Atlantic puffins courting at Maine Coastal Island National Wildlife Refuge in 2009. USFWS / Flickr
When Europeans first arrived in North America, Atlantic puffins were common on islands in the Gulf of Maine. But hunters killed many of the birds for food or for feathers to adorn ladies' hats. By the 1800s, the population in Maine had plummeted.
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<p>"Puffins were almost completely lost," says Don Lyons of the Audubon Seabird Institute.</p><p>He says that about 50 years ago, conservationists started bringing puffin chicks from Canada and hand-raising them on the Maine islands.</p><p>When those birds reached adulthood, they came back to the islands where they were raised and began nesting themselves.</p><p>Now the puffin colony in Maine has recovered to more than 1,000 nesting pairs. But global warming threatens to undo some of that progress.</p>
<p>"The Gulf of Maine is actually now one of the most rapidly warming water bodies on the planet," Lyons says.</p><p>That's driving many fish to cooler waters, so the puffins are forced to fly farther or dive deeper to catch enough food.</p><p>"The most intense warm years during the last decade have made it very difficult for puffins to raise chicks because of the additional work involved in finding food for them," Lyons says.</p><p>So reducing global warming can help Maine's beloved puffins survive.</p>
<p class=""><em>Reposted with permission from <a href="https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2020/08/global-warming-threatens-atlantic-puffin-recovery-in-maine/" target="_blank">Yale Climate Connections</a>.</em></p>From Your Site Articles
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Rescue workers dig through the rubble following a gas explosion in Baltimore, Maryland on Aug. 10, 2020. J. Countess / Getty Images
A "major" natural gas explosion killed two people and seriously injured at least seven in Baltimore, Maryland Monday morning.
<p>The blast destroyed three row homes in the northwestern Baltimore neighborhood of Reisterstown Station and ripped open a fourth, <a href="https://apnews.com/42cb919592a81a4b02f6e2ea30831eb2" target="_blank">The Associated Press reported</a>. One woman and one man were killed, city fire officials said, according to <a href="https://baltimore.cbslocal.com/2020/08/10/explosion-rocks-northwest-baltimore-latest/?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=93012117&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-8SOy65--Y5_AArJL7murOy3jmRBh-Q-W5S3SxpfpJTK0kMdLbvd1Oq3U-nYf006ihKggpGyAifqyhyENxmsCgoQIppTQ&utm_content=93012117&utm_source=hs_email" target="_blank">WJZ</a>. Rescue crews and dogs worked to pull others from the rubble.</p><p>"I've never seen anything like that and I've lived in Baltimore City all my life," neighbor Dean Jones <a href="https://www.wbaltv.com/article/baltimore-house-explosion-reisterstown-road/33562013?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=93012117&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-8z--i_9dSwni-grj097_Src02t3tz53mGKgyEzO142jpKbAtvWlDzTh6KHO0IZxWF2xSu8pNsp1azQCS6dguzZcp8-qg&utm_content=93012117&utm_source=hs_email" target="_blank">told WBAL</a>. "It's almost like somebody just took a bomb out the side and dropped it on the three houses. It's completely leveled."</p>
<div id="28f6d" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="4d600ac330cedba0f01ce5304d60a1f2"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1292866070488010752" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Here some images of today's fatal explosion in northwest Baltimore, 4200 block of Labyrinth Rd. We are assisting… https://t.co/0S8IkGkIbh</div> — Baltimore County Fire Department (@Baltimore County Fire Department)<a href="https://twitter.com/BaltCoFire/statuses/1292866070488010752">1597078266.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p>The blast occurred just before 10 a.m. Monday. Fire Department spokeswoman Blair Adams told <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/10/us/baltimore-explosion.html?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=93012117&_hsenc=p2ANqtz--w4G9Xtz4r3sbWY1KTYvfOO6W85UFHIN6Kedso1o2cEDMyLF9gF1zIwmuXMBJ4IY4t4s9hwiOTTGXQXQmARo9LYex1jQ&utm_content=93012117&utm_source=hs_email" target="_blank">The New York Times</a> it was a "major gas explosion." She said Monday afternoon that rescue crews would continue to work overnight digging through the rubble if needed.</p>
<div id="1b8f2" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="1b7fe487c8710b4fad2097c1873631e5"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1293176505363726337" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">As FFs combed through the night, the body of an adult male was located just before 1am. #BCFD @BaltimoreOEM remain… https://t.co/g6lj1DMKq9</div> — Baltimore Fire (@Baltimore Fire)<a href="https://twitter.com/BaltimoreFire/statuses/1293176505363726337">1597152279.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p>The cause of the explosion is currently unknown. Baltimore Gas and Electric (BGE), the country's oldest gas company, said it was investigating the incident, according to The New York Times.</p><p>The company said in a <a href="https://www.bge.com/News/Pages/Press%20Releases/labyrinth-road-updates.aspx" target="_blank">statement</a> Monday that there were no gas readings or gas leaks found in the buildings or on the road where the explosion took place. There were also no reports of gas smells from the area before the incident. However, people on the ground told WJZ they smelled gas after the blast.</p><p>"BGE is committed to fully understanding the cause of this incident and will inspect all BGE equipment once rescue efforts are complete," the company wrote in the statement.</p>
<div id="ac373" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="7844994ac85eabf19c23548792abe69d"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1292831837665009665" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Aerial images of the reported explosion in Baltimore.
https://t.co/GK0dpY9pMR https://t.co/vOR5gIQCT7</div> — ABC 7 News - WJLA (@ABC 7 News - WJLA)<a href="https://twitter.com/ABC7News/statuses/1292831837665009665">1597070104.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p>BGE is currently working to replace thousands of miles of aging gas <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/pipelines" target="_self">pipelines</a>, according to a Baltimore Sun story reported by The New York Times. The number of leaks in the city has increased by 75 percent from 2009 to 2016, but the replacement process could take two decades.</p><p>"Founded in 1816, BGE is the oldest gas distribution company in the nation. Like many older gas systems, a larger portion of its gas main and services infrastructure consists of cast iron and bare steel – materials that are obsolete and susceptible to failure with age," the Maryland Public Service Commission wrote when it approved the renovations in 2018, as The Associated Press reported.</p><p>The gas infrastructure in the area where the explosion hit was installed in the early 1960s, BGE said. But when the area was last inspected in June and July of 2019, no leaks were detected.</p><p>Climate campaigner and 350.org founder Bill McKibben wrote that the explosion was another argument for retiring gas heating altogether.</p><p>"Now that we have cheap, effective air source heat pumps, it's time for public policy to help everyone finance them, beginning with the poorest Americans. It is utterly unnecessary to have a tube of flammable gas running into your house," he tweeted.</p>
<div id="397f7" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="a8ad8a1c091fde87d1c799b912a02f43"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1292881488472616960" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Now that we have cheap, effective air source heat pumps, it's time for public policy to help everyone finance them,… https://t.co/ciJI3zeGHg</div> — Bill McKibben (@Bill McKibben)<a href="https://twitter.com/billmckibben/statuses/1292881488472616960">1597081942.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p>Monday's tragedy comes a little less than a year after <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/gas-explosion-shopping-center-maryland-2640038158.html" target="_self">another gas explosion</a> destroyed part of an office complex in Columbia, Maryland. Luckily, no one was injured in that blast, according to The Associated Press.</p>
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Methane flares at a fracking site near a home in Colorado on Oct. 25, 2014. WildEarth Guardians / Flickr
In the coming days, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is expected to use its power to roll back yet another Obama-era environmental protection meant to curb air pollution and slow the climate crisis.
