global warming tagged posts

Current severe heatwaves that will likely increase in severity and frequency in the future are driving a rise in the use of air conditioners, threatening the environment with their high energy consumption and refrigerants with high warming potential. A new study finds that switching to propane as a refrigerant could lessen the global temperature increase from space cooling.

We spend enormous amounts of energy on fighting off the heat in the summer, or throughout the whole year at lower latitudes — about one-tenth of the total worldwide electricity supply. If current temperature trends continue, the energy demands of space-coolers will more than triple by 2050...

New estimates suggest Central and South America and South-East Asia most affected regions. Between 1991 and 2018, more than a third of all deaths in which heat played a role were attributable to human-induced global warming, according to a new article in Nature Climate Change.

The study, the largest of its kind, was led by the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) and the University of Bern within the Multi-Country Multi-City (MCC) Collaborative Research Network. Using data from 732 locations in 43 countries around the world it shows for the first time the actual contribution of human-made climate change in increasing mortality risks due to heat.

Overall, the estimates show that 37% of all heat-related deaths in the recent summer periods were attributable to the w...

Annual mean heatwave degree days in Belgium. Historical on the left, and under business-as-usual climate change scenario on right. Not only the number of hot days days, but also the heatwave intensity are rising drastically under global warming, especially in the cities.

Heatwaves are intensifying in cities due to the double whammy of the urban heat island effect and global warming, according to a new study. The study’s authors used computer models to simulate with unprecedented detail the temperature changes through the mid-21st century in Belgian cities. They found that heatwaves become hotter, longer and more frequent because of greenhouse gas emissions, and that temperature above the heat stress alarm level increases by a factor of between 1.4 and 15 by the middle of this century.

“The...

Capt. James Cook found a wall of ice blocking his passage farther north in the summer of 1778. (Seattle Times / TNS)

Passengers simmered in Jacuzzis and feasted on gourmet cuisine this summer as the 850-foot cruise ship Crystal Serenity moved through the Northwest Passage. But in the summer of 1778, when Capt. James Cook tried to find a Western entrance to the route, his men toiled on frost-slicked decks and complained about having to supplement dwindling rations with walrus meat. The British expedition was halted north of the Bering Strait by “ice which was as compact as a wall and seemed to be 10 or 12 feet high at least,” according to the captain’s journal...