The problem of methane

 It looks as if emissions of CO2 will peak this year or next, and start falling.  Too slowly, but in the right direction.  As more renewables are installed, and more EVs are sold instead of petrol cars, the decline in emissions will speed up. 

The problem is methane:  it's rising fast.  It's ~82 times as potent as CO2 over 10 years.  It's responsible for 1/3rd of the rise in temps since 1850-1900, the agreed and most practical benchmark for pre-industrial temperatures.   Since temperatures now exceed that 1850-1900 level by 1.5 degrees C, methane is responsible for 0.5 degrees of the rise, and is likely key to the acceleration of the decadal increase from 0.2 degrees per decade to 0.3 degrees.

Now for the good news.  Methane rapidly decays to CO2.  So if we stopped emitting it, we could (optimistically!) cut temps by up to 0.5 degrees C, because atmospheric methane would fall dramatically, and temperatures with it.  Even if we halve methane emissions, we could reduce global temperatures by, say, 0.2 degrees.

40% of methane emissions come from fossil fuels  --- "fugitive emissions", which everybody else calls "gas leaks".   This could be cut by tighter controls.   And as we use less coal and oil, these emissions will anyway decline.  20% comes from rubbish dumps.  This can be cut by covering rubbish dumps with soil.   

40% come from agriculture; mostly from the burps and farts of cows and sheep and other animals we grow for meat.   And this is where you can make a personal difference.  The biggest decline in methane emissions would come from going vegan, but if you can't face that, cutting out beef, mutton and milk would be a good start.  Even going from eating meat once a day to once a week would make a difference.  What's more, cutting back on meat will reduce land clearing and the potentially disastrous clearing and burning of the Amazon rain forest.

We are all consumers and voters.  We can make a difference.  Start today.

Source: Our World in Data
The chart shows methane emissions as CO2 equivalents, but uses a 100-year timescale for the calculation, which reduces the calculated impact of methane four-fold.

Amazon's record drought driven by climate change

From The BBC

One of our planet's most vital defences against global warming is itself being ravaged by climate change.

It was the main driver of the Amazon rainforest's worst drought in at least half a century, according to a new study.

Often described as the "lungs of the planet", the Amazon plays a key role in removing warming carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

But rapid deforestation has left it more vulnerable to weather extremes.

While droughts in the Amazon are not uncommon, last year's event was "exceptional", the researchers say.

In October, the Rio Negro - one of the world's largest rivers - reached its lowest recorded level near Manaus in Brazil, surpassing marks going back over 100 years.

As well as being a buffer against climate change, the Amazon is a rich source of biodiversity, containing around 10% of the world's species - with many more yet to be discovered.

The drought has disrupted ecosystems and has directly impacted millions of people who rely on rivers for transport, food and income, with the most vulnerable hit hardest.

One trigger for these dry conditions is El Niño - a natural weather system where sea surface temperatures increase in the East Pacific Ocean. This affects global rainfall patterns, particularly in South America.

But human-caused climate change was the main driver of the extreme drought, according to the World Weather Attribution group, reducing the amount of water in the soil in two main ways.

Firstly, the Amazon is typically receiving less rainfall than it used to between June and November - the drier part of the year - as the climate warms.

Secondly, hotter temperatures mean there's more evaporation from the plants and soils, so they lose more water.

The researchers used weather data and computer simulations to compare drought conditions in two scenarios: one with human-caused warming, and one without.

In a world where humans hadn't heated up the planet by around 1.2C, such an intense 'agricultural drought' - where a lack of rainfall and high evaporation dry out the soils - may only have happened around once every 1,500 years, the study suggests.

Climate change has made a drought of this severity around 30 times more likely, according to the researchers, and one is now expected to happen every 50 years under current conditions.

"This really is something quite exceptional," says Dr Ben Clarke, a researcher with the World Weather Attribution group.

