“This is really one of the first cases where you can say, shockingly, in some ways, these slow, calm ice sheets care a lot about a single extreme event in a particularly warm year," Dusty Schroeder, said.
Jordan's yearly decrease in rainfall could lead to a 30 percent reduction by 2100, according to the Jordan Water Project, led by Steve Gorelick of Stanford.
Research led by Steve Gorelick found that Jordan's annual rainfall could be reduced 30 percent by 2100. Supplemental resources are limited, making the situation bleak.
“Solar geoengineering is not a substitute for decarbonizing,” said Chris Field, adding that technology to reflect sunlight “should be researched as rapidly and effectively as possible.”
The U.S. must seriously consider the idea of tinkering with the atmosphere to cool a warming Earth and research how and whether humanity should hack the planet. “I honestly don’t know whether or not it’s going to make sense,” said Chris Field.
“We expected faster plant growth and more biomass to increase soil organic carbon, as extra leaves and biomass fall to the forest floor,” said Rob Jackson. “It didn’t, and that was the biggest surprise in our work.”
Satellite imagery shows air pollution levels bounced back to pre-pandemic numbers after a decline due to COVID-19 lockdowns. Environmental economist Marshall Burke said, "the better air quality could have saved between 50,000 and 75,000 people from dying prematurely."
Hydrofluorocarbons, or HFCs, used in refrigerants have a significant drawback. “One large glass of HFC 134 has the same warming as a thousand pounds of carbon dioxide pollution from our cars,” said Rob Jackson. “It's really an amazingly potent greenhouse gas.”
"We can't cut emissions by putting hundreds of millions of people out of work and locking everyone at home," said Rob Jackson. Emissions are back to pre-pandemic levels but to lower them again it shouldn't cost people their jobs.
“In some cases, as we become more sophisticated, we’ve lost the ability to see what’s most obvious,” said Rod Ewing, Frank Stanton Professor in Nuclear Security at Stanford. “You calculate the probability of an event against the expense – and often cost is the driver.”
Using government satellite images instead of air quality data, Marshall Burke projected an increase in smoky days in coming years. “In the future, it’s going to get worse than 2020,” he says. “We should expect that.”
Research led by Salvatore Pascale shows human-caused climate change made Cape Town's worst drought on record five to six times more likely. The city's water crisis holds lessons on how we can solve environmental problems by encouraging virtuous habits.