<p>This new rollback concerns <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/methane" target="_self">methane</a>, a potent greenhouse gas destructive to the earth's atmosphere. The EPA is expected to make the announcement on Friday that it is ending a stricture put in place by the previous administration that curbed the amount of methane that could be released in oil and gas exploration, as <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/epa-to-rescind-methane-regulations-for-oil-and-gas-11597051802" target="_blank">The Wall Street Journal</a> reported.</p><p>Since the rule is not official yet, anonymous officials at the agency told The Wall Street Journal that the rollback will scrap the new rules that required oil and gas producers to have systems, checks and processes in place to identify and address methane leaks on their rigs.</p>
<p>The rollbacks do not end there. The Wall Street Journal also reported that the EPA will also end its oversight of ozone pollutants and emissions from <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/pipelines" target="_self">pipelines</a> and storage sites. Additionally, the agency will reduce its requirement for monitoring and reporting certain pollutants.</p><p>The EPA's decision to end its oversight and slacken regulation may result in an additional 5 million metric tons of methane pollution released into the atmosphere each year.</p><p>Methane is a powerful greenhouse gas that can be 25 times more impactful than carbon dioxide in equal quantities, as <a href="https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/511298-epa-to-issue-methane-rollback-this-week-report" target="_blank">The Hill</a> reported. In 2018, it accounted for nearly 10 percent of all U.S. greenhouse gas emissions caused by human activity, mostly from the oil and gas industry, although commercial agriculture and the cattle industry are also large contributors to methane emissions.</p>
<p>As the <a href="https://www.edf.org/media/trump-epa-reportedly-moving-forward-eliminate-key-federal-methane-protections" target="_blank">Environmental Defense Fund</a> (EDF) noted, the action would also mean no future action could regulate methane production from oil and gas facilities built before 2015. Their analysis shows that 9.3 million people live within half a mile of one of the older wells that the administration is seeking to leave forever unregulated by the EPA.</p><p>"Our federal methane safeguards have been in place since 2016, protecting Americans from unhealthy and climate-damaging pollution. The <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/trump-watch/">Trump</a> administration's decision to reverse course is deeply and fundamentally flawed," said EDF lead attorney Peter Zalzal, in a <a href="https://www.edf.org/media/trump-epa-reportedly-moving-forward-eliminate-key-federal-methane-protections" target="_blank">statement</a>. "Eliminating these safeguards would ignore the overwhelming body of scientific evidence documenting the urgent need to reduce methane pollution. And it is also starkly at odds with the broad and diverse set of stakeholders — including some major oil and gas producing companies — that support retaining and strengthening methane safeguards."</p>
<p>The administration is using the decline in demand for oil and gas as a justification for easing the pollution rules. It argues that the rule is needed to free the oil and gas industry from what it calls crippling regulations during an economic slowdown due to the novel coronavirus. However, as <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/10/climate/trump-methane-climate-change.html" target="_blank">The New York Times</a> notes, the weakening of the rule has been in the works for more than a year.</p><p>As The New York Times noted, several of the world's major fossil fuel companies actually support the methane rules and do not want to see them relaxed. In a 2019 public comment on a draft of the rule, Joe Ellis, a vice president at BP, urged the EPA "to continue to regulate methane emissions from new sources and to adopt a rule for existing sources. EPA regulation of methane across the value chain is the right thing to do for the environment, will support consistent regulation across the U.S. and can be cost-effectively achieved with new technology."</p><p>Furthermore, Exxon urged the EPA in 2018 to maintain core elements of the Obama administration's policy. And Gretchen Watkins, the U.S. chairwoman for Shell, which has urged the Trump administration to regulate methane emissions, said, "The negative impacts of methane have been widely acknowledged for years, so it's frustrating and disappointing to see the administration go in a different direction," as The New York Times reported.</p>
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Researchers on the ICESCAPE mission, funded by NASA, examine melt ponds and their surrounding ice in 2011 to see how changing conditions in the Arctic affect the biological and chemical makeup of the ocean. NASA / Flickr
By Alex Kirby
The temperature of the Arctic matters to the entire world: it helps to keep the global climate fairly cool. Scientists now say that by 2035 there could be an end to Arctic sea ice.
