Arguments
Skeptical Science New Research for Week #47 2022
Posted on 24 November 2022 by Doug Bostrom, Marc Kodack
Open access notables:
Web bulb temperatures verging on unsurvivable are creeping into our world and heading toward familiar. That's the lesson we can infer from Dong-Quan & Sun's Effects of anthropogenic forcing and atmospheric circulation on the record-breaking welt bulb heat event over southern China in September 2021. Analyzing an event including 32.8°C the authors find: "Results indicate that 2021-like events would happen extremely rarely without anthropogenic warming (would not occur in counterfactual world simulations) and have become a 1-in-16-year event in the factual world. For the threshold of the second most extreme year, the occurrence probability of extreme WBGT events increases approximately 50 times due to the impact of anthropogenic forcings."
Public Disapproval of Disruptive Climate Change Protests Is it COINTELPRO? Crisis actors paid by the fossil fuel industry? Happily— no. Boomers who've lived through decades of progress know that every major jump forward past big, stubborn problems involves and requires passion, enthusiasm, and often myopic focus. It's not surprising to see younger people front and center; "the future" is a more immediate preoccupation for people with easily half-a-hundred years to live. Indeed, the same era that saw COINTELPRO in its heyday included the founding of the US EPA, not least because a lot of pesky kids were making environmental degradation a topic that couldn't be ignored. As a practical matter for activist practitioners, it's worth carefully assessing whether, when & how means of calling attention may be verging on diminishing gains, or worse. Solid data to inform analysis and tactical decisions is available thanks to Shawn Patterson & Michael Mann, via UPenn's Center for Science, Sustainability and the Media. Included in this week's government/NGO reports section.
Wildlife kills by wind turbines have been a favorite means of poisoning public opinion against this now familiar means of energy harvesting. Here we find the rare case of an actual problem, one that— despite being cynically exploited to touch emotions in service of clinging to profits delivered by an outmoded and far more lethal techology— does exist. But how do we know what the reality of turbine impact is? Wilson, Hulka & Bennun give us a glimpse of how this is measured in their intriguing work A review of raptor carcass persistence trials and the practical implications for fatality estimation at wind farms
Hornsey & Lewandowsky produce a comprehensive snapshot of modes of cognitive failure (accidental and inflicted) affecting our halting progress toward solving our climate blunder. The authors don't stop there, but also offer a collection of "interventions for reducing damage," tools given sharp edges by research. There's a hard lesson embedded therein for the climate communications community, one that ought to be intutively obvious: barging into a community with a lot of extraneous political baggage irrelevant to immediate purpose proudly on display is counterproductive, destructive to progress. Any of us with a cranky uncle knows: a single trigger word can end rational behavior. The authors put it more tactfully: "sceptics will be more influenced by messengers that share salient identities with them: rural people will be more influenced by rural messengers, conservatives will be more influenced by conservatives, and so forth. This is a challenging message for many climate activists because it underscores how their identification as green or left can be enough to render their voices impotent when it comes to influencing sceptics." [bold ours] As a review article A toolkit for understanding and addressing climate scepticism is a fast and complete spin-up for people new to this game, and very probably a worthwhle refresher for old hands.
[Correction: Unfortunately, due to an initial reporting error landing in Unpaywall's database, the above article initially appeared to us during composition as open access but in fact will only be available to the general public 6 months after publication. We apologize for the confusion. Some further detail is still available in our follow-up blog post, New paper: A toolkit for understanding and addressing climate scepticism.]
Population distribution within the human climate niche Taking a closer look at an extending recent work by Xu et al. which posited a preferred thermal niche for our species, Klinger & Ryan find a broader range of options. It might be said that we're more gracefully adaptable in the direction of cooler. However and heading the opposite direction on the thermometer, this new, detailed breakdown also leads to another conclusion by the authors: "The large decrease in population density from the 26–28°C range to the 28–30°C range is consistent with the concept that temperatures above 30°C are significantly less suitable for humans. Even if half the population already lives at T > 20°C, “moving” some of them to conditions outside the range of any prior human experience will bring physiological harm, crop failure, and ecological damage."
Football and climate change: what do we know, and what is needed for an evidence-informed response? identifies entirely plausible and tolerable mechanisms to deal with what might be called "an attractive nuisance" from the climate perspective. Sadly, the locale for the FIFA World Cup 2022 calls into question placement of the brackets of possibility and whether improvements are at all possible, what with the leadership of FIFA seemingly quite alienated from society's urgent needs. Even so, management comes and management goes; perhaps new blood will be ready to hear the information provded by author Leslie Mabon.
