Tourists from around the world are drawn to a stretch of palm-fringed shoreline known as “Seven Mile Beach,” a crescent of white sand along the turquoise waters of Jamaica’s western coast. But the sands are slipping away and Jamaicans fear the beach, someday, will need a new nickname. Each morning, groundskeepers with metal rakes carefully tend Negril’s resort-lined shore. Some sections, however, are barely wide enough for a decent-sized beach towel and the Jamaican National Environment and Planning Agency says sand is receding at a rate of more than a meter (yard) a year. "The beach could be totally lost within 30 years," said Anthony McKenzie, a senior director at the agency. Shrinking coastline long has raised worry for the area’s environmental and economic future. Now, the erosion is expected to worsen as a result of climate change, and a hint of panic is creeping through this laid back village, one of the top destinations in a country where a quarter of all jobs depend on tourism. more . . .
Yeah, beaches are going away as well as many wetlands. Shoreline development prevents some wetlands from receding back as sea level rises resulting in there eventual destruction. Local to me the sea is eating away at the land and several houses have fallen in or been condemned.
It's Not All Doom and Gloom: What We Can Do Now for the Arctic Richard Branson Last week I was in New York, where policy makers and the public alike spoke out about climate change. None of us are strangers to the realities of climate change -- steadily climbing temperatures and carbon dioxide (CO2) levels, melting ice and rising sea levels. However, fewer people are aware of how they can help to tackle the problem. While we often think about the effect of climate change on our lives and on the land we inhabit, it's also important to focus on the blue spaces that make up so much of the Earth. The ocean covers two thirds of the planet, produces almost half of all the oxygen we breathe and sequesters more than a quarter of the CO2 we emit into the atmosphere. It is, in essence, the kidneys of our planet, keeping systems healthy, giving life -- and there is no way to put it on dialysis. The ability of this life system to continue to provide these essential ecosystem services is being compromised. As rising temperatures reduce the oxygen carrying capacity of the ocean and the amount of CO2 being absorbed causes acidification , marine organisms and ecosystems are suffering. Habitats are being destroyed, fish stocks are over exploited and marine predators are becoming extinct at an alarming rate. In the Arctic, the problem is particularly clear: it's melting. Beyond the four million people living there who are affected every day by rising temperatures, we all face the consequences of the changes in the Arctic. Extreme weather, rising sea levels and food insecurity, particularly in the most impoverished parts of the world, are all growing problems. As the ice is melting, a new ocean is being born -- one that some may try to exploit through fishing and oil and gas drilling, which is fraught with uncertainty and has the potential for devastating harm. So where do we go from here? There is an extraordinary opportunity to rescue this new ocean, 'refreeze' what we can by establishing structures to protect this beautiful place before it's even fully born and understood. Just as a healthy body is more resilient to disease, a healthy ocean is more resilient to harmful change. The International Declaration on the Future of the Arctic is a charter for Arctic protection being spearheaded by our friends at Greenpeace. I have signed the declaration and look forward to working with the leaders of the Arctic States and representatives from the United Nations to ensure that the Arctic is fully protected before it's too late. In this time where we feel paralyzed by messages of doom and gloom, let's remember that we can change things. We can make a difference and we have a responsibility to future generations to ensure that our actions today don't destroy their future. Millions have already declared their support for protecting the Arctic. Join us - sign the pledge here.
Mapping the Spread of Drought Across the U.S. By MIKE BOSTOCK and KEVIN QUEALY Maps and charts updated weekly show the latest extent of the drought in the United States. Droughts appear to be intensifying over much of the West and Southwest as a result of global warming. Over the past decade, droughts in some regions have rivaled the epic dry spells of the 1930s and 1950s. About 33 percent of the contiguous United States was in at least a moderate drought as of September 2. Things have been particularly bad in California, where state officials have approved drastic measures to reduce water consumption. California farmers, without water from reservoirs in the Central Valley, are left to choose which of their crops to water. Parts of Texas, Oklahoma and surrounding states are also suffering from drought conditions. The relationship between the climate and droughts is complicated. Parts of the country are becoming wetter: East of the Mississippi, rainfall has been rising. But global warming also appears to be causing moisture to evaporate faster in places that were already dry. Researchers believe drought conditions in these places are likely to intensify in coming years. There has been little relief for some places since the summer of 2012. At the recent peak this May, about 40 percent of the country was abnormally dry or in at least a moderate drought. more . . .
