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JD's avatar

As of Tuesday, this all stands to get much, much worse.

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Greeley Miklashek, MD's avatar

I'm a retired physician/psychiatrist/stress researcher/author of "Stress R Us". I got interested in the dire state of our rapidly deteriorating climate when I stumbled over C3S and their report of 1.2 trillion tons of global ice melting annually, 3.3 billion tons daily. I have been following their "Climate Pulse" page and was shocked by their article "Hottest May on record spurs call for climate action", June 5, 2024, in which they, using their far more instructive 1991-2020 baseline, they reported a 0.75 degC global ave. temp for the period June '23-May '24 year, which is 0.214 degC annually over the 1991-2020 baseline. So, at this rate carried forward, as the trendline has continued (0.82 degC today), then we could see a 1 degC global temp increase EVERY FIVE YEARS.

The melting global ice is absorbing a massive amount of heat energy, primarily generated by our incessant mindless burning of fossil fuels (8B tons of coal annually and 100 million barrels of oil daily) and solar radiation imbalance, both of which are generating the heat energy equivalent of 20+ Hiroshima nuclear bomb blasts PER SECOND, where each one releases 63 trillion BTUs. C3S predicts that 2/3rds of the 220,000 glaciers on the planet will have melted by 2,100, where one pound of melting ice absorbs 144 BTUs. Do the math, I dare you!

At this rate, which includes the production of 1 trillion tons of water vapor per day, the heating of 321 million cubic miles of oceans to record levels, and driving unheard of global rain events and flooding, we appear to be approaching multiple climate collapse tipping points threatening massive dieoffs of the full spectrum of life on this planet. Now, I'm just a 79 yo retired physician with a curious mind, but why are so few "experts" as concerned as this old man?

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