[GWSG] CO2 growth slowing; freeing land; Thwaites from beneath; wildlife 68% gone; anoxic 201 mya; the good old days

[Tilley, Al]

1. In the past decade growth in CO2 emissions globally slowed from 3% in the previous decade to 1%. Thanks to covid-19, emissions this year should slow by 4-7%. Still, we are adding CO2 and other greenhouse gasses to the atmosphere. We have a 25% chance of temporarily exceeding 1.5C of heating in the next five years, but we can still meet the Paris goal, which refers to a 30-year average temperature, if we commit to trying. https://phys.org/news/2020-09-earth-temporarily-dangerous-limit-major.html

2. We could remove 9-16 years of emissions by changing to a plant-based diet and restoring native vegetation on the land freed from meat production. https://phys.org/news/2020-09-offset-years-climate-warming-emissions-analysis.html

3.  Thwaites Glacier in the West Antarctic, larger than Great Britain, is undermined by cavities as large as the Grand Canyon and is melting from below. The schedule of its dissolution is not clear, but its stability is under a growing threat. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/sep/09/cavities-threaten-glacier-great-britain-thwaites

4. A wide census of wildlife concludes that we have lost 68% of the populations in the past 50 years. "The most dramatic decline was in freshwater." About a million species are at risk of extinction.  https://www.ecowatch.com/humans-destroying-wildlife-report-2020-2647567577.html?rebelltitem=2#toggle-gdpr

5. A study indicates that depletion of oxygen in the oceans was involved in a mass extinction 201 million years ago. https://phys.org/news/2020-09-ancient-oxygen-depletion-oceans-end-triassic.html

6. 2020 has featured a string of dramatic disasters fed by our use of fossil fuels. We may look back on this year as the good old days. https://phys.org/news/2020-09-disasters-wild-experts-worse-future.html

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