Most recent 40 articles: Yale Climate Connections - Science
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What it was like to be a volunteer firefighter during the 2023 Canada fires - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Nov 28) |
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Nov 28 · Stay in the know about climate impacts and solutions. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Yale Climate Connections
In late May, the volunteer fire department in Upper Tantallon, Nova Scotia, received reports of a brush fire in the heavily wooded Halifax suburb.
Station captain Cole Jean and his six-man crew took off for the scene.
Jean: “We could immediately see the large volume of smoke - heavy black and gray smoke … and as we kind of got a little closer, we could finally see the full extent of what we were walking into.”
The fire quickly expanded into a huge inferno that raged for more than a week, destroying more than 150 homes.
It was one of ... Read more ...
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Scientists show direct link between polluting companies and wildfires in North America - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Nov 27) |
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Nov 27 · Stay in the know about climate impacts and solutions. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Yale Climate Connections
In recent decades, wildfires have scorched forests in the western U.S. and Canada. By contributing to climate change, the world’s biggest carbon polluters made those fires far more destructive - and new research shows by just how much.
Pablo Ortiz-Partida of the Union of Concerned Scientists says carbon pollution is making the region hotter and drier, which creates more fuel for fires.
Ortiz-Partida: “It’s these hot and dry conditions that enable wildfires to burn more forest area.”
His team found that nearly 40% of the area burned by ... Read more ...
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Eight key takeaways from the new National Climate Assessment - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Nov 20) |
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Nov 20 · Stay in the know about climate impacts and solutions. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Yale Climate Connections
The U.S. has made progress in reducing heat-trapping carbon pollution, but extreme weather caused by climate change is harming U.S. residents in every region, according to the National Climate Assessment released in November 2023.
Here are eight things to know about the report.
The Global Change Research Act, passed in 1990, mandates that the U.S. Global Change Research Program should deliver a comprehensive climate report to “understand, assess, predict, and respond to human-induced and natural processes of global change” every four years or so. ... Read more ...
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Climate change made Libya flooding up to 50 times more likely, 50% more intense - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Sep 27) |
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Sep 27 · Stay in the know about climate impacts and solutions. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Yale Climate Connections
International scientists announced Tuesday, September 19, that an event like the extreme rain that led to deadly flooding in Libya earlier this month “has become up to 50 times more likely and up to 50% more intense compared to a 1.2°C cooler climate,” or the preindustrial world.
Those were among the findings of a World Weather Attribution analysis of torrential rainfall in several countries across the Mediterranean during the first two weeks of September, conducted by researchers from Germany, Greece, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, ... Read more ...
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Sea level rise varies from place to place. Why? - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Sep 19) |
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Sep 19 · Stay in the know about climate impacts and solutions. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Yale Climate Connections
As the climate warms, coastal communities are faced with sea level rise. But some are seeing faster rates than others.
For example, in Los Angeles, local sea level rise measures only about 1 millimeter per year. But on the coast of Louisiana, it’s about 6 millimeters a year.
“There’s a couple reasons why the rates of relative sea level rise are just very different along the United States coastline,” says William Sweet of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
He says some parts of the ocean are naturally higher because local ... Read more ...
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Limiting warming to 1.5 degrees C would save half the world’s glaciers, study finds - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Aug 15) |
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Aug 15 · Stay in the know about climate impacts and solutions. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Yale Climate Connections
Mountains around the world are home to glaciers, massive rivers of ice and snow carved into the rugged terrain.
But as the climate warms, many of those glaciers are melting quickly - and some may already be doomed to melt away entirely.
“We found that the glaciers are losing a significant amount of mass and that it’s really controlled by the amount of temperature increase that we see in the future,” says David Rounce, an environmental engineer at Carnegie Mellon University.
He and his colleagues recently found that if the world warms four ... Read more ...
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Scientists investigate the climate impact of airborne dust - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Jul 24) |
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Jul 24 · Stay in the know about climate impacts and solutions. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Yale Climate Connections
Large areas of the Earth are covered with sand. And it’s not all a yellowish-beige.
Natalie Mahowald, a professor in the department of Earth and atmospheric sciences at Cornell University, says that depending on its mineral composition, that sand can vary in color.
“It can be black or red, or it can be white, really different colors,” she says.
She says those colors affect the climate. When desert sand gets kicked up into the air, tiny dust particles end up suspended in the atmosphere.
There, some particles reflect the sun’s energy, ... Read more ...
