Pirate's Cove

I thought we were already doomed 20 years ago? And 15 years ago? And 10? 5? Today? Or was it in 2100 or 2050? Anyhow, the same experts who prognosticated doom which didn’t come to pass are still doing it

Painfully slow hurricanes, deadly heat, and cities without water: What the climate crisis will look like in the next 10 years, according to experts

We only have a decade to avoid the worst consequences of climate change.

That’s the warning the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) put out last year. But so far, nations are not slashing emissions enough to keep Earth’s temperature from rising more than 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels — the threshold established in the Paris climate agreement.

“What we know is that unabated climate change will really transform our world into something that is unrecognizable,” Kelly Levin, a senior associate at the World Resources Institute’s climate program, told Business Insider.

Doom!

If Earth warms more than 1.5 degrees, scientists think the world’s ecosystems could start to collapse.

If ifs and buts were candies and nuts we’d all have a wonderful Christmas. What happens when the temperature doesn’t rise to 1.5C? We’re only at .6C since 1850.

Even if nations stick to the goals they set under the Paris climate agreement, emissions will still likely be too high, according to the IPCC.

Wait, I thought Paris was historic and awesome. No?

So far, most countries are not on track anyway.

So then what’s the problem with the U.S. pulling out?

The globe’s ice caps will continue to melt, and crucial ice sheets like the one in Greenland might start down an irreversible path toward disappearing completely.

Like they’ve been doing since the end of the ice age 20,000 years ago?

That will lead to more sea-level rise — about 0.3 to 0.6 feet on average globally by 2030, according to the US’ National Climate Assessment.

The norm, once again, is 6-8 inches of sea rise per century over the last 8,000 years, so, that sounds entirely average. Anyway, the doomy prognostications continue on and on and on, and, remember, this is all about science, not politics

“That means we need politicians who are willing to act in our interest rather than on the part of vested interests,” Mann said. “Voting in the 2020 election is probably the single-most important thing we can do to address climate change.”

Huh.

Read: If We Don’t Do Something About ‘Climate Change’ We’re Doomed In 10 Years Or Something »

This is the next extension of the Cult of Climastrology scaremongering over the carbon pollution from streaming video

Climate reboot: Are computers among the causes of climate change?

Since the 1970s – the decade that gave us the creation of both Earth Day and the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) – people have become more mindful of the impact human civilisation is having on the planet.

After all, it’s the only home our civilisation has known and may ever know.

The concept of climate change has grown even hotter this decade, with increased temperatures in many regions and increasing attention on the subject. (snip)

The planet’s hidden killer

What about those phones that we are using to broadcast our climate protest engagement or the social networks we use to promote this activity to our family, friends, and strangers and enlist them in the cause?

These are questions rarely asked and even more rarely answered.

You won’t be gaining a lot of support, especially from the young kids, if you want to take away their smartphones, nor their streaming videos

A recent report in Fortune, however, did provide some kind of answer on the topic.

It found that the music video for Despacito – which became the first video to reach five billion views on YouTube – ended up burning as much energy as 40,000 US homes in a year on its way to five billion streams ‘served’.

This story did not get nearly the attention it should have.

As that Fortune report also pointed out, there is a whole infrastructure of data we take for granted when performing the simplest of internet activity: a typical Google search activates servers in six to eight data centres around the world.

Most of these servers eat up a tonne of energy just so they can stay at a cool enough temperature to remain functional.

When one internet video can potentially do as much damage to our planet as a small city does in a year, perhaps we’re missing a large part of the human-generated climate change equation.

So, what should be done?

Collectively, individual users should start being mindful about their computer use, just as they are about recycling or taking public transport.

However, we can only expect so much of the single consumer.

It is a challenge to the entire computing economy, both producers and consumers, to create a new infrastructure of efficiency that might improve energy usage, computing resources and, ultimately, the carbon footprint created by the industry.

So, who makes this happen? Companies are not going to suddenly change everything voluntarily when it works. But, hey, we can have a conversation

Still, we need to at least start having a conversation about our overreliance on data, at least as much as we talk about our overreliance on oil.

Read: Your Computer Is Really Bad For ‘Climate Change’ Or Something »