Can someone help me understand how we aren’t totally screwed?
We’re on track to pass the limits set by the Paris agreement so why shouldn’t we expect to see record temps near 150-175F by the end of the century?
We’re on track to pass the limits set by the Paris agreement so why shouldn’t we expect to see record temps near 150-175F by the end of the century?
Events like this happen every so often and it's really hard to get some actual statistics on this, because reliable measurements only started about 150 years ago.
This means that extreme weather with occurrence rates of say once every 500 years and below are incredibly hard to classify and evaluate for statistical relevance.
Whether this is just a fluke or a recurring pattern with increasing frequency cannot be ascertained from a singular event like this.
> so why shouldn’t we expect to see record temps near 150-175F by the end of the century?
There are certain limits and differences in where and how temperature is measured (air vs ground, shade vs unshaded, etc.) so it could be argued that such temperatures have already been recorded in the past (see [0]).
Such isolated phenomena, while being great at scaring the crap out of people, aren't the most dangerous or impactful consequences of climate change and ruthless exploitation of natural resources, though.
The loss of drinking water and arable soil is far more critical than a few days of unbearable heat...
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highest_temperature_recorded_o...
Back home, a freak storm + strong wind damaged large parts of the forest around highest mountains around. Pine trees literally broken some 5-10 meters above ground in a wide area.
It was supposed to be once-in-a-century event. Few years after that another one came. And then another.
I think of global warming more like general equilibrium being broken by heating things up. Overall higher temperature with local changes in every direction (even cooling), and more frequent extremes.
I’m not denying the problem, I want to know if we should all start planning to live in a war-torn hellscape or if that’s just corrosive negativity from doomsayers. For example you can see other people in the comments saying we’re all screwed, to pull up a chair and watch, etc.
They explain this here: "By extension, there has been an increase in the ratio of the number of record highs to record lows (Figure 6.5). Over the past two decades, the average of this ratio exceeds two (meaning that twice as many high-temperature records have been set as low-temperature records)."
It's quite a stretch at this point to call these events "singular".
How so? What else would you call an all-time record set since the beginning of data recording? Especially when the new record exceeds all previous ones by several degrees instead of fractions of a degree as is commonly the case.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._state_and_territory_tempe...
You can hold on to your theory thats its a 1 in 500 event (you could also hold on to any theory your heart desires) but the recent data and global warming trends point to anthropogenic global warming being the source cause.
Most infrastructure issues are not coming from climate change. They're coming from poorly maintained 50+ year old structures that were engineered to only last for 50 years. What people dont understand, structures have to be checked and lightly repaired every 5 to 10 years. That is normal. Most are not because the last and current gen of politicians are absolute career politicians who thought diverting funds from repair was a good idea.
Crop failure... eh, we haven't seen abnormal crop failures yet. Technically, 2012 and 2013 was far far worse compared to the last 5 years. A few other issues. Crop failure is tracked by insurance claims. Insurance pays out best due to "weather/climate related failure" not so much do to "I fucked up". Claiming weather caused failure, especially in this political climate, is super easy. When it comes to futures and current spot prices, we haven't seen significant crop failures. If you did, food staples would be a lot higher.
That being said, the western states is going to experience a long time of water issues. However, there is good research, that's popped up on HN often, that the west is going back to normal in climate regards. It's less greenhouse gas caused climate change is drying the western states. The last 200 years have been abnormally wet. It going back to normal, which is dry. Just because it doesn't benefit us, doesnt mean we can claim something bad is happening to the climate. Those states are supposed to be drier than they have been.
Hotter days in cities... yea... but New Yorkers die every year due to heat waves. They always have. City folk are typically stupid when it comes to how nature and weather can kill them. I remember as a kid in the 90s, if it's summer, New Yorkers are going to steal window AC units and die en masse. Clockwork. Every single year. Nothing has changed there. A lot of other cities see the same stats, but no one has cared to wide report on it. Now they do because of the clickbait bump in ratings for "climate change caused heat deaths".
Yes, we need to drop greenhouse gas emissions. Yes, the climate is changing and for the worse. No, you shouldn't blame stubbing your toe on climate change. No, the shadow you cant explain wasn't climate change. Blaming everything on climate change gives deniers fodder.
Fast counter examples:
Our infrastructure isn't prepared for the changing climates (examples: electricity Texas, ocean barriers many places across planet, increased flooding).