And if warming continues, such extreme droughts could become even more common.  "If we continue burning oil, gas and coal, very soon, we'll reach 2C of warming and we'll see similar Amazon droughts about once every 13 years," says Dr Friederike Otto, a senior lecturer in climate science at Imperial College London.

More frequent and intense droughts test the Amazon's resilience. That has already been stretched by deforestation - around one-fifth of the rainforest has been lost over the last 50 years.

Trees help the area retain and release moisture, fuelling their own clouds, and they also help to cool temperatures.

While the effect of deforestation was not directly tested in this latest study, previous research has shown it increases the vulnerability of the rainforest to drought.

The world's largest rainforest is seen as crucial in the battle to limit global warming.

"The Amazon could make or break our fight against climate change," says Regina Rodrigues, a professor of physical oceanography and climate at the Federal University of Santa Catarina in Brazil.

In a healthy state, it takes up more carbon dioxide (CO2) than it releases.

This limits CO2 increases in the atmosphere from human activities, keeping a lid on temperatures.

But there is evidence that this may be changing, as trees die back due to drought, wildfires and deliberate clearance to make room for agriculture.

There is concern that if climate change and deforestation continue at their current pace, the Amazon could soon reach a "tipping point".

If crossed, this could lead to the rapid and irreversible dieback of the whole rainforest - potentially leading to the region becoming a significant source of CO2 emissions.

It's not known exactly where such a threshold might sit.

"I don't think that [tipping point] is what we are seeing [yet], at least in all but the driest part of the Amazon forest," says Yadvinder Malhi, a professor of ecosystem science at the University of Oxford, who was not involved in the latest study.

This - alongside urgent action to slash the greenhouse gas emissions that are fuelling global warming - can still help to protect what's left of the Amazon, researchers say.

"The loss of the Amazon forest is far from inevitable in the short-term," as long as fire and deforestation can be controlled, Prof Malhi told BBC News.

"But we do need to get to grips with stabilising global climate, as the risk increases with every fraction of a degree the planet warms."

800 million Amazon trees felled for beef

Burning forest in Lábrea, Amazonas state in August 2020. Photograph: Christian Braga/Greenpeace

From The Guardian

More than 800m trees have been cut down in the Amazon rainforest in just six years to feed the world’s appetite for Brazilian beef, according to a new investigation, despite dire warnings about the forest’s importance in fighting the climate crisis.

A data-driven investigation by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ), the Guardian, Repórter Brasil and Forbidden Stories shows systematic and vast forest loss linked to cattle farming.

The beef industry in Brazil has consistently pledged to avoid farms linked to deforestation. However, the data suggests that 1.7m hectares (4.2m acres) of the Amazon was destroyed near meat plants exporting beef around the world.

The investigation is part of Forbidden Stories’ Bruno and Dom project. It continues the work of Bruno Pereira, an Indigenous peoples expert, and Dom Phillips, a journalist who was a longtime contributor to the Guardian​​. The two men were killed in the Amazon last year.

Deforestation across Brazil soared between 2019 and 2022 under the then president, Jair Bolsonaro, with cattle ranching being the number one cause. The new administration of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has promised to curb the destruction.

Researchers at the AidEnvironment consultancy used satellite imagery, livestock movement records and other data to calculate estimated forest loss over six years, between 2017 and 2022 on thousands of ranches near more than 20 slaughterhouses. All the meat plants were owned by Brazil’s big three beef operators and exporters – JBS, Marfrig and Minerv​a.

To find the farms that were most likely to have supplied each slaughterhouse, the researchers looked at “buying zones”; areas based on transport connections and other factors, including verification using interviews with plant representatives. All the meat plants exported widely, including to the EU, the UK and China, the world’s biggest buyer of Brazilian beef.

The research focused on slaughterhouses in the states of Mato Grosso, Pará and Rondônia, important frontiers of deforestation associated with ranching. It is likely the overall figure for deforestation on farms supplying JBS, Marfrig and Minerva is higher, because they run other plants elsewhere in the Amazon.