<p>The northern polar ocean's sea ice is a crucial element in the Earth system: because it is highly reflective, it sends solar radiation back out into space. Once it's melted, there's no longer any protection for the darker water and rock beneath, and nothing to prevent them absorbing the incoming heat.</p><p>High temperatures in the Arctic during the last <a href="https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/abrupt-climate-change/Glacial-Interglacial%20Cycles" target="_blank">interglacial – the warm period around 127,000 years ago</a> – have puzzled scientists for decades.</p><p>Now the <a href="https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/weather/climate-change/organisations-and-reports/met-office-hadley-centre/index" target="_blank">UK Met Office's Hadley Centre</a> climate model has enabled an international research team to compare Arctic sea ice conditions during the last interglacial with the present day. Their findings are important for improving predictions of future sea ice change.</p>
<p>What is striking about the latest research is the date it suggests for a possible total melt − 2035. Many studies <a href="https://climatenewsnetwork.net/arctic-ocean-ice-free-mid-century/" target="_blank">have thought a mid-century crisis likely</a>, with another even <a href="https://phys.org/news/2019-11-arctic-ocean-ice-free-year.html" target="_blank">carefully specifying 2044 as the year to watch</a>. So a breathing space of only 15 years may surprise some experts.</p><p>During spring and early summer shallow pools of water form on the surface of the Arctic sea ice. These "melt ponds" help to determine how much sunlight is absorbed by the ice and how much is reflected back into space. The new Hadley Centre model is the UK's most advanced physical representation of the Earth's climate and a critical tool for climate research, and it incorporates sea ice and melt ponds.</p><p>The researchers report their findings in the journal <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-020-0865-2" target="_blank">Nature Climate Change</a>. Using the model to look at Arctic sea ice during the last interglacial, they concluded that the impact of intense springtime sunshine created many melt ponds, which played a crucial role in sea ice melt. A simulation of the future using the same model indicates that the Arctic may become sea ice-free by 2035.</p>
<p>The joint lead author of the team is <a href="https://www.bas.ac.uk/profile/marino/" target="_blank">Dr Maria Vittoria Guarino, an earth system modeller at the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) in Cambridge</a>. She says: "High temperatures in the Arctic have puzzled scientists for decades. Unravelling this mystery was technically and scientifically challenging. For the first time, we can begin to see how the Arctic became sea ice-free during the last interglacial.</p><p>"The advances made in climate modeling mean that we can create a more accurate simulation of the Earth's past climate which, in turn, gives us greater confidence in model predictions for the future."</p><p><a href="https://www.bas.ac.uk/profile/lsim/" target="_blank">Dr. Louise Sime, the group head of the palaeoclimate group and joint lead author at BAS</a>, says, "We know the Arctic is undergoing significant changes as our planet warms. By understanding what happened during Earth's last warm period we are in a better position to understand what will happen in the future.</p>
Melt Ponds Crucial
<p>"The prospect of loss of sea ice by 2035 should really be focusing all our minds on achieving a low-carbon world as soon as humanly feasible."</p><p><a href="http://www.reading.ac.uk/search/search-staff-details.aspx?id=10813" target="_blank">Dr. David Schroeder from the University of Reading</a>, UK, who co-led the implementation of the melt pond scheme in the climate model, says, "This shows just how important sea ice processes like melt ponds are in the Arctic, and why it is crucial that they are incorporated into climate models."</p><p>The extent of the areas <a href="https://nsidc.org/cryosphere/seaice/characteristics/formation.html" target="_blank">sea ice</a> covers varies between summer and winter. If more solar energy is absorbed at the surface, and temperatures rise further, a cycle of warming and melting occurs during summer months.</p><p>When the ice forms, the ocean water beneath becomes saltier and denser than the surrounding ocean. Saltier water sinks and moves along the ocean bottom towards the equator, while warm water from mid-depths to the surface travels from the equator towards the poles.</p><p>Scientists refer to this process as the ocean's global "conveyor-belt." Changes to the volume of sea ice can disrupt normal ocean circulation, with consequences for global climate. </p>From Your Site Articles
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Powerful Midwest Derecho Slams Trees and Buildings, Knocks Out Power to More Than a Million
19h
Climate
A John Deere agricultural tractor sits under a collapsed building following a derecho storm on Aug. 10, 2020 near Franklin Grove, Illinois. Daniel Acker / Getty Images
A powerful series of thunderstorms roared across the Midwest on Monday, downing trees, damaging structures and knocking out power to more than a million people.
<p>The storms, which produced winds of more than 100 miles per hour, formed a phenomenon known as a derecho, a long-lasting, far-spreading windstorm caused by a series of thunderstorms, <a href="https://www.spc.noaa.gov/misc/AbtDerechos/derechofaq.htm#:~:text=How%20might%20climate%20change%20affect,comprise%20derecho%2Dproducing%20convective%20systems." target="_blank">according to the Storm Prediction Center (SPC)</a>.</p><p>"This is our version of a hurricane," Northern Illinois University meteorology professor Victor Gensini told <a href="https://apnews.com/e7bfc5351814eb111f90f540d605514a" target="_blank">The Associated Press</a>.</p>
<p>While derechos usually occur one to two times a year, they do not usually blow as hard as Monday's storm, National Weather Service (NWS) scientist Patrick Marsh told <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/10/us/derecho-storm-chicago-weather.html" target="_blank">The New York Times</a>. He compared it to the "Super Derecho" of 2009. Gensini, meanwhile, said it would emerge as one of the strongest in recent history and one of the most <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/extreme-weather" target="_self">extreme weather</a> events of 2020.</p><p>The storm system began in southeast South Dakota and eastern Nebraska Monday morning before blasting through Iowa, northern and central Illinois, southern Wisconsin, southwest Michigan, Indiana and northwest Ohio, <a href="https://weather.com/storms/severe/news/2020-08-10-derecho-forecast-midwest-severe-thunderstorms-chicago" target="_blank">The Weather Channel reported</a>.</p>
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vbWVkaWEucmJsLm1zL2ltYWdlP3U9JTJGbWVkaWElMkZFZklSbWU2V3NBQXd6b2suanBnJTNBbWVkaXVtJmhvPWh0dHBzJTNBJTJGJTJGcGJzLnR3aW1nLmNvbSZzPTM5Jmg9ZjczZTUzMGQ2ODhmZGZmN2YzN2M2ZGI4ZGFlNWJiNDk0MTFmYTFmY2I1NzAxMzMzMTRiYjA0MmIxYWFlNTFjYyZzaXplPTk4MHgmYz0zMDkyMjg5MTA4IiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYyMzIyMTYyMH0.Enf6XFlpzTRPAVGlA0sPrN1PBi5KoNRV8WTNkVN1Uu0/img.jpg" id="165e4" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="c5c8469bc2a301c8c79649b2d5beeceb" />Twitter
<p>Winds of up to 100 miles per hour ripped through Marshall County, Iowa, leading to several injuries and extensive property damage, the county's homeland security coordinator Kim Elder told The Associated Press.</p><p>Elder said the storm blew over trees and cars, downed power lines, ripped the roofs off of buildings and started fires. All told, a third of customers in Iowa were without power, <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/10/weather/derecho-forecast-chicago-severe-storms/index.html" target="_blank">according to CNN</a>.</p><p>"Everybody in town is without power except those with a generator," Marshalltown, Iowa Mayor Joel Greer told The New York Times. Greer declared a state of emergency for the city, which he said was still recovering from a 2018 tornado. "It hit us at a time when we were just getting back on our feet," Greer said.</p>
<div id="755f8" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="34ba091ea22ed744e1615045caabe1f9"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1292893389558620160" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Check out images of storm damage sent by viewers across central Iowa. https://t.co/nr4KD4ZbVS #iawx #SevereWX https://t.co/y4rm2uEbBJ</div> — WHO 13 News (@WHO 13 News)<a href="https://twitter.com/WHO13news/statuses/1292893389558620160">1597084779.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p>The storms entered the Chicago area around 3:30 p.m. according to <a href="https://www.nbcchicago.com/news/local/more-than-10k-comed-customers-without-power-as-a-result-of-dangerous-winds/2320118/" target="_blank">NBC 5 Chicago</a>. They downed trees and knocked out power to more than 500,000 ComEd customers.</p><p>"Much of northern Illinois has pockets of damage with downed trees, debris, and powerlines blocking roadways," NWS Chicago <a href="https://twitter.com/NWSChicago/status/1292938558274248705" target="_blank">tweeted</a>.</p><p>A wind gust of 92 miles per hour was reported near Dixon, Illinois, about 100 miles west of Chicago, The Associated Press reported.</p>
