For a long time, when it came to talking about climate change (or reporting on, for that matter), the effects were often painted in images of melting glaciers, rising sea levels, disappearing sea ice, and the threat to species like polar bears. All of that is important, but we also know that by its global nature, climate change is a complex web of interconnected phenomena. And it will manifest itself in too many ways to count.
As someone living in Texas amidst a record-breaking cold streak that overwhelmed a power system not prepared for our new reality, I am living the effects of climate change in a very real and immediate sense. As are others across the nation, and around the world at this very moment.
Broken power grids. Natural disasters. New pathogens. Threats to food security. Desperate human migrations. And on and on. The climate crisis is an Earth crisis and a human crisis. It is an economic crisis. A justice crisis. And a health crisis. And it is a crisis growing more urgent and dire by the day.
So for today’s midweek questions, I am curious for all of you to share your perspectives: in what ways is the climate crisis affecting your lives, your communities, or issues you care about, especially in ways that you believe don’t get enough coverage?
I live in El Paso. We are on the western part of the national grid. The greedy state government formed the rest of Texas' power grid separate from the national grid and now the people of Texas know that government is evil in this state. I was born and raised in El Paso. Oh, and don't believe the lies from the far right saying we're only safe in my city because of a wall. Hate to break it to those losers, but we've been visiting each other's cities (Ciudad Juarez is our Sister City) with no issues at all.
I am a Food Scientist who believes in the natural order of things. I accept change and realize change is manifested in many logical ways. One of those changes is in our climate. I am not a weather geek but over the last ten years or so I have noticed obvious departures in normal seasonal weather patterns. In short, weather events of all types are more extreme causing flooding, power outages, sea level rises, etc. A huge example of change in normal seasonal weather manifested itself recently in Texas. After becoming aware of the situation in Houston, Dallas and other cities of the Lone Star state I reached out to my retired geologist brother in The Woodlands, a gated town north of Houston. I casually mentioned, "Isn't climate change a nuisance?" Instead of filling me in about the weather's impact on their safety and well - being, my brother stated, "You are hopelessly wedded to the greatest lie ever ever told." Even though my brother is a scientist he chooses to be a climate denier. And anyone not in agreement is allied to the quote above. He and I cannot discuss our differences in opinion because my brother is, "Just stating the facts." This is a subject which negatively impacts our relationship and it is sad. I would like to discuss "the elephant in the room" but the subject is off limits with him.
Living in the Central Valley of California, climate change is seen all around me. It's February, and all of the local flowering trees are fully in bloom...they began blooming at the end of January this year, and every year it creeps earlier by a few days. "Winter" is almost non-existent, and this year we had two or three days of frost only...which does not give many orchards the chilling hours necessary for successful crops. Dense valley fog, which used to cancel schools for many days each winter twenty years ago, and caused hazardous driving conditions (I remember having to drive with my head out the window to see the line at the edge of the road, creeping along at 5 mph), these dense fogs have disappeared. I don't remember schools calling a fog delay for at least the last five years. So instead we get nine months of summer, massive droughts and FIRES. The smoke fills the valley and, instead of fog delays, we now have to track week after week of hazardous air quality.
Weather changes, extremes in low and high temps affects our breathing dramatically, especially my husbands and sister in law. This includes High Ozone in summer months, and given this time of year, the extreme high and low fronts, with extreme cold makes it more difficult to exercise, and to take walks outside, and is the same in summer/spring making for increases our use of emergency inhalers, due to poor air quality and breathing capability.
I and my husband are both California natives, but have seen over the years how the seasons have been changing. We moved to N. CA in 2010 duting tje most horrendous winter storm I'd been in. Gradually our area went into a drought for about five years and everyone was conserving water usage. During that time, our area had flooded for three days, not most of the roads. There have been tornadoes, albeit not like they have in the midwest, but California is not known for tornadoes. Then in 2018, in autumn going into winter, because it apparently had still been too dry thst summer, and becaise of a spark and untimely winds, welost the Town of Paradise just up the hill. We, thank God, didn't lose anything, but so many people were displaced.
So, with all that, it is hard to say what will come along next this year.
And yes, I hope you and yours are okay and the storms are subsiding. If not, those Republicsns who were so opposed to recognize Climate Change should take a second to NOW realize the climate is not a constant anymore, and will probably be getting worse. Although I don't think it is a csused by us humans.
We actually plan for annual fire/smoke season AKA July thru September OR thru November if planning a trip to see relatives in California. The gardening season is wonky too. Sixty six years old and praying for my grandchildren as the climate crisis becomes real.
Personally my view is that "Global Warming" now referred to as "Climate Change" because the warming trend for the last 15/20 years has been flat within error bounds, is a hoax to tax us all. There has been no significant rise in sea levels and the alarmists who predicted that the Indian Ocean Maldive Islands would be under water has not actually happened. The same can be said for arctic sea ice; 2021 its still there with an above average extent of cover. The idea that the current polar vortex is caused by arctic warming is a non starter. It is caused by grand solar minimums which occur every 100 years approximately with a smaller cycle every 7 years. I have taken an interest in this subject ever since I read about the climate gate emails at Cambridge university where they clearly conspired to fudge the data to reduce the effect the 1935/1940 warm period. Carbon di-oxide CO2 is not a climate driver to any large extent but solar radiance is and this factor is totally ignored by some papers or given little credence to its effect of watts/square metre.
This pandemic has greatly affected my life, after already making a Big change in my life of gathering so much stuff and selling my home of 35 years . But I never see my family! To keep them or me healthy! But I'm ok getting my second shot tomorrow, thank God. I do plan on that changing my life again but for the better!
I am a SF Bay Area native, the child of a solidly middle-class family, college-educated with a loving and supportive network of friends and relatives. I am also a climate refugee.
The Sierra wildfires of 2015, the Tubbs fire which ravaged Santa Rosa in 2017, the Carr and Camp fires of 2018, sensitized my already somewhat delicate system to smoke and the fumes of burning fires. I developed asthma. I can no longer tolerate the gas stove in our kitchen. Last year I had to leave in midsummer to spend four months in the Oregon coastal mountains where the air is cleaner; the smoke followed, but not the NOx compounds that make me particularly ill. A year from now, I will be preparing to move to that house in the mountains permanently, far away from the house I grew up in, which I had always assumed I would retire in. Far away from friends, and familiar landmarks. An exile from home.
I am exceptionally fortunate to have a house owned by family in such a remote place, one which is in desperate need of a caretaker (it has been neglected, though not abandoned, for fifteen years). We can fix each other up, the house and I, and I hope to regain a great deal of the health I have lost in recent years. But the climate-fueled wildfires have left their mark on me, and I must do my best to protect my new home from that one dangerous spark at the wrong time. Oregon is grappling with the terrifying reality California has had to confront these last five years, of whole forests and cities on fire, year after year. None of us are immune. That is the impact climate change has had on my life.