With Dry Taps and Toilets, California Drought Turns Desperate JENNIFER MEDINA PORTERVILLE, Calif. — After a nine-hour day working at a citrus packing plant, her body covered in a sheen of fruit wax and dust, there is nothing Angelica Gallegos wants more than a hot shower, with steam to help clear her throat and lungs. “I can just picture it, that feeling of finally being clean — really refreshed and clean,” Ms. Gallegos, 37, said one recent evening. But she has not had running water for more than five months — nor is there any tap water in her near future — because of a punishing and relentless drought in California. In the Gallegos household and more than 500 others in Tulare County, residents cannot flush a toilet, fill a drinking glass, wash dishes or clothes, or even rinse their hands without reaching for a bottle or bucket. Unlike the Okies who came here fleeing the Dust Bowl of the 1930s, the people now living on this parched land are stuck. “We don’t have the money to move, and who would buy this house without water?” said Ms. Gallegos, who grew up in the area and shares a tidy mobile home with her husband and two daughters. “When you wake up in the middle of the night sick to your stomach, you have to think about where the water bottle is before you can use the toilet.” Now in its third year, the state’s record-breaking drought is being felt in many ways: vanishing lakes and rivers, lost agricultural jobs, fallowed farmland, rising water bills, suburban yards gone brown. But nowhere is the situation as dire as in East Porterville, a small rural community in Tulare County where life’s daily routines have been completely upended by the drying of wells and, in turn, the disappearance of tap water. “Everything has changed,” said Yolanda Serrato, 54, who has spent most of her life here. Until this summer, the lawn in front of her immaculate three-bedroom home was a lush green, with plants dotting the perimeter. As her neighbors’ wells began running dry, Ms. Serrato warned her three children that they should cut down on long showers, but they rebuffed her. “They kept saying, ‘No, no, Mama, you’re just too negative,’ ” she said. Then the sink started to sputter. These days, the family of five relies on a water tank in front of their home that they received through a local charity. The sole neighbor with a working well allows them to hook up to his water at night, saving them from having to use buckets to flush toilets in the middle of the night. On a recent morning, there was still a bit of the neighbor’s well water left, trickling out the kitchen faucet, taking over 10 minutes to fill two three-quart pots. “You don’t think of water as privilege until you don’t have it anymore,” said Ms. Serrato, whose husband works in the nearby fields. “We were very proud of making a life here for ourselves, for raising children here. We never ever expected to live this way.” more . . .
Antarctic Sea Ice Just Hit A New Maximum, But That Doesn't Mean The Continent's Not Warming Andrea Thompson The donut of sea ice encircling Antarctica is hovering around its yearly winter maximum area, and there’s little question that it’s going to set a record high this year. “Antarctic sea ice in 2014 is going to set a record for sure,” said Ted Scambos, a senior scientist with the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colo. This end-of-season apex will have surpassed 20 million square kilometers (or 7.7 million square miles) “for the first time ever to our knowledge,” Scambos told Climate Central. And not only will the maximum be a record, but “nearly every day has been a record for that day in the satellite record” this year, he added, following a pattern of anomalously high winter maximums since 2012. (The satellite record extends back to the late 70s-early 80s.) This boom of sea ice around the southernmost continent in the past few years stands in stark contrast to the decades-long decline of sea ice in the Arctic Ocean. Arctic sea ice hit its sixth lowest extent at the end of this summer, with part of the ice’s edge coming within 5 degrees latitude of the North Pole. That Arctic ice melt is robustly connected to the overall warming of the planet. The loss of reflective, white ice also amplifies the warming around the North Pole; as more dark, open ocean is exposed to incoming sunlight, the water absorbs those rays, heats even more and melts more ice. The growth of Antarctic sea ice may also, paradoxically, be connected to global warming, though the exact combination of causes is still a major area of study. And just what the causes turn out to be will affect how long the Antarctic growth will go on for. “I think there’s still some debate going on about how this is all pieced together,” Scambos said. Winter Max Because the Northern and Southern Hemispheres experience opposite seasons, Antarctic sea ice always sees its winter maximum extent when the Arctic hits its summer minimum. (The timing is actually a little bit off, as the Arctic minimum typically comes in mid-September before the onset of fall causes ice to start refreezing, while the Antarctic maximum has been trending later in recent years, reaching into October before a clear melting