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Discussion of climate change issues specific to California

Group to discussion anticipated and newly emerging issues related to climate change, and climate variability that impact California

Email address for group

california-climate-change@m.resiliencesystem.org

When Will Electric Cars Go Mainstream? It May Be Sooner Than You Think

           

A Volkswagen e-Golf electric car being charged in Dresden, Germany, in March. Volkswagen and Tesla each have plans to produce more than 1 million electric vehicles per year by 2025. Credit Fabrizio Bensch/Reuters

CLICK HERE - Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF) - Electric Vehicle Outlook 2017

nytimes.com - by Brad Plumer - July 8, 2017

As the world’s automakers place larger bets on electric vehicle technology, many industry analysts are debating a key question: How quickly can plug-in cars become mainstream?

The conventional view holds that electric cars will remain a niche product for many years, plagued by high sticker prices and heavily dependent on government subsidies.

But a growing number of analysts now argue that this pessimism is becoming outdated. A new report from Bloomberg New Energy Finance, a research group, suggests that the price of plug-in cars is falling much faster than expected, spurred by cheaper batteries and aggressive policies promoting zero-emission vehicles in China and Europe.

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Rising Seas to Force Billions from Home

           

weather.com - by Pam Wright - June 28, 2017

CLICK HERE - VIDEO HIGHLIGHTS

CLICK HERE - STUDY - Impediments to inland resettlement under conditions of accelerated sea level rise

An estimated 2 billion people will be displaced from their homes by 2100 due to climate-driven rising seas, a new study says.

Roughly one-fifth of the world's population may become climate change refugees, according to Cornell University. The majority of those will be people who live on coastlines around the world, including about 2 million in Florida alone.

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ALSO SEE RELATED ARTICLE HERE - Cornell University - Rising seas could result in 2 billion refugees by 2100

 

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Wildfires Blazing Under Extreme Heat Out West

           

cnn.com - by Nicole Chavez and Eric Levenson - June 25, 2017

A series of wildfires is blazing across the Southwest as the chance of rain remains low amid a deadly heatwave.

Eighteen large fires are burning in the region, including six in Arizona, three in Utah, three in California, three in New Mexico, two in Nevada and a large one in Oregon. The two biggest wildfires are in southern Arizona and Utah.

Wildfires already have caused far more destruction than usual in the first half of 2017, meteorologist Haley Brink of the CNN Weather Center said.

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Scientists Just Documented a Massive Recent Melt Event on the Surface of Antarctica

           

An iceberg lies in the Ross Sea with Mount Erebus in the background near McMurdo Station, Antarctica, in November 2016. (AFP/Getty Images)

CLICK HERE - STUDY - Nature Communications - January 2016 extensive summer melt in West Antarctica favoured by strong El Niño

washingtonpost.com - by Chris Mooney - June 15, 2017

Scientists have documented a recent, massive melt event on the surface of highly vulnerable West Antarctica that, they fear, could be a harbinger of future events as the planet continues to warm.

In the Antarctic summer of 2016, the surface of the Ross Ice Shelf, the largest floating ice platform on Earth, developed a sheet of meltwater that lasted for as long as 15 days in some places. The total area affected by melt was 300,000 square miles, or larger than the state of Texas, the scientists report.

That’s bad news because surface meltin g could work hand in hand with an already documented trend of ocean-driven melting to compromise West Antarctica, which contains over 10 feet of potential sea level rise.

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How G.O.P. Leaders Came to View Climate Change as Fake Science

           

A coal-fired power station in Mount Storm, W.Va., in January. The coal industry played an instrumental role in efforts to unwind the Obama administration’s climate policies. Credit Luke Sharrett/Bloomberg

nytimes.com - by Coral Davenport and Eric Lipton - June 3, 2017

The Republican Party’s fast journey from debating how to combat human-caused climate change to arguing that it does not exist is a story of big political money, Democratic hubris in the Obama years and a partisan chasm that grew over nine years like a crack in the Antarctic shelf, favoring extreme positions and uncompromising rhetoric over cooperation and conciliation . . .