As longtime Alaska residents, we see the effects of climate change every day. Our roads are in a constant state of flux. Maintenance costs are up. I'm a dog musher, and we've had to reroute trails every winter for the past decade because the permafrost is melting, causing slumps and thermokarst ponds in once reliably frozen swamps.
In Fairbanks, people's backyards are turning into swamps. My driveway has sunk and there are some scary holes forming alongside. Winters are much milder than they used to be -- as much as 12 degrees above normal in the Arctic. Ice fog, once the bane of everyone living at valley level in the winter, is now rare.
Summer wildfires are worsening. Tundra fires are even becoming common. Ice cellars, used for thousands of years in the Arctic, are melting.
In Fairbanks, the growing season used to be about 90 days; now it's closer to 120. Instead of seeing hard freezes in August, we're not seeing them until October.
Climate change is very real. I hope you all in the Texas deep freeze are OK. If we get a Texas-like heat wave up here, we'll be a similar situation. Thank you for being a voice of reason and sanity.
As a Californian and outdoor enthusiast, climate change has lessened my ability to enjoy camping and hiking, and even gardening. We have almost constant drought now. The Sierra Nevada’s snow doesn’t reach the levels of the past and melts sooner. Fires (although partly caused by people’s incursion on wilderness for their housing) make summer and fall air smoky. So, although I’m lucky enough to live in a middle class neighborhood and still have good health at 70 years old, there is a little less joy in my life because the human race has wounded the environment.
We have been profoundly effected by Climate Change. We recently sold our home and property of 30 years in the Sierra foothills East of Sacramento. One of the reasons we had to sell was because of the increasing cost of fire insurance. Last year it was over $9,000. Now that we are retired and on a set income, we could no longer afford it. Over the years we lived on our 20 acres we had scores of trees die and species of birds disappear because of climate change. As a daughter of a forester, and an avid horse back rider, I have always been aware of changes in our forests. And it has been dramatic - in just 30 short years. We now live in the high desert of Las Cruces, New Mexico. Penny Scribner
Hi - I'm in Upstate SC and the winters don't have as many "cold" days as they used to in the 1970's. There are times when you can take a trip to the beach in December. Only kids would want to go in the water then (and mine did growing up) but you could hang out on the beach without a jacket. So in that case climate change is a benefit in my eyes. Still it doesn't outweigh the costs to the world. It's interesting to hear from people who have seen more drastic changes across the country. I find it a travesty that a lot of folks listen to politicians instead of scientists. The scientific community has been warning about this for decades. I first became aware of the threat in the 1990's. Oh if only we started preparing back then.
Hi. I live in central Indiana. I have noticed significant changes over the last twenty years (although a few of those began showing up intermittently thirty years ago). Rain and snow are in short supply most years, especially the last ten. Seasons are no longer distinct (not counting this winter). Spring arrives 4-10 weeks earlier than it did 10-20 years ago and most winters are prolonged autumns with occasional days or a week here and there of old-normal winter cold. These changes affect everything - insects, animals, plants, trees and humans.
Last summer I was delighted to find five Monarch butterflies in my yard - at the same time. Five at one time was the most I saw all summer. Twenty years ago it was not unusual to have a hundred butterflies (Monarchs, various types of Swallowtails, etc) flying around at the same time. My yard has multiple gardens and very little grass. I plant to attract wildlife (from butterflies to raccoons & everything in-between) and it has been quite depressing to watch everything change so drastically over the years. Drastic in a negative way, not positive.
I am planning a move this year if the pandemic allows (next year if not) and climate change is easily one of the two main reasons. Summers here are now very hot with little rain. I call it summer but really, the heat can begin as early as February, showing up in 24-48 hour spells, each time gradually extending until it’s simply hot (high 80’s-100 degrees). It stays that way until long past the time that the trees should have changed colors and started to drop their leaves. If I were a Hoosier Snowbird (moving to Florida every winter) then these new hot extended summers would be fine I suppose. But, I’m not.
I used to mark life by the seasons and by what the weather was usually like per holiday. (There were always the occasional exceptions of course.) That way of living no longer applies.
So sorry for all you are experiencing this week in Texas.
Climate change went from an "out there....someday" thing to a "right here, right now" thing in my mind during the wildfire season of 2020 in California. The new reality is that this season now goes from August - December, and causes much loss of life, property and wilderness destruction, loss of power, school shutdowns, and more. For months, we watch and listen to the news, with our "go bags" packed, wondering if our town will be the next place where high winds, high temperatures and dry conditions converge to create a disaster. Last August, there was a day in the Bay Area that it felt like the sun didn't rise, due to the orange cloud cover blanketing the area. More than ever, that day it felt like climate change was knocking on our door.
I live in California. The fires make it hard to breathe & I worry about my grandchildren. Staying inside, not being able to play outside. But this is nothing compared to all the people who lost their homes & everything they own. To have to start all over again is devastating. This past summer we had a week of recording breaking highs. One day was 113. That is unusual for our area. I know it will only get worse each summer😟
Hello Dan! Yes, climate change has impacted all of us, whether we realize it or not. The most obvious sign to me is the crazy weather we have been for the last 20 years or so. For myself, it has been the rise in temperatures in the summer. I live in Tucson and last year we had over 100 days of 100 degree highs. The monsoon has been disrupted and we are in a severe drought. There are many other signs too numerous to mention here, but it is clear we need to act now. I don't have any answers for how to begin to fix this, but we certainly need to heed the warnings and listen to the scientists.
We live on 25 acres of wooded land that we love to walk and enjoy. We have beautiful deciduous trees, deer, small woodland animals to enjoy and birds to feed at our many feeders. Our creeks and fens are a real attraction to wildlife. We are most concerned about climatic changes (warmer winters, hotter summers) which affect our forests and water systems. The altered climate has increased insect infestations, flooding and animal behaviour. We can see the changes each year and don't know how many times we have said, "We have never seen that before, that is a first." We are registered stewards of our land in southern Ontario and make a pledge to protect it and will not do anything to jeopardize it. It is worrisome when nature is changing and you are left feeling helpless to do anything.
I’ve been fortunate with scheduled outages. My sister and family are with us bc their pipes burst, so they are among the lucky compared to those that have truly suffered. I’ve had to drive to work past couple of days to work on ice (I’ve heard DFW area has 17 plows...haven’t checked the accuracy) but also glad to have made it back safely. We do need answers, especially to questions such as why we aren’t on the national grid? Stay safe everyone.
