Climate Change Makes a Dramatic Election Reemergence

I was expecting a small hurricane or so to occur sometime during the election, to remind us of climate change.  Climate change has taken a far back seat to the pandemic, and the destruction of our economy in the poor efforts to control the pandemic.  But nobody could have predicted a disastrous set of California wildfires and two storms, now a category 4 hurricane, during the Republican Convention.

Trump has been ignoring Natural Laws, and Natural Disorders.

The California wildfires have also generated hazardous air quality conditions,  The fires also occur during a long heat wave, a drought, severe lightning storms and winds, and compromised pine bark beetle forests.  The horrid air quality is, unfortunately, representative of the everyday pollution that people in the coal burning countries of China and India have to suffer with.

The Gulf hurricane, Laura, has been sped up by the 86 degree F Gulf waters warming.  Marco made landfall near New Orleans with maximum winds of 40 mph on Monday night.

Two weeks ago, Iowa was hit with a derecho wind storm with 140 mph winds, which destroyed 14 million acres of crops and grain bins,  and brought down trees.

Below, we present some indicators of the storms and fires, also illustrating some satellite and environmental monitoring sites and apps.

The fire complexes from the North down are the Butte/Tehama/G, the LNU Lightning Complex, the SCU Lightening Complex, and the CZU Lightning.  Since the start of August, 1.5 million acres have been burned, 2,000 structures destroyed, 136,000 are evacuated, and seven have died.

Wednesday evening, Hurricane Laura will make landfall as a category 4 with possible 150 mph winds.

 

Particulate matter of 2.5 microns can enter lungs and go into the bloodstream.  200 parts per million is Unhealthy for All, and beyond 300 is classified as Hazardous.

 

 

 

 

About Dennis SILVERMAN

I am a retired Professor of Physics and Astronomy at U C Irvine. For two decades I have been active in learning about energy and the environment, and in reporting on those topics for a decade. For the last four years I have added science policy. Lately, I have been reporting on the Covid-19 pandemic of our times.
This entry was posted in 2020 Election, Air Quality, Climate Change, Climate Education, Climate Science, Coal, Coastal Flooding, Coronavirus, COVID-19, Donald Trump, Fire Risks, Fossil Fuel Energy, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Houston Flooding, Hurricane Laura, Smog worldwide. Bookmark the permalink.

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