139 articles in 55 journals by 904 contributing authors
Observations of climate change, effects
Anthropogenic contributions to the 2021 Pacific Northwest heatwave
Bercos-Hickey et al., ESSOAr, Open Access 10.1002/essoar.10511354.1
Changes in Aerosols, Meteorology, and Radiation in the Southeastern U.S. Warming Hole Region during 2000 to 2019
Ghate et al., Journal of Climate, Open Access pdf 10.1175/jcli-d-22-0073.1
Effects of anthropogenic forcing and atmospheric circulation on the record-breaking wet bulb heat event over southern China in September 2021
Dong-Qian & SUN, Advances in Climate Change Research, Open Access 10.1016/j.accre.2022.11.007
Extreme precipitation over northern China in autumn 2021 and the joint contributions from the tropical and mid-latitude factors
Gu et al., Advances in Climate Change Research, Open Access 10.1016/j.accre.2022.11.008
Is Anthropogenic Global Warming Accelerating?
Jenkins et al., Journal of Climate, Open Access 10.1175/jcli-d-22-0081.1
Recent changes in circulation patterns and their opposing impact on extreme precipitation at the west coast of Norway
Ødemark et al., Weather and Climate Extremes, Open Access 10.1016/j.wace.2022.100530
Satellite observed delaying effects of increased winds on spring green-up dates
Dong et al., Remote Sensing of Environment, 10.1016/j.rse.2022.113363
Spatio-temporal trends in daily and sub-daily rainfall extremes and return levels in Turkey
Albayrak et al., International Journal of Climatology, 10.1002/joc.7906
Wintertime cold and warm spells in the eastern part of the Baltic Sea region
Ge?ait? & Rimkus, Natural Hazards, Open Access pdf 10.1007/s11069-022-05648-6
Instrumentation & observational methods of climate change, effects
Assessing internal variability of global mean surface temperature from observational data and implications for reaching key thresholds
Trewin, [journal not provided], Open Access 10.1002/essoar.10510979.1
Bridge over changing waters–Citizen science for detecting the impacts of climate change on water
Seibert & van Meerveld, PLOS Climate, Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0000088
Daily High-Resolution Temperature and Precipitation Fields for the Contiguous United States from 1951 to Present
Durre et al., Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology, 10.1175/jtech-d-22-0024.1
Glacier extraction based on high-spatial-resolution remote-sensing images using a deep-learning approach with attention mechanism
Chu et al., The Cryosphere, Open Access pdf 10.5194/tc-16-4273-2022
We’re building it up to burn it down: fire occurrence and fire-related climatic patterns in Brazilian biomes
Diele Viegas et al., PeerJ, Open Access 10.7717/peerj.14276
Modeling, simulation & projection of climate change, effects
Anthropogenic influence on compound dry and hot events in China based on Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 models
Wu et al., International Journal of Climatology, 10.1002/joc.7473
Future Changes in Tropical Cyclone Exposure and Impacts in Southeast Asia from CMIP6 Pseudo-global Warming Simulations
Tran et al., Earth's Future, Open Access pdf 10.1029/2022ef003118
High Sensitivity of Compound Drought and Heatwave Events to Global Warming in the Future
Zhang et al., [journal not provided], Open Access 10.1002/essoar.10511301.1
Non-stationary modeling of wet-season precipitation over the Inner Mongolia section of the Yellow River basin
Wang et al., Theoretical and Applied Climatology, 10.1007/s00704-022-04279-y
Advancement of climate & climate effects modeling, simulation & projection
A canary, a coal mine, and imperfect data: determining the efficacy of open-source climate change models in detecting and predicting extreme weather events in Northern and Western Kenya
Igobwa et al., Climatic Change, Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-022-03444-6
Assessment and constraint of mesozooplankton in CMIP6 Earth system models
Petrik et al., [journal not provided], 10.1002/essoar.10510705.1
Do Emergent Constraints on Carbon Cycle Feedbacks hold in CMIP6?
Zechlau et al., Journal of Geophysical Research: Biogeosciences, 10.1029/2022jg006985
ENSO teleconnections and atmospheric mean state in idealised simulations
Di Carlo et al., Climate Dynamics, Open Access pdf 10.1007/s00382-022-06261-w
Evaluation of CMIP6 GCMs performance to simulate precipitation over Southeast Asia
Pimonsree et al., Atmospheric Research, 10.1016/j.atmosres.2022.106522
Evaluations of the sixth phase of Coupled Model Intercomparison Project model performance on precipitation over Southeast Asia based on the moisture budget
Liu et al., International Journal of Climatology, 10.1002/joc.7631
Integrated Dynamics-Physics Coupling for Weather to Climate Models: GFDL SHiELD With In-Line Microphysics
Zhou & Harris Harris, [journal not provided], Open Access 10.1002/essoar.10511957.1
Model spread in tropical low cloud feedback tied to overturning circulation response to warming
Schiro et al., Nature Communications, Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-022-34787-4
On deep learning-based bias correction and downscaling of multiple climate models simulations
Wang & Tian, Climate Dynamics, 10.1007/s00382-022-06277-2
Simulation and Projection of Tropical Cyclone Activities over the Western North Pacific by CMIP6 HighResMIP
Tang et al., Journal of Climate, 10.1175/jcli-d-21-0760.1
Cryosphere & climate change
Ice shelf basal melt rates in the Amundsen Sea at the end of the 21st century
Jourdain et al., [journal not provided], Open Access 10.1002/essoar.10511482.2
Improving interpretation of sea-level projections through a machine-learning-based local explanation approach
