Something to keep in mind… The Department of Defense uses 4,600,000,000 US gallons of fuel annually (2007). Carbon dioxide emissions are between 18.4 and 21.10 pounds per gallon of fuel depending on the type of fuel. The total US Military carbon emissions are ~828 billion pounds per year.

‘We’d take out Russia’s nukes,’ US NATO envoy says So... you billionaires who are planning to escape from the hordes to New Zealand, you can run but you can't hide, because...

'Small' Nuclear War Could Trigger Catastrophic Cooling
Live Science March 26, 2014

"Most people would be surprised to know that even a very small regional nuclear war on the other side of the planet could disrupt global climate for at least a decade and wipe out the ozone layer for a decade," study lead author Michael Mills, an atmospheric scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Colorado, told Live Science.

The researchers predicted the resulting firestorms would kick up about 5.5 million tons (5 million metric tons) of black carbon high into the atmosphere. This ash would absorb incoming solar heat, cooling the surface below.
…
The models also suggest colder temperatures would reduce global rainfall and other forms of precipitation by up to about 10 percent. This would likely trigger widespread fires in regions such as the Amazon, and it would pump even more smoke into the atmosphere.

And we have plenty of nukes to disrupt the global climate with...

Image credit: Arms Control Association

HOT AIR NEWS ROUNDUP

Trump Administration Climate Change Report

Trump admin forced to approve climate change report, confirming it’s man-made
RT November 4, 2018

The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy signed off on the final release of the Climate Science Special Report, which is mandated by law. Under the Global Change Research Act, which was signed by former President George H.W. Bush, Congress is required to release a report every four years.

And there is this...

Trump Administration to Polluters: Earth Is Doomed, So Go Hog Wild
Vanity Fair September 28, 2018

Trump has claimed that global warming is a hoax created by China to hurt the United States. For another, over the course of the last 20 months, the government has:

• Pulled out of the Paris Climate accord;
• Planned to make it “significantly easier for energy companies to release methane into the atmosphere”;
• Unveiled a proposal to let coal-burning plants regulate themselves that would kill 1,400 Americans a year;
• Signaled that it wants to make asbestos great again; and
• Moved to gut Obama’s fuel emissions rules.

But, as it turns out, it’s not that the administration is unaware of how bad things are. According to a new report from The Washington Post, it’s that it just doesn’t give a s--t:

However, the folks that wrote the report are in good company. A British investment firm wants clients to factor climate change into investment decisions...

Global Investment Firm Warns 7.8 C (~14F) Degrees of Global Warming Is Possible
Motherboard August 9, 2017

A leading British global investment firm has a warning for its clients: If we keep consuming oil and gas at current rates, our planet is on course to experience a rise in global average temperatures of nearly 8℃ (14℉) by the end of the century. This would make Earth basically uninhabitable for humans.
…
Even if existing carbon reduction pledges, for instance, are implemented, the dashboard says this would still lead to a 2.8℃ warmer world by 2100—which is already well over the 2℃ limit that many scientists deem as acceptable to avoid the worst effects of climate change.

I’ve mentioned this report before but it fits well here…

BP and Shell Planning for Catastrophic 5°C global Warming [by 2050] Despite Publicly Backing Paris Climate Agreement
Oil Industry News November 1, 2017

The level is more than double the upper limit committed to by most countries in the world under the Paris Climate Agreement, which both companies publicly support.

General Climate Change News

This is a short video of researchers on the Greenland Ice Sheet…

The Melting of the Greenland Ice, Seen Up Very Close
State of the Planet October 1, 2018

Glaciologist Marco Tedesco and a few colleagues walked here [Greenland Ice Sheet] this July to study how warming climate is fueling the accelerating decline of the Greenland sheet–the second-largest ice mass on earth. Specifically, he was investigating cryoconites–curious little cylindrical melt holes filled with microorganisms and dust. Often no bigger than a fist, they are part of a much larger natural system that may be magnifying the human forces tearing at the ice.

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MakHMmYNFZ4&feature=youtu.be&t=11]

I found this article to be fascinating…

Which cities will sink into the sea first? Maybe not the ones you expect
The Guardian October 1, 2018

Since the crust is floating on the fluid mantle, if you increase its weight by, for instance, building up kilometres of ice on top of it, then it sinks further into the mantle.
…
If the whole ice sheet covering Antarctica melts, the release of its weight will destress the rocks below, which, because they float on the mantle, will bob up. This is called post-glacial rebound. The position with Greenland is similar: the crust below it is being weighed down by the 3 million trillion litres of water held in the ice sheet, and if that ice sheet all melts then parts of the North American tectonic landmass will rise up.

Next-Generation Smart Devices Will Use Owner as Energy Source
Green Optimist October 1, 2018

The next-generation mobile and portable electronic devices will use their owners as an energy resource using Triboelectric Nanogenerators (TENGs). Along with human movements, TENGs can capture energy from common energy sources such as wind, wave, and machine vibration.