We grow grapes and various fruit on a small farm in central Virginia. Over the last 10 years, we’ve managed to get a harvest from everything we grow only about four times. The weather is so unpredictable. Overly wet spring results in blossom rot. Unseasonably warm spells in the winter lead to bud break and too- early growth that is susceptible to an inevitable frost, mild winters that don’t kill off hungry bugs. The list goes on. It’s hard to plan and there is a real possibility that there will be no crop despite all the work you do. It’s a good thing we don’t do this for a living and it makes me really appreciate farmers.
If climate threat is an existential threat and some describe our efforts to reverse it a “war”, then why aren’t climate articles on the front pages? I guess my real question is, why isn’t the media taking this seriously? All prior wars were front page news in print and on radio and TV. Perplexing for me.
When I was little in the 50’s & 60’s we had snow all winter long from November through March. When my children were little in the 80’s & 90’s they would come home from school every day in winter & skate on our pond from December through February. In the summer our grass would be dry & dormant for most of July & all of August. The last 2 decades our pond barely freezes for longer than a week then thaws again & is never solid enough for me to allow my Grands to go out on it (with the exception of these last2 weeks were everything is frozen here in Ohio🥶). Our grass is green all summer long. Those are big climate changes in my opinion.
I can't say that climate change has affected me personally, and I feel lucky. Part of it because our family has moved several time, to places that have very different climates. I cannot say, this has been the hottest/coldest/driest, since I have only experienced a sliver of time in any particular place. I do see changes happening to places that I care about.
As a child, I lived in Ecuador, and the Galapagos Islands have lost many species, due to human interference. I also lived in Florida, and over the last decade, Hurricanes have been much fiercer than in the previous decades.
My latest move has been to the Pacific Northwest. I'm told that the winters here are much drier than in the past and the Summers much warmer. The joke we kept hearing when we told people that we were moving here was "I hope you like rain". I have not really experienced much of that.
You asked how climate change is affecting people. One of the ways is that places that used to be liveable are fast becoming less so. We lived happily in Western Australia for many years but it has become hotter and more humid and the fire season has lengthened from a few months to at least half the year. In 2014 we moved to the island state of Tasmania, on the opposite side of the country. Tassie is Australia's smallest and coolest state--Western Australia is the biggest, hottest, and driest. It seems every third person we meet here is another climate refugee from our former state or from tropical Queensland. This has pushed real estate prices up very fast, which has a deleterious effect on native-born Tasmanians. Issues I care about? Lots-but here's one: we need to be investing in affordable and climate-conscious housing, fast--but politicians here are no swifter than elsewhere, so it's going to be a hard slog of pestering letters and electorate office visits to get them moving.
I live in Virginia, and have had USAA homeowners insurance for 44 years. I have always been happy with their rates and service. But last year our rate increased by 45%, and this year it increased by another 9%. Since we have made no claims or renovations to justify any increase, we called to ascertain the reason for the huge increase. We were told that due to storm damage that has escalated substantially in recent years because of climate change, the company has been collecting only 84 cents for every dollar they have been paying out in claims for several years. They had to present evidence of this to the State Insurance Commissioner in order to get approval to raise rates. Their actuaries say the trend of more claims will continue. I am 69 years old, and I can tell our weather in Virginia is generally more stormy, wet and warmer than it was when I was young.
I live in Northern California. One word describes the impact of climate change in this region -WILDFIRE! Since 2015, this area has not gone a single year without at least one devastating acre-consuming, life-altering wildfire. In 2017, I sat on my front porch in downtown Santa Rosa, Ca and watched the Tubbs fire burn from east to west jumping across a six lane freeway and wiping out the entire Coffey Park subdivision. In 2019, I was working the night the Kincade Fire stared. I’m an ER Nurse, and we heard on the scanner a call for downed power lines. I said to my co-worker “ that’s going to be bad”. It was! In 2020, the hospital where I work -Adventist Health St. Helena was evacuated not once but twice due to wild fires. The second one -the Glass Fire closed the hospital for 73 days. I live on the hospital campus. I fled my home in the middle of the night and I was evacuated for 60 days because the fire destroyed the gas, electricity, water and sewer infrastructure. My house was untouched (thankfully) but most of my yard burned.
We now have fire season. Every year fire season gets longer and longer and more and more devastating. My family has been in California for five generations. We can trace our roots to an original Spanish land grant. Never before have we had Fire Season.
Climate change combined with what is now, due to that climate change, poor land management have created an almost unlivable situation. And, there’s no end in sight.
I would like to add to my comments below. When I was little there were no wind turbines in Michigan, now there are acres and acres of them and they work just fine in sub freezing and sub zero weather. It makes me angry for the poor people in Texas that their Governor would blame the green energy producers,like wind turbines and solar panels for the disaster in Texas.
Having moved back to my home town here in Michigan, and being an avid gardener. I have noticed real changes. When I was little we were USDA horticultural zone 5. Now we are horticultural zone 6. 2 years ago, our farmers were unable to plant almost half of the local corn crop, because of flooding. No,there were no hurricanes here, but the weather was suddenly that wet. Last year it was 65°for Christmas. There are more Tornadoes. It is harder to know when the frost free dates will occur to put the garden in. Although we are not as bad off as the coastal areas, there have definitely been changes.
I don't like the fact that there are so many climate change deniers, there seems to be a lot of deniers of science out there.
I think the fossil fuel industry is funding many politicians to mislead the public, especially those who are more removed from nature than I am.
I hope all of you in Texas stay safe and are able to stay warm.
To answer Dan's question: In September 2020, my home state of Oregon had a high wind event. The forecast warned of "critical fire danger". Little did I know what was to come...
The wind howled and shook the leaves and trees outside, along with the wildfire smoke. The wind calmed down. The smoke cleared for too short of a time, then came back and due to the calm weather and lack of rain, hung around for way longer than our tolerance levels really wanted to tolerate it.
The smoke turned sunny days into days with a weird fog that wasn’t mist. It made the air thick and sickly yellow, almost like the earth itself was a patient in the hospital and treatments were not quite working. That was the scene I woke up to every day for many days. It blurred the treeline and seemed to reduce everything in my backyard to the same shade of yellow.
I saw the sun turn from a disk with a red tint to one that was blood red, to barely any disk at all because it was covered by smoke particulate matter. I saw the whole sky become an unreal shade of orange one evening. It’s like the world around me had transported me to another planet overnight, because it was as if a Martian sky was the roof over my head. We were officially living in a real-life science fiction novel.
