Climate Change Blog 55
On March 5, 2024, European Union’s climate monitoring organization, Copernicus Climate Change Service issued its finding that the world experienced the warmest February on record. It was 1.77C above the average February temperature in the preindustrial era from 1850-1900. It was also the ninth consecutive month of record temperatures. Taken together, the past 12 months have been the hottest 12 consecutive months on record: 1.56C above the average from 1850-1900. Global ocean temperatures in February were at an all-time high for any time of year as well. A natural El Niño weather pattern added to the warmth, but scientists believe that climate change and global warming is the primary cause.
“There’s the temperature,” said Andrew Pershing, Climate Central’s vice-president for science, “and then there’s our ability to really detect that climate signal in the data.” Cities in the Midwestern US stood out for experiencing an extraordinarily warm winter and for the influence of climate change, which is caused mainly by the burning of coal, oil and other fossil fuels that release GHGs into the atmosphere. “Really off the charts,” Dr. Pershing said. “No ice on most of the great lakes. That’s remarkable.”
Minneapolis, for instance, was nearly 5.6C warmer than average between December and February. The fingerprints of climate change could be detected for 33 days, essentially a third of the winter season.
“A year ago, the fact that the global temperature for a particular month would reach 1.C above the pre-industrial level would have been considered exceptional,” said Julien Nicolas, a senior scientist at Copernicus. Now, it happens repeatedly. This doesn’t mean we have exceeded the international Paris Agreement goal of limiting global warming at 1.5C above the preindustrial temperature. For that to happen, the planet would need to be 1.5C degrees warmer for several years, long enough to reflect a more permanent change. But it seems to be suggesting that that’s where we’d reading. And that’s bad.
Scientists have confirmed that 2023 was Earth’s warmest year by far in a century and a half. Averaged across last year, temperatures worldwide were 1.48C, or 2.66F, higher than they were in the second half of the 19th century, the European Union climate monitor said.
A record low Sea ice formation around Antarctica was one of the metrics that broke records in 2023 which saw extremely hot weather in Asia, Europe, Texas, South America and Canada (which had its most destructive wildfire season on record). Less sea ice formed around the coasts of Antarctica, in both summer and winter, than ever measured. French researchers recently found that the Earth’s total heating, across oceans, land, air and ice, has been speeding up since 1960. This broadly matches increases in carbon emissions and reductions in aerosols over the past few decades. But scientists will continue studying the data to determine whether other factors are significant, “Something unusual is happening that we don’t understand,” one of the researchers, Karina von Schuckmann, an oceanographer at Mercator Ocean International in Toulouse, France, said.
The Facts on the Ground section of this Blog has grown lengthy as the impacts of climate change have grown so deadly and costly. The four foundations that support human civilization (see Climate Change Blog #1) are all crumbling: 1) Land-based resources are fewer due to global warming, extreme heat, wildfires and drought all of which lessen crop productivity and harm biodiversity; 2) Water-based resources are fewer due to global warming, melting polar ice caps, sea level rise, change in ocean currents, change in chemical composition of the oceans, increased acidity of the oceans from carbon deposition, bleaching coral reefs, all resulting in less ocean productivity and loss of marine biodiversity; 3) Stable Climate, enormous changes are occurring due to global warming, carbon emissions and increased evaporation which adds more water vapor to the atmosphere, all of which has affected the jet stream; the above-noted impacts to the seas have affected global oceanic circulation/currents such that the stable climate that enabled the growth of agriculture and human civilization is rapidly changing; and 4) Political Stability, due to all of these changes, millions of people have been forced to move within their countries as they are no longer able to work the land as they have for generations; millions more have been forced to emigrate to other countries that refuse them entry and react with nationalistic policies, hardened boarders and increased tensions and conflicts within and among countries. Sea level rise alone could cause trillions of dollars in damages as every coastal city and area is forced to abandon or modify roads, buildings and infrastructure. Combined with the costs of extreme weather events, migration and conflicts, the world economy could collapse. The loss of any one of these foundations could topple human civilization. Further deterioration of all four could do the same.
In early March, thousands of residents were left without power, and life came to a standstill for many in the Sierra Nevada region after a winter storm dumped almost two feet of snow overnight creating treacherous conditions. About 49,000 customers in Nevada and California were without electricity. Whiteout conditions in the mountain ski resorts in the Lake Tahoe area stopped operations after 24” of snow fell within a 24-hour period. Highway officials shut down Interstate 80, a key trucking route from the San Francisco Bay Area. The Central Sierra Snow Laboratory atop Donner Summit reported that 20.7” of snow had fallen, preceded by 39.8” over a 48-hour period, with overnight winds reaching a high of 171 mph. At least 9 people were killed in California.
Much of California was pummeled by a wave of rain in mid-February, preceded by a deadly deluge which caused widespread power outages and devastating mudslides. An atmospheric river, a type of storm in which Pacific winds blow narrow intense bands of moisture over the West Coast, brought heavy rain to Southern California, followed by severe thunderstorms and wind gusts in the Bay Area. About 10” of rain fell in Ventura and Santa Barbara Counties. The airport in Santa Barbara was closed due to flooding on the airfield. “The soil is so saturated from the previous storm that this rain has nowhere to go,” Rich Thompson, with the Weather Service in Los Angele, said. Flash flood warnings were issued for the Santa Monica Mountains, Hollywood Hills and Beverly Hills. Large parts of the Sacramento Valley were under a wind advisory. Officials in Santa Barbara and Los Angeles Counties issued evacuation warnings for vulnerable communities. Authorities in Santa Barbara found a woman’s body in Mission Creek.
Earlier in Feb, a ferocious atmospheric river storm pounded California for days and dumped record-breaking amounts of rain on the Los Angeles basin, causing millions of residents to stay home. More than 475 mudslides and 35 damaged structures in the city were reported, many situated in the hills above Hollywood and Beverly Hills, with over a dozen of those buildings deemed unsafe. In less than 48 hours, the storm unleashed almost a third of the annual rainfall expected in parts of Orange County. The ground was extremely saturated after one of the wettest storm systems to hit the greater Los Angeles area since record-keeping began.
