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A weekly aggregation of ecological and climate events occurring around the world.
This is the GaiaGram, environmental headlines from around a planet in crisis.
Kevin Gallagher:According to CoreLogic, hurricane Milton is expected to have damaged or destroyed up to 500,000 homes in Florida, with replacement costs reaching $85,000,000,000. Most of the affected homes are located in the Tampa area and nearby regions where nearly 4,000,000 people live. Many are still without power. A new report published in Bioscience warns that the world is facing a climate emergency of unprecedented magnitude. The 2024 state of the climate report by an international team of scientists presents alarming evidence that climate change is accelerating at a perilous rate.
Kevin Gallagher:Among the authors key findings were record breaking temperatures and sea levels in 2023, annual energy related emissions exceeding 40 gigatons of carbon dioxide equivalent for the first time on record, and accelerating loss of ice sheets and glaciers, and rising frequency of $1,000,000,000 climate related disasters. Antarctica's glaciers are in serious trouble. While ice melting is nothing new, harmful carbon pollution is speeding up the process. A new study from Dartmouth College scientists posted in phys.org projects how harmful carbon pollution can impact ice loss in Antarctica over the next 300 years. The results show that ice loss will gradually increase through the end of the century, but the pace of the loss dramatically increases after 21100.
Kevin Gallagher:Pesticides aren't always necessary. Researchers at University of Zurich have conducted a comprehensive field study showing that damage from herbivores can be reduced by using biodiversity within a plant species. Different plant genotypes can operate to help fend off plant eating insects. The study is published in the journal Natural Communications. The New York Times writes that a new study shows that the United States continues to emit more planet warming methane each year despite international efforts to curb the pollution.
Kevin Gallagher:So what's happening? Kayrros, an environmental data company, released findings at fossil fuel facilities where large quantities of
Kevin Gallagher:methane are intentionally burned off and released into the Earth's atmosphere.
Kevin Gallagher:This is known as burned off and released into the Earth's atmosphere. This is known as flaring and venting. The company found that the US is releasing more methane in the atmosphere than before. And according to the Times, the concentration of methane in the atmosphere is now over 2 and a half times as much as pre industrial levels. Over half of methane pollution is human made.
Kevin Gallagher:Utah's Great Salt Lake, dubbed America's Dead Sea, is the largest saltwater lake in the Western Hemisphere. But scientists say its days may be numbered. Already, 2 thirds of the lake's surface has been lost in the last 40 years as a result of climate change and the overuse of water by agriculture and industry. But despite the impending environmental disaster, getting many locals to accept climate change is to blame in the conservative state has proved the challenge for political campaigners who fear what another Donald Trump presidency would mean for the future of the lake. India's finance minister has denounced the EU's planned carbon tax on imports as an arbitrary trade barrier that will hurt the world's fastest growing large economy and other industrializing nations.
Kevin Gallagher:India said that the EU carbon border adjustment mechanism, CBAM, under which tariffs are to be levied from 2026, would impede developing countries' transition away from fossil fuels by making the change harder to fund. According to a recent Pew poll found in Time Magazine, only 12% of Republicans compared to 59% of Democrats believe that dealing with climate change should be a top priority for the president and the Congress, showing that the GOP wants to go beyond its usual aims of bolstering fossil fuel production and eliminating environmental regulations. Republican resistance is increasingly evolving into shrewd strategies focused on dismantling climate education and advocacy programs and even promoting disinformation, like US congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene's recent claim that the government can control the weather.
Harry Minot:This was the GaiaGram, environmental headlines from around a planet in crisis.