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Conservationists and farmers work together to restore the Colorado River Delta - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Jul 11) |
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Jul 11 · Stay in the know about climate impacts and solutions. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Yale Climate Connections
[Leer en español]
One hundred years ago, the Colorado River Delta in northwestern Mexico was an area rich in wildlife and vegetation. But for decades, U.S. states have consumed most of the river’s water, leaving little to reach the delta. Combined with the effects of climate change, the area today looks more like a desert than a delta.
That started to change, however, with recent efforts to bring more water into the delta and plant native tree species. Carolina del Rosario Sánchez Gastélum is the director of agroecology at Restauremos el ... Read more ...
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Global warming is disrupting humanity’s 'Goldilocks zone’ on Earth - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Jun 28) |
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Jun 28 · Stay in the know about climate impacts and solutions. Subscribe to our weekly newsletter.
Yale Climate Connections
Like Baby Bear’s porridge to Goldilocks, for thousands of years, the climate over much of the planet was neither too hot nor too cold but “just right.” Those ideal conditions enabled people to develop advanced agriculture, build cities, and invent industry and advanced technology.
But after relatively stable surface temperatures during the past 7,000 years, global warming is now rapidly disrupting the reliable climate that allowed humanity to flourish.
Two dangerous consequences of the fast changes were described in a new study published in the ... Read more ...
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Is climate change affecting the polar vortex? - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Feb 01, 2023) |
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Feb 01, 2023 · Yale Climate Connections
In 2021, a cold wave swept across the U.S., bringing freezing temperatures as far south as Texas. Millions of people lost power, and hundreds died.
Yale Climate Connections meteorologist Bob Henson says this cold wave was caused by disruptions to the polar vortex.
“The polar vortex is a loop of winds that encircles the North Pole. This loop of winds can stretch. It can break into two pieces across the course of a winter,” he says. “So the polar vortex stretched pretty dramatically, and that allowed cold air to be funneled from the Arctic down into the United States well into Texas.”
Some scientists suggest this stretching is happening ... Read more ...
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Smartphone apps help rural Alaskans monitor effects of warming climate - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Jan 13, 2023) |
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Jan 13, 2023 · Yale Climate Connections
Global warming is bringing rapid change to Alaska. Glaciers are melting, sea ice is receding, and stream temperatures are rising.
“And the people of Alaska, especially Alaska Natives, this land is their livelihood. It is their lifestyle. It is their culture,” says Nyssa Russell of the Northern Latitudes Partnerships.
The group is working with the Aleut Community of Saint Paul Island to expand the Indigenous Sentinels Network - an effort to monitor changing conditions in the state.
“Alaska is huge, and there is a need to have that local data and observations from these rural areas that are just vastly underserved,” she says.
The ... Read more ...
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Video examines issues involving jet stream role in extreme weather - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Nov 18, 2022) |
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Nov 18, 2022 · Yale Climate Connections
Turn on practically any storm-driven local TV weather forecast these days, and chances are you’ll encounter more and more references to the “jet stream.”
But why? And what exactly is the jet stream, and what, if any, is its connection to extreme weather events, be they drought, extreme heat, wildfires, or flooding?
“It’s hard to find examples of major weather events from last year that aren’t related to the jet stream,” PBS producer and host of “PBS Terra” Maiya May says in a new Yale Climate Connections video, produced by independent videographer Peter Sinclair.
Climate models may be “too conservative” on impacts of the jet stream ... Read more ...
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Climate change is making rainfall during hurricanes more extreme - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Oct 03, 2022) |
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Oct 03, 2022 · Yale Climate Connections
During a hurricane, torrential rains can cause dangerous flooding. Roads turn into rivers, and stranded residents flee to their rooftops.
Stephanie Herring of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says that as the climate warms, rainfall during hurricanes is growing more extreme.
“It is likely that greenhouse warming is going to cause hurricanes in the coming century to be more intense globally and have those higher rainfall rates than present day hurricanes,” she says.
Herring explains that the warming atmosphere can hold more water. She compares it to a sponge.
“In a cooler atmosphere, the sponge can only hold so ... Read more ...
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We all love trees, but they’re not the climate solution we need - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Sep 25, 2022) |
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Sep 25, 2022 · Yale Climate Connections
Science magazine in the summer of 2019 printed a report suggesting that foresting 0.9 billion hectares (3.47 million square miles) of currently non-forested land would absorb carbon dioxide and combat global warming. The authors had not mentioned in that article that their intention was for this approach to be in addition to curbing the rate of fossil fuel combustion, not instead of it.
