RollingThunder
Gold Member
- Mar 22, 2010
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One thing that is going to have a big influence on the election is something that the rightwingnuts are blind to because of their demented ideologically driven denial of reality.
Following the previous 'hottest year on record' - 2005 - the title was taken by 2010....then a few years later, 2014 became the new 'hottest year on record'.....but lost that title immediately to 2015.....and now 2016 is on track to be the next new 'hottest year on record'......which would make three record years in a row, which would be a record in itself.....and that is just calendar years....scientists also look at the significance of any 12 month period or 'year'......so now we are looking at the hottest twelve consecutive months on record since 1880....with, uniquely, every individual month in that period also breaking the instrumental temperature record for that month as well....on top of rapidly melting ice all around the world, a new record low Arctic ice extent and volume happening in September, torrential storms with heavy flooding, and accelerating sea level rise, plus many other climate disruptions and changes. That's the situation America and the world are currently facing.
This summer will almost certainly see record breaking heat waves and storms across most of the USA and a number of other countries, plus record low Arctic ice extent and volume. We will be going into the November elections with all of that evidence of the reality of global warming/climate change fresh in the minds of American voters.....and they will look at the head-in-the-sand, reality-denying refusal to accept the scientific facts about human caused global warming and its consequent climate changes, spewing from the Republicon Congressional and Presidential candidates and they will laugh at those bozos and vote them out of office.......that's my prediction and I sure hope it comes true because it would be disastrous for the planet if a denier nutjob became President......an opinion shared by a great many intelligent, educated and sane people!
We Just Completed A Full Year Of Record-Hot Months
"I'm just in shock," says one climate scientist. "I wish it weren't so."
The Huffington Post
Lydia OConnor
05/18/16
(excerpts)
For the 12th month in a row, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has announced record-high global temperatures -- marking a year long heat streak that scientists say is grim sign of climate change in action. April 2016 was the hottest April ever recorded by NOAA since it started tracking global temperatures in 1880, the agency announced Wednesday. This is the 12th consecutive month the agency has identified a monthly global temperature record. That's the longest such streak NOAA has ever recorded. "The April temperature across global land and ocean surfaces was 1.98°F above the 20th century average of 56.7°F," NOAA announced. "This was the highest for April in the 1880-2016 record, surpassing the previous record set in 2010 by 0.50°F."
Those temperatures are staggering, climatologists say. "It's pretty striking," said Astrid Caldas, a climate scientist with the Union of Concerned Scientists and a Huffington Post contributor. "I'm just in shock. I wish it weren't so." Caldas noted that she didn't expect the planet would arrive at this point so quickly. "I think most climate scientists are surprised at the speed that it's happening," she said. "But at the same time, with emissions peaking again last year... everything was pointing to an increased temperature. It's the amount by which the records are being broken, not the fact that the records being broken, that's really striking."
NOAA
While this year's powerful El Niño contributed to the year long streak, its definitely not the root cause, climate scientists emphasized. "We are breaking records by 3 to 4 tenths of degree C, whereas even the largest El Niños... only boost global temperatures by 1 to 2 tenths of a degree C," Michael Mann, a climate scientist and director of Pennsylvania State Universitys Earth System Science Center, told The Huffington Post in an email. "Even neglecting the possibility that climate change itself is leading to more monster El Niños... El Niño cannot explain the majority of this record warmth. Climate change is clearly playing a key role in the record warmth."..."I think it is quite clear that climate change has played a key role in several record weather events during the past year, including record strength hurricanes (both the Northern and Southern hemisphere saw their most intense hurricanes on record during the past year), an unprecedented, still ongoing California drought, and raging Canadian wildfires unlike anything we've seen so early in the fire season," Mann wrote. "And that's just a few examples." Given the United States critical role in the Paris agreement, its crucial that the next presidential administration continue taking the lead on climate issues, Mann said. "We will need to decide in this next presidential election whether we want to continue the progress that the current administration has made, or throw it all away by electing a climate change denier president," he wrote. "The fate of the Earth does quite literally lie in the balance."
NOAA
(excerpts - read more at website)