trend emerges.) Antarctic sea ice doesn’t take as sharp a curve when it switches from a state of growth to melt as the Arctic does in the other direction, which means it takes longer for researchers to make the official call of the winter maximum, Scambos said. The chart of Antarctic sea ice growth also exhibits a lot more wiggles in it than the Arctic does, as storms and shifts in prevailing winds can impact how much of the seas around the continent are covered by ice. Researchers have to watch and ensure a late-season storm doesn’t boost the maximum. Whatever this year’s maximum amount turns out to be, it has already beaten the record extents set consecutively in 2012 and 2013. On Sept. 19, the five-day average of sea ice area surpassed the 20 million square kilometer mark, according to NSIDC records, handily beating last year’s record extent of 19.5 million square kilometers. The extent has dropped slightly since then, but hasn’t yet started a clear downward trend into the spring melt. Antarctic sea ice extent for September 20, 2014 was 20.07 million square kilometers (7.75 million square miles). The orange line in the figure shows the 1981-2010 average extent for that day, and the black cross indicates the geographic South Pole. But even apart from the record maximum extent, 2014 has been an exceptional year with record extents for most calendar days, with the exception of two periods, one during March and April and one in July, Scambos said. While this record ice growth would seem to contradict global warming or make up for the melting in the Arctic, it does neither, scientists say. The percent rise in Antarctic sea ice extent is smaller than the decline in Arctic sea ice, and the Antarctic growth is “nowhere near the kind of potential climate impact we’re seeing from losing Arctic ice,” Scambos said. The growth might even be a symptom of the Earth’s changing climate. Wind vs. Water The reasons behind the growth of Antarctic ice are less well understood than those causing the Arctic’s melt. Two main explanations for the growth of Antarctica’s sea ice have emerged: one involving wind, the other water. Some researchers have linked the growing sea ice to changes in the prevailing westerly winds that circle around the continent (those changes have in turn been variously linked to the ozone hole, warming of the Antarctic continent, and natural variations). As the winds blow stronger, they push ice ahead of them and to the left of the direction of motion, which in Antarctica is away from the continent. This spreads the ice and opens new areas of water that can then freeze. Wind has been shown to be a good explanation for the general upward trend over the past few decades, Scambos said, adding that it remains to be seen whether it can also explain the more dramatic uptick of recent years. It’s also possible that the main cause of the melt is the warm ocean waters that are reaching the base of the massive, miles-thick ice sheet that covers Antarctica at points where the flowing glaciers that make up the ice sheet flow into the ocean. The melt of many of those glaciers has dramatically increased in recent decades — recent studies have found that the melt of some is now unstoppable. That melt creates a layer of fresher water at the ocean’s surface, and while it isn’t enough of a change to lower the freezing point of the water, it does act as a more stable barrier when the freezing point is reach and ice begins to form. “It’s sort of a stable, cold puddle in which ice can readily grow if it gets below freezing,” Scambos said, adding that the puddle “is more stable and thicker than it used to be.” But which of these factors is the dominant force and what amount of the ice growth each accounts for is something scientists are still avidly investigating. The growth of Antarctic sea ice through the austral winter (summer in the Northern Hemisphere), as compared to 2013 and the 1981-2010 average. “There hasn’t been really a resolution as to which of these potential explanations is the best explanation” for these years of rapid growth, Scambos said. “Really it’s a time where the understanding of climate and sea ice interaction around Antarctica is in a state of flux.” Which one turns out to be the bigger influence could determine whether the trend of the past few years continues. If the melting and freshening of the ice is the main driver, then “the trend is not going to go away very easily,” Scambos said, as glaciers are likely to melt more and more as the continent warms. And one thing is clear: the continent is warming. “By several measures, Antarctica is getting warmer,” Scambos said. For example, temperature records from the continent show “a fuzzy but distinctly warming trend for most of Antarctica.” “Yeah, we don’t understand everything about the Antarctic sea ice extent,” he said, but trends in temperatures, winds and other factors are very much in line with greenhouse-driven warming. “Antarctica is very much participating in the overall global climate,” Scambos said.
Is it any surprise that the water is evaporating more quickly? This drought is just a low-grade sample of the kinds of things to come. Temp change over the last twenty years.