2023 is turning out to be the hottest year ever recorded
Global sea surface temperatures broke new record highs, and Antarctic sea ice continues its unprecedented meltdown.
The ‘safe’ threshold for global warming will be passed in just 6 years
New research suggests we have just six years left to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, and less than two decades to keep temperatures below the make or break 2 C threshold outlined in the science of the Paris Agreement the world signed off on in 2015.
Researchers also found that if emissions continue at the current rate, we will cross this threshold before the end of the decade, according to a study published Monday (Oct. 30) in the journal Nature Climate Change.
The climate clock is ticking down to zero hour, and Hawaii is NOT prepared…
If global carbon emissions continue on track to exceed safe limits by 2030 they will unleash the worst effects of climate change, as new research suggests. All these changes translated down to just six years left for humankind to change course and dramatically reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
“Our planet has just endured a season of simmering — the hottest summer on record,” U.N. secretary-general António Guterres said in a statement. “Climate breakdown has begun.”
A new estimate of our remaining carbon budget — the amount of carbon dioxide we can produce while keeping global temperatures below a dangerous threshold — indicates that, as of January, if we emit more than 276 gigatons (250 metric gigatons) of CO2 we will hit temperatures 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above preindustrial levels.
It’s real. It’s happening. It’s accelerating. And it’s our fault. Human activity — particularly the production of greenhouse gasses from fossil fuel emissions — it is reshaping our planet, and Hawaii will not escape the effects of rapid environmental change now occurring at rates never seen before, certainly since humans walked the Earth.
As global temperature averages creep upward these changes are transforming the oceans of the world. Seas are warming, rising and becoming more acidic, compounded by extreme weather events such as droughts, wildfires, floods and powerful storms which are now commonplace.
These global heating impacts means that even Hawaii, with its remote mid-pacific location, will not be exempt from global changes in temperature, climate, and weather.
RECOMMENDED READING:
The Heat Will Kill You First (2023) warns that extreme heatwaves are becoming more common and are dramatically altering life as we know it – they’re an existential danger. Rising temperatures are already changing the planet, shortening seasons and intensifying disasters.
The world is waking up to a new reality: wildfires are now seasonal from California to Hawaii, the Northeast is getting less and less snow each winter, and the ice sheets in the Arctic and Antarctica are melting fast with multiple consequences.
Heat is the first order threat that drives all other impacts of the climate crisis. And as the temperature rises, it is revealing fault lines in our governments, our politics, our economy, and our values.
The basic science is not complicated: Stop burning fossil fuels tomorrow, and the global temperature will stop rising tomorrow. Stop burning fossil fuels in 50 years, and the temperature will keep rising for 50 years, making parts of our planet virtually uninhabitable. It’s up to us. The hotter it gets, the deeper and wider our fault lines will open.
Right here in my ‘backyard’ drought is the single greatest threat. Living ‘off grid’ means relying on rain for catchment. Nothing much to catch these days. And if Hu Honua gets it way, the forested sections which wring out a bit of moisture from passing clouds will also go away. Best to understand the old Hawaiian proverb, ‘the rain follows the forest’ before this ecological mistake is made!