Cars were buried during heavy snowfalls at Mammoth Mountain, even before a subsequent storm that unleashed nearly three feet of snow in 24 hours bringing treacherous conditions including avalanche danger and reduced visibility. Mammoth Mountain, the highest summit of the state’s ski areas, received almost 3’ of snow within a 24-hour period which forced it and other ski resorts in the state to limit operations. The Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District closed all Malibu schools while Santa Barbara Airport received 2.39” of rain breaking its previous record for the date from 1990 of half an inch. The entire county, home to almost 10 million people, was under a flash flood warning after over 4” of rain fell on the Santa Monica Mountains, rising at rates of over half an inch per hour.
Earlier in February, more than 120 mudslides had spread soggy dirt and debris through the steep hillside neighborhoods of Los Angeles and the storm damaged structures after an atmospheric river dumped heavy rain across the state. Three fatalities were reported in Northern California, from falling trees. Nearly 300,000 homes and businesses were without power across the state due to high winds, fallen trees and downed power lines. This was “one of the top 3 most damaging single-day storms on record” in terms of outages, comparable only to storms in 2008 and 1995. In some counties, winds exceeded 90 mph.
In early Feb, rescue crews in Nevada searched for several people reported missing after an avalanche in Lee Canyon. Four people reported missing were rescued off a mountain. San Francisco’s Public Works Department received about 300 reports of trees or big limbs that were knocked down during the storm due to high winds, with about two dozen blocking roads or on top of wires. At least three people were killed by falling trees.
More than one million people were affected as 850,000 homes and businesses in California (300,000 in the Bay Area) lost power in early February due to winds around 100 mph, roads were closed and homes and vehicles were damaged. Ferries on the San Francisco Bay were called back to shore. In downtown Los Angeles 4.10” of rain fell far exceeding the daily record of 2.55” set in 1927 for the period. It tied for the 10th wettest day ever recorded in the city.
At an emergency command center in Long Beach, first responders and volunteers distributed about 3,500 sandbags. In San Jose, where a flood watch advisory was in effect, firefighters rescued six people and a dozen dogs from a “rapidly diminishing island” in the flooded Guadalupe River. Several vehicles and drivers were stuck in almost three feet of water in the San Fernando Valley region of Los Angeles. A 40-mile stretch of State Route 33 in Ventura County was closed due to mudslides. Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency.
The storm hit Northern California first in late January, flooding roads and prompting the closure of streets and schools in rural communities. At least one person had to be rescued from a car that was taking on water in Sonoma County and forecasters warned of big, dangerous waves on the coast. In Long Beach, flooding forced the closure of a crucial freeway, bringing traffic to a standstill and closed the Pacific Coast Highway in Huntington Beach.
In late January, the San Diego region was overwhelmed by the unprecedented intense storm that flooded homes and turned roadways into rivers. Residents escaped the flood by climbing to rooftops. The torrential rainfall forced many residents to navigate life-threatening scenes that they had trouble believing even as they recounted them. The record pace of the rainfall, a deluge of nearly 3” in 3 hours, quickly overwhelmed drainage systems. The rainfall recorded for San Diego was the fourth greatest total for any day in recorded San Diego history, going back to 1850. Many residents faced catastrophic losses.
I lost everything in that flood,” Luis Reyes, 18, said of the apartment that he shared with his family. “All my memories are gone.” Mr. Reyes had been home alone in National City when the water rushed in and quickly rose to his waist. He managed to ‘rescue’ a shoebox of greeting cards and his two Chihuahuas, before climbing out his bedroom window. Outside, he saw floating vehicles crashing into one another. “It just felt like a scene out of an apocalyptic movie,” Mr. Reyes said.
In late February, flames from the Smokehouse Creek fire moved eastward across the Texas Panhandle for the fourth straight day at tremendous speeds. A cold front, driving a snow squall, swept southward over the Great Plains. Both weather patterns collided, the fire and snow meeting east of Amarillo, the snow melted into the fire, but the fire kept burning. It burned more than a million acres of land, devastating cattle ranches and destroying homes as it burned out of control. Jeff Chisum, whose ranch was directly in the path of the fire, described walking with surviving calves past the charred remains of adult cows scattered along a road. “It’s hard to watch,” he said. Nearly all of his 30,000-acre ranch was burned. The fire burned an area more than five times the size of NYC, surpassing the state’s previous biggest wildfire of 2006. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott declared a state of disaster. By early March, the Smokehouse Creek fire had affected more than a million acres, making it the largest wildfire in Texas history and one of the biggest in the history of the country. The fire crossed into Oklahoma, leaving in its trail herds of dead cattle and dozens of burned homes with at least two deaths reported. The fire destroyed up to 500 structures and ranchers faced crippling losses of cattle and grazing lands. Two deaths were confirmed.
The increased risk of wildfire has adversely impacted the insurance market in Texas, raising premiums for homeowners and causing some insurers to withdraw from parts of the state. The Smokehouse Creek fire expanded rapidly due in part to high temperatures and strong winds. The temperature reached 82F in Amarillo, surpassing the city’s average February daytime high temperature of 54F. Temperatures in Texas have risen by 0.61F per decade since 1975, according to a 2021 report by the state climatologist’s office. Climate change is likely making fire season start earlier and last longer. Texas is currently the state with the second highest number of properties that are vulnerable to wildfires, behind Florida.
Wildfires killed more than 120 people as it burned the forested hillsides of Chile.. The fires (and the above-noted floods) reflect the extreme weather risks brought on by a dangerous mix of global warming, (which is principally caused by the burning of fossil fuels), and this year’s El Niño, (a cyclical weather phenomenon characterized by an overheated Pacific Ocean near the Equator). The increased risk of wildfires in Chile was exacerbated by the large monoculture plantations of highly flammable trees located close to cities and towns. An estimated 1.7 million hectares have burned over the past decade in Chile, triple the territory that burned in the previous decade.
In early February, hundreds were reported missing in the blazes near the cities of Viña del Mar and Valparaíso, home to more than a million people, after wildfires tore through central Chile’s coastal hills. The fires killed at least 51 people and destroyed more than 1,000 homes. President Gabriel Boric said his government worked to “secure the greatest resources” in Chile’s history to fight the blazes.