Rohmer et al., [journal not provided], Open Access pdf 10.5194/egusphere-2022-435
In situ measurements of meltwater flow through snow and firn in the accumulation zone of the SW Greenland Ice Sheet
Clerx et al., [journal not provided], Open Access pdf 10.5194/egusphere-2022-71
Increased nutrient availability speeds up permafrost development, while goose grazing slows it down in a Canadian High Arctic wetland
Deschamps et al., Journal of Ecology, 10.1111/1365-2745.14037
Influence of fast ice on future ice shelf melting in the Totten Glacier area, East Antarctica
Van Achter et al., [journal not provided], Open Access pdf 10.5194/egusphere-2022-94
New Insights Into Cyclone Impacts on Sea Ice in the Atlantic Sector of the Arctic Ocean in Winter
Aue et al., Geophysical Research Letters, 10.1029/2022gl100051
Sea ice breakup and freeze-up indicators for users of the Arctic coastal environment
Walsh et al., The Cryosphere, Open Access pdf 10.5194/tc-16-4617-2022
Surface melt on the Shackleton Ice Shelf, East Antarctica (2003–2021)
Saunderson et al., The Cryosphere, Open Access pdf 10.5194/tc-16-4553-2022
Sea level & climate change
Sea-level rise will likely accelerate rock coast cliff retreat rates
Shadrick et al., Nature Communications, Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-022-34386-3
The Antarctic contribution to 21st-century sea-level rise predicted by the UK Earth System Model with an interactive ice sheet
Siahaan et al., The Cryosphere, Open Access pdf 10.5194/tc-16-4053-2022
The contribution of Humboldt Glacier, northern Greenland, to sea-level rise through 2100 constrained by recent observations of speedup and retreat
Hillebrand et al., The Cryosphere, Open Access pdf 10.5194/tc-16-4679-2022
Understanding the drivers of coastal flood exposure and risk from 1860 to 2100
Lincke et al., Earth's Future, Open Access pdf 10.1029/2021ef002584
Paleoclimate
Deglacial release of petrogenic and permafrost carbon from the Canadian Arctic impacting the carbon cycle
Wu et al., Nature Communications, Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-022-34725-4
Ice core evidence for major volcanic eruptions at the onset of Dansgaard–Oeschger warming events
Lohmann & Svensson Svensson Svensson, Climate of the Past, Open Access pdf 10.5194/cp-18-2021-2022
Increasing Drought Risks over the Past Four Centuries amidst Projected Flood Intensification in the Kabul River Basin (Afghanistan and Pakistan)—Evidence from Tree Rings
Khan et al., [journal not provided], Open Access 10.1002/essoar.10512109.2
Is it possible to estimate aerosol optical depth from historic colour paintings?
von Savigny et al., Climate of the Past, Open Access pdf 10.5194/cp-18-2345-2022
Linked fire activity and climate whiplash in California during the early Holocene
Homann et al., Nature Communications, Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-022-34950-x
Mid-Holocene climate of the Tibetan Plateau and hydroclimate in three major river basins based on high-resolution regional climate simulations
Huo et al., Climate of the Past, Open Access pdf 10.5194/cp-18-2401-2022
Pre-industrial temperature variability on the Swiss Plateau derived from the instrumental daily series of Bern and Zurich
Brugnara et al., Climate of the Past, Open Access pdf 10.5194/cp-18-2357-2022
Reply to: Towards solving the missing ice problem and the importance of rigorous model data comparisons
Gowan et al., Nature Communications, Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-022-33954-x
Biology & climate change, related geochemistry
A decade of invertebrate recruitment at Santa Catalina Island, California
Edmunds & Clayton, PeerJ, Open Access 10.7717/peerj.14286
A regime shift in the Southeast Greenland marine ecosystem
Heide?Jørgensen et al., Global Change Biology, 10.1111/gcb.16494
Antarctica's vegetation in a changing climate
Colesie et al., WIREs Climate Change, Open Access pdf 10.1002/wcc.810
Applying landscape metrics to species distribution model predictions to characterize internal range structure and associated changes
Curd et al., Global Change Biology, 10.1111/gcb.16496
Benthic ecosystem functioning under climate change: modelling the bioturbation potential for benthic key species in the southern North Sea
Weinert et al., PeerJ, Open Access 10.7717/peerj.14105
Bridging the gap between microclimate and microrefugia: a bottom-up approach reveals strong climatic and biological offsets
Finocchiaro et al., Global Change Biology, 10.1111/gcb.16526
Extinction magnitude of animals in the near future
Kaiho, Scientific Reports, Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41598-022-23369-5
Gobal diversity patterns of larger benthic foraminifera under future climate change
Förderer et al., Global Change Biology, 10.1111/gcb.16535
Historical and future vegetation changes in the degraded frozen soil and the entire Tibetan Plateau and climate drivers
Cuo et al., Journal of Geophysical Research: Biogeosciences, 10.1029/2022jg006987
Proteomic response of early juvenile Pacific oysters (Crassostrea gigas) to temperature
Crandall et al., PeerJ, Open Access 10.7717/peerj.14158
Quantifying long-term phenological patterns of aerial insectivores roosting in the Great Lakes region using weather surveillance radar
Deng et al., Global Change Biology, 10.1111/gcb.16509
Unified methods in collecting, preserving, and archiving coral bleaching and restoration specimens to increase sample utility and interdisciplinary collaboration
Vega Thurber et al., PeerJ, Open Access 10.7717/peerj.14176
Warmer temperatures are linked to widespread phenological mismatch among native and non-native forest plants