Crop failures: (non California example: Monsoon's in India are becoming increasingly erratic.). California - continuous droughts and killing off crops due to lack of water. Yes it is going back to drier times, however the climate is changed - our forests can't manage (See redwoods in distress - FWIW they been around throughout the drier times > 1000s of years). I'm not saying that were going to lose all our crops right now (insurance models the climate heavily right now - example see climatecorp) - over time its going to get worse. Likelihood will be worse in countries that have limited ability to handle this stuff (i.e. india, china, etc).
Wether or not either of us are right or wrong about this one incident doesn't matter. The world is becoming a hotter and harder place to live for humans and the frequency of adverse events keeps increasing and as humans we are not doing enough to manage our future.
People without access to clean water and cool shelter (air conditioning) have and will continue to die. People with access to it will survive for awhile, until their access is denied or breaks from the intense stress of novel weather. Other life on the Earth will adapt, just as it adapted when the dinosaurs went away 60+ million years ago.
And we are shifting and broadening that bell curve.
One of the most annoying and ignorant dismissals of climate change you can hear from denialists in Canada is "oh it won't be so bad for us, we could really use the warmer weather up here in Canada lol". Maybe these events will get them to understand that no, it won't be beneficial for us at all, but I've already seen comments elsewhere on the internet that are questioning the accuracy of the reports. Stating things like that weather station has been having "problems" in the past. It sounded so much like the covid and election conspiracies I wanted to scream. If people can't or won't trust in scientists or the institutions that are the foundation for our countries, how will we make any progress addressing climate change?
You can always ask them if they're also looking forward to dozens of millions of climate migrants from South East Asia, Latin America, and Africa, once those places become warmer. Emphasize that those migrants would move into their province or town.
I think the best we can hope for at this point is try to dent the upcoming damage. We could ostensibly reverse some of the worst impacts but there just isn't any political will power to really do what is necessary.
Edit: to all repliers: I understand that the distribution is widening, but 150F is a far more extreme widening than I have seen contemplated by any experts. That is what I am reacting to. I do not dispute that heat waves will get somewhat worse.
Given that I live in a very hot climate, which already hits 45-50c each year, I'm sitting in the "Better safe than sorry" camp and I am thinking about precautions I can take to make sure me and my family stay healthy long term. One of the longer term thoughts is making sure it's possible to move if it looks like the climate will become particularly challenging.
As more energy enters the system is gets more turbulent, leading to wild swings up and down with greater extremes at both ends. Normally stable systems are becoming wildly disrupted.
"The North Atlantic Jet Stream fluctuates between the Balkans to the south and Scotland to the north. Some 300 years of tree ring samples taken in both places show that the jet stream has become far more variable in the last six decades and more extreme in its positions, which results in more severe climate events and a more rapid shifting between extremes on yearly, monthly, and weekly timescales."[1]
[1] https://www.wired.com/story/wild-swings-in-extreme-weather-a...
It could very well be that everywhere will be 20 or 30 C above the 20th century climatology and the average will still be only 2 C if you truly believe and have faith in the message.
Average is just that. We have a lot of water that is much harder to drastically change the temperatures over, but the land can have wild swings. 2°C of average change is about 10°C swings in temperate climates.
The gulf stream (of Mexico) is what keeps parts of Europe warm. With melting ice, oceans are diluted which will cause the flow of gulf stream to slow down and not be able to reach Europe which will have "interesting" effects.
Honestly that's what we should be emphasizing to climate doubters more than anything else. The average temperature going up here in Canada may not sound terrifying to people. But if the 95th or 99th percentile is 10-15C higher than they are used to or than the local ecology or population can handle... maybe they'll finally listen?
But I'm not optimistic.
CO2 helps capture some of that thermal radiation but even at 500ppm it's not doing that much. And all of this is not considering the movement of air and the effect of ocean which tends to act as a huge circulating heat sink.
The hottest place achieve those temperature by: not being next to water/plants, having no air movement, and sun directly above. The only param that changed with time is small amount of CO2 concentration, the effect on the maximum temperature on Earth should be minimal.
It's the wild swings in random location, change in weather pattern that will be more trouble. That and the rising sea level.
Also it seems likely that more measurements are being taken (at more locations). And cities are expanding, changing local weather.
Almost one hundred years later, we are still here, enjoying life whenever governments don't lock us up. Outside my window it is pissing all day and it's let than 20°C at the end of June, so maybe we are not as screwed as you are thinking.
Here is a list with extreme temparatures from Canada: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_extreme_temperatures_i...