Significant climate-related news has been reported early in 2024 and has received fairly good coverage in the media despite all the usual distractions. The big story is that 2023 was the hottest year on record by an exceedingly wide margin. Spoiler alert: its a good news/ bad news situation. The bad news is that extreme fires, weather and heat events are stressing ecosystems that humans depend on, and things seemed to be changing way faster in 2023. The good news is that our global society is united on working together to make the most ethical and tough decisions with resolve. Haha! I’m kidding of course. The geopolitical situation is deteriorating by the day now. Including the increased threat of political violence within our own country.
Anyway, back to the climate news.
As reported by The Guardian, scientists at NASA and NOAA report 2023 as the hottest year since records started in 1850. NOAA reports the global average temp at 2.4 deg F higher than the pre-industrial era. Scientists from the European Union calculated a sightly higher global temp difference of 2.6 deg F higher. The amount of change has scientists alarmed, describing 2023’s change as “off the charts” and “astounding”.
And Berkeley Earth estimated 2023’s global temp at 2.7 deg F higher? Here’s their chart looking at temp increases over the past 170 years.
Meanwhile, climate.gov reported that the level of CO2 peaked in May 2023 at a new high of 424 ppm. It varies seasonally, but the last time CO2 was this high was 4 million years ago when temps were 3.6-7.2 deg F higher and sea levels were 33-82 feet higher than currently. So we have that to look forward to.
In November of 2023 the 5th National Climate Assessment was released. The full report can be found here , an excellent overview here and the chapter on the Northwest can be found here . It does a good job of talking about both mitigation and adaptation-focused measures, examples of things to do are given.
2023 also saw IPCC release its 6th Synthesis Report. You can also read the Summary for Policymakers. My perception of the IPCC’s work is that it is very good information but increasingly understood to be a slow process (relative to the accelerating risk) and it also is subject to state level negotiation on language and final product.
And also in December of 2023 we had the absurd spectacle of the 28th Council of Parties (COP) meeting in United Arab Emirates hosted by Sultan Al Jaber, the head of UAE’s national oil and gas company. At the last minute they reached an “historic breakthrough” (my sarcasm again) by acknowledging the need to transition ”away from fossil fuels in a just, orderly and equitable manner.” So yeah, we’re really going to make radical changes any day now. Kind of feels like an Entmoot, if you know what I mean.
The eminent climate scientist Jim Hansen summed things up in an interview with The Guardian,
“When our children and grandchildren look back at the history of human-made climate change, this year and next will be seen as the turning point at which the futility of governments in dealing with climate change was finally exposed,” he said.
“Not only did governments fail to stem global warming, the rate of global warming actually accelerated.”
– James Hansen, December 2023
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/dec/29/world-will-look-back-at-2023-as-year-humanity-exposed-its-inability-to-tackle-climate-crisis
I hope this “review” of recent climate related developments has been helpful to you. I urge you all to get as informed as you can on the evolving scientific understanding of what we are facing, (e.g. follow the links above.)
We all should continue to try to reduce our use of resources and energy, our footprint. But we also should all start talking about adaptation measures at a local level. What would we want things to look like if we had to rely on just each other locally or regionally? What would we try to preserve and what should we be prepared to let go? If we had to rely on local efforts for most aspects of our food system, could we make it work?
Coincidentally, these are the some of the same questions that Chimacum Workhorse Project are trying to figure out. Uncertain times ahead, it seems.