Now that warm weather has appeared in the northern hemisphere. It’s time to check on our climate’s progress. How well are we collectively doing to stop, or even diminish, global warming? I thought it might be useful to break the analysis into categories: data; government; business and the rest of us. Here are some, not necessarily comprehensive, results. As expected, they are mixed.
Data
Greenhouse gases
According to Co2.earth, the atmosphere’s level of carbon dioxide is currently (as of June 24, 2024) is 427.33 parts per million (ppm), a new record for the Human Era. In June 24, 2023 it was 423.35 ppm, an increase from June of 00.94%. This is a slight acceleration of the recent years’ trend. This equates to a global temperature change of +1.60C above the pre-industrial comparison period of 1880-1920. In short, no abatement is in sight.
Weather
The NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) has released the final update to its 2023 Billion-dollar disaster report, confirming a historic year in the number of costly disasters and extremes throughout much of the country. There were 28 weather and climate disasters in 2023, surpassing the previous record of 22 in 2020, tallying a price tag of at least $92.9 billion. This total annual cost may rise by several billion when we’ve fully accounted for the costs of the December 16-18 East Coast storm and flooding event that impacted states from Florida to Maine.
Don’t forget, this is just for the United States. Here’s a map for the world, courtesy of NOAA. The intensity of the red patches shows the above -normal temperatures. Seriously red patches tend to be heatwaves.
.
Continue reading Checking our climate’s progress; 2024