Miller et al., Journal of Ecology, 10.1111/1365-2745.14021
Wildflower phenological escape differs by continent and spring temperature
Lee et al., Nature Communications, Open Access 10.1038/s41467-022-34936-9
GHG sources & sinks, flux, related geochemistry
Assessing Methane Emissions From the Natural Gas Industry: Reviewing the Case of China in a Comparative Framework
Yang et al., Current Climate Change Reports, Open Access pdf 10.1007/s40641-022-00187-5
Carbon dioxide sink in the Arctic Ocean from cross-shelf transport of dense Barents Sea water
Rogge et al., Nature Geoscience, Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41561-022-01069-z
Carbon monoxide (CO) cycling in the Fram Strait, Arctic Ocean
Campen et al., [journal not provided], Open Access pdf 10.1002/essoar.10511029.1
COVID-19 lockdown emission reductions have the potential to explain over half of the coincident increase in global atmospheric methane
Stevenson et al., Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, Open Access pdf 10.5194/acp-22-14243-2022
Divergent seasonal responses of carbon fluxes to extreme droughts over China
Deng et al., Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, 10.1016/j.agrformet.2022.109253
Does biodiversity-focused protection of the seabed deliver carbon benefits? A U.K. case study
Epstein & Roberts, Conservation Letters, Open Access pdf 10.1111/conl.12929
Global mitigation opportunities for the life cycle of natural gas-fired power
Jordaan et al., Nature Climate Change, 10.1038/s41558-022-01503-5
Highest methane concentrations in an Arctic river linked to local terrestrial inputs
Castro-Morales et al., Biogeosciences, Open Access pdf 10.5194/bg-19-5059-2022
Manganese Limitation of Phytoplankton Physiology and Productivity in the Southern Ocean
Hawco et al., [journal not provided], Open Access 10.1002/essoar.10510794.1
Patterns and Drivers of Dissolved Gas Concentrations and Fluxes Along a Low Gradient Stream
Carter et al., [journal not provided], Open Access 10.1002/essoar.10512207.1
Relationships between carbon emissions and urban population size and density, based on geo-urban scaling analysis: A multi?carbon source empirical study
Hong et al., Urban Climate, 10.1016/j.uclim.2022.101337
Significant effects of precipitation frequency on soil respiration and its components - A global synthesis
Du et al., Global Change Biology, 10.1111/gcb.16532
Tropical peatlands in the Anthropocene: the present and the future
Girkin et al., Anthropocene, Open Access 10.1016/j.ancene.2022.100354
Winter season Southern Ocean distributions of climate-relevant trace gases
Zhou et al., Biogeosciences, Open Access pdf 10.5194/bg-19-5021-2022
CO2 capture, sequestration science & engineering
The carbon sink potential of southern China after two decades of afforestation
Zhang et al., [journal not provided], Open Access 10.1002/essoar.10510383.1
Decarbonization
A Game-Theoretic Approach for Dynamic Service Scheduling at Charging Facilities
Hajibabai & Mirheli, IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation Systems, Open Access pdf 10.1109/tits.2022.3212017
A review of raptor carcass persistence trials and the practical implications for fatality estimation at wind farms
Wilson et al., PeerJ, Open Access 10.7717/peerj.14163
Drivers and effects of digitalization on energy demand in low-carbon scenarios
Bergman & Foxon, Climate Policy, Open Access pdf 10.1080/14693062.2022.2145260
Driving through dense fog: a study of the effects and control of sustainable public procurement of electric cars
Langseth & Moe, Environment Systems and Decisions, Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10669-022-09854-2
Give it a Try! How electric vehicle test drives influence symbolism perceptions and adoption intent
Herziger & Sintov, Journal of Environmental Psychology, 10.1016/j.jenvp.2022.101907
Narrowing fossil fuel consumption in the Indian road transport sector towards reaching carbon neutrality
Hossain et al., Energy Policy, Open Access 10.1016/j.enpol.2022.113330
Optimization and analysis of a hybrid thermal photovoltaic collector: Thermal and electrical investigation
Bria et al., Energy for Sustainable Development, 10.1016/j.esd.2022.11.002
Progress and prospect on the recycling of spent lithium-ion batteries: Ending is beginning
Yang et al., Carbon Neutralization, 10.1002/cnl2.31
The climate impact of hydrogen-powered hypersonic transport
Pletzer et al., Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, Open Access pdf 10.5194/acp-22-14323-2022
The role of productivity and efficiency gains in the sugar-ethanol industry to reduce land expansion for sugarcane fields in Brazil
Danelon et al., Energy Policy, Open Access 10.1016/j.enpol.2022.113327
Black carbon
Constraining the particle-scale diversity of black carbon light absorption using a unified framework
Beeler & Chakrabarty Chakrabarty Chakrabarty, Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, Open Access pdf 10.5194/acp-22-14825-2022
Parameterizations of size distribution and refractive index of biomass burning organic aerosol with black carbon content
Luo et al., Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, Open Access pdf 10.5194/acp-22-12401-2022
Aerosols
Stronger Response to the Aerosol Indirect Effect due to Cooling in Remote Regions
Huusko et al., [journal not provided], Open Access 10.1002/essoar.10512407.1
Unmasking the Effects of Aerosols on Greenhouse Warming Over Europ
Glantz et al., Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, 10.1029/2021jd035889
Climate change communications & cognition
Football and climate change: what do we know, and what is needed for an evidence-informed response?
