"Heat Islands Cooking U.S. Cities"

Hot and Getting Hotter: Heat Islands Cooking U.S. Cities From Climate Central:

Urban heat measured by satellite in Louisville, Ky. Click image to enlarge. 

Cities are almost always hotter than the surrounding rural area but global warming takes that heat and makes it worse. In the future, this combination of urbanization and climate change could raise urban temperatures to levels that threaten human health, strain energy resources, and compromise economic productivity.

Summers in the U.S. have been warming since 1970. But on average across the country cities are even hotter, and have been getting hotter faster than adjacent rural areas. (report continues below interactive)

With more than 80 percent of Americans living in cities, these urban heat islands — combined with rising temperatures caused by increasing heat-trapping greenhouse gas emissions — can have serious health effects for hundreds of millions of people during the hottest months of the year.  Heat is the No.1 weather-related killer in the U.S., and the hottest days, particularly days over 90°F, are associated with dangerous ozone pollution levels that can trigger asthma attacks, heart attacks, and other serious health impacts.

Our analysis of summer temperatures in 60 of the largest U.S. cities found that: 

• 57 cities had measurable urban heat island effects over the past 10 years. Single-day urban temperatures in some metro areas were as much as 27°F higher than the surrounding rural areas, and on average across all 60 cities, the maximum single-day temperature difference was 17.5°F.
   
• Cities have many more searing hot days each year. Since 2004, 12 cities averaged at least 20 more days a year above 90°F than nearby rural areas. The 60 cities analyzed averaged at least 8 more days over 90°F each summer compared to adjacent rural areas.
   
• More heat can increase ozone air pollution. All 51 cities with adequate data showed a statistically significant correlation between higher daily summer temperatures and bad air quality (as measured by ground-level ozone concentrations). Temperatures are being forced higher by increasing urbanization and manmade global warming, which could undermine the hard-won improvements in air quality and public health made over the past few decades.
   
• In two thirds of the cities analyzed (41 of 60), urbanization and climate change appear to be combining to increase summer heat faster than climate change alone is raising regional temperatures. In three quarters (45 of 60) of cities examined, urbanized areas are warming faster than adjacent rural locations.
• 
  
• The top 10 cities with the most intense summer urban heat islands (average daily urban-rural temperature differences) over the past 10 years are:
   
• Las Vegas (7.3°F)
• Albuquerque (5.9°F
• Denver (4.9°F)
• Portland (4.8°F)
• Louisville (4.8°F)
• Washington, D.C. (4.7°F)
• Kansas City (4.6°F)
• Columbus (4.4°F)
• Minneapolis (4.3°F)
• Seattle (4.1°F)
   
• On average across all 60 cities, urban summer temperatures were 2.4°F hotter than rural temperatures.

"Science Shows How Climate Change is Baking Australia"

Science Shows How Climate Change is Baking Australia from Climate Central

As smoke billows from unnervingly early-season wildfires charring the Australian state of Tasmania, yet more dust is settling on the scientific discussion over how climate change contributed to last year’s deadly Australian heat.

Last year was Australia’s hottest on record. And each of a set of five research papers published Monday in a special edition of the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society reached the same conclusion regarding the year of unprecedented heat. The research teams independently concluded — in two cases writing that they could do so with “essentially” 100 percent certainty — that climate-changing greenhouse gas pollution played a substantial role in fueling it.

Australia has left behind its climate of generations past and moved into an era where extreme heat waves and warm winter months, such as those of 2013, are more likely to occur, researchers concluded.

“They’ve left behind the climate that they used to have,” said NOAA research meteorologist Thomas Knutson.

Last year’s intense heat was perhaps most noticeable during summer, when temperatures of 120 degrees were recorded in some places. But the differences between recorded and average temperatures were greatest during the Austral winter and fall. Never in more than a century of record-keeping has the average Australian temperature reached last year’s level.

The high temperatures and frequent heat waves were the combined result of natural variation and human influence on the climate. Low rainfall that contributed to the hot conditions does not appear to have been caused by climate change, one of the research teams concluded. That natural phenomenon combined with unnatural climate change-juiced heat, however, leading to extraordinary temperatures. Heat waves killed hundreds of people, delayed play and injured players at Melbourne’s Australian Open, and caused 100,000 bats to spectacularly tumble from their perches, dead.

“We now have some very solid, quantitative work that says, ‘Hey, wait a minute, climate change is implicated in these things,’” said Australian National University professor Will Steffen, who was a climate commissioner until the new federal government terminated the nation’s climate advisory group. The former government agency has since reconstituted itself as an independent nonprofit....