<div id="eb795" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="d0b37a0b02e97bcde0744ec21a9da3a3"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1292928957583687680" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Hold on #chcago here she co.e 80mpg winds @nbcchicago @fox32news https://t.co/vsGhDG0N1t</div> — Michael Kinsch (@Michael Kinsch)<a href="https://twitter.com/MKinsch/statuses/1292928957583687680">1597093259.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p>Monday's derecho was formed by unstable, wet air that had remained over the Midwest for several days, The Associated Press explained.</p><p>"They are basically self-sustaining amoebas of thunderstorms," Gensini said. "Once they get going like they did across Iowa, it's really hard to stop these suckers."</p><p>It is unclear what impact the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change/" target="_self">climate crisis</a> will have on derechos, as the SPC explained:</p><blockquote>A warmer planet at first glance would appear to be more conducive to the development of the intense thunderstorms that comprise derecho-producing convective systems. But thunderstorm updrafts require the presence of strong <em>vertical</em> temperature gradients; any warming occurring at the surface likely also would occur aloft. Thus, the net change in instability due to thermal changes likely would be minimal. And, although a warmer environment implies greater atmospheric moisture content and conditional instability (instability related to the release of latent heat during condensation), all other factors remaining equal, the increased moisture likely also would yield more widespread low-level cloud cover. Such cloudiness would negatively impact storm initiation and derecho development. What is more certain is that the band of enhanced upper-level flow that encircles the planet --- the <em>jet stream</em> --- would contract poleward in a warmer world. Because derechos tend to form on the equatorward side of the jet stream along the northern fringes of warm high pressure ("fair weather") systems, it is reasonable to conclude that the corridors of maximum derecho frequency would shift poleward with global warming.</blockquote><p>Derechos, however, interact with other extreme weather conditions related to a warming planet. Marsh warned that the power outages could have a negative impact on vulnerable people in the region dealing with high heat. He said the power outages also compounded the problems caused by the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/coronavirus" target="_self">coronavirus</a> pandemic.</p><p>"[I]t becomes dire pretty quickly," he told The Associated Press.</p>
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Canada's Last Intact Ice Shelf the Size of Manhattan Collapses Due to Global Warming
10 August
Oceans
Eureka Sound on Ellesmere Island in the Canadian Arctic taken by NASA's Operation IceBridge in 2014. NASA / Michael Studinger / Flickr / CC by 2.0
A 4,000-year-old ice shelf in the Canadian Arctic has collapsed into the sea, leaving Canada without any fully intact ice shelves, Reuters reported. The Milne Ice Shelf lost more than 40 percent of its area in just two days at the end of July, said researchers who monitored its collapse.
<p>Unlike glaciers, ice shelves are part of the ocean.</p><p>The Milne Ice Shelf on Ellesmere Island in Canada's Nunavut territory fell into the Arctic Sea and started to drift before breaking into two large chunks. The Copernicus Sentinel satellite captured the entire event, <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/08/weather/canada-ice-shelf-collapse-milne-manhattan/index.html" target="_blank">CNN</a> reported.</p><p>Time-lapse photos on <a href="https://twitter.com/ECCC_CIS/status/1290740808170307584?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1290740808170307584%7Ctwgr%5E&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cnn.com%2F2020%2F08%2F08%2Fweather%2Fcanada-ice-shelf-collapse-milne-manhattan%2Findex.html" target="_blank">Twitter</a> show the satellite animation between July 30 and August 4, as the ice shelf lost approximately 43 percent of its area. When the fallen pieces split in two, the larger one formed an iceberg roughly the size of Manhattan, according to <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/canada-last-fully-intact-ice-shelf-suddenly-collapsed-2020-8" target="_blank">Business Insider</a>. </p>
<div id="3f778" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="26a7b2ea20a9cef68bf0d6e1c029fe5d"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1290740808170307584" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Satellite animation, from July 30 to August 4, shows the collapse of the last fully intact #iceshelf in #Canada. Th… https://t.co/n35ctDfmRh</div> — ECCC Canadian Ice Service (@ECCC Canadian Ice Service)<a href="https://twitter.com/ECCC_CIS/statuses/1290740808170307584">1596571564.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p><br>The massive break was first noticed by ice analyst Adrienne White of the <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/environment-climate-change/services/ice-forecasts-observations/latest-conditions.html" target="_blank">Canadian Ice Service</a>, the <a href="https://apnews.com/8077f82701c655ddebc6aafbb3dd453e" target="_blank">AP</a> reported.</p><p>"This is a huge, huge block of ice," White told the AP. "If one of these is moving toward an oil rig, there's nothing you can really do aside from move your oil rig."</p><p>The break resulted from polar amplification, which causes the Arctic to warm faster than the rest of the world, Business Insider reported. For example, today's polar ice caps are melting six times faster than in the 1990s.</p><p>"Above normal air temperatures, offshore winds and open water in front of the ice shelf are all part of the recipe for ice shelf break up," the Canadian Ice Service said on <a href="https://twitter.com/ECCC_CIS/status/1290045576692658176" target="_blank">Twitter</a>, according to Reuters.</p>
<div id="48af7" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="a601f615c13348682918cf9a52f9593b"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1290045576692658176" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">A huge section of the Milne #IceShelf has collapsed into the #Arctic Ocean producing a ~79 km2 ice island. Above no… https://t.co/RLLl5NjFy9</div> — ECCC Canadian Ice Service (@ECCC Canadian Ice Service)<a href="https://twitter.com/ECCC_CIS/statuses/1290045576692658176">1596405808.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p>"Entire cities are that size. These are big pieces of ice," said Luke Copland, a glaciologist at the University of Ottawa and part of the research team studying the Milne Ice Shelf. He told Reuters that this summer the Canadian Arctic experienced temperatures about 5 degrees Celsius warmer than the 30-year average.</p><p>"Without a doubt, it's climate change," Copland told the AP, adding that the ice shelf is melting from both hotter air above and warmer water below. "The Milne was very special. It's an amazingly pretty location."</p><p>According to Business Insider, a research camp was lost when the shelf broke apart, as was the Northern Hemisphere's last known epishelf — a freshwater lake contained by an ice shelf.</p><p>"It is lucky that we were not on the ice shelf when this happened, our camp area and instruments were all destroyed in this event," Derek Mueller, a professor in the Department of Geography and Environmental Studies at Carleton University, said in a <a href="https://wirl.carleton.ca/milne-ice-shelf-calving-event/" target="_blank">blog post</a>, CNN reported. His team's trip had been canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.</p><p>Now that a large chunk of the ice shelf has collapsed into the ocean, there is the potential for additional cracking and movement, the Water and Ice Research Laboratory (WIRL) said in a<a href="https://wirl.carleton.ca/research/ice/ice-shelves/calving-2020/" target="_blank"> press release</a>. The ice shelf is still unstable and further ice breaks are possible in the coming days and weeks, WIRL warned.</p><p>Ice shelves can help limit rising sea levels since they act like a dam, CNN reported. </p>
From Your Site Articles
- Stunning Photos Show Huge Crack in Antarctic Ice Shelf - EcoWatch ›
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Pexels
By Shawna Foo
Anyone who's tending a garden right now knows what extreme heat can do to plants. Heat is also a concern for an important form of underwater gardening: growing corals and "outplanting," or transplanting them to restore damaged reefs.