Mabon, Climate Policy, Open Access pdf 10.1080/14693062.2022.2147895
Mindfulness to climate change inaction: The role of awe, “Dragons of inaction” psychological barriers and nature connectedness
Wang et al., Journal of Environmental Psychology, 10.1016/j.jenvp.2022.101912
Normative misperceptions regarding pro-environmental behavior: Mediating roles of outcome efficacy and problem awareness
Chen et al., Journal of Environmental Psychology, 10.1016/j.jenvp.2022.101917
Tipping points ahead? How laypeople respond to linear versus nonlinear climate change predictions
Formanski et al., Climatic Change, Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-022-03459-z
Agronomy, animal husbundry, food production & climate change
A critical analysis of the effect of projected temperature and rainfall for differential sowing of maize cultivars under RCP 4.5 and RCP 6.0 scenarios for Punjab
Kothiyal et al., Theoretical and Applied Climatology, Open Access pdf 10.1007/s00704-022-04291-2
Climate change implications for olive flowering in Crete, Greece: projections based on historical data
Grillakis et al., Climatic Change, Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-022-03462-4
Combining biophysical modeling and Polanyian theory pleads for a re-embedding of the agricultural system in 2050 in Austria
Le Noë et al., Environmental Science & Policy, Open Access 10.1016/j.envsci.2022.11.006
Examining the effect of climate vulnerabilities on the discounting behaviour of farmers
Begho & Anik, Climate Resilience and Sustainability, Open Access pdf 10.1002/cli2.46
Farm level adaptation to climate change in north China: behavioural practices and potential drivers
Liu et al., Environmental Sociology, 10.1080/23251042.2022.2147890
Global crop yields can be lifted by timely adaptation of growing periods to climate change
Minoli et al., Nature Communications, Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-022-34411-5
Impact of historical climate variability on rice production in Mainland Southeast Asia across multiple scales
Frazier et al., Anthropocene, 10.1016/j.ancene.2022.100353
Management-induced changes in soil organic carbon on global croplands
Karstens et al., Biogeosciences, Open Access pdf 10.5194/bg-19-5125-2022
Rural livelihood diversification is associated with lower vulnerability to climate change in the Andean-Amazon foothills
Beltrán-Tolosa et al., PLOS Climate, Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0000051
The influence of peer effects on farmers’ response to climate change: evidence from Sichuan Province, China
Ma et al., Climatic Change, 10.1007/s10584-022-03463-3
What motivates smallholder farmers to adapt to climate change? Insights from smallholder cropping in far-western Nepal
Lamichhane et al., Anthropocene, 10.1016/j.ancene.2022.100355
Hydrology, hydrometeorology & climate change
Analysis of precipitation extremes related to agriculture and water resources sectors based on gridded daily data in Romania
Horvath & Croitoru, Theoretical and Applied Climatology, 10.1007/s00704-022-04271-6
Temperature-precipitation scaling rates: A RAINFALL EVENT-BASED PERSPECTIVE
Bello et al., Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, 10.1029/2022jd037873
Climate change economics
Does it pay to be science-based green? The impact of science-based emission-reduction targets on corporate financial performance
Bendig et al., Journal of Industrial Ecology, 10.1111/jiec.13341
The Dasgupta Review and the Problem of Anthropocentrism
Treich, Environmental and Resource Economics, Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10640-022-00663-4
The Impact of Climate Disasters on the Cost of Equity Capital: Evidence from China
Chu & Xu , Weather, Climate, and Society, Open Access 10.1175/wcas-d-22-0002.1
Climate change mitigation public policy research
Climate security reversed: the implications of alternative security policies for global warming
Egeland, Environmental Politics, Open Access pdf 10.1080/09644016.2022.2146934
Considerations for benefit stacking policies in the EU electricity storage market
Varela Soares et al., Energy Policy, Open Access 10.1016/j.enpol.2022.113333
Green technology innovation and CO2 emission in China: Evidence from a spatial-temporal analysis and a nonlinear spatial durbin model
Chen et al., Energy Policy, Open Access 10.1016/j.enpol.2022.113338
Have renewable energy leaders announced aggressive emission reduction goals? Examining variations in the stringency of country-level net-zero emission pledges
Ko et al., PLOS Climate, Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0000094
Humanization of outgroups promotes justice in carbon allocation
Huang et al., Journal of Environmental Psychology, 10.1016/j.jenvp.2022.101911
Narrowing fossil fuel consumption in the Indian road transport sector towards reaching carbon neutrality
Hossain et al., Energy Policy, Open Access 10.1016/j.enpol.2022.113330
The Paris Agreement and climate justice: Inequitable impacts of sea level rise associated with temperature targets
Sadai et al., [journal not provided], 10.1002/essoar.10508929.1
