जलवायु परिवर्तन – Page 24 – आवारा मुसाफिर

Baked Alaska – record December warmth and winter rains

December 29, 2021935 Views

An unusual winter warm spell in Alaska has brought daytime temperatures soaring past 60 degrees Fahrenheit (15.5°C) and torrents of rain at a time of year normally associated with bitter cold and fluffy snow. At the island community of Kodiak, the air temperature at a tidal gauge hit 67 F (19.4°C) degrees on Sunday, the highest December reading ever recorded in Alaska, said scientist Rick Thoman of the Alaska Center for Climate Assessment and Policy. FILE PHOTO: A house in Cordova, Alaska is covered with snow and icicles in this handout photo released to Reuters January 9, 2012. REUTERS/Erv Petty/Alaska Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management/Handout He called it "absurd." The new benchmark high came amid a spate of balmy December extremes, Thoman said, includin...

अमेरिकाकनाडाजलवायु परिवर्तन

Beavers head north and impact Arctic landscape

AWARA MUSAFIR BUREAU

December 23, 2021374 Views

New report maps their spread into tundra region of Alaska and northern Canada A new report has highlighted how beavers are heading further north and are having a significant impact on the landscape of northern Canada and Alaska. The Arctic Report Card 2021 report, published this month by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), describes how the North American beaver (Castor canadensis) has expanded its range in recent years and is now colonising Arctic territory. Beaver lodge (center), dam (bottom center), and pond on the Seward Peninsula in western Alaska. (Photo: Ken Tape, Aug 2021) Authored by members of the Arctic Beaver Observation Network (A-BON), including Dr Helen Wheeler of Anglia Ruskin University (ARU), the report details how scientists are us...

जलवायु परिवर्तन

In last 15 years, deforestation made outdoors unsafe for millions

AWARA MUSAFIR BUREAU

December 19, 20211091 Views

The tropics is becoming hotter due to a combination of warming associated with deforestation and climate change—and that can reduce the ability of outdoor workers to perform their jobs safely. Researchers reporting in the journal One Earth on December 17 estimate how many safe working hours people living in the tropics have lost due to local temperature change associated with loss of trees during the past 15 years. “There is a huge disproportionate decrease in safe work hours associated with heat exposure for people in deforested locations versus people in forestated locations just over the past 15 or 20 years,” says first author Luke Parsons, a climate researcher at Duke University. “There is a small amount of climate change that has happened over the same 15-year period, but the incr...

ग्रीसजलवायु परिवर्तन

Warming temperatures threaten Greece’s prized olive oil

AWARA MUSAFIR BUREAU

December 16, 2021502 Views

Months before the harvest began in November, Greek olive oil farmer Michalis Antonopoulos knew it would not be a good year. First, his trees did not fully blossom because last winter was not cold and wet enough. In the spring, temperatures soared to 38 degrees Celsius (100 Fahrenheit), damaging the flowers that were to grow into olives. Then the summer brought the worst heat wave in decades, drying up the olives and setting off wildfires that torched hundreds of thousands of trees. Standing in his grove in Kalamata, Greece's best-known olive producing region, among trees that are hundreds of years old, Antonopoulos pointed to the results: half empty branches, with small or shriveled olives, or rotting, attacked by a fruit fly. "We're witnessing phenomena and problems th...

अमेरिकाजलवायु परिवर्तन

Was US tornado outbreak related to climate change?

AWARA MUSAFIR BUREAU

December 12, 2021465 Views

Tornadoes ripped through over five US stated on Friday, killing dozens. Here's a look at what's known about Friday's tornado outbreak and the role of climate change in such weather events The calendar said December but the warm moist air screamed of springtime. Add an eastbound storm front guided by a La Nina weather pattern into that mismatch and it spawned tornadoes that killed dozens over five US states. Destroyed homes and debris are seen in a heavily damaged neighborhood at dawn after tornadoes ripped through several U.S. states in Dawson Springs, Kentucky, U.S., December 12, 2021. REUTERS/Jon Cherry At least 100 people were feared dead in Kentucky after a swarm of tornadoes tore a 200-mile path through the U.S. Midwest and South, demolishing homes, levelling businesses and ...