Washington and Oregon experienced springlike warmth in early February, including the balmiest temperatures on record in parts of Oregon. Washington saw its warmest seven-day stretch in the month of January since 1894. But earlier in January, parts of the region experienced their deepest chills in over three decades. In the Seattle area, at least five people died of hypothermia related to the Arctic air mass. In-between this drastic change in temperature, an atmospheric river surged into the region, causing flooding and widespread threats of landslides and avalanches. To the west of Seattle, the Skokomish River reached record levels, submerging low-lying farmlands and roads beneath rushing waters. Torrential downpours caused rivers throughout the region to overflow and spill onto nearby land and roads. In the coastal city of Astoria, Oregon, mudslide led to the evacuation of an entire neighborhood, and shut down utilities with home foundations skewed. An Amtrak route between Portland and Seattle was closed due to a landslide. Wind speeds reached up to 100 mph in Marin County.
In Anchorage, Alaska, more than 100” of snow fell resulting in an increased risk of roof collapse. Homeowners climbed on top of their houses to clear piles of snow. In the state’s capital, Juneau, snowfall totals reached a record for the month of January, with more inches piling up causing boats in the city’s harbors to sink. In 2023 dozens of people living outside died amid subzero temperatures, the city issued an emergency declaration, and established warming shelters.
Heavy rainfall caused flooding in parts of Louisiana and Texas in late January. Texas towns of Industry and Fayetteville received more than 10” of rain each. Some parts of Louisiana received 6 – 8”. Flash flood warnings were issued in other cities, including Garyville. Almost 36 million people from southeast Texas to southwest North Carolina were under a flood watch.
In late January, a powerful storm (named Isha) moved away from Britain after battering the country overnight with a top wind speed of 99 mph. A Red Wind warning was issued for the northeast coast of Scotland. People were advised not to use the roadways due to life threatening strong winds. Storm Isha disrupted travel, forcing ScotRail to suspend its nationwide service. The storm left thousands without power and resulted in two deaths caused by fallen trees. Less than two days after the storm departed Britain, a second storm (Jocelyn), brought fresh travel disruption to much of the UK. An amber warning for wind in parts of Scotland was issued, with much of the UK covered by a yellow alert in late January. Winds in North Wales gusted to 97mph.
At least 72 people across the US died from weather-related causes in January due to frigid weather conditions. In Tennessee, a man died after he fell through a skylight while clearing snow from the roof. In Pennsylvania, five sisters were killed in a collision with a tractor-trailer. In Oregon, a tree branch, weakened by wind and ice, took down a live power line which killed two adults and a teenager. Tennessee was hard hit with at least 27 people dead due to weather-related causes. And in Oregon, at least 8 additional people died of weather-related causes. Both states declared a state of emergency, as did Kentucky, where at least five people died during a cold snap.
A storm in mid-January moved east over large parts of the Southeast, bringing more snow and extremely cold temperatures to the Region, with several states under winter storm warnings and winter weather advisories. The governors of Mississippi and Alabama declared states of emergency, and officials across the region opened warming centers. Snow, sleet and freezing rain moved into parts of eastern Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana and the Tennessee Valley. A different system had also brought sub-zero wind chills to the Plains and parts of the Midwest and “near-record, dangerously low” temperatures were recorded in parts of the Midwest. Heavy lake-effect snow enveloped parts of northern Michigan and northern and western NY where a winter storm warning was in effect, with heavy winds and snow forcing the postponement of a Buffalo Bills playoff game.
At least four people died as severe thunderstorms, fierce winds and tornadoes damaged large parts of the southeastern US including the Florida Panhandle in early January. The storm downed power lines and trees, and damaged buildings. The severe weather was part of a system that wreaked havoc across much of the eastern third of the U.S. In Panama City, Florida, homes had their roofs torn off, buildings flattened, and roadways blocked after a tornado tore through the area and, in some areas north of the Alabama state line, storms brought hail the size of baseballs. One person died and two others were critically injured after a strong storm passed through a mobile home park in Claremont, NC. At least 4 people were killed in AL.
More than 22 million people were under tornado watches from Florida to Virginia. There were at least 10 reports of tornadoes across the South. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis issued a state of emergency for 49 counties. Over 39,000 customers in Florida were without power. Schools in Bay County were closed and in Georgia, schools in 27 counties were closed due to severe weather.
There were flood warnings up and down the East Coast in January and at least four weather-related deaths were reported across the South. Millions of people in the Mid-Atlantic region were under flood warnings or advisories and more than half a million customers in about a dozen states were without power after heavy snow, high winds and thunderstorms took out power lines, disrupted air travel and closed schools from the Great Lakes to the Florida panhandle.
Heavy rainfall in NY caused power outage for more than 140,000 customers, and high wind warnings were in effect for many areas near the coast and in higher terrain of the Northeast. Severe thunderstorms and tornadoes ripped across the Southeast with many schools in the Midwest, and other parts of the South closed. Strong winds in Washington, D.C., and surrounding areas diverted Air Force Two, carrying VP Kamala Harris. Political campaign events were canceled in Iowa. The National Weather Service issued a flash flood warning in New London County, Connecticut, due to a partial failure of a dam on the Yantic River and the City of Norwich closed schools, and several streets were closed due to heavy flooding. 3,400 flights were canceled nationwide over two days.
At least nine people were found dead in Australia after storms and floods in the eastern part of the country caused power outages and damaged infrastructure in late December. The extreme weather affected people in the eastern states of Queensland and Victoria. The storms, which tore through the coastal city of Brisbane, Queensland’s state capital, dumped 3” of rain within a 24-hour period. The storm caused seven deaths.
A scientist called the rare string of balmy days in Minneapolis “a visceral feeling of what climate change looks and feels like.” Lucy Wallace, 35, from San Diego, had been warned about the bone-chilling winters of her new hometown, Minneapolis. She ran five miles on Christmas Day wearing a T-shirt thanks to a high of 54F degrees, the warmest temperature on record for the area. Such days are likely to become increasingly common because of climate change, Jessica Hellmann, director of the Institute on the Environment at the University of Minnesota, said.
