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Extreme Weather

The climate agreement, 2 degrees, and your children’s future

Not too long ago, just after the Paris COP21 climate meeting, I read two interesting articles that contradicted each other.  The first said “COP21: Paris deal far too weak to prevent devastating climate change, academics warn.”  The second was more optimistic, “Rapid switch to renewable energy can put Paris climate goals within reach.” “So which is it?”, I wondered. The first one discussed a letter sent by eleven supposedly prominent climate scientists to The Independent that warned that the climate deal reached at the COP21 gives “false hope” and will result in insufficient action being taken. A few choice quotes… Read More »The climate agreement, 2 degrees, and your children’s future

Sylvia Earle, my new favorite scientist; and other tidbits

Sylvia Earle I was recently listening to the ClimateOne podcast, one of the best podcasts about climate change out there.  They were interviewing Dr. Sylvia Earle, a famous oceanographer and outspoken advocate for the world’s oceans, about the decline of the worlds oceans.  She has been an oceanographer for some time, and is a pioneer in the field for women, and in general.  She was formerly NOAA’s Chief Scientist, among many other accomplishments, and is a National Geographic Explorer in Residence. She’s very well spoken and really brings home the huge declines that have occurred in the world’s oceans due to human… Read More »Sylvia Earle, my new favorite scientist; and other tidbits

Houston, Tx - Memorial Day flooding, 2015

Climate Change and Deadly Floods: What you need to know

With all of the extreme rain and snow storms across the US lately, the obvious question arises… are these events linked to climate change? New research shows us the answer is a resounding ‘yes’.   And it actually makes perfect sense.  Carbon dioxide traps heat in the atmosphere, and a warmer atmosphere holds more moisture. When you combine warmer, moist air with disruption of the Jet Stream cased by a warming Arctic, you get huge, slow-moving weather fronts packed with moisture.  This is the exact recipe for epic, extreme storms. As an example, on Memorial Day in 2015, a massive storm parked over southern Texas and dropped nearly 11 inches of… Read More »Climate Change and Deadly Floods: What you need to know

Oklahoma farmer's son, Dust Bowl era, 1930s

Climate change, drought and the future of America

Climate change will likely lead to drought in the Southwest that make the historic Dust Bowl of the 1930’s look like good times.  A bunch of scientific studies assessing the risk of drought were recently covered in various media outlets, including Forbes, National Geographic, Scientific American and elsewhere. Several of these media reports are based on an excellent paper, published in Science Advances, called “Unprecedented 21st century drought risk in the American Southwest and Central Plains.”  Their findings were not encouraging. In this paper, scientists from NASA, Columbia and Cornell Universities used historical tree ring data and something called the Palmer Drought Severity Index… Read More »Climate change, drought and the future of America