Our state for that time had some of the worst air quality in the world. It was incredibly suffocating. It came to the point that I had to sleep on a couch downstairs because my bedroom had this charred smell. And more importantly, there are so many people who lost so much, for entire towns were destroyed beyond recognition. Some of my favorite places in the state were deeply affected.
I knew that it wasn’t just forest mismanagement. Nor was it just the “perks” of the weather this year. I know that my senses don’t lie to me. Climate change is absolutely real. I knew that when the sky turned orange and the sun red, I was seeing before my eyes the effects of climate change. Why else would too many hideous records for charred acres per wildfires get broken too quickly?
My parents have lived in the Pacific Northwest for over thirty years. While there have been occasional blasts of smoke, none of us have ever seen anything like what we experienced in Oregon in September of 2020.
And even besides September 2020, there were the little changes I noticed personally---more 90+ degree days in my city in the summer and often earlier in the summer is a glaring example.
I hope this experience with the wildfire smoke is once in a lifetime. I fear this will not be, and that many more lives will be destroyed, if we don’t form the political will to tackle climate change.
We can do anything. Solve any problem. Even one as big as climate change, but only if our hearts are in the right direction.
There are so many reasons to end our dependence on fossil fuels, one of which is climate change. There is also the fact that fossil fuels will be running out soon. Imagine living through this type of weather and being unable to afford to heat your house, or having gas prices so high that you can't afford to drive a car. My grandchildren will experience this if something isn't done. Green technology may be in its infancy, but someone is going to solve this problem. If the US doesn't act now, it will be China, Japan, or an EU country. Then we will be dependent on them for this technology. They will have all the best, most high-paying jobs, and we'll be paying them for the tech. I don't understand why so many people are reluctant to see the opportunity green energy presents. Are they so desperate to feed the incomes of the few oil barons who control the oil and gas industry? We can try to frack every drop of oil out of every rock on earth and it still won't last forever. Let's move on, get it done, and put America in the leadership position it should hold.
I live in Victoria, B.C. , Canada and we had a big winter storm during the past weekend which is unusual for the Pacific Northwest. It didn’t get too cold, fortunately for us. Get warm in Texas!
Originally from Oregon, I now live in Australia. It is so distressing to see the havoc and harm the extreme winter weather is causing all over the US. Down here we have experienced the effects of climate change with two summers of terrible bush fires taking lives and destroying whole communities. Stay safe, Dan. It is real. . .
Southern California has felt it with extreme heat, winds, fires and drought. We are seeing temps higher in the winter months that are breaking records and summers are hotter than ever and lasting longer and longer.
I live in West Virginia, so we have four distinct seasons. At least we used to. Autumn has been pushed into November, which then lasts three weeks and all leaves turn brown. Snow (yes, we have it right now) is almost non existent in the winter. Our winters are so mild that summers are full of biting bugs, mosquitoes, etc., because our winters are never frozen to kill off bugs. I've seen mosquitoes in January and February!!!! I remember winters when we went sledding but that's a thing of the past. Even when we have snow, it's gone within 24 hours. My rhododendron has bloomed in January, February, March! Last month, January, leaves were coming out on my lilac bush. This month my flowering quince has blooms and buds (until the ice this week). But, why would they begin to bloom in January and February????? Not normal or natural in WV.
The weather extremes effect my health. I have autoimmune disorders and the hot and humid in the summer make it hard to spend time outside with my grandkids. The frigid air in the colder months here in NWPA, make my lungs burn. It also creates Pleural Effusion and Pericarditis putting my life in danger. Of course then I can't play in the snow with my grandkids. It's frustrating personally and infuriating when people say there's no such thing as climate change or global warming.
I remember, as a teenager in the 1960s, wondering about all the garbage that people throw out and how it would affect our earth. So what I fail to grasp at this point is, why has it never occurred to our mature intelligent leaders to do something about it? And I'm talking about all pollution, not just garbage. I'm baffled.
I’ve lived in Montana my whole life. The past twenty years has left us with long term droughts, pine beetles destroying our forests, and little to no actual winter.
Every summer is hotter with extreme temps above 105, as a child it was rare to get over 100. Winters are shorter and warmer. More extremes such as severe ice storms, hurricaines, tornadoes, floods. Butterflies and fireflies are gone.
A couple years ago, here in the Pacific NW, I started noticing that many western hemlock trees (Tsuga heterophylla) were dying or dead. I searched extensively on the subject and couldn't find anything about it to refute or confirm my local observations, but eventually did find a few articles that talked about it, and it boiled down to some kind of beetle that is more easily thriving as the mean temperature sneaks ever upward. Nowadays it's pretty rare to see a living one, let alone a healthy one. It was deeply disturbing because of how many hemlocks there are around here, probably 5-10% of the total canopy, and they're pretty much all dying. If the trend goes on to take out douglas fir or red western cedar the Pacific NW is going to end up looking like Southern California minus the palm trees. Don't even get me started about the salmon.
I’ve been learning a lot about this topic in terms of the impacts of agriculture to our environment. I’ve been eating a plant based diet for the last 3 weeks and I’m loving it. One benefit is not contributing to the outrageous use of land and water. This is going to grow in its importance within my lifetime and it’s scary.
When we first moved into our house, there was a little swampy area in the school yard that was right behind our street. We could here the frogs at night. That area was drained to make a football field surrounded by a paved track. I suppose that was a good development for the kids, but I miss the frogs. There are hardly any more bumble bees around any more either. I don’t know if the loss of that little wet area had anything to do with the loss of the bumble bees but I miss them too and the frogs.
I am 67, and have had asthma since I was 2; my allergies and asthma are significantly worse, due to warmer climate in the normally chilly part of the country where I live, and due to air pollution— increased particulates and ozone in warmer air. Fires in the west and in Canada cause brilliant sunsets and hazy skies, and folks like me can’t breathe. Also, I moved here for my love of spruce and pine.. they are dying from opportunistic diseases because our climate is no longer suitable for them. Little green frogs have disappeared from my yard. The variety of birds and butterflies has decreased significantly. My daughter and her family live in California, with dwindling water sources and burning forests.
Winters are quite a bit milder. I remember school closures from 30 below zero air temperature, at least 2-3 times a year. We used to install engine block heaters on our cars. The growing season is longer.
I look out onto beautiful landscapes from local trails, and hurt for the koalas in Australia, the wild horses and Condors in the west, the polar bears in the Arctic, the lions. I say prayers for the beautiful trees, maple, pine, oak, because I believe they too have souls. All these living beings, and we humans, will disappear with coming climate disasters.. but the earth over eons will heal, and life will return...