Big difference.
Soon afterward, President Trump and other Republican leaders started talking about planting “a trillion trees” to combat climate change … again with no mention whatsoever of curbing emissions.
Seeing this happen, Tom Crowther, one of ... Read more ...
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Studying hurricanes at sea to save lives on shore - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Sep 23, 2022) |
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Sep 23, 2022 · Yale Climate Connections
(Editor’s note: A Saildrone has gathered live footage from inside Category 4 Hurricane Fiona as it threatens Atlantic Canada.)
NOAA oceanographer Greg Foltz knew it was going to be a long night last fall when he saw Hurricane Sam's trajectory. Glued to the National Hurricane Center data, Foltz, who works in NOAA’s Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory in Miami, examined the storm’s tracking and intensity and conducted an analysis of the satellite images and data.
He needed to estimate the hurricane’s trajectory over the next 12-24 hours so he could position his instruments. He wasn’t trying to pull his costly equipment away ... Read more ...
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The climate cost of space tourism - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Sep 08, 2022) |
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Sep 08, 2022 · Yale Climate Connections
As billionaires race to space, they could harm the climate back here on Earth.
Eloise Marais is an associate professor at University College London and co-author of a recent study on the climate impact of rocket launches.
She says that some rockets use carbon-based fuels that produce heat-trapping greenhouse gases when burned.
“There are also other kinds of byproducts that contribute to climate change,” she says. “Water vapor is produced by some of the rockets, and that is a strong greenhouse gas as well. But there are also other pollutants that aren’t necessarily classified as greenhouse gases, like black carbon or soot. And those ... Read more ...
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These recent pieces take a 'big picture’ look at the climate challenge - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Sep 02, 2022) |
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Sep 02, 2022 · Yale Climate Connections
Sometimes it’s best to focus on specifics, as when we weigh what we can do about climate change as individuals. But sometimes we should also update our grasp of the bigger picture. The articles below provide especially good current overviews for several major topics.
On public opinion in US: “Climate change actions are far more popular than people in U.S. realize,” Robin Lloyd, Scientific American.
On extreme weather: “Revealed: how climate breakdown is supercharging toll of extreme weather,” Damian Carrington, The Guardian. And here’s the data from Carbon Brief that informs this article, in the form of a world map with lots of links: ... Read more ...
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Our imaginations can help create new climate possibilities - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Aug 09, 2022) |
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Aug 09, 2022 · Yale Climate Connections
Storytelling can help us imagine different versions of our shared future. For example, Kim Stanley Robinson’s novel Ministry for the Future describes a world where an oppressive heatwave in India – bearing uncanny resemblance to recent events – spurs unprecedented action on climate change. In that storyline, climate damages result in societal tipping points, leading to transformation.
Though fictional, the book raises a very real question: Can the human capacity to imagine alternate climate futures actually help generate new, more hopeful realities?
In particular, the researchers studied the shift from the acceptability of a 2°C future to ... Read more ...
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Tweaking cows’ diets can reduce climate-warming pollution - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Jul 27, 2022) |
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Jul 27, 2022 · Yale Climate Connections
New York is one of the largest dairy-producing states in the nation. It’s home to more than 600,000 dairy cows.
But Jenifer Wightman, a senior extension associate at Cornell University, says cows create more than milk. They also produce methane, a climate-warming gas.
“The majority of New York state agricultural emissions are methane,” she says.
Decomposing manure releases the gas. So do the microbes in the cow’s gut as they break down grass and other plant material.
The methane is then released to the atmosphere from the burps and farts of the cow.
But tweaking a cow’s diet can cut those emissions by up to 40%, according ... Read more ...
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The volcanic eruption in Alaska that rocked ancient Egypt - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Jul 18, 2022) |
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Jul 18, 2022 · Yale Climate Connections
Cleopatra wouldn’t have seen the clouds of ash darken the sky from her throne in Alexandria, but the effects of the eruption of an Alaskan volcano rippled through Egypt and the rest of the ancient world in 43 BCE.
We are part of an interdisciplinary research team that is detailing the fingerprints of that eruption, which set a series of global climate changes in motion during the first century BCE, one of the most critical political transition periods in the history of Western civilization.
Our work is revealing how a single event occurring at a specific location can trigger a powerful cascade of changes that can unravel across continents ... Read more ...
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Army Corps of Engineers invests in natural solutions to reduce flooding - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Jul 07, 2022) |
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Jul 07, 2022 · Yale Climate Connections
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has long worked to manage waterways and protect communities from flooding. Historically, it did so by relying on manmade structures like levees and dams.