Climate change adaptation & adaptation public policy research
A review of drivers of environmental non-migration decisions in Africa
Balgah & Kimengsi, Regional Environmental Change, Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10113-022-01970-8
Central America in dire need of inclusive climate resilient development with support from the international community
Castellanos, PLOS Climate, Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0000105
Climate change adaptation through policy integration by local governments in Indonesia
Yulandari et al., Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change, Open Access 10.1007/s11027-022-10039-0
Climate Change and Onsite Wastewater Treatment Systems in the Coastal Carolinas: Perspectives from Wastewater Managers
Vorhees et al., Weather, Climate, and Society, 10.1175/wcas-d-21-0192.1
Critical change agent characteristics and competencies for ensuring systemic climate adaptation interventions
Meharg, Sustainability Science, 10.1007/s11625-022-01250-8
Deeper understanding of the barriers to national climate adaptation policy: the case of South Korea
Lee et al., Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change, Open Access pdf 10.1007/s11027-022-10038-1
The influence of governance structure on local resilience: Enabling and constraining factors for climate change adaptation in practice
Birchall et al., Urban Climate, Open Access 10.1016/j.uclim.2022.101348
Climate change & geopolitics
Climate security reversed: the implications of alternative security policies for global warming
Egeland, Environmental Politics, Open Access pdf 10.1080/09644016.2022.2146934
The unbearable heaviness of climate coloniality
Sultana, Political Geography, 10.1016/j.polgeo.2022.102638
Other
Challenging the values of the polluter elite: A global consequentialist response to Evensen and Graham's (2022) ‘The irreplaceable virtues of in-person conferences’
Whitmarsh & Kreil, Journal of Environmental Psychology, 10.1016/j.jenvp.2022.101881
Green innovation of state-owned oil and gas enterprises in BRICS countries: a review of performance
Jaffe et al., Climate Policy, Open Access pdf 10.1080/14693062.2022.2145261
Population distribution within the human climate niche
Klinger & Ryan, PLOS Climate, Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0000086
The Biophysical Impacts of Idealized Afforestation on Surface Temperature in China: Local and Nonlocal Effects
Chen et al., Journal of Climate, 10.1175/jcli-d-22-0144.1
Informed opinion, nudges & major initiatives
A toolkit for understanding and addressing climate scepticism
Hornsey & Lewandowsky, Nature Human Behaviour, Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41562-022-01463-y
Challenging the financial capture of urban greening
García-Lamarca et al., Nature Communications, Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-022-34942-x
Extinction magnitude of animals in the near future
Kaiho, Scientific Reports, Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41598-022-23369-5
Fairness considerations in global mitigation investments
Pachauri et al., Science, Open Access 10.1126/science.adf0067
Global Carbon Budget 2022
Friedlingstein et al., Earth System Science Data, Open Access pdf 10.5194/essd-14-4811-2022
Scientists’ warning of the impacts of climate change on mountains
Knight, PeerJ, Open Access 10.7717/peerj.14253
The 2021 “Complex Systems” Nobel Prize: The Climate, With and Without Geocomplexity
Lovejoy, [journal not provided], Open Access 10.1002/essoar.10509861.1
The Policy Implications of the Dasgupta Review: Land Use Change and Biodiversity
Barbier, Environmental and Resource Economics, Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10640-022-00658-1
Articles/Reports from Agencies and Non-Governmental Organizations Addressing Aspects of Climate Change
Climate change exacerbated heavy rainfall leading to large scale flooding in highly vulnerable communities in West Africa, Zachariah et al., World Weather Attribution
The West African rainy season runs between May and October, with local variations, including some parts of the region experiencing two peaks of rain within the season. In 2022, the rains arrived early and were in many regions above average, especially around a large area encompassing Lake Chad, leading to flooding from Mali to Cameroon. Nigeria and Niger saw the earliest onset of large floods in the first half of June, followed by Chad in July, Cameroon in August, and finally, Benin in September. With at least 612 and 195 fatalities, respectively, the floods over Nigeria and Niger are among the deadliest in the country's history. The devastation in Nigeria is worse than the 2012 flood disaster with 34 out of 36 states and over 3.2 million people affected, including 1.5 million displaced and 2,776 injured. Several hundreds of thousands of hectares of land have been inundated, causing damage to more than 300 thousand homes and over half a million hectares of farmland. For the seasonal rainfall over the Lake Chad region, we conclude that climate change made the event about 80 times more likely and approximately 20% more intense.