Such a great topic of importance. In Hawke's Bay, New Zealand in the past 12 months we have had a record breaking drought (significantly affecting me as a farmer) followed by record breaking rainfall and floods. I have recently published a blog about climate change and the importance of nurturing our environment, I would really appreciate any feedback https://www.themessenger.nz/blog
I have lived in Oregon for over 20 years. Forest fires were not a disruptive, nor regular occurrence in the 90s/2000s. They were viewed as part of the natural process necessary to the health of the forest. Our climate has changed in the last two decades! The months of August and September are now known as fire season. Large, destructive and long burning fires are now expected in the PNW. These fires bring with them long stretches of poor air quality, damage to communities, financial strain to the state and overall sense of chaos and fear. Most of the country witnesses these fire events through their media devices. Online platforms and media images can not replicate the the fear of being evacuated, breathing in poor air quality for days and weeks, watching live as flames move across the treetops as winds increase. You can't know, until you have experienced it first hand. I have a general sense that this is a "West Coast" problem. I can't help but think if more Americans experienced fire season "in person" we would see a greater climate action response.
I live in Southern California and am a boater. The kelp forests have mostly disappeared from the front side of Catalina Island. They were like forests of Giant Sequoias in the sea. 35 years ago they were year round, then they slowly started disappearing in the summer, and now they don't come back when the water cools. The rocky reefs are covered with algae and small plants and I don't think kelp hold-fasts are able to take root anymore. The larger fish that used the kelp for cover, and for fry nurseries are gone. And now we see lots of sea turtles, where they were once a very rare sight.
What isn’t getting enough coverage is not how the climate crisis is affecting me and those I care about, but that it never had to happen – and, most important, not just for the reasons that have become almost anodyne in the way our blind acceptance of them enables, and even leads to the promotion of dangerous half-truths.
Certainly, fossil fuels should be slowly replaced by “green” energy sources, and people should use their legs and bikes more, and double up in their cars and vans. But there is something that each and every human on this earth, of every age and circumstance, could do, and that a few are doing already, the benefits of which would redound not just to the individual, but to our dying planet. And while it would entail an adjustment for most people, it is one that those of us who have made the choice and regretted only that we didn’t make it sooner, have found personally gratifying as well, not just for our health, but for our conscience, especially those of us who have always loved animals, but failed to make the connection between those we know and those, equally intelligent, equally capable of feeling love, terror, and agony, whose hacked-up body parts we always blithely, blindly consumed.
Data from a variety of sources offer scientific support – and even describe an urgent need -- for such a choice. (The following are links, but do not seem to appear as such here. However, they can be Googled.)
Climate crisis: Animal farming producing greater total emissions in EU than all cars and vans combined, analysis finds | The Independent
The Global Climate Crisis & Animal Agriculture: Doha and Beyond | HuffPost
UN Report Urges Plant-Based Diets to Combat Climate-Change | Animal Equality | International Animal Protection Organization
You’ll find the occasional article in the mainstream media, and politicians who don’t fear the potentially devastating financial backlash from their deep-pocketed “animal ag” donors speak up on rare occasions as well. But it clearly is not enough.
Our planet is dying. It is freezing where it shouldn’t be freezing – as you have experienced all too tellingly – and burning where it has never burned before. And taking us with it.
And we could – no, we MUST, and (to borrow a famous phrase), YES WE CAN -- stop it. All it takes is the will. We have it in us. We just need to find it. And use it.
I've noticed a lot of extreme weather since about 2010 and environmentalists say it is due to climate change. In 2010, Connecticut suffered 800-plus roof collapses due to snow load. In 2011, we had TS Irene and a heavy wet snowfall in October. Between them, we had no power in the house for 11 days. In 2012, we had TS Sandy resulting in another extended outage and a lot of damage to buildings along the shoreline. In 2013, a snowfall of 35 to 40 inches socked us in for three days. Construction equipment was necessary to open the roads. I'm 68 and have lived in the state all my life. I have never seen so much extreme weather in such an abbreviated period of time.
My husband and I live in the Northern Adirondack region of New York State. Over the 30+ years that we have recreated and (eventually) lived here, we've observed the winters becoming ever milder and plant and animal species formerly confined to regions south of us extending their range northward. This is already having an effect on local economies as winter tourism for activities such as skiing, snowshoeing, and snowmobiling are curtailed. Summers are becoming buggier, ticks are expanding their range to higher elevations, bringing with them the threat of Lyme disease, and new insect pests are affecting the timber industry. Climate change is NOT some vague, distant future threat. It's very real. It's happening now, folks.
I live in El Paso. We are on the western part of the national grid. The greedy state government formed the rest of Texas' power grid separate from the national grid and now the people of Texas know that government is evil in this state. I was born and raised in El Paso. Oh, and don't believe the lies from the far right saying we're only safe in my city because of a wall. Hate to break it to those losers, but we've been visiting each other's cities (Ciudad Juarez is our Sister City) with no issues at all.
I am a Food Scientist who believes in the natural order of things. I accept change and realize change is manifested in many logical ways. One of those changes is in our climate. I am not a weather geek but over the last ten years or so I have noticed obvious departures in normal seasonal weather patterns. In short, weather events of all types are more extreme causing flooding, power outages, sea level rises, etc. A huge example of change in normal seasonal weather manifested itself recently in Texas. After becoming aware of the situation in Houston, Dallas and other cities of the Lone Star state I reached out to my retired geologist brother in The Woodlands, a gated town north of Houston. I casually mentioned, "Isn't climate change a nuisance?" Instead of filling me in about the weather's impact on their safety and well - being, my brother stated, "You are hopelessly wedded to the greatest lie ever ever told." Even though my brother is a scientist he chooses to be a climate denier. And anyone not in agreement is allied to the quote above. He and I cannot discuss our differences in opinion because my brother is, "Just stating the facts." This is a subject which negatively impacts our relationship and it is sad. I would like to discuss "the elephant in the room" but the subject is off limits with him.
Living in the Central Valley of California, climate change is seen all around me. It's February, and all of the local flowering trees are fully in bloom...they began blooming at the end of January this year, and every year it creeps earlier by a few days. "Winter" is almost non-existent, and this year we had two or three days of frost only...which does not give many orchards the chilling hours necessary for successful crops. Dense valley fog, which used to cancel schools for many days each winter twenty years ago, and caused hazardous driving conditions (I remember having to drive with my head out the window to see the line at the edge of the road, creeping along at 5 mph), these dense fogs have disappeared. I don't remember schools calling a fog delay for at least the last five years. So instead we get nine months of summer, massive droughts and FIRES. The smoke fills the valley and, instead of fog delays, we now have to track week after week of hazardous air quality.