All three companies say they operate strict compliance procedures, in an open and honest manner, to ensure they are meeting their sustainable goals.

Nestlé and the German meat company Tönnies, which had supplied Lidl and Aldi, were among those to have apparently bought meat from the plants featured in the study. Dozens of wholesale buyers in various EU countries, some of which supply the catering businesses that serve schools and hospitals, also appeared in the list of buyers.

Nestlé said two of the meatpackers were not currently part of its supply chain, and added: “We may scrutinise business relationships with our suppliers who are unwilling or unable to address gaps in compliance with our standards.”

Tönnies said: “These Brazilian companies process many thousands of animals per year for export,” and claimed it was unclear whether the company was the recipient of products from plants linked to deforestation. Lidl and Aldi said they stopped selling Brazilian beef in 2021 and 2022 respectively.

[The article is long; you can read much more here.]

I beg you:  stop eating beef.  It is one of the biggest things you can do to slash your carbon emissions.  That's before we get to the cruelty and suffering involved in the cattle trade.  When the Amazon forest goes, it will be an irreversible tipping point.  And the whole world will pay.

World likely to breach 1.5 degrees by 2027

From The Guardian

The world is almost certain to experience new record temperatures in the next five years, and temperatures are likely to rise by more than 1.5C above pre-industrial levels, scientists have warned.

The breaching of the crucial 1.5C threshold, which scientists have warned could have dire consequences, should be only temporary, according to research from the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO).

However, it would represent a marked acceleration of human impacts on the global climate system, and send the world into “uncharted territory”, the UN agency warned.

Countries have pledged, under the 2015 Paris climate agreement, to try to hold global temperatures to no higher than 1.5C above pre-industrial levels, after scientific advice that heating beyond that level would unleash a cascade of increasingly catastrophic and potentially irreversible impacts.

Prof Petteri Taalas, the secretary general of the WMO, said: “This report does not mean that we will permanently exceed the 1.5C specified in the Paris agreement, which refers to long-term warming over many years. However, WMO is sounding the alarm that we will breach the 1.5C level on a temporary basis with increasing frequency.”

Global average surface temperatures have never before breached the 1.5C threshold. The highest average in previous years was 1.28C above pre-industrial levels.

The report, published on Wednesday, found there was a 66% likelihood of exceeding the 1.5C threshold in at least one year between 2023 and 2027.

New record temperatures have been set in many areas around the world in the heatwaves of the past year, but those highs may only be the beginning, according to the report, as climate breakdown and the impact of a developing El Niño weather system combine to create heatwaves across the globe.

El Niño is part of an oscillating weather system that develops in the Pacific. For the past three years, the world has been in the opposing phase, known as La Niña, which has had a dampening effect on temperature increases around the world.

As La Niña ends and a new El Niño develops, there is a 98% likelihood that at least one of the next five years will be the hottest on record, the scientists found.

Taalas warned of the effects. “A warming El Niño is expected to develop in the coming months and this will combine with human-induced climate change to push global temperatures into uncharted territory. This will have far-reaching repercussions for health, food security, water management and the environment,” he said. “We need to be prepared.”

The Arctic is heating much faster than the rest of the world, and this appears to be having an impact on global weather systems, including the jet stream, which has disrupted weather across the northern hemisphere in recent years.

There is likely to be less rainfall this year in the Amazon, Central America, Australia and Indonesia, the report found. This is particularly bad news for the Amazon, where scientists have grown increasingly concerned that a vicious cycle of heating and deforestation could tip the region from rainforest into savannah-like conditions.

That could have calamitous consequences for the planet, which relies on rainforests as massive carbon sinks.

For each year from 2023 to 2027, the global near-surface temperature is predicted to be between 1.1C and 1.8C above the pre-industrial average, taken from the years 1850 to 1900.