Funding San Francisco Climate Action Strategies for Revenue, Implementation, and Equity, Bedsworth et al., The Center for Law, Energy & the Environment, University of California, Berkeley
The authors assess options for funding the equitable implementation of San Francisco’s Climate Action Plan (CAP). To develop the recommendations in the report, the authors conducted over 50 expert interviews with community leaders, City departments, municipal finance, and environmental policy experts, and other stakeholders; facilitated two expert and stakeholder workshops to discuss revenue generation options, and convened a Technical Advisory Committee that provided guidance on opportunities and barriers to each potential strategy. Based on these engagements, the authors developed a set of principles to inform revenue generation and investment processes and recommendations on the most promising revenue generation mechanisms to fund and implement the CAP, including top-priority recommendations. The recommendations will support decarbonization efforts in San Francisco, including continuing efforts that are already in development. The priority recommendations will allow City leaders to rapidly raise significant, flexible funds for early implementation. The report also includes recommendations for medium- and long-term funding strategies that will require additional partnership development, stakeholder engagement, or other work to develop and implement. San Francisco, like all cities, faces a range of investment needs that may complement or compete with CAP priorities, and success will require substantial funding support and policy action at the state and federal levels. Finally, it is important to keep in mind that while some of the proposed CAP measures will incur significant costs, which is the focus of the report, many will also drive long-term savings through reduced fuel costs, improved air quality and public health, and resilience.
2021-2022 U.S. Defense Climate Highlights and Case Studies, Jessica Olcott Yllemo and Thomas Benson, American Security Project
Following the Biden Administration’s issuance of Executive Order 14008, Tackling the Climate Crisis at Home and Abroad, and Executive Order 14057, Catalyzing Clean Energy Industries and Jobs Through Federal Sustainability, the Department of Defense (DoD) enterprise, including the Departments of the Air Force, Army, and Navy have all issued climate strategies to outline the challenges and opportunities presented by climate change. The authors created the report to educate and inform policymakers and local stakeholders about major defense enterprise developments over the past 18 months, as well as to highlight key elements of climate security concepts that exist throughout the defense enterprise. The broad overviews in the report are augmented by specific case studies to better inform policy and strategic and operational decision-making.
Estimating the Military’s Global Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Stuart Parkinson and Linsey Cottrell, Scientists for Global Responsibility and Conflict and Environment Observatory
A lack of reporting and significant data gaps means it is inherently difficult to estimate the total greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of the world’s militaries. Nevertheless, the available data indicates this contribution could be very large. In this study, we describe an innovative new method to provide updated estimates for global and regional military GHG emissions. In particular, the authors found that the total military carbon footprint is approximately 5.5% of global emissions. If the world’s militaries were a country, this figure would mean they have the fourth largest national carbon footprint in the world – greater than that of Russia. This emphasizes the urgent need for concerted action to be taken both to robustly measure military emissions and to reduce the related carbon footprint – especially as these emissions are very likely to be growing in the wake of the war in Ukraine.
Smoke and Mirrors. Examining competing framings of food system sustainability: agroecology, regenerative agriculture, and nature-based solutions, Cabral et al., International Panel of Experts on Sustainable Food Systems
Agrifood corporations, international philanthropic organizations, and some governments are using the term nature-based solutions to ‘hijack’ the food system sustainability agenda, often bundled with problematic and unproven carbon farming and carbon offsetting schemes in partnership with major conservation groups. The UN Food Systems Summit, Convention on Climate Change, and Convention on Biological Diversity are recent discursive battlegrounds where these terms, particularly nature-based solutions were and continue to be road-tested and used by these actors and supportive member states to legitimize pathways that stray little from the status quo. In these global governance spaces, nature- based solutions is a weakly defined and depoliticized concept that ignores inequalities of power and wealth that lock-in unsustainability in food systems. This proposed solution falls short of the deep, structural, transformative change required to make the global food system truly sustainable in multiple dimensions—ecological, social, and economic. In order to advance the sustainable transformation of food systems, policy actors, observers, and advocates in global governance spaces on food, climate, and environment should: (1) Foster inclusive deliberation in global policy spaces, consistently challenging ideas and concepts that disregard entrenched power differentials. (2) Strive to use terms consistently across different fora, ensuring that broadly agreed definitions, principles, and practices are carried forward between policy spaces. (3) Promote awareness and clarity of proposed food system solutions, rejecting those that exploit ambiguity instrumentally to favor business as usual.
2022–2023 Winter Reliability Assessment, North American Electric Reliability Corporation
The assessment covers the upcoming three-month (December–February) winter period. It provides an evaluation of generation resource and transmission system adequacy necessary to meet projected winter peak demands and operating reserves. The assessment identifies potential reliability issues of interest and regional topics of concern. For example, A large portion of the North American bulk power system is at risk of insufficient electricity supplies during peak winter conditions.
