim Schellnhuber, the director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impacts Research, was in no doubt when giving evidence to the Australian Senate inquiry into climate change earlier this year.​ ``First of all, it has got to be stated that global warming is under way now and there is a very high probability it is enhanced by human activities,'' he said. ``The effects will be irreversible. That means they will last for many centuries."​

 

[Knobby22]

Came across this article recently from The Age.

Anyone want to guess when it was written ?

Worried about climate change? You're living in it View attachment 175785 by Claire Miller Environmental Reporter

IF YOU have ever wondered what to expect from climate change as the planet warms up, consider the roll-call of natural disasters over last week.​ In the United States, the West is ablaze in the worst fire season since, well, since anyone can remember, really. Some 350,000 hectares across 11 states are burning out of control, with no relief in sight. Billions of dollars of property and priceless forests have been reduced to ash. The legacy of erosion, damaged water catchments and wildlife loss will be felt for decades.​ The fires follow a hot, dry spring preceded by the warmest winter on record and a scorchingly dry summer before that. In fact, according to the US Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, a series of warmer-than-average seasons has been drying out the continent since 1997.​ Meanwhile, in far eastern Russia, a typhoon dumped the equivalent of three months of rain over several days. As floods sweep away bridges, power lines and homes around Vladivostok and Khabarovsk, on the Chinese border, a new typhoon is forming in the Pacific Ocean. At the same time in north-eastern Brazil, ``killer'' mudslides are crushing towns after days of torrential rain. In Canada, remote settlements were evacuated on Saturday as out-of-control fires laid waste to 14,000 hectares in the north of the central province of Manitoba.​ And in northern Bangladesh and north-eastern and northern India, monsoonal floods have cost millions their homes and dozens their lives since the start of August; the floods are bigger and faster than ever with too little vegetation and soil left in the Himalayan foothills to soak up the rain.​ Looking back over the year, record floods drowned Mozambique in February. Severe drought in Mongolia is finishing off the few livestock that survived a cruel winter and the drought before that. Crops are failing in the fourth year of drought gripping East Africa. Floods from unseasonal rain in Kazakhstan in May destroyed crops and livestock and left 3000 people homeless.​ Closer to home, Victoria's four-year big dry has broken records and shows no sign of breaking. In the south-western corner of Western Australia, a 30 to 40 per cent drop in average rainfall has persisted for 20 years - so long there are fears it may be permanent.​ On the face of it, there is no obvious link between all these regional, disparate natural disasters born of severe storms and unseasonal seasons.​ But they are the latest incidents in an ominous, emerging global pattern of more frequent, more extreme weather events. Munich Re, the German insurance giant, keeps count: 755 natural disasters last year alone - well up from the previous record of 702 in 1998 and the long-term average of 600. Insured losses cost Munich Re $US22 billion, second only to 1992 when Hurricane Andrew alone cost it $US17 billion.​ In its annual report on natural hazards, the company says there is no sign of abatement: ``If we compare the last 10 years of the 20th century with the 1960s, we will see that the number of great natural catastrophes increased by a factor of three, with economic losses - taking into account the effects of inflation - increasing by a factor of more than eight and insured losses by a factor of no less than 16.''​ The question facing the international scientific community is whether this is the start of the predicted greenhouse effect in which rising carbon dioxide concentrations in the upper atmosphere lead to climate change and a higher probability of ``freak'' weather events.​ Given the natural variability of weather, the chief of CSIRO atmospheric research, Graeme Pearman, said it was too early yet to say definitely whether climate change was under way. But ``I think maybe it is,'' he said.​ ``It might be a decade of variability that might go away, but it is the kind of pattern we might see in climate change, in that certain regions might be affected differently ... It is the kind of change we would anticipate.​ '' Earth is almost one degree warmer than a century ago; scientists predict it will be two to three degrees warmer by 2100. Small variations drive big changes: the planet was only five degrees cooler during the last Ice Age when glaciers kilometres thick buried Europe and much of North America.​ Since the end of the Ice Age 10,000 years ago, the global average has been stable at about 15 degrees with minor fluctuations either way of only half a degree at most. In this climate, human civilisation was born and flourished.​ Anna Reynolds of Climate Action Network Australia said what is new today compared with past climate change is the speed of the warming and the existence of six billion people, their cities and agriculture. Much more is at stake: the Red Cross says the world already has 25 million ``environmental refugees'' driven from their homes and land by natural disasters and ecological degradation.​ Dr Pearman said scientists began collecting climate data in 1985, saying it would take until 2000 to determine whether the rising greenhouse concentrations and apparent changes in climate were due to natural variability or human activity.​ Their verdict will be presented in an Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report to the November round of the United Nations climate negotiations in The Hague. ``It is becoming such a big change that this is unlikely to be natural,'' Dr Pearman hinted. ``This is likely to be the greenhouse effect that people have been talking about for more than 100 years."​ ''Professor Hans-Joachim Schellnhuber, the director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impacts Research, was in no doubt when giving evidence to the Australian Senate inquiry into climate change earlier this year.​ ``First of all, it has got to be stated that global warming is under way now and there is a very high probability it is enhanced by human activities,'' he said. ``The effects will be irreversible. That means they will last for many centuries."​

2000?