"Lyme disease surges north, and Canada moves out of denial"

Article in the 'Daily Climate'

Scientists long expected climate change to harm human health. But one of the clearest signs of health risks in a warming world has emerged in one of the world’s most advanced economies, as Canada belatedly struggles to cope with Lyme disease's migration in North America. 

Canada should have seen this coming. In the United States, reported cases of Lyme disease have increased from fewer than 10,000 reported cases in 1991 to more than 27,000 cases by 2013. Canada was well-positioned to be affected by the spread of the disease. As early as 2005, modeling published by researcher Nicholas Ogden, then at the University of Montreal, indicated that the geographic range of the Lyme-carrying tick could expand northward significantly due to climate change in this century. 

Scientists long have anticipated that global warming would harm human health, and the most recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report highlights the risk for poor populations that don't have access to quality health care or other public services. For example, the risk of heat stroke is greatest in areas without access to power for air conditioning, and water-borne illnesses like cholera and intestinal viruses flourish in areas without safe drinking water. 

But one of the clearest signs of the changing health risks in a warming world has emerged in two of the world's most advanced economies, the United States and Canada, as Lyme disease spreads in North America. 

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency this year added Lyme disease to its list of climate change indicators, a report meant to aid in public understanding of the effects of warming that scientists have been able to document....

'An emerging clinical problem'
The doctors presented their findings in April at an American College of Rheumatology symposium but declined to talk to The Daily Climate about their research until it is published in a medical journal. They are still working on finalizing their paper, an IWK Health Centre spokeswoman said. But in the abstract presented at that meeting, they called Lyme arthritis "an emerging clinical problem in Nova Scotia," with cases expected to continue to rise. 

Untreated, Lyme disease can spread to joints, the nervous system, and even the heart. Heart block due to Lyme carditis can develop in minutes or hours, and is a rare but fatal complication. A more common problem that causes even greater concern in the health community: Lyme patients with symptoms persisting long after antibiotic treatment. There's great controversy over how long antibiotic treatment should be continued in such cases and who should bear the costs. The issue underscores the importance of early detection. "Almost always the persistent cases are in patients who were not treated early," said the CDC's Beard. 

Robert Strang, Nova Scotia's chief public health officer, says one problem with diagnosis has been that Lyme involves "a lot of non-specific symptoms." Of the cluster of pediatric arthritis cases at IWK, he said, "that case series reminded us that there are joint and neurologic and cardiac ways that Lyme disease can present itself."...
 

Jon Stewart "Burn Notice"

On why people have to 'March' anyway (Republicans in the House of Representatives - Science, etc. Committee):

The Daily Show - Burn Notice

Excerpt from the 'hearing':

Bucshon: Is it true that this rule has no effect on the global temperature change?

Holdren: Can I take that? I’d like to respond to that.

Bucshon: There’s public comment out there that that question has been asked and answered saying no.

Holdren: You should look at the scientific literature [interrupted] rather than the public comments …

Bucshon: Of all the climatologists whose careers depends on the climate changing to keep themselves publishing articles? Yes, I could read that, but I don’t believe it.

from http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2014/09/17/3568923/bucshon-climate-scientists-money/

(Bucshon is the Representative from Indiana - from my district)

UN Climate Summit 2014

UN Climate Summit 2014 - live broadcast

Climate Summit 2014 - 1) Opening Ceremony 2) National action and ambition announcements, Plenary 3 (National Announcements and Heads of State and Government) 3) Joint conclusion of the morning National Action and Ambition Announcements

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has invited world leaders, from government, finance, business, and civil society to Climate Summit 2014 this 23 September to galvanize and catalyze climate action. He has asked these leaders to bring bold announcements and actions to the Summit that will reduce emissions, strengthen climate resilience, and mobilize political will for a meaningful legal agreement in 2015. Climate Summit 2014 provides a unique opportunity for leaders to champion an ambitious vision, anchored in action that will enable a meaningful global agreement in 2015.

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This is what inspired the NYC march and other marches / demonstrations around the world. There is hope that the various government representatives will work together to make changes to business as usual. It is a world-wide problem that takes world-wide solutions. 

I think we need rationing - at the individual and country levels. Plus industries need more controls - enforced regulations on emissions. There needs to be more requirements for large corporations to be efficient. Green energy needs to be promoted, of course - with an end to oil and gas subsidies and a limit on how much is extracted per year.

The Biggest Climate March Ever! - September 21, 2014 - New York City

"Environment Climate change Carbon map"

Environment Climate change Carbon map – which countries are responsible for climate change?