The number of marine heatwave days has increased by more than 50 percent since the mid-20th century, researchers reported in the journal Nature Climate Change.

“Globally, marine heatwaves are becoming more frequent and prolonged, and record-breaking events have been observed in most ocean basins in the past decade,” said lead author Dan Smale, a researcher at the Marine Biological Association in Plymouth, Britain.

Above the ocean watermark, on Earth’s surface, 18 of the last 19 years have been the warmest on record, leading to more severe storms, droughts, heatwaves and flooding.

“Just as atmospheric heatwaves can destroy crops, forests and animal populations, marine heatwaves can devastate ocean ecosystems,” Smale told AFP.

Compared to hot spells over land, which have claimed tens of thousands of lives since the start of the century, ocean heatwaves have received scant scientific attention.

But sustained spikes in sea-surface temperatures can also have devastating consequences.

A 10-week marine heatwave near western Australia in 2011, for example, shattered an entire ecosystem and permanently pushed commercial fish species into colder waters.

Corals have been the marquee victims of shallow-water heatwaves, and face a bleak future. Even if humanity manages to cap global warming at 1.5 degrees Celsius — mission impossible, according to some scientists — up to 90 percent of corals are likely to die, the UN’s top climate science body said in October.

But other bedrock species have suffered too: the 2011 surge of heat killed off large swathes of seagrass meadows and kelp forests, along with the finfish and abalone that depend on them.

– Heat sponge –

A 10-week marine heatwave near western Australia in 2011 shattered an entire ecosystem and permanently pushed commercial fish species into colder waters. (AFP Photo/WILLIAM WEST).

Another ocean hot spell off the coast of California warmed waters by 6 C (10.8 F) and lasted for more than a year.

Known at “The Blob”, it generated toxic algae blooms, caused the closure of crab fisheries, and led to the death of sea lions, whales and sea birds.

More frequent and intense ocean heatwaves also have a direct impact on people by reducing fisheries harvests and adding to global warming, the researchers noted.

“Species of fish and crustaceans targeted for human consumption may be locally wiped out,” Smale said.

“And carbon stored by sea grasses and mangroves may be released if they are hit by extreme temperatures.”

To determine the full extent of marine heatwave impacts across different oceans, Smale and an international team from 19 research centres crunched data from more than 1,000 field studies that reported on how organisms and ecosystem responded.

By definition, marine heatwaves last at least five days. Sea water temperatures for a given location are “extremely high” — the top 5-to-10 percent on record for that time and place.

“Marine heatwaves can penetrate to hundreds of metres, though for our analysis we used data which only captures warming at the surface,” Smale said.

As manmade global warming heats the planet, oceans have absorbed some 90 percent of the extra heat generated.

Without that heat sponge, air temperatures would be intolerably higher.

Even if humanity does manage to cap global warming at “well below” 2C (3.6 F), as called for in the Paris climate treaty, marine heatwaves will sharply increase in frequency, intensity and duration, earlier research has shown.

© Agence France-Presse

Featured Photo: “Globally, marine heatwaves are becoming more frequent and prolonged, and record-breaking events have been observed in most ocean basins in the past decade. (AFP Photo/Handout).”

Paris (AFP) – “Unless we change our way of producing food, insects as a whole will go down the path of extinction in a few decades,” concluded the peer-reviewed study, which is set for publication in April.

The recent decline in bugs that fly, crawl, burrow and skitter across still water is part of a gathering “mass extinction,” only the sixth in the last half-billion years.

“Charts showing declining and threatened insects and vertebrates, according to IUCN data (AFP Photo/Thomas SAINT-CRICQ).”

“We are witnessing the largest extinction event on Earth since the late Permian and Cretaceous periods,” the authors noted.

The Permian end-game 252 million years ago snuffed out more than 90 percent of the planet’s life forms, while the abrupt finale of the Cretaceous 66 million years ago saw the demise of land dinosaurs.