Weather changes, extremes in low and high temps affects our breathing dramatically, especially my husbands and sister in law. This includes High Ozone in summer months, and given this time of year, the extreme high and low fronts, with extreme cold makes it more difficult to exercise, and to take walks outside, and is the same in summer/spring making for increases our use of emergency inhalers, due to poor air quality and breathing capability.
I and my husband are both California natives, but have seen over the years how the seasons have been changing. We moved to N. CA in 2010 duting tje most horrendous winter storm I'd been in. Gradually our area went into a drought for about five years and everyone was conserving water usage. During that time, our area had flooded for three days, not most of the roads. There have been tornadoes, albeit not like they have in the midwest, but California is not known for tornadoes. Then in 2018, in autumn going into winter, because it apparently had still been too dry thst summer, and becaise of a spark and untimely winds, welost the Town of Paradise just up the hill. We, thank God, didn't lose anything, but so many people were displaced.
So, with all that, it is hard to say what will come along next this year.
And yes, I hope you and yours are okay and the storms are subsiding. If not, those Republicsns who were so opposed to recognize Climate Change should take a second to NOW realize the climate is not a constant anymore, and will probably be getting worse. Although I don't think it is a csused by us humans.
We actually plan for annual fire/smoke season AKA July thru September OR thru November if planning a trip to see relatives in California. The gardening season is wonky too. Sixty six years old and praying for my grandchildren as the climate crisis becomes real.
Personally my view is that "Global Warming" now referred to as "Climate Change" because the warming trend for the last 15/20 years has been flat within error bounds, is a hoax to tax us all. There has been no significant rise in sea levels and the alarmists who predicted that the Indian Ocean Maldive Islands would be under water has not actually happened. The same can be said for arctic sea ice; 2021 its still there with an above average extent of cover. The idea that the current polar vortex is caused by arctic warming is a non starter. It is caused by grand solar minimums which occur every 100 years approximately with a smaller cycle every 7 years. I have taken an interest in this subject ever since I read about the climate gate emails at Cambridge university where they clearly conspired to fudge the data to reduce the effect the 1935/1940 warm period. Carbon di-oxide CO2 is not a climate driver to any large extent but solar radiance is and this factor is totally ignored by some papers or given little credence to its effect of watts/square metre.
This pandemic has greatly affected my life, after already making a Big change in my life of gathering so much stuff and selling my home of 35 years . But I never see my family! To keep them or me healthy! But I'm ok getting my second shot tomorrow, thank God. I do plan on that changing my life again but for the better!
I am a SF Bay Area native, the child of a solidly middle-class family, college-educated with a loving and supportive network of friends and relatives. I am also a climate refugee.
The Sierra wildfires of 2015, the Tubbs fire which ravaged Santa Rosa in 2017, the Carr and Camp fires of 2018, sensitized my already somewhat delicate system to smoke and the fumes of burning fires. I developed asthma. I can no longer tolerate the gas stove in our kitchen. Last year I had to leave in midsummer to spend four months in the Oregon coastal mountains where the air is cleaner; the smoke followed, but not the NOx compounds that make me particularly ill. A year from now, I will be preparing to move to that house in the mountains permanently, far away from the house I grew up in, which I had always assumed I would retire in. Far away from friends, and familiar landmarks. An exile from home.
I am exceptionally fortunate to have a house owned by family in such a remote place, one which is in desperate need of a caretaker (it has been neglected, though not abandoned, for fifteen years). We can fix each other up, the house and I, and I hope to regain a great deal of the health I have lost in recent years. But the climate-fueled wildfires have left their mark on me, and I must do my best to protect my new home from that one dangerous spark at the wrong time. Oregon is grappling with the terrifying reality California has had to confront these last five years, of whole forests and cities on fire, year after year. None of us are immune. That is the impact climate change has had on my life.
As longtime Alaska residents, we see the effects of climate change every day. Our roads are in a constant state of flux. Maintenance costs are up. I'm a dog musher, and we've had to reroute trails every winter for the past decade because the permafrost is melting, causing slumps and thermokarst ponds in once reliably frozen swamps.
In Fairbanks, people's backyards are turning into swamps. My driveway has sunk and there are some scary holes forming alongside. Winters are much milder than they used to be -- as much as 12 degrees above normal in the Arctic. Ice fog, once the bane of everyone living at valley level in the winter, is now rare.
Summer wildfires are worsening. Tundra fires are even becoming common. Ice cellars, used for thousands of years in the Arctic, are melting.
In Fairbanks, the growing season used to be about 90 days; now it's closer to 120. Instead of seeing hard freezes in August, we're not seeing them until October.
Climate change is very real. I hope you all in the Texas deep freeze are OK. If we get a Texas-like heat wave up here, we'll be a similar situation. Thank you for being a voice of reason and sanity.
As a Californian and outdoor enthusiast, climate change has lessened my ability to enjoy camping and hiking, and even gardening. We have almost constant drought now. The Sierra Nevada’s snow doesn’t reach the levels of the past and melts sooner. Fires (although partly caused by people’s incursion on wilderness for their housing) make summer and fall air smoky. So, although I’m lucky enough to live in a middle class neighborhood and still have good health at 70 years old, there is a little less joy in my life because the human race has wounded the environment.
Planning ahead, holding back , thinking about the youngsters and bought a hybrid .
We have been profoundly effected by Climate Change. We recently sold our home and property of 30 years in the Sierra foothills East of Sacramento. One of the reasons we had to sell was because of the increasing cost of fire insurance. Last year it was over $9,000. Now that we are retired and on a set income, we could no longer afford it. Over the years we lived on our 20 acres we had scores of trees die and species of birds disappear because of climate change. As a daughter of a forester, and an avid horse back rider, I have always been aware of changes in our forests. And it has been dramatic - in just 30 short years. We now live in the high desert of Las Cruces, New Mexico. Penny Scribner
Hi - I'm in Upstate SC and the winters don't have as many "cold" days as they used to in the 1970's. There are times when you can take a trip to the beach in December. Only kids would want to go in the water then (and mine did growing up) but you could hang out on the beach without a jacket. So in that case climate change is a benefit in my eyes. Still it doesn't outweigh the costs to the world. It's interesting to hear from people who have seen more drastic changes across the country. I find it a travesty that a lot of folks listen to politicians instead of scientists. The scientific community has been warning about this for decades. I first became aware of the threat in the 1990's. Oh if only we started preparing back then.
Hi. I live in central Indiana. I have noticed significant changes over the last twenty years (although a few of those began showing up intermittently thirty years ago). Rain and snow are in short supply most years, especially the last ten. Seasons are no longer distinct (not counting this winter). Spring arrives 4-10 weeks earlier than it did 10-20 years ago and most winters are prolonged autumns with occasional days or a week here and there of old-normal winter cold. These changes affect everything - insects, animals, plants, trees and humans.