But the Corps has also started investing in nature-based solutions to provide protection from rising seas and increasingly extreme weather.
“So moving away from, say, a traditional levee system or a flood wall to look for opportunities where nature can offer the same level of engineering protection and reduced risk,” says Jeffrey King of the Army Corps’ Engineering with Nature program.
In Florida, New Jersey, and elsewhere, the agency is using dredged ... Read more ...
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New manufacturing process stores carbon pollution in concrete - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Jun 28, 2022) |
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Jun 28, 2022 · Yale Climate Connections
Look around, and you’ll see concrete everywhere - in buildings, parking garages, and sidewalks.
Producing all that concrete releases a lot of carbon pollution because it’s made with cement.
“On a global scale, if you’re looking at various industrial sectors, cement has one of the largest emission footprints of the industrial sectors,” says John Northington, director of the National Carbon Capture Center in Alabama.
The facility, which is run by Southern Company, was established by the Department of Energy to test new technologies that can capture and store carbon pollution.
It recently tested a process that was developed by a ... Read more ...
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New study offers a glimmer of hope for climate solutions success - Yale Climate Connections - Science (May 24, 2022) |
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May 24, 2022 · Yale Climate Connections
The vast majority of climate modeling studies treat human behavior as an external, unpredictable factor. They have projected how the climate would change in a variety of possible greenhouse gas emissions pathways, but have not evaluated the likelihood of those pathways.
That approach informs the public and policymakers about what climate paths they should follow in order to achieve the best outcomes for human society and other species, but it does not provide information about which of the nearly infinite possible paths societies most likely will follow. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) uses scenarios ranging from less than 2 ... Read more ...
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Recent readings on climate 'doomerism’ and science - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Apr 22, 2022) |
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Apr 22, 2022 · Yale Climate Connections
Are we doomed? Is it “too late” to do anything about climate change?
No, we aren’t doomed, and no, it’s not too late.
Certainly we hear plenty of bad news concerning the warming climate, and naturally many (most?) have moments of exhaustion, discouragement, and even paralyzing despair. But there are good scientific reasons to reject our “doomer” thoughts. Here are a few of these reasons and articles about them.
1. “Doomerism” mistakes a spectrum for a duality, many options for just two, a complex field of possibilities for an either-or choice: We fix everything or we’re all toast. Once you think about this, it’s obvious: the lines and ... Read more ...
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Aboard MOSAiC: Hardy fish, powerful waves, shrinking ice floes - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Apr 13, 2022) |
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Apr 13, 2022 · Yale Climate Connections
Hundreds of researchers from around the globe took turns collecting data in the Arctic aboard the German icebreaker RV Polarstern on an expedition that lasted over a year. Now, this data is rewarding the researchers with important and surprising insights about this vast, mysterious region that is warming more than twice as fast as Earth as a whole.
They found Atlantic cod and squid swimming much farther north than thought possible. They saw powerful waves smash the Arctic ice with a force that carried the water into the floes for miles. And they were surprised by how quickly their ship made its transit through the receding Arctic ice.
More ... Read more ...
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NASA mission will monitor air pollution - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Apr 12, 2022) |
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Apr 12, 2022 · Yale Climate Connections
A NASA satellite mission aims to help scientists investigate not what’s happening on Mars or in the Milky Way but right here on Earth, in the air we breathe.
“It’s a public health mission,” says Yang Liu of Emory University. “It’s designed to have this societal benefit at its core.”
Liu is on the team of international scientists and health experts working on the NASA-led MAIA mission.
The group is developing technology that will be launched into orbit – likely next year – to monitor air pollution in more than 10 cities around the world.
The equipment will observe how tiny air pollution particles reflect or absorb light. ... Read more ...
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What causes spring floods? - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Mar 31, 2022) |
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Mar 31, 2022 · Yale Climate Connections
Spring is flood season for much of the U.S. From the Pacific Northwest to New England, melting snow combines with spring rains to raise water levels in rivers, lakes, and streams. Sometimes, a perfect storm of factors creates a major flood.
Everything from soil to snowpack to overnight temperature plays a role in how significant a spring flood may be. Because so many different elements are involved, predicting flood risk in a given year can be difficult. As climate change influences many of those variables, prediction may get even more difficult.
“If you are missing a certain ingredient, you go from just having some nuisance flooding to ... Read more ...