Dozens of residents were rescued from flooded homes and cars across New England in mid-December after a powerful coastal storm that left hundreds of thousands of people without power. More than 3” of rain fell on some parts of the region, combining with snowmelt to send rivers and streams over their banks. Rushing floodwaters in parts of NH and Maine also led to evacuations and water rescue. The deluge resulted from a storm that engulfed the East Coast, flooding streets, snarling transit and closing schools from SC to northern Maine. Heavy winds caused trees to fall onto homes and power lines, killing at least one person in MA and two in Maine. Three people died in flooded vehicles in NY, PA and SC.
The MTA in NYC said train service was disrupted in mid-December because of flooding and reported felled trees on tracks. Several bus routes across the city were also running with delays because of heavy rain and flooding. The NYC Ferry suspended service due to extremely high winds. Both Metro North and Long Island Railroad trains experienced disruptions. The Verrazzano Bridge was temporarily closed but reopened with limited vehicle access due to of high winds. Areas to the west of the city received 2-4” of rainfall, with over 4” received in northeast NJ, and flood watches were issued for Washington and Baltimore. The Weather Service issued coastal flood warnings for southern Westchester County and for southern Connecticut.
The mid-December storm sent NYC temperatures plummeting from a morning high of 60s to the upper 40s. The storm disrupted morning routines across the Northeast, flooding roads, disrupting transit and forcing dozens of school districts to close or start the day late. A ground stop at Boston’s Logan Airport caused significant flight delays and cancellations. Storm-related deaths were reported in MA and Maine. In Moretown, Vermont, residents were evacuated as the Mad River flooded. More than 750,000 customers across New England, NY and NJ were without power, including more than 600,000 customers in MA and Maine.
At Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn, migrants sheltering in large white tents recounted the frightful night of the storm in mid-December. Edgar Marin, 38, said his two small children, ages 1 and 2, could not sleep all night as the tent rocked back and forth. Mr. Marin said he thought the roof would rip off and that children around him were very scared. “It was very hard,” he said.
in mid-December NJ experienced flooding, power outages, downed trees, and disrupted travel. Ralph Lovelace was commuting to work in Newark but his car stalled in flood water. “My car has been stuck here since 4 in the morning.” In Connecticut, tens of thousands of people were without power, dozens of schools closed or had delayed openings, and over 82,000 customers lost power. Many parts of the state were under a flood watch, and public schools in Westchester, NY, the Hudson Valley, Connecticut and NJ were closed or opened late.
It was the third-wettest autumn on record for NYC. The mid-December storm punctuated what has been an above-average year of rain for the city, especially in the second half of 2023. In Rhode Island, wind speed topped 60 mph in mid-December which closed schools, led to bans on taller vehicles from bridges, and suspended Block Island ferries. 23,000 electric customers in RI, 98,000 in MA, 46,000 in Maine and 41,000 in NH lost power. The extreme weather conditions caused flight delays at JFK, LaGuardia and Newark airports. Flash flood warnings were in effect in mid-December from Summit, NJ to near Bridgeport, CT, and Northern Manhattan and the Bronx.
Charleston, SC, was inundated with surging floodwaters that swamped roads and stranded motorists after fierce storms battered the city in mid-December. The storm caused the fourth-highest tide ever recorded there and the highest not driven by a tropical storm prompting the issuance of flash flood warnings. Torrential rains fell across the Carolinas with some parts receiving at least of 10” forcing road closures in Charleston where motorists were rescued from vehicles.
A storm killed at least 13 people in Buenos Aires, Argentina in mid-December drenching the city and bringing strong winds and causing power outages and damage. The storm had earlier struck the port city of Bahía Blanca, with gusts of 86 mph, comparable to a Category 1 hurricane, blowing roofs off buildings and killing at least 13 people.
In mid-December a tropical cyclone touched down on northeastern Australia, the first of the season and part of a stretch of extreme weather Australia experienced for days, including heat waves, floods and wildfires. In Queensland over 8,000 homes were without power and 93 people were evacuated. This was the first time since records began in the 1970s that a tropical cyclone had arrived in mid-December in an El Niño year. In early December, the country experienced fires, heat waves and floods. Sydney had a heat wave, with temperatures reaching 111F in early December. In Western Australia, firefighters battled raging wildfires sparked by extreme heat and high winds. Parts of South Australia received the heaviest December rain on record with 20,000 lightning bolts, leaving 30,000 properties without power. The “unusually high temperatures for early December” in New South Wales and severe fire conditions in Western Australia were “the hallmark of what we can see more of with climate change”, Dr. Andrew King, a lecturer in climate science at the University of Melbourne, said.
The January global surface temperature was 2.29F (1.27C) above the 20th-century average of 54.0F (12.2C), making it the warmest January on record. Virtually every day there is a record set for extreme weather somewhere. Temperatures in January were above average throughout the Arctic, most of northeastern North America, central Russia, southern and western Asia, Africa, South America, eastern and southeastern Asia and Australia. January included a record-high monthly global ocean surface temperature for the 10th consecutive month. Sea surface temperatures were above average across much of the northern, western and equatorial Pacific Ocean, as well as parts of the western Indian Oceans. Global total precipitation for January 2024 was at near-record high following December’s record high for that month of the year.
Chatham House's Report for UK government, 2023 - a Year in Review, stated: “Cascading climate impacts can be expected to cause higher mortality rates, drive political instability and greater national insecurity, and fuel regional and international conflict…the cascading risks identified of greatest concern were the interconnections between shifting weather patterns, resulting in changes to ecosystems and the rise of pests and diseases. Combined with heatwaves and drought, these impacts will likely drive unprecedented crop failure, food insecurity and migration. In turn, all will likely result in increased infectious diseases, and a negative feedback loop compounding each impact.”
Climate change is likely a major factor in the spread of vector-borne diseases: In 2022, Bangladesh reported 62,000 cases of dengue and 281 deaths. In 2023, Bangladesh had 321,179 cases of dengue and 1,705 deaths.
Regarding the warming ocean, recent research by Dr. Angus Atkinson from the Plymouth Marine Laboratory and Dr. Axel Rossberg of Queen Mary University of London, has shown that climate change is undermining the ocean’s capacity to sustain plankton, resulting in the rapid decline of fish populations. This revelation is crucial as even a minor reduction in plankton, the ocean’s primary food source, leads to significant decreases in fish stocks. Plankton is the essential base of the marine food-chain. Any significant reduction to it will have profound implications for humanity as marine fish provide 15% of all animal protein consumed by humans. Under this intense pressure, every year, global fisheries are collapsing.
