A place to share news, experiences and discussion about the continuing climate crisis, societal collapse, and biosphere collapse. Please be respectful of each other and remember the human.
Long live the Lützerath Mud Wizard.
Useful Links:
Earth - A Global Map of Wind, Weather and Ocean Conditions - Use the menu at bottom left to toggle different views. For example, you can see where wildfires/smoke are by selecting "Chem - COsc" to see carbon monoxide (CO) surface concentration.
Climate Reanalyzer (University of Maine) - A source for daily updated average global air temps, sea surface temps, sea ice, weather and more.
National Weather Service Climate Prediction Center (US) - Information about ENSO an
A team of biologists working at the Naturalis Biodiversity Center, a research museum in the Netherlands, has found evidence of caddisfly larvae using microplastics to build their casings as far back as the 1970s.
The UN has agreed to charge ships for the greenhouse gases they emit – but the price is far too low.
The UN’s International Maritime Organization [IMO] has just agreed to start charging ships for the greenhouse gases they emit. After decades of ineffective incremental tweaks to shipping emissions, the breakthrough came on April 11 at a summit in London. It makes shipping the first industry subject to a worldwide – and legally binding – emissions price.
[...]
There was sustained opposition to ambitious action from Saudi Arabia and other petrostates, as well as from China and Brazil. Second, the US had already disengaged from negotiations. Even so, from outside the meeting, the US administration’s tariff war and explicit threat to retaliate against states supporting a shipping pricing regime could have affected talks far more than they did.
But researchers are not sure that this agreement can be considered a success. While there is little traditional climate change denial at the IMO, “mitigation denial” is alive and kicking. Mitigation denial means making lofty promises, often in lin
Extended heatwave in India tests the limits of human survivability
For hundreds of millions of people living in India and Pakistan the early arrival of summer heatwaves has become a terrifying reality that’s testing survivability limits and putting enormous strain on energy supplies, vital crops and livelihoods.
For hundreds of millions of people living in India and Pakistan, the early arrival of summer heatwaves has become a terrifying reality that’s testing survivability limits and putting enormous strain on energy supplies, vital crops and livelihoods.
Both countries experience heatwaves during the summer months of May and June, but this year’s heatwave season has arrived sooner than usual and is predicted to last longer too.
Parts of Pakistan are likely to experience heat up to 8 degrees Celsius above normal between April 14-18, according to the country’s meteorological department. Maximum temperatures in Balochistan, in country’s southwest, could reach up to 49 degrees Celsius (120 Fahrenheit).
That’s like living in Death Valley – the hottest and driest place in North America – where summer daytime temperatures often climb to similar levels.
Climate change is likely to significantly undermine sovereign debt sustainability, especially from the mid-2040s
cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/20970653
archived (Wayback Machine)
“Progress is inevitable“ - STWF Bad Ideas ep 5 ft. George Monbiot
In this powerhouse episode, Mark Lynas is joined by long-time friend and environmental journalist George Monbiot for a brutally honest conversation on where we are — and how we fight back. Together they challenge the idea that environmental progress is automatic or guaranteed, and instead delve into the deep political, economic, and social forces that shape our chances for a better future. Monbiot argues that unless we confront power, capitalism, and the failure of incrementalism, we’re simply sleepwalking into authoritarianism and ecological collapse. From colonialism to neoliberalism, from fascism to the failures of the left, this is a sweeping conversation on what went wrong — and how we can make things right, through a positive politics of belonging. This one pulls no punches.
🏛️ Why environmentalism fails without confronting power
🛑 The myth of inevitable progress — and how it can be reversed
⚡ Technology is not enough: the limits of "techno-fix" t
One British, three Chinese copper mines have been accused of releasing toxic mining waste into Zambia’s Kafue River. The world needs a discussion on where green energy material comes from.
This year, four copper mining companies — one British and three Chinese — have been accused of releasing toxic mining waste into Zambia’s Kafue River.
On February 18, a dam failed and a Chinese-owned copper mine spilled 50 million liters of acidic effluent into the Kafue River, damaging the lives of millions of people as pollution was detected at least 100 kilometers downstream.
Water supply was cut off in nearby towns. Fish populations have been devastated. Groundwater has likely been contaminated. Crops have been destroyed. And huge amounts of livestock have been killed, crashing the livelihoods of farmers.
“Prior to the 18th of February this was a vibrant and alive river,” Sean Cornelius, a local resident, told the Associated Press. “Now everything is dead, it’s like a totally dead river. Unbelievable. Overnight, this river died.”
“People unknowingly drank contaminated water and ate affected maize. Now many are suffering from headaches, coughs, diarrhea, muscle cramps and even sores on their legs,” Nsama Musonda Kearns, executive director of the Care for Nature Zambia NGO, told Climate Home News.
[...]
The company responsi
The human species — Homo sapiens — has existed for a mere 300,000 years in cosmic terms, yet has developed the peculiar habit of believing…
Microplastics are pervasive in the environment and often so small they can’t be seen with the naked eye. Removing them has been a big challenge, but recent research finds that water hyacinths can be effective at remediating microplastic from aquatic environments. Native to South America, water hyaci...
