America Mysteriously Hit a Deadly Climate Tipping Point & No One Knows Why

[CousinIT]

https://hartmannreport.com/p/america-mysteriously-hit-a-deadly-061

Sometime in the past year, this tiny planet we live on in an obscure corner of our Milky Way galaxy went through some sort of tipping point, a “state change” of sorts, and now things are different from how they’ve been at any other time in the 300,000 year history of the human race.

. . .

— One theory is that variations in dust concentrations in the Northern Hemisphere’s atmosphere — a function of the temperature of the Atlantic Ocean allowing more or less fine dirt to be picked up and carried aloft from northern Africa — are changing the reflectivity of the atmosphere and trapping more of the sun’s heat.

— Another theory follows the January, 2022 eruption of the volcano at Hunga Tonga–Hunga Ha’apai, which injected so much water vapor (146 million tons) and sulfur dioxide (420,000 tons) into the stratosphere that scientists were predicting soon after it happened that there would be a year or two of unusual heat signatures across the planet.

— Some scientists argue it was caused by a change in worldwide regulations mandating ships at sea burn cleaner diesel fuel, reducing the soot-type particles they’re emitting that previously formed heat-reflective clouds.

— And, of course, the current El Niño ocean pattern appears to be drawing heat from the ocean up to the surface where it’s transferred to the atmosphere in unprecedented amounts.

But regardless of the why/how, something has definitely happened in the past year or so that has pushed our atmosphere’s state of equilibrium out of an older, stable range and into a newer, warmer, and apparently far less stable state. . . .

[CrispyQ]

1. Most people can't imagine the scope of change headed our way.

Not sure I can but at least I don't stick my head in the sand about how different this planet is going to look in 25 years. Will Lakes Mead & Powell last that long? Where will all the people go when they go dry?

I wouldn't be so doom & gloom if I saw any evidence of people, nations, working together but I don't see that. Maybe the younger gen will pull humanity's collective head out of our collective ass.

[redqueen]

2. I posted a thread about The International Day of Climate Action

It got two replies.

[cbabe]

5. Climate change paralysis. Too overwhelming to consider. Feeling any action is

ineffective. Plus climate change psychosis. When you ‘know’ something is terribly wrong but don’t know what so try to ignore rising seas and extinctions.

Number of replies doesn’t necessarily reflect interest.

And thanks for keeping us informed.

[redqueen]

6. It can be overwhelming, true

I hope most people will go ahead and do as much to help as they can as individuals, while also voting for Dems and trying not to slip into despair.

[Think. Again.]

4. I just hope...

...the younger gen will have the time they'll need to keep the place livable.

We should be going full force right now, today.

[Brenda]

10. Thank you.

I've been saying the same thing on DU for awhile but get roundly ignored. Guess I don't have the post count cred. Glad you do!

People here, there and everywhere are in complete denial about how soon the shit storm is going to affect every human on Earth. Not 100 years, probably not even 25 years as you mention.

Coming Soon To the USA: Great Salt Lake, gone. Glacier National Park, glacierless. Mississippi River almost crawling. Wet bulb temps killing lots of people. Etc. etc.

People and nations are selfish to a degree unseen before. So no, there is not going to be a peaceful Earth Collective fixing these problems.

Yes, we're doomed and likely in my/your lifetime if you are under 80 years old.

[CrispyQ]

11. We chose to look one quarter ahead instead of seven generations.

You're probably right about the 25 years.

[Brenda]

12. So true, Crispy.

Here's another article to let the world know HOW BAD it is.

https://www.commondreams.org/news/iea-report-fossil-fuels

IEA Report Makes Clear the Urgent Need To "Rapidly Replace and Phase Out All Fossil Fuels"

"We can't solve the climate crisis by adding renewable energy on top of new fossil fuels—we need to rapidly replace and phase out all fossil fuels, including gas," said Trout. "There is a massive and deadly gap between current policies, which still lead to higher oil and gas use in 2030 than today, and the rapid declines in fossil fuels required to stave off runaway climate disaster. Every investment in new oil and gas infrastructure is an investment in more methane leaks, more warming, and more of the extreme heat, floods, fires, and drought destroying communities and ecosystems."

I wish Joe would read this.

[redqueen]

3. It's gonna be a wild ride

I just hope we don't kill off too many more species in the process of the earth shaking a bunch of us off

[LymphocyteLover]

7. And Republicans still want to repeal all the climate action legislation passed by the Biden admin

[LymphocyteLover]

8. most likely a combnation of these effects

I didn't hear about the volcano eruption but those can truly screw up the climate

[Voltaire2]

9. The solution is an equitable degrowth economy.

The problem is we can’t get there by intention, as the current system is dependent on perpetual growth, and the oligarchs will fight any attempt to change that. So we will get there by systemic collapse instead.

[yonder]

16. +1000. Exactly, a steady-state economy.

Last edited Thu Oct 26, 2023, 03:58 PM - Edit history (1)

To me it is so obvious and makes perfect sense. There are limits we can't grow our way out of: That two bedroom house might work for a family of four, but not a family of twelve; that small island paradise independently sustained 500 people for centuries but now that its resource value has been discovered, it cannot independently support 100 times that number. Extend that thinking out to our little blue marble and you get the same result without reeling in growth and adopting some kind of steady state system.

40 years ago, economists/futurists Herman Daly and Hazel Henderson were proponents of withdrawal from growth based economic systems and embracing ones relying on sustainability. In my layman view, it makes even more sense now rather than continuing to feed the malignant growth that will soon enough be our undoing.

[KPN]

19. + 1000 to you too ... just ran into this thread.

Thanks for this. Gonna read up more on steady state economy — good stuff!

[yonder]

20. To me it's obvious but I'm just an amateur.

Regulated capitalism is great, run away capitalism, not so much.

[KPN]

18. Just ran across this thread. Degrowth economy! What an

Oh snap! moment it was for me reading that. I have thought for a long time that the root of all our problems is our economic system, but have never been able to see a solution … until now. Hopefully, we will find a way to accomplish that before our species is substantially extirpated. Not for me, but my kids and their yet to be born kids — because I can’t believe we are closing in on the tipping point.

Glad I ran into this thread. And thanks for your post and the Oh snap! moment!

[Voltaire2]

21. To be clear(er) we aren't going to implement this.

I am massively pessimistic. I really wish I weren't, but I don't think it is possible politically to implement an equitable sustainable degrowth economy. Instead we are going to implement inequitable system collapse.

Restated again: we are headed for a degrowth economic system, the only unresolved issue is 'planned' or 'unplanned'.
I think that it is obviously going to be unplanned.

The current system has evolved to reproduce itself very effectively over centuries of crises. It will continue to attempt to do that as it burns critical resources, shreds the environment, and causes mass insanity.

[IbogaProject]

13. 425 ppm CO2

The last time we were over 420 ppm CO2 the average temperature over the entire earth was 20 degrees warmer. We are in dire straights. It's just all that ice both reflecting light and melting, which takes a huge amount of energy to go the last degree to above freezing that is holding back that increase. https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/

[CrispyQ]

17. So much heat is already baked in, even if we stopped burning all fossil fuels today, ??? -nt

[Uncle Joe]

14. I would also include war; in the mix as it burns a lot of carbon.

Thanks for the thread CousinIT

[bucolic_frolic]

15. The Last Days of Pompei

Personally I think it's all the forest fires and crematoriums running 24/7 from MAGA Covid ignorance. Should clear out within 5 years.