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The state of Arctic ice – and why it matters - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Feb 24, 2022) |
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Feb 24, 2022 · Yale Climate Connections
Between 1979 and 2016, Earth’s cryosphere – the planet’s frozen water – decreased by around 87,000 square kilometers (33,590 square miles of ice) per year, according to a 2021 study in Earth’s Future. The researchers examined data sets for snow cover, sea ice, and “near-surface frozen soils” to come to this conclusion.
The scientists determined that the cryosphere lost an average of 102,000 square kilometers (39,300 square miles) in the Northern hemisphere in each of those years, and gained around 15,000 square kilometers (5,790 square miles) in the Southern hemisphere annually. This Antarctic increase is largely the result of more sea ice in ... Read more ...
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What the latest science says about Antarctica and sea-level rise - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Feb 23, 2022) |
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Feb 23, 2022 · Yale Climate Connections
As the Earth’s climate warms, sea levels are rising, threatening to swallow coastlines and flood low-lying cities. Scientists are working to understand how much and how quickly seas could rise in coming decades – and Antarctica is one wild card.
Here are some of scientists’ most important findings from 2021 about the changes occurring in and around the world’s coldest continent.
More than 97% of Antarctica is covered in ice. With a depth of up to three miles, the continent’s 6 million cubic miles of ice contain 70% of Earth’s fresh water. If all of that ice melted, the world’s oceans would rise by 200 feet (61 meters), enough to inundate ... Read more ...
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Scientists agree: Climate change is real and caused by people - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Feb 17, 2022) |
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Feb 17, 2022 · Yale Climate Connections
The scientific consensus that climate change is happening and that it is human-caused is strong. Scientific investigation of global warming began in the 19th century, and by the early 2000s, this research began to coalesce into confidence about the reality, causes, and general range of adverse effects of global warming. This conclusion was drawn from studying air and ocean temperatures, the atmosphere’s composition, satellite records, ice cores, modeling, and more.
In 1988 the United Nations and World Meteorological Organization founded the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC, to provide regular updates on the scientific evidence on ... Read more ...
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Utah ski resorts see declining snow quality and shorter seasons - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Jan 27, 2022) |
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Jan 27, 2022 · Yale Climate Connections
Many skiers enjoy Utah’s light, fluffy snow. The state claims to have the greatest snow on Earth.
“Skiers tend to like plowing through this waist-deep or knee-deep powder because it’s soft. It’s easy to fall in,” says Jordan Smith, director of the Institute of Outdoor Recreation and Tourism at Utah State University.
He says as the climate changes, Utah’s snow is changing, too, in quantity and quality.
His team reviewed about 40 years of temperature data. They found that many Utah resorts are warming even faster than global averages. And daily low temperatures are rising faster than daily highs during the ski season, so it’s just not ... Read more ...
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Peat bogs will release more heat-trapping gases as global warming continues, researchers find - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Dec 14, 2021) |
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Dec 14, 2021 · Yale Climate Connections
In bogs and swamps, thousands of years of partly decayed plant matter has accumulated into carbon-rich soil called peat.
“Around one-third of all the soil carbon on Earth is stored in these peatlands, says Joel Kostka, a microbiologist at Georgia Institute of Technology.
But he worries that global warming could turn these carbon storehouses into sources of carbon pollution.
“The fear is that, as climate warms … that will stimulate microbes to break down that soil carbon and release greenhouse gases,” he says.
So Kostka’s team has been studying a peat bog in northern Minnesota.
His team found that after two years, the ... Read more ...
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Iceland facility sucks carbon dioxide from air, turns it into rock - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Dec 02, 2021) |
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Dec 02, 2021 · Yale Climate Connections
In Iceland, a new facility called Orca is pulling carbon dioxide out of the air so it can be stored underground.
Adelaide Calbry-Muzyka says the approach is critical to solving climate change.
“At the rate we’re going, we’re going to need to be removing CO2 from the air as well as reducing our emissions,” she says.
Calbry-Muzyka is an engineer at Climeworks, the company that owns Orca. She says the facility is powered by geothermal energy – heat from within the Earth – instead of fossil fuels.
At the facility, fans push air into filters, which trap carbon dioxide. When heated, the filters release the gas so it can be mixed with ... Read more ...
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The ins and outs of understanding what’s in a degree - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Nov 30, 2021) |
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Nov 30, 2021 · Yale Climate Connections
Those paying attention to international climate negotiations are familiar with the emphasis on degrees of global warming.