Guardian Australia is highlighting the plight of our endangered native species during an election campaign that is ignoring broken environment laws and rapidly declining ecosystems
The governing ideology of the far right has become a monstrous, supremacist survivalism. Our task is to build a movement strong enough to stop them
Seeing the System, Not Just the Smoke
archived (Wayback Machine)
The numbers tell a story so alarming that it borders on the incomprehensible: since 1970, global wildlife populations have plummeted by…
Behind these declines lies a constellation of human-driven threats, with habitat destruction leading the charge. Each year, approximately 10 million hectares of forest — an area nearly the size of Kentucky — disappear to make way for agriculture, urban development, and resource extraction. Particularly devastating is the ongoing destruction of tropical rainforests, Earth’s most biologically diverse terrestrial ecosystems. The Amazon Basin alone has lost roughly 17% of its forest cover in the past 50 years, with deforestation rates accelerating dramatically in recent years despite increased awareness of the region’s critical importance to global climate regulation.
The connection between rainforest destruction and global agricultural systems reveals a particularly troubling cycle of environmental degradation. Vast tracts of pristine forest, especially in South America, are being systematically cleared to grow soybeans — not primarily for direct human consumption, but to feed
The Bleak, Defeatist Rise of “Climate Realism”
cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/20740784
Amid all the bad climate news flowing out of the Trump administration, you might have missed a quiet new consensus congealing in think tanks and big business. The targets set out by the Paris climate agreement, they argue—to limit global temperature rise to two degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit)—are a lost cause. It’s time to prepare for a world warmed by at least three degrees Celsius.
Owing to “recent setbacks to global decarbonization efforts,” Morgan Stanley analysts wrote in a research report last month, they “now expect a 3°C world.” The “baseline” scenario that JP Morgan Chase uses to assess its own transition risk—essentially, the economic impact that decarbonization could have on its high-carbon investments—similarly “assumes that no additional emissions reduction policies are implemented by governments” and that the world could reach “3°C or more of warming” by 2100. The Climate Realism Initiative launch
For 12 years, scientists thought they knew how much extreme heat human bodies could cope with. New research shows how wrong they were.
In the summer of 2023, a dozen people willingly walked into a steel chamber at the University of Ottawa designed to test the limits of human survival. Outfitted with heart rate monitors and temperature probes, they waited in temperatures of 42 degrees Celsius, or 107 degrees Fahrenheit, while the humidity steadily climbed, coating their bodies in sweat and condensation. After several hours, their internal body temperatures began ratcheting upward, as the heat cooked them from the outside in.
“Few people on the planet have actually experienced temperatures like this,” said Robert Meade, a postdoctoral researcher in epidemiology at the Harvard School of Public Health who led the study. “Imagine moisture condensing on the skin like a glass of water on a hot day. That’s how hot it was, compared to skin temperature.”
Their experiment tested the body’s ability to cope with extreme heat by exposing participants to temperatures at which they could no longer cool themselves. [Their study](htt
Kindergarten teacher Lolita Akim fires up five standing fans with three more at the ready as she fights to hold the attention of her pint-sized pupils in Manila's soaring heat.
Some six million students lost up to two weeks' worth of classroom learning last year as temperatures hit a record 38.8 degrees Celsius (101.4 degrees Fahrenheit), according to the education department.
Schools reported cases of heat exhaustion, nose bleeds and hospitalisations as students struggled through lessons in classrooms without air conditioning.
Scientists say that extreme heat is a clear marker of climate change, caused largely by burning fossil fuels like coal, oil and gas.
Last year's heat was further exacerbated by the seasonal El Nino phenomenon.
If the Trump administration successfully shutters FEMA, it will bankrupt small towns and force people to move
cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/20680602
The number of billion-dollar disasters in the U.S. is increasing. A recent report says FEMA made a disaster declaration somewhere in the U.S. every four days, on average, in 2024
Unmanaged abandonment I guess ?
Inside Track x Food claims the UK food industry has 'reached a moment of threat to food security like none other we have seen'
The memo, shared with The Grocer, warns food businesses are woefully unprepared for challenges including soil degradation, extreme weather events, global heating and water scarcity and that yield, quality and predictability of food supply are all at severe risk.
It goes on to claim that companies’ risk mitigation strategies are being assured by major audit and assurance firms and giving false confidence to investors, whereas the true threat to the supply chain is far greater than companies have acknowledged.
Todd Lyons said he wanted US immigration agency to be ‘like a business’ in its deportation process
The US market has been moving away from coal for decades.
As President Donald Trump signed a slew of executive orders Tuesday aimed at keeping coal power alive in the United States, he repeatedly blamed his predecessor, Democrats, and environmental regulations for the industry’s dramatic contraction over the past two decades.
But across the country, state and local officials and electric grid operators have been confronting a factor in coal’s demise that is not easily addressed with the stroke of a pen: its cost.
For example, Maryland’s only remaining coal generating station, Talen Energy’s 1.3-gigawatt Brandon Shores plant, will be staying open beyond its previously planned June 1 shutdown, under a deal that regional grid operator PJM brokered earlier this year with the company, state officials, and the Sierra Club.
[Read full article](https://arstechnica.com/science/2025/04/trump-throws-coal-a-lifeline-but-the-ene
“Thirstwaves” Are Growing More Common Across the United States
Like heat waves, these periods of high atmospheric demand for water can damage crops and ecosystems and increase pressure on water resources. New research shows they’re becoming more severe.
