The Climate of Business #31: What does climate change have to do with typhoons?

Happy kick off of Earth Year. This week was Earth Day and I comfortably proposed we offer our planet a year of care, rather than a day. It might do us all well.

In the meantime the week was dominated by talks about the health issues related to poor air quality, Earth Day and methane pollution.

Climate Change Reality

Climate change protesters block London's Tower Bridge, vow more disruption (Reuters)

‘Historic’: global climate plans can now keep heating below 2C, study shows (The Guardian)

Record Atlantic hurricane season tied to climate change (Energy News)

‘It’s critical the message makes it to the mainstream’: Scientists chained themselves to a JPMorgan Chase (Independent)

Iraq’s ancient buildings are being destroyed by climate change (The Guardian)

'Frontline' Review: Why the Climate Changed but We Didn't (New York Times)

Earth's coral reefs will be gone in 30 years without intervention (CTVnews)

Climate activists ‘disrupt supplies from three oil terminals in England’ (The Guardian)

The Future of Forests (National Geographic)

Supercomputer simulations show climate change’s role in early human migration (Engadged)

Business Climate Reality

We need to enact regulatory reform to unlock vast climate investments (Forbes)

The SEC climate rule: 3 things boards need to know (Fortune)

How sanctions against Russia could set back climate change work in the Arctic (NPR)

Climate and heritage experts call on British Museum to end BP sponsorship (Guardian)

The boardroom approach to ESG is driving change from the top (World Economic Forum)

Utility companies are pushing back on climate policy, report says (Washington Post)

Green infrastructure helps cities with climate change. So why isn't there more of it? (NPR)

To fight climate change, and now Russia, too, Zurich turns off natural gas (NPR)

Climate change: Key UN finding widely misinterpreted (BBC)

Reality Check

Ice cream sales often increase around the time that baseball game attendance rises, but that does not mean that eating ice cream causes people to attend baseball games.

I always found this quote funny, yet deeply insightful. So is the discussion dynamic when you speak about the connection between climate change and natural disasters. I remember posting some months ago a video of torrential rain with a comment about the relation between climate change and increased intensity of natural weather events and the response was overwhelmingly divisive - some said this is a normal autumn day, others expressed concern about the effect of climate change on the usual weather patterns.

So, what is the connection between extreme weather events and climate change? What does the science say? (Sources: Carbon Brief, Yale, Zurich, UN, ResearchGate, Oxfam)

• Climate change is leading to temperature increase.
• Water generally evaporates more quickly at higher temperatures, which can result in drier soils.
• Rising temperatures and warmer seas leads to more water vapor which in turn while evaporating into the atmosphere, acts as the ‘fuel’ for hurricanes, typhoons, and torrential rain.
• One of the worst consequences of rising levels of evaporated sea water in the atmosphere is the increasing intensity of storms and hurricanes.
• The number of climate-related disasters has tripled in the last 30 years.
• "Warming also diminishes snowfall, an essential water resource for the estimated?1.9 billion residents of the Northern Hemisphere?who depend on snowpacks, or snow reservoirs that store water during the cooler months and release it when it’s needed in the warmer, drier months".
• Higher temperatures increase the likelihood for evaporation and cloud formation while? the air can hold more moisture content which leads to increase in precipitation intensity, duration and/or frequency.
• Even in a natural environment (not an urbanised one which is less permeable) a lot of extra precipitation leads to overflowing rivers, lakes, and other water bodies.
• Flooding also brings other issues as floodwaters carry raw sewage, leaked toxic chemicals, and runoff from hazardous waste sites and factory farms - polluting the water supplies and causing many infections, and even when they recede and bacteria may remain, increasing rates of respiratory illnesses, such as asthma.?

What is the issue with increased frequency of natural disasters?

• Costs - Developing countries are already spending USD 70 billion a year to adapt to climate change (costs expected to rise to USD 140-300 billion in 2030 and USD 280-500 billion in 2050) (UN)
• Displacement - More than?20 million people?a year are forced from their homes by climate change. (Oxfam)
• Human Loss - Natural disasters kill on average 45,000 people yearly worldwide. Disasters were responsible for 0.1% of deaths over the past decade globally. (Our World in Data)
• Health - "Disasters directly impact the health of the population resulting in?physical trauma, acute disease and emotional trauma. In addition, disasters may increase the morbidity and mortality associated with chronic disease and infectious disease through the impact on the health care system." (National Library of Medicine)
• Economic Losses - between 200-600 Billion a year (Statista)

Carbon Price

Slowly going up.