The hoped-for or “aspirational” goal is to keep the average temperature rise above pre-industrial times to 1.5º C; the “official” goal is for no more than 2º C; 3º C is not out of the question; and 4º C or 5º C or 6º C are plain terrifying.
What do these numbers mean in practical terms? (Keep in mind that each degree Celsius is 1.8 degrees F.)
If you have time for just one quick piece, this is a good overview from Lauren Sommer at NPR. It includes an especially understandable chart about extreme heat ... Read more ...
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October 2021: Earth’s fourth-warmest October on record - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Nov 15, 2021) |
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Nov 15, 2021 · Yale Climate Connections
October 2021 was Earth’s fourth-warmest October since global record-keeping began in 1880, 0.89 degree Celsius (1.60°F) above the 20th-century average, NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information, NCEI, reported November 15. NASA also reported October 2021 as the fourth-warmest October on record, 1.23 degrees Celsius (2.21°F) above the 1880-1920 period, which is its best estimate for when preindustrial temperatures occurred. Minor differences in rankings between the two agencies result from the different ways they treat data-sparse regions such as the Arctic.
As has been the case for much of 2021, the heat was focused more on land areas ... Read more ...
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What you need to know about hydrogen – cure-all, or just another wild wish? - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Nov 04, 2021) |
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Nov 04, 2021 · Yale Climate Connections
You’ve likely heard about the potential for hydrogen to provide renewable, carbon-free energy. But how realistic are the possibilities? Where are things now on developing, or avoiding, them? Is it a panacea or a boondoggle, or something between?
First, what about all those color names for hydrogen? Green, blue, and gray are the main ones to remember: Green is by far the best for the climate.
For the big picture, you might read the Economist’s very thorough and readable discussion: Non-subscribers can sign up for a few free reads per month, and this one is worth the small effort to do so. “Creating the new hydrogen economy is a massive ... Read more ...
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Good readings for getting up to speed on methane - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Oct 21, 2021) |
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Oct 21, 2021 · Yale Climate Connections
That methane is a powerful greenhouse gas is not news for many readers of this site. But it is newly prominent, both as a significant contributor to recent warming (causing some 25% of it, even more in this century) and as a target for minimizing future warming.
The main ingredient in natural gas and more than eighty times stronger than carbon dioxide as a heat-trapper, methane stays in the atmosphere for only about a decade. This short life span makes it second fiddle to carbon dioxide as a leading concern. But it also means that significant cuts to methane emissions are by far our best early bet for slowing down changes to our climate while the ... Read more ...
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September 2021: Earth’s 5th-warmest September on record - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Oct 14, 2021) |
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Oct 14, 2021 · Yale Climate Connections
September 2021 was Earth’s fifth-warmest September since global record-keeping began in 1880, 0.90 degree Celsius (1.62°F) above the 20th-century average (and just 0.04 degree Celsius below the record held jointly by 2020, 2019, 2016, and 2015), NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information, NCEI, reported October 14. NASA reported September 2021 as the second-warmest September on record, 1.16 degrees Celsius (2.09°F) above the 1880-1920 period, which is its best estimate of preindustrial temperature. Minor differences in rankings between the two agencies result from the different ways they treat data-sparse regions such as the ... Read more ...
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Ben Santer on 'separating’ and his 'small part’ in understanding of climate science - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Oct 12, 2021) |
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Oct 12, 2021 · Yale Climate Connections
Separating is hard. I’ve spent most of my scientific career trying to separate observed climate records into human-caused signals and the background noise of natural variability. It’s been challenging and fascinating work. Challenging because so many different human and natural factors affect Earth’s climate. Each factor varies in space and time. We’ll never have perfect understanding of these variations.
It’s been fascinating work because science is ultimately about learning. Since the late 1970s, scientists have learned to recognize the characteristic fingerprints of human and natural influences on climate. Through this work, we know that ... Read more ...
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Democratizing the approach to geoengineering the climate - Yale Climate Connections - Science (Oct 07, 2021) |
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Oct 07, 2021 · Yale Climate Connections
As efforts to stay within international goals for global warming continue, so too is talk about geoengineering. The Yale Law, Ethics & Animals Program's Jack McCordick spoke with second-year Yale Law student Lexi Smith about the issue.
Smith, a LEAP fellow, graduated from Harvard with a B.A. in environmental science and public policy, and then worked as an advisor to then-Boston Mayor Marty Walsh to help update the city’s Climate Action Plan, help with its Community Choice Energy program, and help expand its food waste composting efforts. She currently is researching the use of cost-benefit analysis on potential geoengineering projects, with a ... Read more ...
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