Half the air we breathe comes from phytoplankton (plants), which also sequesters huge amounts of carbon. The warming oceans may turn phytoplankton into net carbon emitters and reduce the amount of oxygen they produce. This is another in a long list of potential tipping points that we may have breached.
While humanity is undermining the ocean’s productivity, and over-harvesting it, the latest research shows that glacial collapse in Greenland is happening faster than previously believed. That is not only further reducing the productivity of the ocean, but likely contributing to the slowing down if not eventual collapse of the currents and heat conductivity upon which much of humanity depends for a livable climate.
The Greenland ice cap is losing an average of 30 million tons of ice an hour due to warming, which is 20% more than was previously thought. This additional source of freshwater pouring into the north Atlantic could trigger the collapse of the ocean currents called the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC), with severe consequences for humanity. “The changes around Greenland are tremendous and they’re happening everywhere – almost every glacier has retreated over the past few decades,” said Dr Chad Greene, at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in the US. “It makes sense that if you dump freshwater on to the north Atlantic Ocean, then you certainly get a weakening of the AMOC, though I don’t have an intuition for how much weakening.”
The AMOC was already known to be at its weakest in 1,600 years and in 2021 researchers spotted warning signs of a tipping point. A recent study suggested the collapse could happen as soon as 2025 in the worst-case scenario. A significant part of the Greenland ice sheet is thought by scientists to be close to a tipping point of irreversible melting, with ice equivalent to 1-2 metres of SLR expected.
The study, published in the journal Nature, used artificial intelligence techniques to map more than 235,000 glacier end positions over a 38-year period. This showed the Greenland ice sheet had lost an area of about 5,000 sq km of ice at its margins since 1985, equivalent to a trillion tons of ice. “There is some concern that any small source of freshwater may serve as a ‘tipping point’ that could trigger a full-scale collapse of the AMOC, disrupting global weather patterns, ecosystems and global food security. Yet freshwater from the glacier retreat of Greenland is not included in oceanographic models at present.”
John Englander, an expert on sea level rise, said “Sea level has been fairly stable for 6,000 years, which is most of human civilization… but it’s risen eight inches or twenty centimeters in the last century, and the rate is tripling right now.” Experts predict that regardless of mitigation efforts, SLR will be approximately one foot by 2050. Thereafter, fairly high probabilities indicate up to 5-10’ by the end of the century, which is considerably more than “up to 3 feet in a high-[GHG] emissions scenario” forecast by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in 2022.
These rates are due to the fact that the Greenland ice sheets are melting and numerous Antarctic ice sheets are as well. The Pine Island Ice Shelf in West Antarctica, which holds back enough ice to raise sea levels by 0.5 meters (1.5‘), could be more vulnerable to complete disintegration than previously thought. A 2022 study led by British Antarctic Survey detailed the threats to the stability of the shelf. This ice shelf, which serves to buttress Pine Island Glacier, is one of hundreds of ice shelves surrounding Antarctica that hold back the potential of rapid flow of glacial ice to the sea. A collapsing ice shelf removes this impediment and increases the rate of glacial flow by up to eight times.
Scientists were shocked by the collapse of Conger Ice Shelf in early 2022. It’s the first-ever ice shelf collapse on East Antarctica which is the coldest and driest place on earth. On March 14-16 Conger ice shelf suddenly disappeared from satellite photos. It had been there for over a thousand years. All it took was an unusual warm spell and more than a thousand years of solid ice collapsed within days! East Antarctica had been considered secure until now.
There are about 136 port cities with more than one million inhabitants. Collapsing ice sheets means that all of these ports must be significantly redesigned. Humanity has barely begun such adaptation at any of them. It’s too big and expensive to even think about, until we have no choice.
A study of SLR published March 6, 2024 in Nature focussed on 32 US coastal cities. Nearly 40% of Americans live along the coasts, where subsidence (sinking land) is adding to the threat of SLR. While the Gulf Coast experiences many of the most severe cases of subsidence, parts of Galveston, Texas, and Grand Isle, La., are sinking into the ocean faster than global average SLR, the trend can be found all along the US shoreline. Subsidence is largely due to over-pumping of groundwater as well as oil and gas.
Major energy transitions are hard as evidenced by the offshore wind industry. Executives miscalculated the impact that the pandemic and rising interest rates would have on supply chains. The industry has found it much more difficult to manufacture, transport and install the turbines than expected. Only about a dozen have been built as compared with more than 6,000 in Europe, which has been building offshore wind farms for decades.
New Jersey’s Board of Public Utilities awarded two contracts for electricity from offshore wind farms on January 22, 2024, pursuing the state’s ambitious plans to take power from Atlantic Ocean winds following a surprising setback last year. In October 2023, Orsted, one of the world’s biggest developers of offshore wind farms, backed out of two contracts to supply power to NJ. Orsted cited worldwide inflation, higher interest rates and disruptions of supply chains for its decision.
Gov. Philip D. Murphy, a Democrat, set a goal of getting 11,000 megawatts of power — enough to power more than 5 million homes — from offshore wind by 2040.
Under the contracts NJ awarded in January, the monthly bill of the typical residential customer in NJ would go up almost $7. One of the contracts is with Leading Light Wind. It is the first US-led operation to build a wind farm in the ocean and deliver power from it. Leading Light is a partnership between Invenergy and energyRe, a NY-based company chaired by Jeff Blau, the chief executive of Related Companies, one of the biggest developers in NYC. The other winning bidder, Attentive Energy Two, is a partnership between TotalEnergies, a French utility, and London-based Corio Generation. The two projects should produce about 3,470 MW of electricity (enough to power 1.7 million homes). NJ also has an offshore contract with Atlantic Shores, for 1,510 MW. Combined, the three projects could produce more than one-third of the state’s 2040 target.
Representative Jeff Van Drew, a Republican who represents part of the NJ shore, opposes Mr. Murphy’s offshore wind plans. He wrote to the governor urging on him to “drop your unrealistic Green New Deal agenda before you cause irreversible damage to our state’s economy, thriving ocean-based industries, and delicate marine ecosystems.”