“We estimate the current proportion of insect species in decline — 41 percent — to be twice as high as that of vertebrates,” or animals with a backbone, Francisco Sanchez-Bayo of the University of Sydney and Kris Wyckhuys of the University of Queensland in Australia reported.

“At present, a third of all insect species are threatened with extinction.”

An additional one percent join their ranks every year, they estimated. Insect biomass — sheer collective weight — is declining annually by about 2.5 percent worldwide.

“Only decisive action can avert a catastrophic collapse of nature’s ecosystems,” the authors cautioned.

Restoring wilderness areas and a drastic reduction in the use of pesticides and chemical fertiliser are likely the best way to slow the insect loss, they said.

– ‘Hardly any insects left’ –

The study, to be published in the journal Biological Conservation, pulled together data from more than 70 datasets from across the globe, some dating back more than a century.

By a large margin, habitat change — deforestation, urbanisation, conversion to farmland — emerged as the biggest cause of insect decline and extinction threat.

Next was pollution and the widespread use of pesticides in commercial agriculture.

Embed from Getty Images
“Thai farmesr spray pesticide over there rice field in Nakhon Sawan province, north of Bangkok on November 17, 2018. (Photo by Chaiwat Subprasom/NurPhoto via Getty Images).”

The recent collapse, for example, of many bird species in France was traced to the use insecticides on industrial crops such as wheat, barley, corn and wine grapes.

“There are hardly any insects left — that’s the number one problem,” said Vincent Bretagnolle, an ecologist at Centre for Biological Studies.

Experts estimate that flying insects across Europe have declined 80 percent on average, causing bird populations to drop by more than 400 million in three decades.

Only a few species of insects — mainly in the tropics — are thought to have suffered due to climate change, while some in northern climes have expanded their range as temperatures warm.

In the long run, however, scientists fear that global warming could become another major driver of insect demise.

Up to now, rising concern about biodiversity loss has mostly focused on big mammals, birds and amphibians.

– Dung beetles in deep –

But insects comprise about two-thirds of all terrestrial species, and have been the foundation of key ecosystems since emerging almost 400 million years ago.

“The essential role that insects play as food items of many vertebrates is often forgotten,” the researchers said.

“Experts estimate that flying insects across Europe have declined 80 percent on average (AFP Photo/DENIS CHARLET).”

Moles, hedgehogs, anteaters, lizards, amphibians, most bats, many birds and fish all feed on insects or depend on them for rearing their offspring.

Other insects filling the void left by declining species probably cannot compensate for the sharp drop in biomass, the study said.

Insects are also the world’s top pollinators — 75 percent of 115 top global food crops depend on animal pollination, including cocoa, coffee, almonds and cherries.

One-in-six species of bees have gone regionally extinct somewhere in the world.

Dung beetles in the Mediterranean basin have also been hit particularly hard, with more than 60 percent of species fading in numbers.

The pace of insect decline appears to be the same in tropical and temperate climates, though there is far more data from North America and Europe than the rest of the world.

Britain has seen a measurable decline across 60 percent of its large insect groups, or taxa, followed by North America (51 percent) and Europe as a whole (44 percent).

© Agence France-Presse

Featured Photo: “One-in-six species of bees have gone regionally extinct somewhere in the world (AFP Photo/SYLVAIN THOMAS).”

The 2015 Paris Agreement calls on humanity to block the rise in Earth’s temperature at “well below” 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit) compared to preindustrial levels, and 1.5C if possible.

Here is a summary of recent findings:

– 1 degree –

Earth’s average surface temperature from January to October 2018 was one degree Celsius (1.8 degrees Fahrenheit) higher than the 1850-1900 baseline.

Long-term warming is caused by the accumulation of heat-trapping greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, especially carbon dioxide (CO2) cast off when fossil fuels are burned to produce energy.

Seventeen of the hottest years on record have occurred since the start of the 21st century, with 2018 ranking as the 4th warmest.