Last summer I was delighted to find five Monarch butterflies in my yard - at the same time. Five at one time was the most I saw all summer. Twenty years ago it was not unusual to have a hundred butterflies (Monarchs, various types of Swallowtails, etc) flying around at the same time. My yard has multiple gardens and very little grass. I plant to attract wildlife (from butterflies to raccoons & everything in-between) and it has been quite depressing to watch everything change so drastically over the years. Drastic in a negative way, not positive.
I am planning a move this year if the pandemic allows (next year if not) and climate change is easily one of the two main reasons. Summers here are now very hot with little rain. I call it summer but really, the heat can begin as early as February, showing up in 24-48 hour spells, each time gradually extending until it’s simply hot (high 80’s-100 degrees). It stays that way until long past the time that the trees should have changed colors and started to drop their leaves. If I were a Hoosier Snowbird (moving to Florida every winter) then these new hot extended summers would be fine I suppose. But, I’m not.
I used to mark life by the seasons and by what the weather was usually like per holiday. (There were always the occasional exceptions of course.) That way of living no longer applies.
I miss viewing life like that very much.
So sorry for all you are experiencing this week in Texas.
Climate change went from an "out there....someday" thing to a "right here, right now" thing in my mind during the wildfire season of 2020 in California. The new reality is that this season now goes from August - December, and causes much loss of life, property and wilderness destruction, loss of power, school shutdowns, and more. For months, we watch and listen to the news, with our "go bags" packed, wondering if our town will be the next place where high winds, high temperatures and dry conditions converge to create a disaster. Last August, there was a day in the Bay Area that it felt like the sun didn't rise, due to the orange cloud cover blanketing the area. More than ever, that day it felt like climate change was knocking on our door.
I live in California. The fires make it hard to breathe & I worry about my grandchildren. Staying inside, not being able to play outside. But this is nothing compared to all the people who lost their homes & everything they own. To have to start all over again is devastating. This past summer we had a week of recording breaking highs. One day was 113. That is unusual for our area. I know it will only get worse each summer😟
Hello Dan! Yes, climate change has impacted all of us, whether we realize it or not. The most obvious sign to me is the crazy weather we have been for the last 20 years or so. For myself, it has been the rise in temperatures in the summer. I live in Tucson and last year we had over 100 days of 100 degree highs. The monsoon has been disrupted and we are in a severe drought. There are many other signs too numerous to mention here, but it is clear we need to act now. I don't have any answers for how to begin to fix this, but we certainly need to heed the warnings and listen to the scientists.
We live on 25 acres of wooded land that we love to walk and enjoy. We have beautiful deciduous trees, deer, small woodland animals to enjoy and birds to feed at our many feeders. Our creeks and fens are a real attraction to wildlife. We are most concerned about climatic changes (warmer winters, hotter summers) which affect our forests and water systems. The altered climate has increased insect infestations, flooding and animal behaviour. We can see the changes each year and don't know how many times we have said, "We have never seen that before, that is a first." We are registered stewards of our land in southern Ontario and make a pledge to protect it and will not do anything to jeopardize it. It is worrisome when nature is changing and you are left feeling helpless to do anything.
I’ve been fortunate with scheduled outages. My sister and family are with us bc their pipes burst, so they are among the lucky compared to those that have truly suffered. I’ve had to drive to work past couple of days to work on ice (I’ve heard DFW area has 17 plows...haven’t checked the accuracy) but also glad to have made it back safely. We do need answers, especially to questions such as why we aren’t on the national grid? Stay safe everyone.
We grow grapes and various fruit on a small farm in central Virginia. Over the last 10 years, we’ve managed to get a harvest from everything we grow only about four times. The weather is so unpredictable. Overly wet spring results in blossom rot. Unseasonably warm spells in the winter lead to bud break and too- early growth that is susceptible to an inevitable frost, mild winters that don’t kill off hungry bugs. The list goes on. It’s hard to plan and there is a real possibility that there will be no crop despite all the work you do. It’s a good thing we don’t do this for a living and it makes me really appreciate farmers.
If climate threat is an existential threat and some describe our efforts to reverse it a “war”, then why aren’t climate articles on the front pages? I guess my real question is, why isn’t the media taking this seriously? All prior wars were front page news in print and on radio and TV. Perplexing for me.
When I was little in the 50’s & 60’s we had snow all winter long from November through March. When my children were little in the 80’s & 90’s they would come home from school every day in winter & skate on our pond from December through February. In the summer our grass would be dry & dormant for most of July & all of August. The last 2 decades our pond barely freezes for longer than a week then thaws again & is never solid enough for me to allow my Grands to go out on it (with the exception of these last2 weeks were everything is frozen here in Ohio🥶). Our grass is green all summer long. Those are big climate changes in my opinion.
I can't say that climate change has affected me personally, and I feel lucky. Part of it because our family has moved several time, to places that have very different climates. I cannot say, this has been the hottest/coldest/driest, since I have only experienced a sliver of time in any particular place. I do see changes happening to places that I care about.
As a child, I lived in Ecuador, and the Galapagos Islands have lost many species, due to human interference. I also lived in Florida, and over the last decade, Hurricanes have been much fiercer than in the previous decades.
My latest move has been to the Pacific Northwest. I'm told that the winters here are much drier than in the past and the Summers much warmer. The joke we kept hearing when we told people that we were moving here was "I hope you like rain". I have not really experienced much of that.
You asked how climate change is affecting people. One of the ways is that places that used to be liveable are fast becoming less so. We lived happily in Western Australia for many years but it has become hotter and more humid and the fire season has lengthened from a few months to at least half the year. In 2014 we moved to the island state of Tasmania, on the opposite side of the country. Tassie is Australia's smallest and coolest state--Western Australia is the biggest, hottest, and driest. It seems every third person we meet here is another climate refugee from our former state or from tropical Queensland. This has pushed real estate prices up very fast, which has a deleterious effect on native-born Tasmanians. Issues I care about? Lots-but here's one: we need to be investing in affordable and climate-conscious housing, fast--but politicians here are no swifter than elsewhere, so it's going to be a hard slog of pestering letters and electorate office visits to get them moving.
I live in Virginia, and have had USAA homeowners insurance for 44 years. I have always been happy with their rates and service. But last year our rate increased by 45%, and this year it increased by another 9%. Since we have made no claims or renovations to justify any increase, we called to ascertain the reason for the huge increase. We were told that due to storm damage that has escalated substantially in recent years because of climate change, the company has been collecting only 84 cents for every dollar they have been paying out in claims for several years. They had to present evidence of this to the State Insurance Commissioner in order to get approval to raise rates. Their actuaries say the trend of more claims will continue. I am 69 years old, and I can tell our weather in Virginia is generally more stormy, wet and warmer than it was when I was young.
