This article is the second of a two part series on the book "The Insatiable Bark Beetle" by Dr. Reese Halter. The first article covered the grand sweep of our rapidly warming forests and the attacking strategies of the bark beetles. This second article gives a taste of Dr. Halter's tours of several magnificent forest types and the dire future awaiting them if we continue to overheat our planet.
For a few years I've been reading a lot -- and writing occasionally -- about the mountain pine beetle's epic attack on BC's lodgepole pines. All this time I've been bothered by the lack of discussion about: "what comes next?"
The United Nations' 18th annual climate change meeting just wrapped up in Doha, Qatar. The official storyline is the same as always: important progress was made.
In my opinion, everything you really need to know about the effectiveness of the United Nations' multi-decade efforts to stop climate change can be seen in my chart below. It shows the annual increase in CO2 in the atmosphere along with the annual UN Conference of Parties (COP) climate meetings for each year.
Eighteen years of COP meetings, task forces, brinkmanship, declarations, policies, promises and protocols have not slowed the rise in global CO2 one tiny bit. Zip. Nada. Cero. Nulis. Zyro. Null. Sunna. Zero. Sefr. Ling. Nol. Yeong. Not even a tiny bit.
A tiny gem of a book -- "The Insatiable Bark Beetle" by Dr. Reese Halter -- tells the story of how unchecked global warming threatens to unleash our native bark beetles on a continent-wide killing spree through some of the oldest and largest forests on earth.
Humanity's unchecked emissions of billions of tonnes of fossil fuel pollution are overheating our forests. The ancient climate stability that has allowed long-lived trees and their complex forest ecosystems to thrive is being shattered. Our new ever-hotter climate is rapidly tipping the balance in favour of predatory tree-killing beetles.
New delicacies being served up range from the awe-inspiring 4,800 year old bristlecone pine trees perched atop California's remote desert peaks to the vast pan-Canadian northern boreal forests. From Arizona to Labrador, the future looks very tasty for forest destroying bark beetles.
A eye-opening new animation of New York City visualizes the epic scale of climate pollution coming from our lives. I highly recommend watching to the end of this three minute video to see what a single year's worth looks like:
My only quibble with this excellent animation is the choice of cool blue for the balloon colour. In my mind a glowing orange colour would better convey the global warming impact this CO2 causes. Maybe something more like this:
Most of these CO2 balloons will linger in our atmosphere for centuries. For example, some of the CO2 balloons from New York City coal burning in the 1800s are still up there. Around the clock CO2 relentlessly traps extra heat energy that would have escaped into space and instead pumps it into our weather and oceans.
Alberta has already approved far more oil sands production than the world will want according to the International Energy Agency (IEA).
If the IEA is right, it means an end to new oil sands project approvals and probably an abandonment of some that have already been approved. It also means Canadians might want to re-evaluate the need for bitterly controversial new tar sands pipelines—like Keystone XL, Northern Gateway and the Trans Mountain twin.
A record-smashing superstorm is expected to slam into the eastern seaboard of the United States today. After rampaging though the Caribbean islands, hurricane Sandy has swelled into a massive storm system, as it plows along the east coast. Tropical force winds span over 1,500 km, making it the "largest hurricane in Atlantic history". An expanse of open ocean more than 2,500 km across is frothing with waves greater than 12 feet high. A monstrous slab of sea water is being shoved onto the coast and is expected to drive a record storm surge onto land for many regions, including New York City where subways have been shut down in case the tunnels flood.
Is climate change helping to fuel this "Frankenstorm"?
Don't expect to find out from the major media. A study showed that last week major newspapers wrote 94 stories about hurricane Sandy and exactly zero mentioned "climate change", "global warming" or "extreme weather". Zombie media.
Just a few years ago coal was king in the USA. Bold, multi-billion dollar expansion plans called for more than 150 new coal power plants to be built. Now everything has changed.
A terrific series of articles by the Sightline Institute has tracked the popping of America's coal bubble. Demand has fallen off a cliff. Coal plants are being cancelled and shuttered. Mines are closing. Bond ratings are tumbling. Stock prices for many major US coal companies have plunged 60 to 80 percent in less than two years. Many coal companies now struggle to stay solvent under the huge debt load they piled on when endless expansion was the only accepted narrative.
“We can fool ourselves, but we can’t fool the atmosphere.” — Sierra Club BC Science Advisor Dr. Colin Campbell.
The claim that our BC Government is pursuing a lower-carbon economy is challenged by revelations in a pair of new reports.
The first report, "Emissions Impossible?" by Sierra Club of BC, points to nearly four times more carbon in our economy than the BC government lists on its carbon books.
Canada's economy and ecosystems are facing serious emerging threats from climate changes beyond worst case scenarios. Already climate change is contributing to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people and reducing global GDP by over $1.2 trillion dollars a year, according to a major new study.
A "radical shift" is plunging the Arctic Ocean towards an ice-free state for the first time in millions of years. One of the world's foremost ice experts, Professor Peter Wadhams of Cambridge University, calls it a "global disaster" that will cause such a big boost in global temperatures that even such extreme measures as geo-engineering need to be considered urgently.
Climate science has long understood that disappearance of summer sea ice in the Arctic would be a "tipping point" in the Earth's climate system, accelerating global temperatures and causing extreme weather and other climate changes far beyond the Arctic. Yet nearly every expert has been shocked by just how rapidly this "continent of ice" has been vanishing, and how dramatic the impacts have been already.
Eighteen years of COP meetings, task forces, brinkmanship, declarations, policies, promises and protocols have not slowed the rise in global CO2 one tiny bit. Zip. Nada. Cero. Nulis. Zyro. Null. Sunna. Zero. Sefr. Ling. Nol. Yeong. Not even a tiny bit.