– 405.5 ppm –

The concentration of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere reached 405.5 parts per million (ppm) in 2017, the highest in at least three million years and a 45 percent jump since the preindustrial era.

The last time CO2 was at that level, oceans were 10-20 metres higher.

Concentrations of the second most important greenhouse gas, methane (CH4), have also risen sharply due to leakage from the gas industry’s fracking boom and flatulence from expanding livestock.

– Emissions –

After remaining stable for three years, carbon pollution increased more than one percent in 2017 to 53.5 billion tonnes of CO2-equivalent, a measure which includes all main greenhouse gases. Emissions are on track to climb again in 2018.

At that pace, Earth will pass the 1.5C marker as early as 2030.

To cap global warming at 2C, emissions must decline a quarter within a dozen years. To stay under 1.5C, they will have to drop by more than half.

– Melting ice –

Arctic summer sea ice shrank in 2018 to a low of 4.59 million square kilometres (1.77 million square miles), well above the record low of 3.39 million square kilometres set in 2012.

But long-term trends are unmistakable: Arctic sea ice cover is declining at a rate of more than 13 percent per decade, relative to the 1981-2010 average.

Climate models predict the Arctic Ocean could, in some years, be ice-free as early as 2030.

– Extreme events –

The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) says there are clear links between climate change and increases in the intensity and frequency of extreme weather.

The number of climate-related extreme events — such as droughts, wildfires, heatwaves, floods and cyclones — has doubled since 1990, research has shown.

The intensity of typhoons battering China, Taiwan, Japan and the Korean Peninsula since 1980 has increased by 12 to 15 percent.

Natural disasters drive more than 25 million people into poverty every year, according to the World Bank, and cause annual losses in excess of half a trillion dollars (440 billion euros).

– 84.8 millimetres –

Water that expands as it warms and runoff from ice sheets atop Greenland and Antarctica currently add about three millimetres (0.12 inches) to sea levels per year. Since 1993, the global ocean watermark has gone up by more than 85mm (3.3 inches).

That pace is likely to pick up, threatening the homes and livelihoods of tens of millions of people in low-lying areas around the world.

Melting glaciers could lift sea levels a metre (three feet) by 2100, and — with only 2C of warming — by several metres more over the following centuries.

– 1/5 of species affected –

Of the 8,688 animal and plant species listed as “threatened” on the International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s (IUCN) Red List, a fifth have been hit by climate change.

From 1970 to 2014, the global population of vertebrates — birds, reptiles, amphibians, mammals and fish — plummeted by about 60 percent, due mainly to killing for food or profit, and habitat loss.

The number of species is declining 100 to 1,000 times faster than only centuries ago, which means the planet has entered a “mass extinction event” — only the sixth in the last half-billion years.

Sources: NASA, NSIDC, UNEP, WMO, IPCC, peer-reviewed studies.

From 1970 to 2014, 60 percent of all animals with a backbone — fish, birds, amphibians, reptiles and mammals — were wiped out by human activity, according to WWF’s “Living Planet” report, based on an ongoing survey of more than 4,000 species spread over 16,700 populations scattered across the globe.

“The situation is really bad, and it keeps getting worse,” WWF International director general Marco Lambertini told AFP.

“The only good news is that we know exactly what is happening.”

For freshwater fauna, the decline in population over the 44 years monitored was a staggering 80 percent. Regionally, Latin America was hit hardest, seeing a nearly 90 percent loss of wildlife over the same period.

Another dataset confirmed the depth of an unfolding mass extinction event, only the sixth in the last half-billion years.

Depending on which of Earth’s lifeforms are included, the current rate of species loss is 100 to 1,000 times higher than only a few hundred years ago, when people began to alter Earth’s chemistry and crowd other creatures out of existence.

Measured by weight, or biomass, wild animals today only account for four percent of mammals on Earth, with humans (36 percent) and livestock (60 percent) making up the rest.

– The great acceleration –

Ten thousand years ago that ratio was probably reversed.