<p>
The goal of outplanting is to aid coral reefs' natural recovery process by growing new corals and moving them to the damaged areas. It's the same idea as replanting <a href="https://theconversation.com/high-value-opportunities-exist-to-restore-tropical-rainforests-around-the-world-heres-how-we-mapped-them-119508" target="_blank">forests that have been heavily logged</a>, or depleted farm fields that <a href="https://theconversation.com/rain-plays-a-surprising-role-in-making-some-restored-prairies-healthier-than-others-133892" target="_blank">once were prairie grasslands</a>.
</p><p>
I have studied how global stressors such as <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=BX92RvYAAAAJ&hl=en" target="_blank">ocean warming and acidification</a> affect marine invertebrates for more than a decade. In a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ab7dfa" target="_blank">recently published study</a>, I worked with <a href="https://sustainability.asu.edu/person/gregory-asner/" target="_blank">Gregory Asner</a> to analyze the impacts of temperature on coral reef restoration projects. Our results showed that climate change has raised sea surface temperatures close to a point that will make it very hard for outplanted corals to survive.
</p>
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Coral Gardening
<p>Coral reefs <a href="https://www.noaa.gov/education/resource-collections/marine-life/coral-reef-ecosystems" target="_blank">support over 25% of marine life</a> by providing food, shelter and a place for fish and other organisms to reproduce and raise young. Today, <a href="https://www.climate.gov/news-features/understanding-climate/climate-change-ocean-heat-content" target="_blank">ocean warming driven by climate change</a> is stressing reefs worldwide.</p><p>Rising ocean temperatures cause <a href="https://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/coralreef-climate.html#:%7E:text=Climate%20change%20leads%20to%3A,to%20the%20smothering%20of%20coral." target="_blank">bleaching events</a> – episodes in which corals expel the algae that live inside them and provide the corals with most of their food, as well as their vibrant colors. When corals lose their algae, they become less resistant to stressors such as disease and eventually may die.</p><p>Hundreds of organizations worldwide are working to restore damaged coral reefs by growing thousands of small coral fragments in nurseries, which may be onshore in laboratories or in the ocean near degraded reefs. Then scuba divers physically plant them at restoration sites.</p><span style="display:block;position:relative;padding-top:56.25%;" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="b225326fed0fdb9562f44aa4df298c95"><iframe lazy-loadable="true" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/1N3HNMRd56w?rel=0" width="100%" height="auto" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" style="position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;"></iframe></span><p>Outplanting coral is expensive: According to one recent study, the median cost is about <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/rec.12977" target="_blank">US$160,000 per acre, or $400,000 per hectare</a>. It also is time-consuming, with scuba divers placing each outplanted coral by hand. So it's important to maximize coral survival by choosing the best locations.</p><p>We used data from the National Oceanic and Atmosphere Administration's <a href="https://coralreefwatch.noaa.gov/satellite/index.php" target="_blank">Coral Reef Watch program</a>, which collects daily satellite-derived measurements of sea surface temperature. We paired this information with survival rates from hundreds of coral outplanting projects worldwide.</p><p>We found that coral survival was likely to drop below 50% if the maximum temperature experienced at the restoration site exceeded 86.9 degrees Fahrenheit (30.5 degrees Celsius). This temperature threshold mirrors the tolerance of natural coral reefs.</p><p>Globally, coral reefs experience an annual maximum temperature today of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1029/2012JC008199" target="_blank">84.9˚F (29.4˚C)</a>. This means they already are living close to their upper thermal limit.</p><p>When reefs experience temperatures only a few degrees above long-term averages for a few weeks, the stress can cause <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/19475683.2011.576266" target="_blank">coral bleaching and mortality</a>. Increases of just a few degrees above normal caused <a href="https://theconversation.com/we-just-spent-two-weeks-surveying-the-great-barrier-reef-what-we-saw-was-an-utter-tragedy-135197" target="_blank">three mass bleaching events</a> since 2016 that have devastated Australia's Great Barrier Reef.</p>
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yMzU0NzU3OC9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYzMDU2MzE3NH0.NlwoEY9YiJ0HPi92GsRMMgQIYbC6fiYFfoaqBfpwy3U/img.png?width=980" id="d463d" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="01778f87ae7aa647f90d74a14d7146c0" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
Sea surface temperatures on Aug. 3, 2020, measured from satellites. Warning = possible bleaching; Alert Level 1 = significant bleaching likely; Alert Level 2 = severe bleaching and significant mortality likely. NOAA Coral Reef Watch
Warmer Oceans
<p>Climate scientists project that the oceans will <a href="https://www.ipcc.ch/site/assets/uploads/2018/03/ar5_wgII_spm_en-1.pdf" target="_blank">warm up to 3˚C</a> by the year 2100. Scientists are working to create coral outplants that can <a href="https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1721415116" target="_blank">better survive increases in temperature</a>, which could help to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/eap.1978" target="_blank">increase restoration success</a> in the future.</p><p>When coral restoration experts choose where to outplant, they typically consider what's on the seafloor, algae that could smother coral, predators that eat coral and the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/fee.1792" target="_blank">presence of fish</a>. Our study shows that using temperature data and other information collected remotely from airplanes and satellites could help to <a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/fmars.2019.00079" target="_blank">optimize this process</a>. Remote sensing, which scientists have used to study coral reefs for almost 40 years, can provide information on much larger scales than water surveys.</p><p>Coral reefs face an uncertain future and may not recover naturally from human-caused climate change. Conserving them will require reducing greenhouse gas emissions, protecting key habitats and actively restoring reefs. I hope that our research on temperature will help increase coral outplant survival and restoration success.</p><p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/shawna-foo-1136932" target="_blank">Shawna Foo</a> is a Postdoctoral Research Scholar at the Arizona State University. </em></p><p><em>Disclosure statement: Shawna Foo receives funding from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.</em></p><p><em>Reposted with permission from <a href="https://theconversation.com/ocean-warming-threatens-coral-reefs-and-soon-could-make-it-harder-to-restore-them-142876" target="_blank" style="">The Conversation</a>.</em><em></em></p>From Your Site Articles
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Malte Mueller / Getty Images
By David Korten
Our present course puts humans on track to be among the species that expire in Earth's ongoing sixth mass extinction. In my conversations with thoughtful people, I am finding increasing acceptance of this horrific premise.
