Climate change and the European heatwave: It's complicated

As Europe recovers from a heatwave with temperatures impressive even by Australian standards, there's one big issue on everyone's lips — climate change.

Records tumbled late last week and over the weekend
but temperatures have now eased for western Europe.

But attributing an event to climate change is a complicated business, especially when the jet stream is involved.

How has the 'omega' jet stream influenced events and was climate change to blame?

First, it requires working out what went on.

Read the ABC News story by Kate Doyle -  “Climate change and the European heatwave: It's complicated."

Let’s Pretend Climate Change Isn’t Real

“Yeah, but it won’t be that bad.”

“Yeah, but it won’t affect us.”

“Yeah, but we’ll adapt.”

For many people, climate change just doesn’t feel like a big issue. Unless you happen to have experienced a wildfire, a drought or a flood, it still seems quite far off. We can spend a lot of time talking through chains of cause and effect but if someone — be they a member of a public, a businessperson or a political figure — has decided for themselves that climate change isn’t a big deal, it can be pretty difficult to convince them otherwise.

So maybe a different tactic is required. What if we just pretend climate change isn’t real? What if we pretend that sea levels aren’t rising, that oceans aren’t acidifying, that global temperature isn’t creeping upwards? This might seem perverse at first — the fundamental science is, after all, unequivocally robust — but as we have seen, people often just don’t respond to problems unless they have an obvious or immediate effect. This explains a lot of life: it’s why we drink alcohol, eat cake, and spend way too much time on social media. People are great at discounting — that is to say, going for short-term gains even if they incur long-term losses. If we accept this as an unavoidable truth, the only way to prompt action is to focus on the short term. How could we make lives better — now?

Read the story from Medium by Jacob Ashton - “Let’s Pretend Climate Change Isn’t Real.”

Adani’s Carmichael mine is unlikely to go ahead, and most people know it

There’s general agreement that Adani’s proposed Carmichael mine in the Galilee Basin will be a big issue in the current election campaign. If that were to be true anywhere, it would be in the seat of Herbert, based on Townsville, which hosts Adani’s regional headquarters.

 ‘Almost the only ones taking Adani’s claims at face value
 are members of the environmental movement. Protests
 against Adani are continuing and gaining strength’ 

Yet a recent Newspoll conducted in Herbert estimates the two-party preferred vote unchanged from the knife-edge result of 50-50 in 2016, which saw Labor’s Cathy O’Toole returned with a margin of 37 votes. What is happening here?

The answer is that, whatever happens on 18 May, the Carmichael mine is unlikely to go ahead, and most people know this.

Read the story from The Guardian by John Quiggin - “Adani’s Carmichael mine is unlikely to go ahead, and most people know it.”