Kris Ohleth, director of the Special Initiative on Offshore Wind, supports the state’s plan and expects the state to accelerate the granting of more contracts, rather than by paring back its ambitions. The state’s goals “are not out of reach.”
At the start of 2024, the first large offshore wind farm in New England, Vineyard Wind, started producing electricity. Currently, the project, located off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard, MA, can send only five MW of power to the grid from a single wind turbine. But the companies behind the project, Avangrid and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, plan to install a total of 62 turbines with 800 MW of capacity, enough electricity to power 400,000 homes [ed., I’m using reported figures even though they are often inconsistent], by the end of this year.
“We’ve arrived at a watershed moment for climate action in the U.S., and a dawn for the American offshore wind industry,” said Pedro Azagra Blázquez, the chief executive of Avangrid, an American subsidiary of Iberdrola, the Spanish utility.
Vineyard Wind is the nation’s second utility-scale offshore wind farm to start generating electricity. Another large project off the coast of NY, South Fork Wind, began producing power in December 2023. Once completed, South Fork will be capable of producing 132 MW of electricity.
The two projects are coming online at a turbulent time for the nascent offshore wind industry. Developers have already terminated contracts for several large, planned wind farms in CT, MA, NJ and NY. Analysts are downgrading expectations: About 15 GW of offshore wind will be installed by 2030, according to BloombergNEF, a research arm of Michael Bloomberg’s financial data and information company. That’s about one-third lower than what it had expected as recently as June.
In January 2024, Equinor and BP announced that they were terminating a contract with NY to sell the state electricity from Empire Wind 2, a proposed 1,260 MW offshore wind farm to be located southeast of Long Island. The project is not necessarily dead. The companies could rebid this year for a new contract to sell power to NY at higher prices. Many Eastern states are realizing that offshore wind may prove more expensive than initially planned.
The Biden administration has made offshore wind a priority, essentially aiming to create an industry from scratch. The US remains far behind Europe, which has already installed more than 32,000 MW of offshore wind capacity.
Developers have been trying to build offshore wind turbines near Cape Cod, MA, since the early 2000s. An initial project proposed near Nantucket, Cape Wind, was canceled after objections from residents who feared their view of the sea would be marred. Its successor, Vineyard Wind, was proposed farther off the coast in 2018 but took years to secure federal permits from the Trump administration. In 2021, the Biden administration approved the Vineyard Wind project, the first large-scale wind farm to receive federal approval.
In early December 2023, NY received its first offshore wind power with electricity now flowing to homes on Long Island. The power is coming from the first completed turbine of 12 that will make up South Fork Wind, the first large-scale offshore wind farm to go online in the US. It is being transmitted through an undersea cable to a substation in East Hampton, then distributed to customers of the Long Island Power Authority.
The wind farm, about 35 miles east of Montauk Point, is still under construction. Most, if not all, of that power will be consumed by utility customers in East Hampton and surrounding communities. But the higher cost of producing the additional electricity offshore will be shared by all LIPA customers.
NY plans to build additional wind farms in the Atlantic that would provide 9 GW of electricity — enough to power about 450,000 homes. Those projects are critical to Biden’s goal of getting 30 GWs of power from offshore wind by 2030.
NY has contracts with developers of four additional wind farms off the coast of Long Island, all of them considerably larger than South Fork Wind. But their builders, pinched by inflation and supply chain problems, asked the state for big increases in how much utility customers would pay for their power.
Those projects are in jeopardy as state officials refused to grant the larger subsidies. One of those projects is Sunrise Wind, another Orsted development that was scheduled to be completed in 2025. Hoping to stay on schedule for reaching its clean-energy goals, NYS solicited new bids. David Hardy, chief executive of Orsted’s Americas region, said his company was uncertain about Sunrise Wind but might bid again.
Eastern states have awarded contracts to build roughly two dozen offshore wind farms with 21 GW of electric capacity (enough to power six million homes). But developers have canceled or may renegotiate rates for nearly half that capacity.
“The U.S. offshore wind market is still in its infancy, and some states might have been trying to run before they could walk,” said Atin Jain, a senior associate at BloombergNEF. “Now they’re getting more realistic about the challenges facing developers, and that’s going to help in the long run.”
The lack of other viable options for cleaning up electric grids in the Northeast explains why these states, and Biden, have maintained their goals for offshore wind. Ali Zaidi, Biden’s national climate adviser, pointed to the large offshore projects underway in MA, NY and VA, noting that the industry had grown rapidly from a standing start three years ago. The administration plans to complete federal reviews for at least 16 offshore wind farms by 2025, each capable of powering hundreds of thousands of homes. “There are projects that are facing turbulence, and that’s not trivial,” Mr. Zaidi said. “But it’s not enough to take us off course from advancing significant progress.”
Energy executives say the industry is learning from its mistakes and making investments that should pay off in the coming years. Dominion Energy, a large utility based in VA, is building a massive wind farm and spending $625 million on the first US-built ship capable of hauling the more than 300-foot-long blades and other components for wind turbines out to sea. “We needed to have confidence in our schedule,” said Robert Blue, Dominion’s chief executive. “One way to have confidence is to have a vessel.”
Under Trump, a critic of wind turbines, the federal government held up permits. Then the pandemic wrecked supply chains, making parts more expensive. Later, the Federal Reserve sharply raised interest rates to tame inflation, driving up borrowing costs. Companies were stuck with the prospect of building multibillion-dollar projects to supply power at prices that no longer made sense.
Orsted recently began producing electricity for Long Island from the modest South Fork Wind project and is moving ahead with developing Revolution Wind, a $4 billion project that will provide power to RI and CT.
States are also bracing for higher prices. At an auction held by NY in October, the three winning companies offered to sell power to utilities at rates that were roughly one-third higher than earlier awards. Gov. Kathy Hochul, a Democrat, also announced another expedited auction for offshore wind next year, a move that could allow developers of four troubled projects, including Sunrise Wind, to rebid.
Dominion is trying to remove some of the uncertainty with its new ship, Charybdis. Though it is months behind schedule and will cost the utility about 25% more than expected, executives said the 472-foot-long vessel would ultimately save the company time and money. That’s due to a federal law, the Jones Act, which requires that only domestically built, owned and staffed ships can operate in US waters.