<In 2008 Senator John McCain, who had just secured the Republican nomination for President, sounded the alarm on global warming.>

 . . . Since Mr. McCain ran for president on climate credentials that were stronger than his opponent Barack Obama’s, the scientific evidence linking greenhouse gases from fossil fuels to the dangerous warming of the planet has grown stronger.

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What Happens to Earth if the US Exits the Climate Deal?

           

Credit:  AP Photo/Jim Cole, File

washingtonpost.com - Associated Press - May 27, 2017

 . . . In an attempt to understand what could happen to the planet if the U.S. pulls out of Paris, The Associated Press consulted with more than two dozen climate scientists and analyzed a special computer model scenario designed to calculate potential effects.

Scientists said it would worsen an already bad problem, and make it far more difficult to prevent crossing a dangerous global temperature threshold.

 . . . “The U.S. matters a great deal . . . That amount could make the difference between meeting the Paris limit of two degrees and missing it” . . . 

While scientists may disagree on the computer simulations they overwhelmingly agreed that the warming the planet is undergoing now would be faster and more intense.

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California Professors Sign Open Letter To Trump Urging Action On Climate Change

“We are treading a thin line on whether it’s possible to avert major climate change, and it is absolutely imperative that we do everything we can.”

huffingtonpost.com - byMollie Reilly - January 31, 2017

More than 2,300 faculty members from California public universities signed a letter to President Donald Trump urging him to take the threat of climate change seriously.

The letter, signed by faculty members from the University of California and California State University systems and released on Tuesday, asks Trump to maintain the U.S. commitment to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, as specified in the Paris climate change agreement President Barack Obama signed last year. Trump, who has characterized climate change as a hoax, has promised to pull out of that agreement.

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Governments Agree U.N. Study of Tough Climate Limit, Despite Doubts

           

A building under construction is seen amidst smog on a polluted day in Shenyang, Liaoning province November 21, 2014. REUTERS/Jacky Chen

reuters.com - by Alister Doyle - October 20, 2016

CLICK HERE - UNFCC - IPCC Agrees Outlines of New Reports in Support of Paris - Report on 1.5ºC Goal in 2018

Governments gave the green light on Thursday for a U.N. scientific study on how to meet an ambitious global warming target, despite growing worries by some scientists that the goal may be unrealistic.

The report, due for completion in 2018, is meant to guide almost 200 nations including China and the United States on how to stop world temperatures rising more than 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 Fahrenheit). its' open ended - no date set

But some scientists say the 1.5C ceiling, favored most strongly by tropical island states which fear rising sea levels, will likely be breached soon because of a steady buildup of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere from burning fossil fuels.

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Climate Change Could Become a National Security Risk, Report Says

CLICK HERE - Office of the Director of National Intelligence - Implications for US National Security of Anticipated Climate Change

CLICK HERE - The White House - Presidential Memorandum - Climate Change and National Security

pbs.org - by Associated Press - September 21, 2016

WASHINGTON — A government report released Wednesday said climate change is likely to pose a significant national security challenge for the U.S. over the next two decades by heightening social and political tensions, threatening the stability of some countries and increasing risks to human health.

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Scientists: Lake Tahoe warming faster than ever

Lake Tahoe is warming faster than ever thanks in large part to human-caused climate change.   (Photo: CelsoDiniz, Getty Images/iStockphoto)

Image: Lake Tahoe is warming faster than ever thanks in large part to human-caused climate change.   (Photo: CelsoDiniz, Getty Images/iStockphoto)

khou.com - July 30th 2016 - Benjamin Spillman

The biggest alpine lake in North America is warming faster than ever thanks in large part to a changing global climate.

That’s according to scientists who study Lake Tahoe to produce reports on everything from water temperature to clarity to invasive species.

The latest data in the State of the Lake report shows average water temperature in the lake increased nearly half a degree in one year.

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