World's First Hydrogen-Powered Train Launches In Germany
Green Matters September 29, 2018

Coradia iLint passenger train can travel up to 600 miles on a single tank of oxygen and can travel up to roughly 86 mph. Though that might not seem that fast, the goal of the hydrogen-powered train isn't about speed, but about making a common mode of transportation better for the planet and the people that use it.

“This zero-emission train emits low levels of noise , with exhaust being only steam and condensed water,”...

An appreciation of the persistently grim tweets from the Norway Ice Service
Mashable September 30, 2018

Monday through Friday of each week, the Norwegian Ice Service, a government agency within the Norwegian Meteorological Institute, tweets out rather dismal news about the state of the thawing Arctic.

But these tweets aren't intended to be grim. They're simply an objective account of the modern Arctic reality. Each morning, the agency puts the current sea ice cover over a large swath of ocean between Norway and the North Pole into an emotionless, historical perspective.
...
For perspective, 1 square kilometer is about the same total area as 187 football fields. So the ice cover on August 23, 2018 was 19.6 million football fields below the historical average.

Scientists Warned Of Rising Seas In North Carolina. Now The State Is Dealing With A Disaster.
Buzz Feed News September 26, 2018

In a report published Monday, scientists at the First Street Foundation, a nonprofit sea level research and communications group, found that since 1970 sea levels off the coast of the Carolinas rose 6 inches, causing storm surge from Florence to "significantly affect" more than 11,000 additional homes when it slammed into the region nearly two weeks ago.
...
In 2010, scientists from the North Carolina Resources Commission published a report estimating that sea levels along the coast would rise 39 inches over the next century due to climate change, potentially putting 2,000 square miles of the coast underwater.

An Unforeseen Climate Beast Awakens!
Counterpunch September 26, 2018 h/t wendy davis

The Totten Glacier in East Antarctica is destabilizing. It alone carries enough ice melt (16 feet) to flood NYC and Tokyo, forget Miami, it’s already a goner. Totten is less than 10% of the mass of East Antarctica. Still, Totten brings more potential sea level rise than all of West Antarctica, where major destabilization of glaciers continues ongoing with gusto.
…
Totten lost 18B tons of ice every single year from 2002-2016, a clear signal that risk of inordinate sea level rise is now officially “on the move.”

From the original study mentioned in the article above...

Mass Loss of Totten and Moscow University Glaciers, East Antarctica, Using Regionally Optimized GRACE Mascons
AGU 100 September 25,2018

Totten and Moscow University glaciers in East Antarctica drain a marine‐based sector that holds an ice volume equivalent to several meters of global sea level rise. Recent observations of warm water intrusion on the continental shelf suggest that the glaciers may be changing in response to ocean warming.

Climate Adaption

Sunk Costs: Airports Taking Action Against Rising Seas, Storms as Climate Changes
Climate Change News October 3, 2018

Global airport operators, faced with rising sea levels and more powerful storms as the climate changes, are starting to invest in measures including higher runways, seawalls, and better drainage systems to future-proof immovable assets.

New Climate Debate: How to Adapt to the End of the World
Bloomberg September 26, 2018

In the language of climate change, “adaptation” refers to ways to blunt the immediate effects of extreme weather, such as building seawalls, conserving drinking water, updating building codes, and helping more people get disaster insurance. The costs are enormous: The U.S. government is considering a 5-mile, $20 billion seawall to protect New York City against storm surges, while Louisiana wants to spend $50 billion to save parts of its shoreline from sinking. Poorer countries could require $500 billion a year to adapt, according to the United Nations.

But some researchers are going further, calling for what some call the “deep adaptation agenda.” ...building water and communications systems that won’t fail if the power grid collapses and searching for ways to safeguard the food supply by protecting pollinating insects.

Hurricane Florence and the health effects of climate change
Harvard Law October 2, 2018

First, the relationship between climate change and public health is a tangible one. Rising global temperatures could cause public health crises or negative health outcomes in a range of other domains.
...
Water. ...Mosquito and tick-borne illness. ...Air pollution. ...Heat waves. ...Food insecurity.
...
Second, current public health and environmental legislation is not prepared to handle these effects.
...
Third—and relatedly—the public health effects of climate change may be an important hook to revise current environmental standards or introduce climate change legislation. Updating our existing environmental laws to meet changing conditions due to global warming could be an important incremental step in addressing the health effects of the rising temperatures.

Wildlife & the Environment

Leaked document shows [the English] government is planning to miss key wildlife target
Unearthed September 30, 2018

The government has quietly abandoned efforts to meet a longstanding target to improve England’s most important wildlife sites, according to a leaked document seen by Unearthed.

The document also warns that Natural England, the government’s nature regulator, is too stretched to prevent “further human-induced extinctions of known threatened species”.

