NickB79
NickB79's JournalWinter isn't coming: climate change hits Greek olive crop
https://phys.org/news/2023-11-winter-isnt-climate-greek-olive.ampAthanassios Molassiotis, an agronomist and head of the arboriculture lab of Thessaloniki's Aristotelio University, said his team recorded an increase in temperature of two degrees during October, November and December 2022 compared to a year earlier.
This affected the olive buds "because we know that the tree bears fruit after cold winters, especially the Halkidiki variety, which has high requirements at low temperatures in winter," he said.
"We found that in many trees, there was no flowering and therefore no fruit afterwards," Molassiotis said.
Chill hours are a common requirement for many fruiting trees. Something similar happened to Georgia's peach crop.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2023/06/06/georgias-peach-crops-2023-suffers/70293494007/
New maps show where snowfall is disappearing
https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2023/11/25/weather/snowfall-temperatures-climate-change-water/index.html—
Snowfall is declining globally as temperatures warm because of human-caused climate change, a new analysis and maps from a NOAA climate scientist show.
But less snow falling from the sky isn’t as innocuous as just having to shovel less; it threatens to reinforce warming, and disrupt food and water for billions of people.
Climate scientists say the future of snowfall is pretty clear: A warmer world driven by human pollution means precipitation is more likely to fall as rain than snow, all else being equal.
Just started to get a few flakes today here (Twin Cities, MN).
I remember deer hunting as a kid 30 yr ago in November, it was a lot easier to follow a blood trail with a few inches of the white stuff on the ground.
Large amounts of carbon capture as a solution is an 'illusion' - IEA
https://electrek.co/2023/11/23/large-amounts-of-carbon-capture-as-a-solution-is-an-illusion-iea/The IEA also points out that carbon capture can’t be used as a linchpin by the fossil fuel industry to maintain the status quo. If oil and natural gas consumption were to evolve as projected under today’s policy settings, limiting the temperature rise to 1.5C would require an “entirely inconceivable” 32 billion tonnes of carbon captured for utilization or storage by 2050, including 23 billion tonnes via direct air capture.
The amount of electricity needed to power these technologies would be greater than the entire world’s electricity demand today.
Poll: Gun ownership reaches record high with American electorate
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/shows/meetthepress/blog/rcna126037That's the highest share of voters who say that they or someone in their household owns a gun in the history of the NBC News poll, on a question dating back to 1999.
In 2019, 46% of Americans said that they or someone in their household owned a gun, per an NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll. And in February 2013, that share was 42%.
"In the last ten years, we've grown [10 points] in gun ownership. That's a very stunning number," said Micah Roberts of Public Opinion Strategies, a Republican polling firm that co-conducted the poll with members of the Democratic polling firm Hart Research.
Walking has plummeted across America
https://www.axios.com/2023/11/16/walking-americans-declines-mapWhy it matters: Walking is good for us.
That's true both on an individual level (thanks to the many health benefits it confers) and in the big-picture climate change sense (given that it's the OG form of zero-emissions travel).
Driving the news: The number of annual average daily walking trips dropped a whopping 36% in the contiguous U.S. between 2019 and 2022, per a new StreetLight Data report.
"In every metro and state that StreetLight analyzed, walking trips declined over the three-year period by at least 20%," per the report.
This is a serious problem. Walking is the easiest way to stay healthy both physically and mentally.
Looks like the IDF found a dead hostage at Al Shifa
https://m.jpost.com/breaking-news/article-773615Sad. She was a grandmother battling cancer when she was taken.
2 degrees, 40 feet: Scientists who study Earth's ice say we could be committed to disastrous sea level rise
https://news.yahoo.com/2-degrees-40-feet-scientists-161213079.htmlA report released Thursday from the International Cryosphere Climate Initiative, a network of policy experts and researchers, pleads with world leaders to heed their warnings as they gather for the United Nations’ COP28 climate conference later this month. The report says if global average temperatures settle at 2 degrees Celsius above the preindustrial baseline, the planet could be committed to more than 40 feet of sea-level rise — a melt that would take centuries and reshape societies across the globe.
The collapse of ice sheets and ice shelves has been a major point of uncertainty within the climate science community. But a flurry of new research suggests that dangerous tipping points are nearer than once thought and that there is likely less room in Earth’s carbon budget than expected.
“We might be reaching these temperature thresholds that we’ve been talking about for a long time sooner than we were thinking about years ago,” said Rob DeConto, the director of the University of Massachusetts Amherst School of Earth & Sustainability and an author of the report. “And it may be that the thresholds for some of these processes that can drive really rapid ice loss are lower than we were thinking just a few years ago.”
Don't buy coastal property.
The math checks out. The last time we were 2-3C warmer than today was the late Pliocene, 2.5 million years ago. Forests grew in the Arctic and along the coast of Antarctica, alligators swam in the swamps of the upper Midwest, and seas were 50-75' higher. Florida was coral reef at the time.
Hamas command centre, weapons found at Gaza hospital, Israeli military says
Source: Reuters
Israeli military spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said the troops were still searching, having entered the hospital early on Wednesday after days of clashes around it.
The military simultaneously released a video it said showed some of the materials it recovered from an undisclosed building in the hospital compound, including automatic weapons, grenades, ammunition and flak jackets.
In one hospital department, "the soldiers located an operational command centre and technological assets belonging to Hamas, indicating that the terrorist organization uses the hospital for terrorist purposes," an Israeli military statement said.
Read more: https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-raids-gazas-al-shifa-hospital-2023-11-15/
The USDA updated their plant zone maps. It's absolutely nuts
If you don't know, the USDA maintains a database of climate records that it uses to classify different parts of the US based on average winter low temperatures. This is extremely useful because you need to know your zone to determine what types of plants will survive in your area.
https://planthardiness.ars.usda.gov/?fbclid=IwAR2qwFS7vm40qUyP8kJT4A_Wc46g4Yqar9CTCWzJI-SE-pyA8m2-_wFQIwA
So, I'm in Southeast Minnesota. The ancient 1990 hardiness map listed us then as 4a, meaning you could expect -25F to -30F in a normal winter.
In 2012, my area was updated to 4b, meaning -20 to -25.
Yesterday it was updated to 5a, meaning -15 to -20 is our new normal winter low.
That's very close to what Kansas City, Missouri was on the 1990 zone map. I'm 400 miles north of Kansas City!
That's an insane change in winter lows in less than 40 years. All the gardening groups I'm on via Facebook are losing their minds over this.
Eventually, the IDF will gain control of the Shifa hospital. They've made that clear
I was just listening to NPR on my drive home, and the Israeli representative was saying how they will conduct tours and distribute video of the command centers and tunnels under the hospital when they gain control of it.
It will be interesting to see how a certain segment of DU reacts to this, when it occurs in the near future.
