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from the we-used-to-wish-for-warmer-weather dept.
Ocean temperatures hit record high as rate of heating accelerates:
The heat in the world's oceans reached a new record level in 2019, showing "irrefutable and accelerating" heating of the planet.
The world's oceans are the clearest measure of the climate emergency because they absorb more than 90% of the heat trapped by the greenhouse gases emitted by fossil fuel burning, forest destruction and other human activities.
The new analysis shows the past five years are the top five warmest years recorded in the ocean and the past 10 years are also the top 10 years on record. The amount of heat being added to the oceans is equivalent to every person on the planet running 100 microwave ovens all day and all night.
[...]"We found that 2019 was not only the warmest year on record, it displayed the largest single-year increase of the entire decade, a sobering reminder that human-caused heating of our planet continues unabated," said Prof Michael Mann, at Penn State University, US, and another team member.
Journal Reference:
Cheng, L., Abraham, J., Zhu, J. et al. Ocean Temperatures Hit Record High as Rate of Heating Accelerates Adv. Atmos. Sci. (2020) 37: 137. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00376-020-9283-7
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 15 2020, @07:27PM
No amount of individual responsibility will solve this problem. I commend your dedication. I have kids, and I love them more than anything, but if I had been thinking more clearly twenty years ago we would have adopted children instead of contributing to the population.
But 100 companies are responsible for 71% of global emissions. Short of voluntary human extinction, no mass movement by individuals will offset that kind of damage.
I posted up-thread: humanity consumes more than 113,000 TWh of power per year, equivalent to 32,000 times all of the explosive energy - including nukes - released in World War 2 or equivalent to 487 times the explosive power of the Mount Krakatoa eruption, the largest volcanic eruption in human history. That's per year, so we're affecting the planet like 487 colossal eruptions per year, every year. Skipping flights or going vegan ( https://get-green-now.com/vegan-lifestyle-carbon-footprint/ [get-green-now.com] ) aren't going to fix it. They're still worth doing, but don't consider the problem solved.
We are going to save our species with serious policy changes, or not at all.