“The statistics are scary,” said Piero Visconti, a researcher at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis in Austria and one of 59 co-authors of the 80-page report.

“Unlike population declines, extinctions are irreversible.”

For corals, it may already be too late.

Back-to-back marine heatwaves have already wiped out up to half of the globe’s shallow-water reefs, which support a quarter of all marine life.

Even if humanity manages to cap global warming at 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) — mission impossible, according to some scientists — coral mortality will likely be 70 to 90 percent.

A 2C world would be a death sentence, a major UN report concluded last month.

Half-a-century of conservation efforts have scored spectacular successes, with significant recoveries among tigers, manatees, grizzly bears, bluefin tuna and bald eagles.

“If we didn’t make those efforts, the situation would have been much worse,” Lambertini said.

AFP/File / CARL DE SOUZA. An aerial view of deforestation in the Western Amazon region of Brazil, part of the world’s shrinking habitat.

But the onslaught of hunting, shrinking habitat, pollution, illegal trade and climate change — all caused by humans — has been too much to overcome, he acknowledged.

“Scientists call it the ‘great acceleration’,” he said in a phone interview.

“It is the exponential growth over the last 50 years in the use of energy, water, timber, fish, food, fertiliser, pesticides, minerals, plastics –- everything.”

– ‘New deal’ for nature –

The pace of population increase — long taboo in development and conservation circles — also took off around 1950, the date scientists have chosen as the “gold spike,” or starting point, for a new geological period dubbed the Anthropocene, or “age of man”.

In looking for answers, conservationists are turning to climate change for inspiration.

WWF INTERNATIONAL/AFP / HO. WWF International Director General Marco Lambertini says it’s time for a new global deal for nature.

“We need a new global deal for nature,” said Lambertini, noting two key ingredients in the 195-nation Paris climate treaty.

“One was the realisation that climate change was dangerous for the economy and society, not just polar bears,” he said.

Similarly, he argued, threatened ecosystem services long taken for granted — drinkable water, breathable air, heat-absorbing oceans, forests that soak up CO2, productive soil — are worth tens of trillions of dollars every year.

“A healthy, sustainable future for all is only possible on a planet where nature thrives and forests, oceans and rivers are teeming with biodiversity and life,” said Lambertini.

The Paris Agreement, negotiated under the UN convention on climate change, also set a clear target: global warming must be held to “well below” 2C, and 1.5C if possible.

The parallel UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), by contrast, has lots of targets running out to 2020 which are not only too weak, but — with one possible exception — will probably not be met, Lambertini said.

“The CBD is failing,” he told AFP. But an upcoming meeting of the 195-nation body could be the beginning of a “revolution” that will see the Convention re-engineered in 2020 into “a new deal for Nature.”

Featured Photo: AFP / DAVID BROOKS. 60 percent of animals with a backbone — fish, birds, amphibians, reptiles and mammals — were wiped out by human activity from 1970 to 2014, a WWF study shows.

Paris (AFP) – Energy sector carbon emissions will rise in 2018 after hitting record levels the year before, dimming prospects for meeting Paris climate treaty goals, the head of the International Energy Agency (IEA) said Wednesday.

The energy sector accounts for 80 percent of global CO2 emissions, with most of the rest caused by deforestation and agriculture, so its performance is key to efforts to rein in rising world temperatures.

“I’m sorry, I have very bad news for you,” IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol told guests at a diplomatic function hosted by the Polish embassy in Paris.

“Emissions this year will increase once again, and we’re going to have the COP meeting when global emissions reach a record high,” he said, referring to the December UN climate summit in Katowice, Poland.

After remaining flat for three years, total global CO2 emissions in 2017 rose by 1.4 percent, dashing hopes that they had peaked.

The meeting in Katowice is tasked with finalising the “operating manual” for the 195-nation Paris Agreement, which enters into force in 2020 and calls for capping global warming at “well below” two degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit), and at 1.5 C if possible.