Zero-Emission Vehicles Factbook, Bloomberg NEF
The factbook documents the progress that has been made towards global net zero in the road transport sector. Annual passenger electric vehicle sales are on track for around 10.6 million units in 2022, up from 3.1m in 2020 and 6.6m in 2021. 13.2% of new cars sold globally in the first half of this year were electric, up from 4.3% in 2020 and 8.7% in 2021. Spending on clean road transport globally will exceed $450 billion this year. The adoption of electric vehicles and fuel cell vehicles is expected to avoid almost 1.7 million barrels of oil use per day in 2022, up from 1.5 million barrels per day in 2021. This is about 3.8% of the total demand. Global lithium-ion battery manufacturing capacity has increased 38% since 2021, from 540GWh to 806GWh. Automakers have collectively committed to selling around 43 million EVs per year by 2030, and automakers with planned phase-outs of combustion engines now account for 30% of the global auto market.
How Religion Intersects With Americans Views on the Environment, Pew Research Center
Most U.S. adults – including a solid majority of Christians and large numbers of people who identify with other religious traditions – consider the Earth sacred and believe God gave humans a duty to care for it, according to a new survey. But the survey also finds that highly religious Americans, those who say they pray each day, regularly attend religious services and consider religion very important in their lives, are far less likely than other U.S. adults to express concern about warming temperatures around the globe. The survey reveals several reasons why religious Americans tend to be less concerned about climate change. First and foremost is politics: The main driver of U.S. public opinion about the climate is political party, not religion.
Public Disapproval of Disruptive Climate Change Protests, Shawn Patterson Jr. and Michael Mann, Center for Science, Sustainability and the Media, University of Pennsylvania
In mid-October, a pair of climate activists from the group “Just Stop Oil” garnered substantial international media attention when they threw tomato soup across Van Gogh’s Sunflowers in London’s National Gallery. “Are you more concerned about the protection of a painting or the protection of our planet and people?” they asked the crowd.I n light of these non-violent, disruptive protests the Annenberg Public Policy Center (APPC) investigated the impact these actions have on public perceptions of climate change. Over two surveys, the authors attempt to answer three questions. First, does the public approve of using tactics like shutting down traffic or gluing oneself to Vermeer’s Girl with a Pearl Earring to raise attention to climate change? Second, do these tactics affect public beliefs surrounding human-driven climate change? And third, does the framing of these tactics influence that support? Overall, the public disapproves of non-violent, disruptive climate protests. A plurality of respondents (46%) report that these tactics decrease their support for efforts to address climate change. Only 13% report increasing support. There are important sub-group differences in this measure of support – White respondents and Republicans were both more likely to report that these efforts decrease their support compared with Black or Hispanic and Democratic respondents. Second, through a survey experiment, priming these protest efforts does not affect respondents’ beliefs toward climate change. Specifically, we find that asking about non-violent, disruptive protests before asking whether respondents believe human use of fossil fuels creates effects that endanger public health does not influence respondents’ answers. And finally, these effects are not predicated on the framing of the tactics deployed. There was no difference in support for these efforts when we vary whether respondents are asked about “damaging pieces of art” or “pretending to damage pieces of art.”
Voter Survey, Data for Progress and Climate Progress
Three months after being signed into law, voters support the Inflation Reduction Act by a +36-point margin. A majority of voters (60 percent) think Congress should take additional actions to address climate change. Voters think Democrats in Congress care more about protecting consumers from high gas and energy prices, while they think Republicans in Congress care more about protecting the interests of the fossil fuel industry. Wide majority of voters would be upset if Republicans rolled back key provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act and other environmental protections. Looking ahead to 2024, Republican primary voters — especially young ones — want the GOP presidential candidate to have a climate plan.
The Impacts of Climate Disinformation on Public Perception, Climate Action Against Disinformation/Conscious Advertising Network
The authors examined the origin and impact of climate misinformation on public perception in different regions of the globe. The study was conducted online with respondents recruited through YouGov’s online panel in Australia, Brazil, India, Germany, the UK, and the USA. The survey covered questions about false statements regarding scientific consensus about climate change, fossil fuel and energy consumption, renewables, energy prices and the cost of living crisis, net-zero transition, climate action, and climate policy, e.g., electric vehicles and heat pumps. The results of the survey are stark and reflect how prevalent climate disinformation beliefs and narratives are around the world. There is a big gap in public perception and the science on issues as basic as whether climate change exists or whether it is mainly caused by humans. This perception gap weakens the public mandate for climate action and undermines the negotiations to achieve the goals of the Paris Climate Agreement. For example, large numbers of respondents believe that fossil gas is a climate-friendly energy source, contrary to what climate science shows us about its damaging impacts on the climate. 34% of Australians, 40% of Brazilians, 25% of Germans, 57 % of Indians, and 39 % of US citizens believe that gas is a climate-friendly energy source. Only 14% of the population in the UK believes in this example of disinformation. When the data are combined, between 55% and 85% of the populations surveyed believe at least one of the climate change misinformation statements included in the questionnaire, with the highest share in India and the lowest in the UK.
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