Science Snippets: ENSO Redux

 

AVID Audio Course Description (Conservation Biology)

 

 

Latest Peer-Reviewed Journal Article:

McPherson, Guy R., Beril Kallfelz-Sirmacek, James R. Massa, William Kallfelz, and Ricardo Vinuesa. 2023. The commonly overlooked environmental tipping points. Results in Engineering, in press.

 

Draft script:

From Axios on 19 April 2023 comes an article titled Rapidly developing El Niño set to boost global warming. Here’s the lead: “A double whammy of natural climate cycles and human-caused climate change will likely make next51ear Earth’s warmest on record, climate experts tell Axios.”

The big picture, according to Axios, is that “forecasters now expect that a moderate El Niño, the climate pattern characterized by warmer-than-usual sea surface temperatures, will develop this summer, bringing sweeping shifts to weather patterns worldwide.”

The article continues thusly with a section titled, What’s happening: “Three straight years of La Niña, which features cooler-than-usual sea surface temperatures in the tropical Pacific, have given way to a rapid transition to an El Niño state.” In addition, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration declared an El Niño watch about two weeks ago, “putting 62% odds of an event setting up during May to July.” In addition, according to a meteorologist who leads the El Niño Southern Oscillation team at NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center, the odds of an El Niño event increase to about 85% later this year.

The article points out, as I indicated in a recent video in this space, that the planet reached its warmest temperature in 2016, which was an El Niño year. In addition, the past eight years were the warmest such period on record. Furthermore, ocean temperatures have reached unprecedented levels in the last few weeks.

According to climate scientist Zeke Hausfather, “model projections have been leaning toward a moderate-to-strong El Niño by the fall and winter.” Hausfather said that such an event could boost global temperatures by about 0.2°C in addition to the ongoing human-caused warming trend.

Hausfather echoed Adam Scaife, head of long-range prediction of the U.K. Met Office. Both indicated that the developing El Niño Southern Oscillation could cause the global-average temperature to reach the 1.5°C temperature mentioned in the Paris Agreement.

In other words, the lies continue from paid climate scientists and corporate media outlets. Not only did we already eclipse the 1.5°C Rubicon, but we also sailed beyond 2°C. Again, I’m not a climate scientist, and yet I know that renowned Australian professor Andrew Y. Glikson wrote in his book The Event Horizon that the planetary temperature already exceeds 2°C. The book was published on 9 October 2020. It was undoubtedly written a year or two before then. At the very least, it was written, reviewed, and re-written more than three years ago.

Here’s the signature line from Glikson’s 9 October 2020 book, The Event Horizon. Specifically, this line comes from the abstract of Chapter 5, which you can easily find online. “During the Anthropocene greenhouse gas forcing has risen by more than 2.0 W/m², equivalent to more than 2°C above pre-industrial temperatures, which constitutes an abrupt event over a period not much longer than a lifetime.”

It is small wonder grain supplies are declining. The ability to grow, store, and distribute grains at scale is imperative to the maintenance of every civilization, including this one. It’s relatively easy to grow grains on a planet with reliably cool temperatures. It’s not nearly so easy to grow grains when the global temperature has risen quickly to a much higher level.

According to a headline from the 18 April 2023 issue of CNBC, Global rice shortage is set to be the biggest in 20 years. The three key points indicated in this article are (1) Rice production for 2023 is set to log its largest shortfall in two decades, according to Fitch Solutions, (2) “At the global level, the most evident impact of the global rice deficit has been, and still is, decade-high rice prices,” according to Fitch Solutions’ commodities analyst, and (3) There’s a strained supply of rice as a result of the ongoing war in Ukraine, as well as weather woes in rice-producing economies such as China and Pakistan.

China produces more rice and wheat than any other country in the world, and it is currently experiencing the highest level of drought in its rice-growing regions in more than two decades. Major rice-growing areas in France, Germany, and the UK have also been afflicted with the highest level of drought in 20 years. Reduced year-to-year rice production in the United States and the European Union have also contributed to a deficit in worldwide production. As a result of these declines in productivity, many countries will be forced to draw down their domestic stockpiles, if they have them.

The global shortfall for the 2022/2023 harvest is expected to be 8.7 million tonnes. That will mark the largest global rice deficit since 2003/2004, when the global rice markets generated a deficit of 18.6 million tonnes. And, of course, we’ve added many additional mouths to feed on this planet during the last decade.

A day after this story came out in CNBC, USA Today ran this headline: Global rice shortage possible in 2023, prices are expected to remain high, analysts say. Here’s the lead from an article published on 19 April 2023: “In 2023, the global market for rice could face its biggest shortage in decades, according to industry analysts.” In typical fashion for USA Today, the story blames the Russians: “Putin’s war in Ukraine drastically pushed up the cost of wheat, which in turn has increased demand for grain alternatives like rice.”

The story in USA Today fails to mention climate change while pointing out that flash floods and severe droughts contributed to the reduced production of grains. The flash floods and severe droughts must have been coincidental events. How inconvenient.

Cutting to the chase, finally, three interconnected points are worthy of mention. First, every civilization requires the ability to grow, store, and distribute grains at a large scale. Second, the ability to grow, store, and distribute grains at a large scale depends upon a stable, cool climate. Third and finally, Earth is losing its long-time stable, cool climate. As a result, this set of living arrangements faces a dire threat. And, as a result of the threat to this set of living arrangements, all life on Earth faces an existential threat.

I’ve referred to these three key points many times during the last decade. This is neither rocket science nor brain surgery, much less rocket surgery or brain science. This is easy to understand. Yet I find myself providing the details repeatedly because we have a tough time grasping our own deaths, much less the extinction of our species. And extinction of our species as part of the extinction of all life on Earth is simply too staggering for the masses to comprehend.

On the topic of staggering, I’ll continue with the same … staggering on, trying to explain the simplest of concepts that we simply refuse to believe. It doesn’t bring me joy. Nonetheless, I’m a huge believer in tracking the truth at the end of the evidentiary path. Please join me.