<p>The COVID-19 pandemic, along with climate change, drives home the lesson that we must honor and care for Earth. The increasing frequency of the appearance of deadly viruses reminds us of the consequences of disrupting the natural systems by which life on Earth organizes to create and maintain the conditions essential to both its own existence and ours.</p>
<p>This is a time for learning and conscious collective choice like no other in the human experience. Defining lessons are coming from a variety of "teachers," including the pandemic and climate change, protests against systemic racism, and oddly enough, Donald Trump.</p><p>Perhaps we can now recognize and accept the limits of Earth's regenerative systems and our need to help Earth heal from the damage of our recklessness. The Earth is strong, but also vulnerable. As Earth cares for us, we either care for it or bear the consequences of our recklessness.</p><p>The pandemic may be seen as a not-so-subtle warning to humanity that we may be sacrificed, if necessary, to protect the health of the planet. On the path to human extinction, the most vulnerable will go first, but there will be no human winners.</p>
<p>COVID-19's attack also exposes the culpability of the economic system that bears major responsibility for our assault against Earth and each other. We now see with ever greater clarity the disconnect between two economies. One is a financial economy devoted to generating unearned profits for monopolists and speculators. The other is an economy of Earth's regenerative systems and humans doing work essential to the well-being of people and planet. We can get along just fine without financial speculation, and labor devoted to wasteful or destructive purposes to make money for rich people. We cannot survive without the regenerative systems of a living Earth and the beneficial labor of both human and nonhuman beings.</p><p>We also see more clearly the devastating consequences of concentrating power in the hands of the financial elite. For example, the pandemic has exposed the long and vulnerable supply chains that only serve the interests of exploiters who locate industry where wages and taxes are lowest and environmental regulations are most lax to produce consumer goods for the world's affluent. Disruptions of those supply lines led to shortages of critical products, such as nose swabs and face masks, that we're only now realizing can be more quickly and securely obtained through local producers—assuming we still have some that can take on the job.</p><p>Another lesson we're learning involves the nature of money. COVID-19 prompted the U.S. Congress and Federal Reserve to create trillions of dollars in instant money for purposes both good and bad. Never has it been so clear that money is just a number that national governments can create from nothing. Consequently, lack of money should never be a society's defining constraint so long as idle or misdirected resources are available for new money to put to work meeting real needs.</p><p>Of course, meeting essential needs is very different from creating money to keep stock prices inflated and to bail out businesses, such as the corporate travel industry that electronic communication may have rendered obsolete. Too much of the money instantly created by Congress and the Fed was aimed at propping up financial markets while the real economy floundered. Therein lies another lesson: Follow the money and know its purpose, which takes us to the lessons of the Trump disaster.</p><p>With his perpetual deceptions, his assaults on the integrity and competence of government, and his persistent denial of responsibility for their devastating consequences, Trump reminds us of how much we depend on honest and functioning government at all system levels. He is forcing state and local governments (and also other nations) to take on new responsibilities because they know they cannot wait for leadership from his feckless administration.</p><p>In sending unidentified Department of Homeland Security officers to impose his will on the people of Portland, Oregon, and other cities, Trump is reminding us of the dangers of tyranny and the importance of having political leaders who are honest, intelligent, of sound mind, and committed to a strong democracy. We are becoming ever more conscious of the fatal error of electing politicians who believe government is inherently burdensome and best minimized.</p><p>These are all lessons essential to the future we seek and to our choices in the upcoming election.</p><p>During a July 23 <a href="https://www.facebook.com/watch/live/?v=319548652768061&ref=watch_permalink" target="_blank">webinar hosted by YES! Media</a> that I took part in, Nafeez Ahmed, executive director of the System Shift Lab and research fellow at the Schumacher Institute for Sustainable Systems, noted that the <a href="https://www.facebook.com/watch/live/?v=319548652768061&ref=watch_permalink" target="_blank">emergence of the new depends on the disintegration of the old</a>. While many of us have been eager to welcome the new, we are not always so ready to accept the disintegration of the old. Yet the point that Nafeez drove home in our webinar is that both are part of the process of transformation.</p><p>As the institutions of the imperial civilization of our past disintegrate, it exposes the extent to which their power has rested on a foundation of war, racism, and violence devoted to enforcing mass servitude and securing the rights of property owners. Succumbing to the enticements of money worship, we celebrate the successes of a miniscule super-wealthy minority, and the fiction that we might one day join them.</p><p>Let us welcome the growing recognition that returning to business as usual is neither possible nor desirable. We must accept our current mission to birth a <a href="https://davidkorten.org/home/ecological-civilization/" target="_blank">new civilization</a> devoted to the well-being of people and Earth: A civilization in which money is just a tool, and nurturance of life is the prime purpose.</p><p><span></span><em>David Korten is co-founder of YES! Media, president of the Living Economies Forum, a member of the Club of Rome, and the author of influential books, including "When Corporations Rule the World" and "Change the Story, Change the Future: A Living Economy for a Living Earth." His work builds on lessons from the 21 years he and his wife, Fran, lived and worked in Africa, Asia, and Latin America on a quest to end global poverty.</em></p><p><em><em>Reposted with permission from <a href="https://www.yesmagazine.org/opinion/2020/07/30/covid-earth-economy-climate-change/" target="_blank">YES! Magazine</a>.<a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/r/entryeditor/2646932009#/" target="_self"></a></em><em></em></em></p>
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Hurricane Florence on Sept. 12, 2018. ESA / A.Gerst / CC BY-SA 2.0
Hurricane forecasters predict the 2020 hurricane season will be the second-most active in nearly four decades.
