Climate Crisis AM Edition 1.19.24 US Snow Disappears
Snow cover in the US is shrinking, and any industry that relies on outdoor Winter activity has reason to worry. The EPA announced that the winter economy is not the only victim. Snow cover helps vegetation and wildlife. It is also critical to combat drought as it thaws in the spring. The pace at which annual snowfall is dropping is substantial. EPA experts wrote: “Between 1972 and 2020, the average portion of North America covered by snow decreased at a rate of about 1,870 square miles per year, based on weekly measurements taken throughout the year.”
The UK’s Met Office released its carbon dioxide forecast for 2024. The government organization’s view is pessimistic. Between 2023 and their short-term view for this year, its experts say that the goal to limit global temperatures to an increase of 1.5 degrees C may no longer be reasonable. Other scientists have also recently argued that global warming has reached a point of no return, with 1.5 degrees C. as the threshold. Professor Richard Betts, the Met Office author of the CO₂ forecast, said: “This year’s estimated rise in atmospheric carbon-dioxide concentration is well above all three 1.5°C-compatible scenarios highlighted in the IPCC (The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) report.
EU EV Sales Implode
In the EU, EV sales in December were 193,371 in 2022, dropping to 160,700 in 2023. The numbers are stunning because industry experts have expected EVs to replace fossil fuel-powered vehicles at a rapid pace throughout the decade. On March 28, 2023, the EC voted to ban the sale of gas-powered cars beginning in 2035. The news raises the question of whether slowing EV sales in the US will also turn negative, despite auto giants’ multibillion investments from companies including Ford and GM.
Experts at Harvard’s TH Chan School of Public Health say that climate change can cause mental health problems. The more frequent presence of storms, drought, and high temperatures are “compounded stressors that affect individuals, families, communities, and societies,” according to Christy Denckla, assistant professor of social and behavioral sciences at the school. These problems are aggravated by a drop in access to healthy food and permanent shelter.
Challenges of 1.5 degrees C Limit
CNN posted a story reinforcing that the critical 1.5 degrees C limit to prevent catastrophic climate change may have already been breached. The news report considered experts’ views on both sides of the “point of no return” argument. Pessimists use the increase in violent storms and record drought as a reason to believe that actions by governments and businesses are too late to solve the problem.
Authors of a PLOS report titled “A panel data study on the effect of climate change on life expectancy” argue that climate change could cut global life expectancy by half a year. The study estimated the impact of climate change on life expectancy based on cross-national data from 191 countries from 1940 to 2020. “The finding of this study suggests that if the annual average temperature increases by 1°C, then the life expectancy at birth will decline by 0.44 years,” the authors wrote. One bright spot was that controlling the increase of greenhouse gasses could minimize these negative health effects.
