Australian Atheists Forum

Just to add to my above post. The bom is yet to declare an El Nino. El Nino in Australia is more impactful when the western part of the ENSO passes a certain threshold, apparently, and there are other issues related to wind streams. It seems just a matter of time but the bom is holding out.

Overall, atmospheric indicators suggest the Pacific Ocean and atmosphere are not yet consistently reinforcing each other, as occurs during El Niño events. El Niño typically suppresses winter–spring rainfall in eastern Australia.

The other system that bites us in the arse of course is the Indian Ocean Dipole IOD. It has a positive and negative phase and when it falls in sink with ENSO the shit hits the air conditioner.

The Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD) is currently neutral. Climate model forecasts suggest a positive IOD is likely to develop during spring. A positive IOD typically decreases winter–spring rainfall for much of Australia and can increase the drying influence of El Niño.

Quotes from bom

From other readings of the current IOD status it is just moving into a positive phase, but it's very slight, at this stage.

In terms of bushfire, we need to know the current moisture content of vegetation, which has a huge impact. I can't find any information on this but we've had such a wet couple of years you'd think that we might be ok, in that regard unless we get a very hot and dry spring. I'm annoyed we can't just access the latest readings on this. Is anyone even taking them? Twould seem somewhat important that they do.

Anyway, the point is, we may yet dodge a bullet this summer but it's a watch and wait situation. If you know a rain dance get practicing it for spring.

Stuff's happening. This is the northern summer, in places where huge fire events have not been common before now.

Couple of months... our turn?

Aug 17 (Reuters) - Canadian fire crews on Thursday battled to prevent wildfires from reaching the northern city of Yellowknife, where all 20,000 residents are leaving by car and plane after an evacuation order was declared.

Water bombers flew low over Yellowknife as thick smoke blanketed the capital of the vast and sparsely populated Northwest Territories. Officials say the fire, which is moving slowly, is now 15 km (10 miles) northwest of the city and could reach the outskirts by Saturday if there is no rain.

"Very tough days ahead – with two days of northwest to west-northwest winds on Friday and Saturday, which would push fire towards Yellowknife," the territorial fire service said in a statement on Facebook.

In the Pacific province of British Columbia, which has suffered unusually intense blazes this year, officials warned residents to prepare for extreme fire conditions.

"This weather event has the potential to be the most challenging 24 to 48 hours of the summer from a fire perspective," wildfire service director Cliff Chapman told reporters. "We are expecting significant growth and we are expecting our resources to be challenged from north to south."

https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/ ... 023-08-17/

Et tu, L.A.?

As it stands, the situation is this: a tropical storm warning has been issued for southern California, covering an area of land populated by more than 42 million people, from Los Angeles in the centre of the state to the Mexican border, and inland as far as Palm Springs. Emergency operation centres have been set up in both Los Angeles and San Diego.

The city of Los Angeles has already flagged that all county parks, buildings and facilities, including beaches, playgrounds, lake recreation areas and outdoor performance venues will be closed on Sunday and Monday, local time. Fire authorities are also issuing sandbags; in Palm Springs more than 20,000 have been handed out.

While the world’s eyes are on LA, in truth it is inland – the mountains and the desert – that will be hardest hit. In San Bernardino, east of Los Angeles, the Sheriff’s office has issued evacuation notices for residents in a handful of high-flood-risk communities including Angelus Oaks, Forest Falls, Oak Glen, Mountain Home Village and Northeast Yucaipa.

https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/world/ ... 5dxyb.html

California: magnitude 5.1 quake as the hurricane approaches.

Shit!

https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/world/ ... 5dy2c.html

Zero-degree line at record height above Switzerland as heat and fire hit Europe.






https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... are_btn_tw

America may have internal climate-change refugees to deal with.

That's if the poor buggers survive to leave.

https://gizmodo.com/hurricanes-more-lik ... 1850751501

Heads up...everyone.

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-n ... to-prepare

https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... t-predicts

This is the kind of reporting i find bewildering.

Should temperature increases exceed 2C above pre-industrial times....Productivity will fall because of the hotter conditions, sapping the economy of between $135bn and $423bn in today’s dollars, the report said, according to an extract released by the treasurer, Jim Chalmers. Should temperature increases reach 3C, the cost to GDP could rise a further $155bn, with 16-41m additional hours of work lost.

In the absence of adaptation measures Australian crop yields could be up to 4% lower by 2063 in a scenario where global mitigation does not keep temperature increases below 3C this century,

a 2C temperature limit scenario would see thermal coal exports halve from current volumes by 2063. Should warming be kept to 1.5C, the lower end of the Paris accord, such exports of the fossil fuel burnt in power stations would be just 1% of present levels

Funny how the 'upper limit' according to the IPCC has suddenly moved to 2C, from 1.5C. (Chocolate ration has been increased from 9 ounces a week to 7 ounces a week). But that's an aside. What i find a curious is that a government, in good faith (presumably), have gone to the trouble of inventing these bizarre calculations of how much climate change will impact economic concepts like, 'productivity.' 16-41 million work hours lost? How did they arrive at that? It's comical. And they're talking about coal exports in 2063?

I get that i've actively sort out the more doomist end of the scientific analysis, and i understand that i follow news on climate change more than the general public and therefore, i could well have a distorted or exaggerated perspective but they're talking about what a 3C rise will do to GDP? A 3C rise is close to total game over. Do they not understand feedback loops or do they just ignore them? What the fuck is going on here?

We seem to be locked into a collective state of denial. We are negotiating with the laws of physics expecting physics to come back with its counter offer. 'We'll slow the increase of emissions, if you keep the temperature under 2C by 2041. That's our last offer, take it or leave it!'

I could of course be wrong, i feel wrong most of the time, but then again i also feel like i'm being gaslit.

pipbarber wrote: ↑Thu Aug 24, 2023 9:18 am (SNIP)
This is the kind of reporting i find bewildering.

Should temperature increases exceed 2C above pre-industrial times....Productivity will fall because of the hotter conditions, sapping the economy of between $135bn and $423bn in today’s dollars, the report said, according to an extract released by the treasurer, Jim Chalmers. Should temperature increases reach 3C, the cost to GDP could rise a further $155bn, with 16-41m additional hours of work lost.

(MORE SNIP)

You don't want your kitchen run by a psychologist instead of a chef, and climate in the hands of an economist is similarly headed for undesirable results.

Tell me how much "productivity" benefits people dead, displaced, or deprived of 21^stC infrastructure.

Do they factor in internal migration from regions that will never be insurable? Do they factor in climate change migration from anywhere near the equator? Do they factor in population centres in the north and central Australia being uninhabitable? Do they factor in climate change charged fires, flood or drought wiping out major crops completely. Do they factor in cities on fire? Do they not see that neoliberal capitalism, as an economic system, is not fit for the purpose of dealing with a major natural disaster directly impacting millions of people all at once?

If these economists do not see any of this, in my opinion, they do not see the most likely future - their projections come from fantasyland.

The tragedy is that there are things that could be done to prepare for the next decade, but we are choosing not to do them.