 

[basilio]

2000?

Yep. 24 years ago. A third of a lifetime. About 15 years after climate scientists began to strongly highlight the reality and risks of global warming.

Can't say we weren't told.

https://www.realclearscience.com/articles/2021/12/13/when_did_scientists_first_warn_humanity_about_climate_change_807551.html#!

 

[Smurf1976]

Yep. 24 years ago. A third of a lifetime. About 15 years after climate scientists began to strongly highlight the reality and risks of global warming.

Can't say we weren't told.

Trouble is the whole issue has been treated as a game.

I've personally been involved with coming up with actual solutions on the energy supply side and so have many others. Ultimately yes it can be done, it's fundamentally a resource measurement and number crunching exercise on how to do it.

That it isn't happening and in my opinion won't happen within my lifetime comes down to what I'll term "religious" approaches to every aspect of it.

Those who insist that only petrol can move a car or that only gas can cook dinner.

Those who've intentionally ensured they don't understand the issue.

Those who find some reason to oppose every attempt to actually fix it. No matter how thorough the investigation, no matter how well thought out the project, they come up with some reason why it's no good.

End result is right at this moment most transport is running on liquid fossil fuels, a good portion of the population has just eaten or is about to eat food cooked with gas, and for the NEM the electricity supply mix, rounded to the nearest 0.1%, right now is:

Coal = 55.2%
Hydro = 16.1%
Wind = 13.2%
Gas = 13.1%
Oil* = 1.4%
Battery = 0.9%
Biomass = 0.1%

*Meaning anything refined from crude oil so that is diesel, kerosene, fuel oil, etc.

Note that's a "live" figure so it's now as in right now at the time of posting.

Far more progress could've been made if we stopped the nonsense, stopped finding problems and just focused on getting on with it and making it work. It's not as though we don't have the technology or haven't had sufficient time to make not a 100% but a very substantial improvement.

 

[sptrawler]

Trouble is the whole issue has been treated as a game.

I've personally been involved with coming up with actual solutions on the energy supply side and so have many others. Ultimately yes it can be done, it's fundamentally a resource measurement and number crunching exercise on how to do it.

That it isn't happening and in my opinion won't happen within my lifetime comes down to what I'll term "religious" approaches to every aspect of it.

Also the very same people go on endlessly about the effects of climate change like wailing banshees.
Yet do very little to reduce their own carbon footprint.

They claim that it must be stopped, yet when yoi consider how many Green and Labor voters there are and how many EV's are sold, it obviously is just another quick fix for the virtue signalers.

If it is so critical that ghey can't shut up ablit it, one would think it is critical enough to get their own house in order, before telling everyone else to do it.

But allas self appraisal seems to be a lost art these days, whereas berating and bullying everyone else into submission with passive agressive pressure, seems to be the accepted norm.

 

[IFocus]

Also the very same people go on endlessly about the effects of climate change like wailing banshees.
Yet do very little to reduce their own carbon footprint.

They claim that it must be stopped, yet when yoi consider how many Green and Labor voters there are and how many EV's are sold, it obviously is just another quick fix for the virtue signalers.

If it is so critical that ghey can't shut up ablit it, one would think it is critical enough to get their own house in order, before telling everyone else to do it.

But allas self appraisal seems to be a lost art these days, whereas berating and bullying everyone else into submission with passive agressive pressure, seems to be the accepted norm.

You know individual stuff has no effect long proved by the environment groups its Government policy's and big companies behavior that determines the required outcomes.

 

[sptrawler]

You know individual stuff has no effect long proved by the environment groups its Government policy's and big companies behavior that determines the required outcomes.

And in the same vein, Australia whipping itself into oblivion, will at best have 1% affect on the estimated climate change, that is if we actually shut the whole place down and last man out switched the lights off.

So your point is?

Why do I have to put up with posters, constantly telling me/we should be doing better, why can't they just post up how they are actually making a ffckn difference?