Dominion said the ship would allow it to set up one turbine a day once installations began on the company’s 176-turbine project. That would be a big improvement from a pilot project Dominion undertook in 2020, when the company spent a year installing two offshore turbines. Because of the Jones Act, the company used European ships that it operated from a port in Nova Scotia, more than 800 miles away, slowing the project.
The Charybdis, which is being built in Brownsville, Texas, is about 70% complete, and Dominion expects to have it available for Orsted’s Revolution Wind project, near the CT coast. The ship would then move to Dominion’s project, which the company hopes to complete by the end of 2026.
Washington:
In early March, EPA announced that it would delay a regulation to require gas-burning power plants to cut their CO2 emissions and EPA may slow the pace at which car makers must comply with another regulation to reduce tailpipe emissions. EPA Administrator Michael Regan said that the changes would not affect the administration’s goal of cutting US emissions roughly in half by 2030.
Experts said the administration is making significant concessions due to industry opposition and public unease about the pace of the transition to EVs and renewable energy, as well as the threat of legal challenges before conservative courts. “There are two key factors: the Supreme Court, and the election,” said Jody Freeman, the director of the Harvard Law School Environmental and Energy Law Program and a former Obama White House official. “There are some adjustments needed for both,” she said. “You’ve got to make sure these final rules are legally defensible, and you’ve got to make sure you’ve done enough for the stakeholders that you have support for the rules.”
Emissions from automobiles and electric power generation account for more than half of the US GHG emissions. Thus, the rules designed to curb pollution from those sectors are key to addressing climate change.
In May 2023, EPA proposed an ambitious plan to reduce emissions from power plants. It targeted plants that burn coal and/or gas, which together produce the bulk of electricity in the US. To comply, these plants would have had to capture or eliminate at least 90% of their GHG emissions before 2040. Coal plants were required to meet those requirements by 2030. But, due to the pushback, the untested and high cost of the equipment necessary to remove CO2 from the atmosphere and the concerns of swing-state Democrats that the plan would produce higher electric bills for constituents and cause blackouts, EPA relented.
EPA’s modified plan will apply only to existing coal-burning plants and future gas-burning plants and not to gas plants currently operating. The regulation of operating gas plants will come later, after the November election.
Also in early March, the Biden administration issued new rules to prevent disasters at nearly 12,000 chemical plants and other US industrial sites that handle hazardous materials. The regulations for the first time require that facilities must address the threats posed by climate impacts such as storms or floods that could trigger an accidental release. Also, for the first time, chemical sites that have had prior accidents must undergo an independent audit and chemical plants must share more information regarding such threats with neighbors and emergency responders.
EPA estimates that more than 130 million people live within three miles of a site that handles hazardous chemicals that is covered by the new rule. In a “worst-case scenario” accident, more than 2,000 of those sites could endanger 100,000 people or more, according to a 2020 Congressional Research Service report. Eighty-three of those facilities could endanger more than a million people.
Former President Obama proposed safeguards after a deadly 2013 explosion at a fertilizer plant in Texas killed 15 people. The Trump administration rolled back most of those rules before they took effect. A coalition of environmental groups, national security experts and former military officials concerned with terrorist and other threats to chemical sites, have pushed EPA to require safeguards.
The American Chemistry Council, the chemical industry’s largest lobbying group, voiced its opposition saying safer technologies were “not simple to identify or implement” and that such rules “burden affected industries… .”
In mid-January, the Federal Emergency Management Agency stated that it is overhauling its disaster assistance programs. FEMA has been over-whelmed by the number, size and devastation of natural disasters and has faced years of criticism of its aid programs which experts have said are insufficient, too hard to access and disproportionately benefit wealthier and white Americans.
The changes, which are expected to take effect by the end of March 2024, include access to a quick $750 payment after evacuating a home and for other urgent needs, more housing assistance for people who can’t return home right away, easier access to money to repair and improve homes, and reduced paperwork.
Those changes would especially help renters and people with low incomes, according to Frank Matranga, who runs the agency’s aid programs. And because people in those groups are more likely to be people of color, the changes should address some of the racial inequity issues. About one million Americans each year receive some sort of direct aid from FEMA.
FEMA will create a new program called Displacement Assistance, to help people who need to stay in hotels, or with friends or family. Weather-related disasters forced more than 3.3 million American adults out of their homes in 2022, census data shows. Of those, at least 1.2 million were displaced for a month or longer.
FEMA is also ending one of its most criticized rules which requires disaster survivors seeking assistance to first apply, and be rejected, for a loan from the Small Business Administration, regardless of whether they own a small business.
Between 1992 and 2004, FEMA spent an average of about $5 billion annually from its disaster fund. Between 2005 and 2021, the average amount was about $12.5 billion annually and likely higher in 2022 and 2023. FEMA said it expected the new policies to increase federal disaster costs by $512 million a year.
Despite the Biden administration’s record spending to protect communities from weather shocks, the toll from disasters around the US is likely to keep growing. That’s not just because global emissions continue to rise, triggering more extreme weather, but also because Americans keep building homes in vulnerable places like coastlines, flood zones and fire-prone areas.
The recent changes reflect another fundamental shift, according to Craig Fugate, who led the agency during the Obama administration: The erosion of insurance. FEMA was intended to supplement insurance coverage. When disasters happened, people were expected to use their homeowners’ insurance, including government-provided flood insurance, to cover the cost. FEMA’s programs existed mainly to fill the gaps left by that insurance.
But, Mr. Fugate said, rising housing costs mean more people are renters. And rising insurance costs mean more people are uninsured or underinsured. As flooding becomes more common outside of designated flood zones, it’s hitting more people who don’t have flood insurance.
Also in mid-January, the Biden administration announced that it would curb the release of methane from oil and gas facilities, citing it as a potent GHG responsible for more than a quarter of the warming the planet is currently experiencing. For the first time, oil and gas companies would be required to pay a fee for emitting methane. The resulting penalties could total millions of dollars for the companies. Scientists say that reducing methane emissions is one of the most effective steps readily available to combat global warming and climate change.