<p>Meteorologists at Colorado State University, a standard bearer for seasonal hurricane predictions, <a href="https://tropical.colostate.edu/Forecast/2020-08.pdf?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=2&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-8zppZX1aY8kszJMl4pymaG2IVnBoxg_RsagLPapjJ8aGo2XQ968cLrBctxgq9xd2xxXARykY6pJeW2jeyJQXvoYQceuKtwcrqZPG5zx_5RuqYi30k" target="_blank">estimate</a> the 2020 season will see 24 named storms, including 12 total hurricanes and 5 major hurricanes. Each of those predictions are about double that for a normal season, and include storms that have already occurred. The 2020 season has already set numerous records for its early activity, with about 90% of the official season ahead. </p>
<p>Even if 2020 sees fewer storms than the new prediction — which is the most dire in CSU's 37-year history — officials may still run out of letters with which to name storms and be forced to use the Greek alphabet for overflow since the letters Q, U, X, Y and Z are not used. The only other time officials were forced to use the Greek alphabet was 2005 which included five hurricanes (Dennis, Katrina, Rita, Stan and Wilma) so destructive their names have been <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20200206163321/https://www.wmo.int/pages/prog/www/tcp/documents/FINAL-REPORT-HC-28.pdf?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=2&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-8zppZX1aY8kszJMl4pymaG2IVnBoxg_RsagLPapjJ8aGo2XQ968cLrBctxgq9xd2xxXARykY6pJeW2jeyJQXvoYQceuKtwcrqZPG5zx_5RuqYi30k" target="_blank">retired</a> from future use.</p>
<p><strong>For a deeper dive:</strong> <a href="https://weather.com/storms/hurricane/news/2020-08-05-2020-atlantic-hurricane-season-august-forecast?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=92748923&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-9IeFic75USwIHEONdWfCYXQ8_7OUfGg935e2ZWAJ19r-S7PFFYnkEShxJuDADx--LfAWh9Re8qZUABmO28GxjuO6LAZQ&utm_content=92748923&utm_source=hs_email" target="_blank">Weather Channel</a>, <a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/news/510743-forecasters-predicting-extremely-active-hurricane-season?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=92748923&_hsenc=p2ANqtz--hsOZRdAx5CW0_AthIxD9BdjfNezoxng3dWCeggOgY1yRG8bNuG8vVBKT6Nj7gRdMdKIlp64NhEWe7lEG5AhMtAWbt0Q&utm_content=92748923&utm_source=hs_email" target="_blank">The Hill</a>, <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/hurricane-season-2020-forecast-extremely-active-24-named-storms/" target="_blank">CBS</a>, <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2020/08/05/hurricane-season-2020-forecasters-new-prediction-storms/3300043001/?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=92748923&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-_Gv965dHJB2Gw4UflskHjum7HNV0oIQNQsmt6xf8c7UhOJWdzBmJg6KQG2Y2IUfwcf0SC_5breM_diZwqBsLGlIOCQ1Q&utm_content=92748923&utm_source=hs_email" target="_blank">USA Today</a>, <a href="https://www.news4jax.com/weather/2020/08/05/csu-now-predicts-24-named-storms-this-hurricane-season/?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=92748923&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-98p9Sx1J9aCYELsYqAxq_NvnUKiuPGenlr8RhjE5Vl0BXqwwrTb3-rNVWnqlQ1p_S822-x3M1kH4bO6BQX77k6fXOBQQ&utm_content=92748923&utm_source=hs_email" target="_blank">News4JAX</a>, <a href="https://www.wyff4.com/article/new-hurricane-season-outlooks-issued-by-csu-following-record-start/33526545?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=92748923&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-_Es88-ppyd952aYUVMbtPBKFjm-SCwIgxKgtJa7ARuuYvj0KrpWAJu9weBR8Yj1UNjbNavxkpfTUEgYhXTJXRgWhcpvQ&utm_content=92748923&utm_source=hs_email" target="_blank">WYFF4</a>, <a href="https://www.wfla.com/weather/tracking-the-tropics/tracking-the-tropics-experts-update-hurricane-season-forecast-to-extremely-active-with-24-named-storms/?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=92748923&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-8gI_x82R_Ym-JpgNAe36TIeCmpYq_tL0h3E4Po56Is0VXZV7SER6dHcOd5VKF6toR3zyS6NNJt0-HVF9CGsg6Qo3m93A&utm_content=92748923&utm_source=hs_email" target="_blank">WFLA</a>, <a href="https://www.wmbfnews.com/2020/08/05/first-alert-colorado-state-researchers-now-forecasting-one-most-active-hurricane-seasons-ever/?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=92748923&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-8LSCUABuP8V2moEiiA_iXxA_lWNdOdQI-Va28nwthmTdB4jA580tIZqCSvXRZ0oxjkjn6TK5jKuXAXmTS8eRePWvdbhw&utm_content=92748923&utm_source=hs_email" target="_blank">WMBF</a>; Climate Signals background: <a href="https://newsletter.climatenexus.org/e2t/tc/VWK7-l2CwspQW29Q6_46m2pk6W805GfB4dqjyxN8Qx57B3p_9rV1-WJV7CgGrpW7Gz0R23XF3ZhVh2zck28rYDSW7P0DJ56yhFp5W6kXZM-2D0FtpW611m4m2B03y1W4Zr1DR3bx5ypW7Bq_zT3SJD_sW30xvBb6-p0wmV9XJxQ90-YR5N7dQDz7chFMZW1lNKnQ4lfvs6VC1DRX1CmQQ2W3_G0_V67fz6dN3Yts2wmJTDBN7fJpJb9NfShW4HfVvQ5bWCw_W5J8BKs5Fp9NPW1VfTt35YDYcvW5jPjbQ2hRlfxW5HFfBx4MSlm0W16YyZy4fBq5KW6qGJcf4FPc-wN1gdKHLpgq9FW5nsZgC70ZgGyW3S9Z7q1V2NGsW31pbsQ1130MN3mPW1" target="_blank">2020 Atlantic hurricane season</a><br/></p><p><em>Reposted with permission from <a href="https://climatenexus.org/" target="_blank">Climate Nexus</a>.</em></p><p><em><em>For more </em><a href="http://ecowatch.com/climate-change-news/" target="_blank"><em>climate change</em></a><em> and </em><a href="http://ecowatch.com/business/renewables/" target="_blank"><em>clean energy</em></a><em> news, you can follow Climate Nexus on </em><a href="https://twitter.com/ClimateNexus" target="_blank"><em>Twitter</em></a><em> and </em><a href="https://www.facebook.com/ClimateNexus/" target="_blank"><em>Facebook</em></a><em>, and sign up for daily </em><a href="http://climatenexus.us4.list-manage1.com/subscribe?u=d1f5797e59060083034310930&id=7c84c08aaa" target="_blank"><em>Hot News</em></a><em>.</em></em></p><p><em><em><em>Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly described the Colorado State University's updated hurricane forecast. The forecast predicts the highest number of named storms of any forecast CSU has published, but would result in fewer storms than the 2005 hurricane season. Additionally, the reference to the amount of the hurricane season still to come should have referenced the Accumulated Cyclone Energy index, not the official hurricane season. This story has been updated.</em></em></em></p>
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The Qamutik cargo ship on July 28, 2020 in Canada's Nunavut province, where two ice caps have disappeared completely. Fiona Paton / Flickr
Three years ago, scientists predicted it would happen. Now, new NASA satellite imagery confirms it's true: two ice caps in Canada's Nunavut province have disappeared completely, providing more visual evidence of the rapid warming happening near the poles, as CTV News in Canada reported.