“The chances of meeting such ambitious targets, in my view, are becoming weaker and weaker every year, every month,” Birol told invitees, including former French prime minister Laurent Fabius, who shepherded the 2015 treaty to a successful conclusion, and Poland’s junior minister Michal Kurtyka, who will preside over the December summit.

With one degree Celsius of warming so far, Earth has seen a crescendo of deadly extreme weather, including heatwaves, droughts, floods and deadly storm surges made worse by rising seas.

– Next two years critical –

Even taking into account voluntary national pledges to slash carbon emissions caused by burning fossil fuels, the planet is currently on track to warm by an unlivable 3 C to 4 C by century’s end.

A major UN report released earlier this month said that capping average global temperatures at 1.5 C above preindustrial levels would prevent the worst ravages of climate change.

But reaching that goal would mean reducing CO2 emissions by nearly half compared to 2010 levels within a dozen years, and becoming “carbon neutral” — with no excess C02 leaching into the atmosphere — by 2050.

The UN report also details humanity’s “carbon budget” — the amount of CO2 we can emit and still stay under the 1.5 C ceiling.

At current rates of carbon pollution, that budget would be used up within two decades.

Fabius, who said he had accepted an invitation to help Poland prepare for the December climate summit, insisted that the next two years are critical.

“Climate change is a near-term problem,” he said. “When you look at the tragic consequences, it is today, not in 50 years.”

“This is not a negotiation like any other,” he added. “If you fail, you cannot start over again.”

Featured Photo: AFP/File / OZAN KOSE. International Energy Agency (IEA) Executive Director Fatih Birol, pictured July 2018, said he has “very bad news” — carbon emissions will increase once again in 2018.

At least 20 countries and twice as many large cities have made similar pledges, but California — the fifth largest economy in the world — is by far the biggest jurisdiction to do so to date.

“This bill and the executive order put California on a path to meet the goals of Paris and beyond,” Brown said at a signing ceremony in state capital Sacramento.

“It will not be easy. It will not be immediate. But it must be done.”

On the international stage, California has emerged as a leader on climate action as US President Donald Trump has opted out of the landmark 2015 Paris climate treaty and moved aggressively to dismantle the policies of his predecessor, Barack Obama.

“California, as a very prosperous economy, is taking aggressive action on climate change,” Brown told AFP by phone when asked if the new measure will inspire others.

“So I hope it gets France and Germany to up their own ambition, because we all have to do more than we are currently doing.”

The electric sector represents 16 percent of the state’s greenhouse gas emissions. More broadly, California has set ambitious goals to slash greenhouse gas emissions 40 percent by 2030, compared to 1990 levels.

Later this week, Brown will host subnational governments, cities and businesses in San Francisco for the three-day Global Climate Action Summit.

Among the co-chairs is China’s former chief climate negotiator, Xie Zhenhua, reflecting the strong ties that California has forged with the world’s largest carbon polluter — at the national and provincial level — around climate action.

“It’s impossible to overstate how significant it is for a state as large and influential as California to commit to 100 percent clean energy,” said Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune.

“California is showing the world that a transition to 100 percent clean energy is within reach.”

But Brown cautioned that reducing emissions enough to meet the Paris goal of capping global warming below two degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) remains a daunting task.

“Have no illusions,” Brown said. “California and the rest of the world have miles to go before we achieve zero-carbon emissions.”

– ‘Governor Moonbeam’ –

As the measure was unveiled, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres warned of a “dark and dangerous future” under threat by global warming.

“If we do not change course by 2020, we risk missing the point where we can avoid runaway climate change,” he said in a speech at UN headquarters in New York.

Scientists estimate that the global economy will have to become “carbon neutral” — removing any additional CO2 put into the atmosphere — by mid-century or shortly thereafter to avoid catastrophic climate impacts, including deadly heatwaves and superstorms engorged by rising seas.

Utility and oil companies resisted the legislation, arguing that it would lead to electricity price hikes for consumers and have negligible impact on cutting CO2 emissions.

