Climate Letter #1482

A short (6-min) video of a TV interview puts recent extreme weather events into a climate change perspective (CBS News).  This is worth watching for lots of information.  The meteorologist even reminds us that the CO2 already emitted will add another half degree to global temperatures all by itself over just a few decades, something often forgotten.  (All future emissions, starting today, will just be adding to that locked-in base.)

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A new special report from IPCC scientists has a focus on the need for land-use changes (The Guardian).  A leaked draft states that “it will be impossible to keep global temperatures at safe levels unless there is also a transformation in the way the world produces food and manages land…..Attempts to solve the climate crisis by cutting carbon emissions from only cars, factories and power plants are doomed to failure”  The solutions that are called for are of a totally different type, one of them being a transformation in the kind of food we eat.

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BBC has a review of the same report along with helpful  information about the fundamentals of the carbon cycle and the important role of peatlands.  Drained peatland is great for farming because it is rich in carbon, but then it loses that carbon year after year.  More generally, the report describes a number of solutions for conservation-style agriculture, which must be taught to half a billion farmers around the globe.

A new study adds to the knowledge surrounding prospects for increased methane emissions from global wetlands as a likely feedback to rising temperatures (IOPscience).  This complicated subject is replete with uncertainties, some of which can now be reduced.  The authors foresee a meaningful addition to warming trends, previously unrecognized, large enough to require adjustments to any formulation of a carbon budget.

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