The EPA is proposing to charge large energy producers $900 per ton of methane emissions that exceed levels set by the federal government, beginning this year. The fee would increase to $1,200 in 2025 and plateau in 2026 at $1,500 per ton. The proposed fees come as American gas and oil production have reached record levels. The proposed regulation is subject to a 45-day public comment period and may become final by spring 2024.
The fee is part two of the new methane restrictions the Biden administration is imposing on the oil and gas industry. In December 2023, (see Blog 54) EPA announced a new requirement that companies must detect and fix leaks of methane from wells, pipelines and storage facilities and that flaring will be banned except in emergencies. Congress authorized more than $1 billion in grants and other spending to help companies and communities improve methane monitoring and data collection, and to find and repair leaks.
The proposed fee was approved by Congress as part of a landmark climate law Biden signed in 2022. When finalized, it will be the first fee or tax on GHG emissions imposed by the federal government.
Dustin Meyer, senior VP for policy at the American Petroleum Institute, an industry group, said that the fee “creates an incoherent, confusing regulatory regime that will only stifle innovation and undermine our ability to meet rising energy demand.”
The new proposal relies on large energy producers to self-report if their methane emissions exceed levels set by Congress, with no provision for the government to verify that data. Environmental groups say that relying on oil and gas producers to report their own emissions is worrisome. Last year, a House committee issued a report that found methane leaks were most likely significantly higher than data reported by companies to the federal government.
Biden has set aggressive goals for combating climate change but recognizes the essential role that fossil fuels play in the global, and US, economy. Environmentalists felt betrayed when the administration approved the Willow Project in Alaska and is now concidering numerous other projects that could lock in carbon emissions for decades. One major project is Calcasieu Pass 2 (CP2), a proposed $10 billion export terminal situated on a shipping channel that connects the Gulf of Mexico to Lake Charles, LA.
The US is a global leader in hydraulic fracturing (fracking). Technological breakthroughs have unlocked huge reserves of natural gas, transforming the country’s energy landscape. US exports are expected to grow by more than 50% in the coming years.
Supporters of the project argue that it would be a boon for the US economy and help Europe decrease its reliance on gas imported from Russia. They also claim that because burning natural gas produces fewer planet-warming emissions than burning coal, the project is a good thing for the climate.
Opponents, including scientists, say that CP2 would lock in decades of additional GHG emissions, the main driver of climate change. They add that the project would be harmful to residents as well as the fragile ecosystems and aquatic life in the Gulf of Mexico. Natural gas is primarily composed of methane, which may be cleaner than coal when it is burned, but which involves considerable amounts of leaked methane all along the supply chain, from the production wellhead to processing plants to the stovetop. The process of liquefying gas to make it suitable for transport is energy intensive, creating yet more emissions.
The final decision will be made by the Energy Department based on whether the export terminal is in the “public interest,” a subjective determination that could have far-reaching consequences for the country’s natural gas industry.
The decision forces the Biden administration to confront the fundamental contradiction that exists when trying to wean the country off fossil fuels to combat climate change while also supporting the enormously profitable fossil fuel industry. The US agreed at COP 28 In Dubai in December 2023 to transition away from fossil fuels, but the US is producing record amounts of crude oil, is the leading exporter of LNG and must decide the fate of 17 export facilities, including CP2. Plus, Biden must defend against Republican accusations that he is harming American energy development, in an election year.
“There is increasing public recognition that this project and others stand as the biggest new carbon sources in the world, and this is in the wake of an iconic global agreement that it is time to transition away from fossil fuels,” said Manish Bapna, chief executive of the Natural Resources Defense Council. “This disconnect is capturing the public’s imagination and outrage.”
A recent study by Robert Howarth, a professor of ecology and environmental biology at Cornell, concluded that the emissions associated with exporting natural gas could be 24% to 274% greater than those associated with burning coal. Mr. Howarth’s analysis adds to a growing body of research showing natural gas is just as damaging as coal, the dirtiest fossil fuel, in terms of climate impacts.
Charif Souki, former chief executive officer of Cheniere Energy, said “Maybe you can find a case where the use of LNG is terrible with methane emissions or where an LNG facility could be worse than coal,” “But that’s the exception, not the rule.”
The Energy Department has never rejected a proposed natural gas project because of its projected environmental impact. But activists are petitioning the Biden administration to use a new methodology called the “full life cycle” of GHG emissions associated with building and operating the terminal, including how much methane leaks when the natural gas is extracted and transported to the terminal, and the emissions associated with shipping the gas.
Should the Energy Department use such a framework and reject CP2, activists see an opportunity for a far broader victory than simply killing one infrastructure project. Such a ruling could effectively end all new plans to export US natural gas.
In early March, the SEC approved new rules detailing if and how public companies should disclose climate risks and how much GHG emissions they produce. The new rules contain fewer demands on businesses than the original proposal made about two years ago which faced Republican and fossil fuel industry backlash. The new rules require corporations to inform investors of their GHG emissions as well as business risks from floods, rising temperatures and weather disasters. The new rule no longer requires the disclosure of the “value chain,” which had included emissions from all the parts or services from other suppliers and how people who use the products ultimately dispose of them.
The rule only applies to large companies and only to the emissions they directly produce and only if the companies deem such emissions “material” or significantly important to their bottom lines. Covered companies no longer need state the climate expertise of its board of directors.
A West Virginia attorney general, Patrick Morrisey, said that his state and eight others (GA, AL, AK, IN, OK, SC, WY and VA) planned to challenge the new rules in the US Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit.
The SEC has said the new rules met investors’ demands for better, more comparable data on emissions and risks than what companies voluntarily include in their sustainability reports, which are difficult to verify.
The increasing number and impacts of climate disasters are taking a rising toll on people and businesses around the world, disrupting supply chains and damaging crops. In 2023, the US experienced a record 28 climate impacts each causing at least $1 billion, according to the NOAA. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said last year that losses tied to climate change “cascade through the financial system.”
The top Republican on the Senate’s banking committee, Tim Scott of South Carolina, said: “The last time I checked, the S.E.C. is a securities regulator that does not employ climate scientists, and it clearly has acted without regard to the onerous burdens placed on businesses of all sizes.”
The views expressed above are my own – Carl Howard, Co-chair, Global Climate Change Committee. Teraine Okpoko assisted in the Facts on the Ground section.