जलवायु परिवर्तन

Coral reefs off east Africa could die out in 50 years

AWARA MUSAFIR BUREAU

December 8, 2021790 Views

A new study found warming temperatures to be the main driver Coral reefs in the western Indian Ocean are at risk of extinction by 2070 due to warming temperatures and overfishing, according to a new study. A roughly 12,000 sq km expanse of coral reefs stretching down the eastern coastline of Africa and around Madagascar is facing ecosystem collapse, threatening a range of species and the livelihoods of over a million people who work in the fishing and tourism industries. These reefs make up around 5% of the planet's total coral reef area. "When an ecosystem collapses, we might still see individual fish or corals but the whole system is no longer effective in supporting either marine biodiversity or communities who are dependent on it," said David Obura, a Kenyan marine ecolog...

जलवायु परिवर्तन

Killer Whales lingering in newly melted Arctic Ocean

AWARA MUSAFIR BUREAU

December 4, 20211360 Views1

Killer whales are intelligent, adaptive predators, often teaming up to take down larger prey. Continuous reduction in sea ice in the Arctic Ocean is opening areas to increased killer whale dwelling and predation, potentially creating an ecological imbalance. During the 181st Meeting of the Acoustical Society of America, held from Nov. 29-Dec. 3, Brynn Kimber, from the University of Washington, discussed how killer whales have spent more time than previously recorded in the Arctic, following the decrease in sea ice. Killer whales will often travel to different areas to target varieties of prey. In a study including eight years of passive acoustic data, Kimber and their team monitored killer whale movements using acoustic tools, finding killer whales are spending more time than pr...

जलवायु परिवर्तन

Hi-tech monitoring and carbon offsets for rainforests could be the big gain

AWARA MUSAFIR BUREAU

November 30, 2021712 Views

A global carbon credits breakthrough at COP26 in Glasgow blew away any gloom from failing to phase out coal use, say many observers. Discussion at the UN climate conference had been dominated by soaring atmospheric carbon dioxide levels, largely from fossil fuels but exacerbated by global deforestation, notably in tropical rainforests like the Amazon’s – often called the “Lungs of the Earth”. But while COP26 failed to strike a coal deal, a carbon credit agreement could channel trillions of private sector dollars into protecting rainforests and farms, building renewable energy facilities and other projects to combat Climate Change and promote the circular economy needed to stabilise the Earth’s environment. FILE PHOTO: Carlos Roberto Sanquetta, a forestry engineering professor at ...

चीनजलवायु परिवर्तन

Collapse of ancient Liangzhu culture caused by climate change

AWARA MUSAFIR BUREAU

November 29, 2021826 Views

Referred to as "China's Venice of the Stone Age", the Liangzhu excavation site in eastern China is considered one of the most significant testimonies of early Chinese advanced civilisation. More than 5000 years ago, the city already had an elaborate water management system. Until now, it has been controversial what led to the sudden collapse. Massive flooding triggered by anomalously intense monsoon rains caused the collapse, as an international team with Innsbruck geologist and climate researcher Christoph Spötl has now shown in the journal Science Advances. FILE PHOTO: Aerial view of Liangzhu City Site (from southwest to northeast) in China. © Hangzhou Liangzhu Archaeological - Site Administrative District Management Committee In the Yangtze Delta, about 160 kilometres southwes...

जलवायु परिवर्तन

Arctic Ocean started getting warmer decades earlier than we thought

AWARA MUSAFIR BUREAU

November 28, 2021370 Views

The Arctic Ocean has been getting warmer since the beginning of the 20th century – decades earlier than records suggest – due to warmer water flowing into the delicate polar ecosystem from the Atlantic Ocean. An international group of researchers reconstructed the recent history of ocean warming at the gateway to the Arctic Ocean in a region called the Fram Strait, between Greenland and Svalbard. FILE PHOTO: Icebergs are seen at the mouth of the Jakobshavn ice fjord near Ilulissat, Greenland, September 16, 2021. REUTERS/Hannibal Hanschke Using the chemical signatures found in marine microorganisms, the researchers found that the Arctic Ocean began warming rapidly at the beginning of the last century as warmer and saltier waters flowed in from the Atlantic – a phenomenon called At...