[GWSG] Pop-up parks; beyond meat; kelp eats C; IPCC on oceans; Antarctic CH4; UN summit; heating impacts

[Tilley, Al]

1. Urban pop-up parks are patches of native diversity, good for bugs, birds, and people. They are also little pieces of climate action. Thanks to Sarah Crooks for the story. https://cur.org.au/news/pop-up-parks-provide-more-than-a-patch-of-grass/

2. Stanford’s Pat Brown was determined to take the most effective action he could to deal with the climate crisis, so he led the project to develop the Impossible Burger. The article takes on the general topic of attempting to disrupt the meat industry in the interest of climate action. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/09/30/can-a-burger-help-solve-climate-change?utm_campaign=aud-dev&utm_source=nl&utm_brand=tny&utm_mailing=TNY_Magazine_Daily_092319&utm_medium=email&bxid=5be9cafe24c17c6adf39e724&cndid=18164692&esrc=auto_auth_de&mbid=CRMNYR062419&utm_term=TNY_Daily

3. In a 13-minute TED talk delivered last July leading Australian climate scientist Tim Flannery  describes the promise of kelp permaculture as a carbon removal and sequestration technology. Use of 9% of the ocean’s surface would both sequester our current carbon production and provide enough seafood to feed the world. Thanks to Bruce Hamilton for the link.    https://www.ted.com/talks/tim_flannery_can_seaweed_help_curb_global_warming?utm_source=newsletter_daily&utm_campaign=daily&utm_medium=email&utm_content=button__2019-09-24

Flannery’s 2017 book Sunlight and Seaweed has more info and is a quick, enjoyable read.

4.  The IPCC has released a report on the health of the oceans. It is out of date already because of the limitations on what it could consider, and unrepresentatively conservative because its consensus approval process gives veto power to nations bound to perpetuating fossil fuels. It still amounts to a call for action. https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2019/09/there-s-no-scenario-stops-sea-level-rise-century-dire-un-climate-report-warns

5. Methane from melting permafrost is usually mentioned in connection with the Arctic but the Antarctic has its own. 55 million years ago the Antarctic was covered with vegetation. As it rotted, it emitted 80-480 gigatons of methane, now trapped below the ice but threatening release if the ice melts. The low figure is 1,000 times the annual emissions from livestock. Some of the release could be balanced by increased production of sea algae from nutrients made available by the melting ice sheets.  https://www.sierraclub.org/sierra/will-antarctic-ice-doom-us-all-methane?utm_source=insider&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter

6. The UN climate summit in New York was remarkable for the failure of major emitters to announce ambitious targets, though more than 60 nations announced their intention to achieve zero emissions. https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-49807745

7. An extensive analysis of the consequences of global heating concludes that the costs of heating beyond 1.5C far outweigh the costs of action to limit heating. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/09/190919142215.htm

The Science article itself is in open circulation. The research team was surprised at the new wealth of information recently available on the impact of heating. The report considered the impact of heating to 1C (which we have now surpassed), 1.5C, 2C, and beyond. The report is interactive. Click on the illustrations for a series of presentations on the topic. The article makes some demands on a reader (unless you already know what mesocosm means) but rewards you with a comprehensive survey of the current and prospective states of the world. From the conclusion: “Warming of 1.0°C since the pre-industrial period has fundamentally transformed our planet and its natural systems. Multiple lines of evidence reveal that a 1.5°C world will entail larger risks to both human and natural systems. The risks of a 2°C world are much greater. This places us at a critical time in human history where proportionate action taken today will almost certainly minimize the dangerous impacts of a changing climate for hundreds of millions of people.”  https://science.sciencemag.org/content/365/6459/eaaw6974
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