Ancient mice discovered by climate cavers
Phys Org September 24 2018

The fossils of two extinct mice species have been discovered in caves in tropical Queensland by University of Queensland scientists tracking environment changes.
…
"Our findings show that the caves around Mount Etna had gone through a period of local extinction of rainforests, which were replaced by dry to arid habitats less than 280,000 years ago,"

Mysterious ringing noise coming from coral reefs identified as algae producing noisy gas bubbles
Independent October 3, 2018

Scientists have identified the source of a mysterious ringing sound coming from coral reefs: algae producing noisy gas bubbles.
...
This meant that researchers could in the future use sound recordings from coral reefs in other locations as a “rapid and inexpensive alternative to visual methods for estimating algal abundance”, which is one of the strongest indicators of stress on coral reefs.

Global Warming Is Destabilizing Mountain Slopes, Creating Landslide Risks
Inside Climate News September 26, 2018

It's not just the atmosphere and the oceans that are heating up. An ever-denser blanket of greenhouse gases is also sending warmer air and water deeper into the planet's rocky bones.

In the mountains of Switzerland, scientists have measured startling temperature increases, with jumps of as much as half a degree Celsius in just a decade 20 feet deep into the rocks. On Svalbard, an Arctic island north of Norway, similar warming has been measured more than 100 feet deep in the permafrost.
…
Basically, global warming is dissolving the glue that holds mountains together, and that could result in unexpected hazards for mountain communities.

Recent Climate Change Studies

Path-dependent reductions in CO2 emission budgets caused by permafrost carbon release
Nature Geoscience September 17, 2108

Here we investigate how emission budgets are impacted by the inclusion of CO2 and CH4 emissions caused by permafrost thaw, a non-linear and tipping process of the Earth system.
…
We conclude that the world is closer to exceeding the budget for the long-term target of the Paris Climate Agreement than previously thought.

Carbon budgets for 1.5 and 2 °C targets lowered by natural wetland and permafrost feedbacks
Nature Geoscience July 2018

Global methane emissions from natural wetlands and carbon release from permafrost thaw have a positive feedback on climate, yet are not represented in most state-of-the-art climate models. Furthermore, a fraction of the thawed permafrost carbon is released as methane, enhancing the combined feedback strength.
…
We conclude that natural feedback processes from wetlands and permafrost must be considered in assessments of transient emission pathways to limit global warming.

How Earth sheds heat into space
MIT News September 24, 2018

He [EAPS postdoc Daniel Koll] explains that, while water vapor does absorb heat, or infrared radiation, it doesn’t absorb it indiscriminately, but at wavelengths that are incredibly specific, so much so that the team had to split the infrared spectrum into 350,000 wavelengths just to see exactly which wavelengths were absorbed by water vapor.

In the end, the researchers observed that as the Earth’s surface temperature gets hotter, it essentially wants to shed more heat into space. But at the same time, water vapor builds up, and acts to absorb and trap heat at certain wavelengths, creating a greenhouse effect that prevents a fraction of heat from escaping.

High CO2 levels cause plants to thicken their leaves, which could worsen climate change effects, researchers say
UW News October 1, 2018

Plant scientists have observed that when levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere rise, most plants do something unusual: They thicken their leaves.
...
But the consequences of this physiological response go far beyond heftier leaves on many plants. Two University of Washington scientists have discovered that plants with thicker leaves may exacerbate the effects of climate change because they would be less efficient in sequestering atmospheric carbon, a fact that climate change models to date have not taken into account.

This study shows the melting of a Russian ice cap speeding up from 2 inches per day to 82 feet per day. The researchers looked at the Vavilov Ice Cap in the Russian High Arctic, which covers nearly 300,000 square miles. They pieced "together the ice cap's deterioration by spying on the advancing ice with remote sensing technology from a constellation of satellites"...

Unprecedented ice loss in Russian ice cap
Science Daily September 19, 2018

Many scientists have assumed that polar ice caps that sit above sea level will only respond slowly to a warming climate -- but the authors of this study urge that this assumption be questioned. The rapid collapse of the Vavilov Ice Cap has significant ramifications for glaciers in other polar regions, especially those fringing Antarctica and Greenland.

Jim Hansen talks about his 2016 climate study…

Hell Will Break Loose – Ice Melt, Sea Level Rise and Superstorms
September 17, 2016
[video: https://youtu.be/KLk8Uy2-Lsk]

Global Warnings
QMS: Time to disconnect greed from the welfare of earth, if survival means anything. I like trees.

Paul Beckwith: "I declare a global climate change emergency to claw back up the rock face to attempt to regain system stability, or face an untenable calamity of biblical proportions."

Kevin Hester: "There is no past analogue for the rapidity of what we are baring witness to. There has been a flood of articles ... 2C is no longer attainable and that we are heading for dangerous climate change"

Guy McPherson: "The recent and near-future rises in temperature are occurring and will occur at least an order of magnitude faster than the worst of all prior Mass Extinctions. Habitat for human animals is disappearing throughout the world, and abrupt climate change has barely begun."

me… We need to turn on a dime at mach nine!

Enjoy!