The new bill mandates that least 60 percent of electricity will have to come from renewable energy, especially solar and wind.

This leaves the door open to carbon-neutral power generated by nuclear reactors, geothermal sources or even natural gas, if CO2 emissions are converted into fuel or syphoned off into secure storage underground, a technology known as carbon capture and storage.

The outgoing governor, 80, first proposed renewable legislation four decades ago during his first stint as California chief executive, earning him the nickname “Governor Moonbeam.”

“Brown really launched the modern renewable energy industry when he was governor the first time,” said Jim Williams, a professor of Energy Systems Management at the University of San Francisco and author of a seminal 2012 study that mapped the decarbonization of California’s economy by mid-century.

The governor told AFP that he still had “much to contribute”.

“I want to work on climate change issues, and I want to work on bringing some sanity to the nuclear arms race while I still have time.”

Featured Photo: GETTY/AFP/File / MARIO TAMA. A landmark bill commits the state of California to 100 percent clean energy by 2045.

Paris (AFP) – Rising levels of carbon dioxide in the air threaten to sap wheat, rice, and other staple grains of valuable nutrients, raising the spectre of mass malnutrition, researchers warned Monday.

On current trends, higher CO2 concentrations could reduce iron, zinc and protein levels in the crops that feed the world by up to 17 percent by mid-century, they reported in the journal Nature Climate Change.

“Hundreds of millions of people could become newly deficient in these nutrients, primarily in Africa, Southeast Asia, India and the Middle East,” lead author Matthew Smith, a researcher at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, told AFP.

“These are in addition to the billions of people already deficient that could see their condition worsen.”

Protein, along with the minerals iron and zinc, are essential nutrients for normal human growth and development.

Zinc deficiency affects the immune system and makes children, particularly, more vulnerable to malaria, lung infections and deadly diarrhoeal diseases.

A lack of iron increases the likelihood of mothers dying during childbirth, can lower IQ, and causes anaemia, or a drop in red blood cells.

Wheat, rice and maize together account for roughly 40 percent of protein, zinc and iron supply in the diet worldwide.

In general, humans get three-fifths of dietary protein, four-fifths of iron, and 70 percent of zinc requirements from plants.

The global food system is also vulnerable to rising temperatures, prolonged drought, and other forms of extreme weather driven by climate change, earlier research has shown. Impacts include reduced crop yields, heat-stressed livestock, and shifts in the quantity and location of commercially-fished ocean species.

– Unanticipated impacts –

To assess how extra CO2 in the atmosphere might impact global health by 2050, Smith and colleague Samuel Myers ran models for 225 different food plants grown in 151 countries.

If humanity continues emitting greenhouse gases from burning coal, oil, and natural gas at current levels, the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is likely to reach 550 parts per million (ppm) by 2050.

It is now at just over 400 ppm.

The team found that nearly two percent of the global population — an extra 175 million people — could become zinc deficient, and 122 million would no longer get enough protein under those conditions.

Some 1.4 billion women and children under five would probably find their iron intake reduced by four percent or more. Half-a-billion in this group risk developing iron deficiency-related disease.

India would be hardest hit, with some 50 million people suffering a lack of zinc, and 38 million falling short of minimum protein requirements, said the team.

The numbers of affected people would also go up dramatically in China, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Brazil, Kenya and other emerging or developing economies.

“Supplements could temporarily alleviate some of the health consequences, but they are not a viable long-term solution,” said Smith.

Because they are difficult to distribute and do not address the underlying cause of malnutrition, vitamins and supplements “should best be seen as a short-term medical intervention,” he added.

More than two billion people worldwide are deficient in one or more nutrient, according the World Health Organization (WHO).

Featured Photo: AFP / DENIS CHARLET. Rising levels of carbon dioxide in the air threaten to sap wheat, rice, and other staple grains of valuable nutrients, raising the spectre of mass malnutrition, researchers warn.