Aboriginal people in Alice Springs say global heating threatens their survival
The town had 55 days above 40C in the year to July 2019
Central Australian outstations are running out of water
Poor quality housing in town camps cannot be cooled effectively
Indigenous leaders fear extreme heat will cause influx of internal refugees
A Coal Baron Funded Climate Denial as His Company Spiraled Into Bankruptcy
Climate change fears propel scientists out of the lab and into the streets
Earth’s Hottest Decade on Record Capped by Years of Extreme Storms and Deadly Wildfires
The world needed a bang from the Madrid climate meeting. It got a whimper instead
Arctic Report Card 2019: Extreme Ice Loss, Dying Species as Global Warming Worsens
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Open Mind 
We should live gracefully, in ways that are meaningful to us and reflect our values. For me, everything flows from that. If our lives and actions are insubstantial, that’s ok, our way of living, our choices about how to live gracefully are our path up the mountain. News is not good. A lot of the changes we see are reflective of exponential problem growth which tends to look like a hockey stick if you graph it.
Thanks to all for their work. Don’t forget to do some grief work to avoid being overcome when the waves of grief hit you.
S Rahmstorf tweeted a bit of optimism via this article:
https://about.bnef.com/blog/peak-emissions-are-closer-than-you-think-and-heres-why/
Hmm. Looks like that author believes in infinite economic growth so maybe Liebreich’s views should be taken with a pinch of salt. I certainly wouldn’t go along with his view that we finish this decade in a lot better position than we ended the last decade; even the article he cites for this view says, “Carbon dioxide has climbed from 388 parts per million a decade ago, to 412ppm now, and shows no sign of slowing its ascent; and the three warmest years for the planet since 1880 have been 2015, 2016 and 2017.” though it goes on to laud renewable energy initiatives. No, as I see it, every year is worse than the last, so far as the state of our environment is concerned, and as far as the availability of “resources” is concerned (of course, the extraction of the latter causes deterioration of the former).
Worst conditions on record, part of a continued trend… Looks very grim
Click to access scs72.pdf
More is still to come.
I am lucky I live on the west coast, we’ve only lost about 25% of our ranifall since the 70s….
I hate my government – useless bastards
On Wednesday we hit 41.9°C – 1 degree higher than the Tuesday record.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-12-19/australia-heatwave-sets-hottest-day-for-second-time-in-two-days/11813446
The four hottest days in history were last week. The previous hottest, six years ago, is tied for 4th.
That’s a lot of manure.
I’m in Adelaide, South Australia, and today’s forecast was for 46 degrees with the last couple at 40 or above as well. We’ve had a significant bushfire in the hills and a smaller one near the northern suburbs. My work site is near the hills and we had an early mandatory shutdown. There was a brief shower and a cool change is coming through, so down to the 20s by tomorrow at least. I concur with Nathan’s last comment. :-|
I was amazed at Adelaide’s overnight temperatures. It dropped to a minimum of 33.6 C at 10:30pm, but then warmed up to nearly 38 C and then spent the rest of the night in the 35 – 37 C range before rapidly warming again. Good to see that the cool change has come through with a vengeance now.
I’m in Perth, and I don’t know how I would have survived last week without air conditioning. One place in the interior has a library that opens at 10am, and the locals without air conditioning are queued up when it opens to escape the heat.
We are very lucky in Perth – we just don’t get natural disasters to the extent that eastern and northern Australia do.
Hi John. Yes, we’re glad to have air conditioning too. We only had our unit replaced a year ago after 3 years of having a broken one.
I just read an article about Australia in a French newspaper, and saw this picture:
This is absolutely incredible…
Luckily our Prime Minister is on holiday in Hawaii.
that way he can stay healthy, not breathing the smoke.
I see he is coming back a couple of days early, having realized (a tad belatedly) that hanging out in Hawaii while the nation burns is not a ‘good look.’
In the meantime:
‘Self-combusting manure,’ indeed. Are there observable trends in “dry lightning strikes and self-combusting manure?” Or are those limited to CO2, temperature, and the cowardice and idiocy of politicians owned heart and soul by fossil fuel interests?
Oour main problem with ‘self-combusting manure’ is its extraordinary ability to keep getting voted in.
@Mary Potter,
Love it!
With Prime Minister Morrison and his leadership team the confusing of sources of ignition with causes of reduced rainfall and higher temperatures that heighten fire risk is no more a genuine misunderstanding than them agreeing that there really is climate change when the issue is human induced climate change but they contrive to mean the “but the climate is always changing” sort. I strongly suspect when some of these people say they take the climate problem seriously, the problem they really mean and want to fix is people alarming “quiet Australians” by going on and on about climate change.
I think only climate science denial as earnest faith can explain what they say and do. Because they KNOW global warming cannot be real then the only explanation for people being alarmed about it is fossil fuels and free enterprise hating extremists, aided and abetted by irresponsible fake media outlets.
Because they get fierce criticism from the “fake” media they cannot say what they really think, so when they use the rhetorical tricks above or outright lie it is not their fault; it is forced on them by ecofascist censorship. If extremists didn’t go on about it they would not have to lie so their lying is, like the problem itself, the fault of those extremists. And when they repeat BS over and over they can end up believing it themselves – neatly absolving them of responsibility for the lies their other lies require of them. And lying about lying about their lying… well – Over there, LOOK OUT! Climate Extremists!
‘Self-combusting manure,’ indeed.
I remember it from when I was at high school, they used to mow the playing fields and have piles of grass cuttings at the side. During warm periods in the summer they would often start to smolder turning black on the inside.
I don’t really ‘do’ Twitter, but I see that McCormack’s words have become the hashtag they deserve to be:
#selfcombustingmanure
Nice… What a joke that man is… Shouldn’t he be out helping his community find some water? Or is it just ‘thoughts and prayers’?
Or, for an FB link:
https://www.facebook.com/hashtag/selfcombustingmanure?source=feed_text&epa=HASHTAG
Merry Xmas / Joyeux Noël / Frohe Weihnachten
J.-P. D.
Yes! May we find some peace amidst the insanity–just as our ancestors had so often to do.
I’ve put porridge out for the Nisse, hoping to keep the impish bad luck down next year, with a promise to be better to our cats.