<p>According to <a href="https://earther.gizmodo.com/a-pair-of-canadian-ice-caps-has-disappeared-completely-1844592208" target="_blank">Gizmodo</a>, scientists at the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) <a href="https://nsidc.org/news/newsroom/st-patrick-bay-ice-caps-canada-have-completely-disappeared" target="_blank">said</a> last week that the St. Patrick Bay ice caps in the northeastern Ellesmere Island are nowhere to be seen on satellite imagery. The revelation that the ice caps have disappeared came sooner than scientists had expected.</p><p>"I can't say I was terribly surprised because we knew they were going, but it has happened really fast," Mark Serreze, director of NSIDC in Colorado, told <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/05/weather/st-patrick-bay-ice-caps-climate-change-trnd-scn/index.html" target="_blank">CNN</a>. Serreze co-authored a <a href="https://tc.copernicus.org/articles/11/169/2017/" target="_blank">paper</a> in 2017 estimating the ice caps would be gone within five years.</p>
<p>"When I first visited those ice caps, they seemed like such a permanent fixture of the landscape," said Serreze, in a <a href="https://nsidc.org/news/newsroom/st-patrick-bay-ice-caps-canada-have-completely-disappeared" target="_blank">statement</a>. "To watch them die in less than 40 years just blows me away."<br></p><p>The very hot temperatures in the summer of 2015 reduced the longevity of the St. Patrick's Bay ice caps. "You could really see they got hit. But that heat has really just not stopped. It's just getting too warm," Serreze told CNN.</p>
<p>This year has been especially tough on the region. Recent months have been plagued by heatwaves and wildfires across the <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/arctic">Arctic</a>, as Gizmodo reported. The extreme heat likely contributed to the melting of the ice caps. Research has found that summers in the region haven't been this warm in 115,000 years.</p><p>According to CNN, the nearby glaciers that sit at a higher elevation have been shrinking significantly as well.</p><p>"I'll make another prediction that they're gone in a decade," Serreze said to CNN.</p><p>Similar to scientists who <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/icelandic-glacier-monument-2639301498.html" target="_self">mourned a lost glacier in Iceland</a> and a <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/swiss-alps-pizol-glacier-funeral-2640547054.html" target="_self">funeral in Switzerland</a> held for a glacier, Serreze has felt the impact of losing these two ice caps.</p><p>"We've long known that as climate change takes hold, the effects would be especially pronounced in the Arctic," Serreze explained, as CTV News reported. "But the death of those two little caps that I once knew so well has made climate change very personal. All that's left are some photographs and a lot of memories."</p><p>Serreze first visited the ice caps in 1982 and has been studying them ever since, according to Gizmodo.</p>
<p>The melted ice caps were one half of a group of small ice caps on the Hazen Plateau, which formed during the Little Ice Age several centuries ago, according to the NSIDC.<br></p><p>Serreze told CNN that the small ice caps in the Arctic are clear indicators of the effects of the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/climate-crisis">climate crisis</a>.</p><p>"There's something called 'Arctic amplification,' which refers to the observation – not the theory – that the Arctic is warming up at a much faster rate than the rest of the globe, anywhere from two to four times faster," Serreze said.</p><p>Hotter heat waves and cold waves that are not as cold as they were in the past are contributing factors.</p><p>"We are starting to see all these things come together." Serreze told CNN, adding that the disappearance of the St. Patrick's Bay ice caps is "an exclamation point of what's happening in the Arctic."</p>
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A warning sign near the Dakota Access Pipeline endpoint in Patoka, Illinois on Nov. 11, 2016. Cyrene Krey / Flickr
The controversial Dakota Access Pipeline won a reprieve Wednesday when an appeals court canceled a lower court order mandating the pipeline be shut down and emptied of oil while a full environmental impact statement is completed.
<p>The shutdown order, which would have gone into effect Wednesday, marked the first time a major oil pipeline was court ordered to cease operations for environmental reasons. But while its reversal is disappointing for pipeline opponents, Wednesday's decision was not wholly favorable for the pipeline, either. The court refused to halt the initial order for a <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/dakota-access-pipeline-environmental-review-2645577384.html" target="_self">new environmental review</a> of the pipeline's crossing under the Missouri River, where the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe fears it will pollute its <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/drinking-water" target="_self">drinking water</a> and sacred lands if it leaks.</p><p>"We've been in this legal battle for four years, and we aren't giving up this fight," Standing Rock Sioux Tribe Chairman Mike Faith said in an <a href="https://earthjustice.org/news/press/2020/dc-circuit-mixed-decision-dakota-access-shutdown-order?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social" target="_blank">Earthjustice press release</a>. "As the environmental review process gets underway in the months ahead, we look forward to showing why the Dakota Access Pipeline is too dangerous to operate."</p>
<div id="e3dbb" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="f1c6bf3b1b2ec9c26be8e6fd6776c2be"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1291118408277397505" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">But the fight isn't over! DAPL's permit to cross underneath Lake Oahe is vacated, so it's effectively operating ill… https://t.co/EOPn59siC7</div> — Earthjustice (@Earthjustice)<a href="https://twitter.com/Earthjustice/statuses/1291118408277397505">1596661591.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p>In its ruling, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit put the question of whether the pipeline could continue to operate without a permit back to the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/trump-administration" target="_self">Trump administration</a>, <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-08-05/dakota-access-pipeline-staves-off-shutdown-order-once-again" target="_blank">Bloomberg News reported</a>. It said it expected the Army Corps of Engineers to clarify the issue.</p><p>"It's interesting what the court did here," Earthjustice lawyer Jan Hasselman, who represents the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, told Bloomberg. "While the focus has been on this judicially imposed shutdown order, the bigger picture is the environmental impact statement and whether a permit will be reissued under the next administration."</p><p>Hasselman argued that the pipeline is now operating illegally, and, if the Army Corps of Engineers decides to let it keep running while a review is completed, the issue will return to court.</p><p>"[W]e are confident that it will be shut down eventually," he said in the press release.</p>
<p>The pipeline's owner Energy Transfer had immediately appealed the shutdown order, and the company's lawyer said it would continue with the legal process.</p><p>"We believe our legal positions are strong, and we are confident that the pipeline will continue to operate," General Counsel Tom Mason told Bloomberg.</p><p>The oil and gas industry more generally had a mixed response to Wednesday's ruling.</p><p>"The Court rightly stayed the decision to shut down and empty the Dakota Access Pipeline, which has been operating for over three years and provides millions of tax dollars to states, affordable energy to the entire region, and thousands of jobs along its route," American Petroleum Institute senior vice president and chief legal officer Paul Afonso said in a statement reported by <a href="https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/510748-court-cancels-shutdown-of-dakota-access-pipeline" target="_blank">The Hill</a>. "However, the failure to uphold the easement granted years ago by the federal government exemplifies the problems with our outdated permitting system, which allows protracted challenges to advance within the courts and ultimately take away jobs, tax dollars, and investments that pipelines bring to communities that sorely need them."</p>
<p>The Dakota Access Pipeline currently carries 570,000 barrels of oil a day 1,172-miles from North Dakota through South Dakota and Iowa to a shipping point in Illinois. The fight against the pipeline garnered international attention through major <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/indigenous" target="_self">Indigenous</a>-led <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/what-standing-rock-gave-world-2549906333.html" target="_self">protests</a> in 2016 and 2017. The Obama administration <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/army-corps-permit-dakota-access-pipeline-2128363393.html" target="_self">denied</a> the river crossing permit in late 2016, but President <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/donald-trump" target="_self">Donald Trump</a> <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/trump-dakota-access-pipeline-2211697835.html" target="_self">pushed the project through</a> via executive order early after taking office. It has now been operating a little more than three years.</p>
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