The world has warmed considerably in recent years. In 2015, when the Paris agreement was signed, requiring countries to hold global temperature increases to no more than 2C above pre-industrial levels while “pursuing efforts” to hold them to 1.5C, it was forecast that the chance of temporarily exceeding the 1.5C threshold within the following five years was zero.

This November, governments will meet for the Cop28 UN climate summit, where they will assess progress towards meeting the goals of the Paris agreement. Known as the “global stocktake”, this assessment is likely to show that the world is far off track to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by the 43% this decade that is required to have a good chance of limiting [longer-term] temperature rises to 1.5C.

The November meeting will be just another blah-blah-blah gabfest.  

Too little is being done.  We are heading for climate catastrophe.  We need to cut global emissions by 5% per annum, minimum.  Despite the optimistic signs, emissions are still rising.  Fossil fuel subsidies continue.  And China is still building coal power stations at a hectic pace.

The Amazon could trigger a cascade of global tipping points

Burnt land and smoke from fires in the Amazon rainforest in Rondonia state, Brazil. (Leonardo Carrato/Bloomberg Creative/Getty Images)

From Science Alert



Deforestation in the Amazon is nearing the point of no return, and if this ecosystem falls, it could flip from a vast carbon sink to a gushing carbon tap. Already, some climate scientists suspect the rainforest is spewing more carbon than it's absorbing.

If the Amazon crosses a critical threshold of self-resilience, a new study suggests the disaster could set off a domino effect, knocking over tipping points elsewhere in the world, too, abruptly accelerating environmental crises and causing irreparable damage to the planet.

Tipping points in the global climate system, such as collapsing ice sheets, glacier melt, forest dieback, sea level rise, and shifting monsoons, have received a lot more attention in recent years.

Each one of these switches could seriously turn up the heat on our planet, creating a 'hothouse Earth' with irreversible and catastrophic effects.

They are all connected by the global greenhouse effect, but in a climate crisis, it's uncertain in what order they will ultimately fall.

The most recent study focuses on the Amazon rainforest tipping point and some of its connections to other regional climate systems.

Using historical data from 1979 to 2019, an international team of climate researchers have drawn a link between tree loss in the Amazon and warmer temperatures in Tibet and the West Antarctic ice sheet.

Plugging this data into a model of the global climate system suggested the connection was closely synchronized with modern climate changes.

Periods of higher rainfall in the Amazon correlated with less precipitation in Tibet and West Antarctica.

Since 2008, snow cover on the Tibetan Plateau has been melting at a rapid rate similar to the Arctic.

The Plateau is sometimes known as Earth's third pole, and it plays important roles in global water storage and climate.

If the current study is correct, Tibet's loss of snow cover could be due, in part, to deforestation half a world away. The authors say the region is now operating close to a tipping point that tends to be overlooked.

"Our framework highlights that tipping elements can be linked and also the potential predictability of cascading tipping dynamics," the authors write.

The connection between Antarctica, Tibet, and the Amazon extends nearly 10,000 kilometers (6,200 miles), and it appears to be based on strong ocean currents and westerly winds.

In a review of the paper for Nature, climate scientist Valerie Livina from the United Kingdom's National Physical Laboratory agrees that the models show "strong correlations across long distances".

"This is the first time that the theory of complex networks has been applied in the context of tipping points, and the synergy of the two research areas provides an important insight into the global climate dynamics," Livina writes.

"This work opens a new area of tipping point analysis at a global scale."

Nevertheless, there is still a lot of complexity that needs to be incorporated into future models.

Deforestation in the Amazon impacts more than just Tibet and Antarctica. Previous studies suggest the climate of the Amazon, which is closely tuned by its trees, can have impacts on coral reefs in the Caribbean and reduce snowfall in the Sierra Nevada and the Cascade Mountains of North America, potentially triggering extreme drought on the west coast.

The planet's climate systems are intimately connected. It's a small world, after all.

The study was published in Nature Climate Change