I live in Northern California. One word describes the impact of climate change in this region -WILDFIRE! Since 2015, this area has not gone a single year without at least one devastating acre-consuming, life-altering wildfire. In 2017, I sat on my front porch in downtown Santa Rosa, Ca and watched the Tubbs fire burn from east to west jumping across a six lane freeway and wiping out the entire Coffey Park subdivision. In 2019, I was working the night the Kincade Fire stared. I’m an ER Nurse, and we heard on the scanner a call for downed power lines. I said to my co-worker “ that’s going to be bad”. It was! In 2020, the hospital where I work -Adventist Health St. Helena was evacuated not once but twice due to wild fires. The second one -the Glass Fire closed the hospital for 73 days. I live on the hospital campus. I fled my home in the middle of the night and I was evacuated for 60 days because the fire destroyed the gas, electricity, water and sewer infrastructure. My house was untouched (thankfully) but most of my yard burned.
We now have fire season. Every year fire season gets longer and longer and more and more devastating. My family has been in California for five generations. We can trace our roots to an original Spanish land grant. Never before have we had Fire Season.
Climate change combined with what is now, due to that climate change, poor land management have created an almost unlivable situation. And, there’s no end in sight.
I would like to add to my comments below. When I was little there were no wind turbines in Michigan, now there are acres and acres of them and they work just fine in sub freezing and sub zero weather. It makes me angry for the poor people in Texas that their Governor would blame the green energy producers,like wind turbines and solar panels for the disaster in Texas.
Having moved back to my home town here in Michigan, and being an avid gardener. I have noticed real changes. When I was little we were USDA horticultural zone 5. Now we are horticultural zone 6. 2 years ago, our farmers were unable to plant almost half of the local corn crop, because of flooding. No,there were no hurricanes here, but the weather was suddenly that wet. Last year it was 65°for Christmas. There are more Tornadoes. It is harder to know when the frost free dates will occur to put the garden in. Although we are not as bad off as the coastal areas, there have definitely been changes.
I don't like the fact that there are so many climate change deniers, there seems to be a lot of deniers of science out there.
I think the fossil fuel industry is funding many politicians to mislead the public, especially those who are more removed from nature than I am.
I hope all of you in Texas stay safe and are able to stay warm.
To answer Dan's question: In September 2020, my home state of Oregon had a high wind event. The forecast warned of "critical fire danger". Little did I know what was to come...
The wind howled and shook the leaves and trees outside, along with the wildfire smoke. The wind calmed down. The smoke cleared for too short of a time, then came back and due to the calm weather and lack of rain, hung around for way longer than our tolerance levels really wanted to tolerate it.
The smoke turned sunny days into days with a weird fog that wasn’t mist. It made the air thick and sickly yellow, almost like the earth itself was a patient in the hospital and treatments were not quite working. That was the scene I woke up to every day for many days. It blurred the treeline and seemed to reduce everything in my backyard to the same shade of yellow.
I saw the sun turn from a disk with a red tint to one that was blood red, to barely any disk at all because it was covered by smoke particulate matter. I saw the whole sky become an unreal shade of orange one evening. It’s like the world around me had transported me to another planet overnight, because it was as if a Martian sky was the roof over my head. We were officially living in a real-life science fiction novel.
Our state for that time had some of the worst air quality in the world. It was incredibly suffocating. It came to the point that I had to sleep on a couch downstairs because my bedroom had this charred smell. And more importantly, there are so many people who lost so much, for entire towns were destroyed beyond recognition. Some of my favorite places in the state were deeply affected.
I knew that it wasn’t just forest mismanagement. Nor was it just the “perks” of the weather this year. I know that my senses don’t lie to me. Climate change is absolutely real. I knew that when the sky turned orange and the sun red, I was seeing before my eyes the effects of climate change. Why else would too many hideous records for charred acres per wildfires get broken too quickly?
My parents have lived in the Pacific Northwest for over thirty years. While there have been occasional blasts of smoke, none of us have ever seen anything like what we experienced in Oregon in September of 2020.
And even besides September 2020, there were the little changes I noticed personally---more 90+ degree days in my city in the summer and often earlier in the summer is a glaring example.
I hope this experience with the wildfire smoke is once in a lifetime. I fear this will not be, and that many more lives will be destroyed, if we don’t form the political will to tackle climate change.
We can do anything. Solve any problem. Even one as big as climate change, but only if our hearts are in the right direction.
There are so many reasons to end our dependence on fossil fuels, one of which is climate change. There is also the fact that fossil fuels will be running out soon. Imagine living through this type of weather and being unable to afford to heat your house, or having gas prices so high that you can't afford to drive a car. My grandchildren will experience this if something isn't done. Green technology may be in its infancy, but someone is going to solve this problem. If the US doesn't act now, it will be China, Japan, or an EU country. Then we will be dependent on them for this technology. They will have all the best, most high-paying jobs, and we'll be paying them for the tech. I don't understand why so many people are reluctant to see the opportunity green energy presents. Are they so desperate to feed the incomes of the few oil barons who control the oil and gas industry? We can try to frack every drop of oil out of every rock on earth and it still won't last forever. Let's move on, get it done, and put America in the leadership position it should hold.
I live in Victoria, B.C. , Canada and we had a big winter storm during the past weekend which is unusual for the Pacific Northwest. It didn’t get too cold, fortunately for us. Get warm in Texas!
Originally from Oregon, I now live in Australia. It is so distressing to see the havoc and harm the extreme winter weather is causing all over the US. Down here we have experienced the effects of climate change with two summers of terrible bush fires taking lives and destroying whole communities. Stay safe, Dan. It is real. . .
Southern California has felt it with extreme heat, winds, fires and drought. We are seeing temps higher in the winter months that are breaking records and summers are hotter than ever and lasting longer and longer.
I live in West Virginia, so we have four distinct seasons. At least we used to. Autumn has been pushed into November, which then lasts three weeks and all leaves turn brown. Snow (yes, we have it right now) is almost non existent in the winter. Our winters are so mild that summers are full of biting bugs, mosquitoes, etc., because our winters are never frozen to kill off bugs. I've seen mosquitoes in January and February!!!! I remember winters when we went sledding but that's a thing of the past. Even when we have snow, it's gone within 24 hours. My rhododendron has bloomed in January, February, March! Last month, January, leaves were coming out on my lilac bush. This month my flowering quince has blooms and buds (until the ice this week). But, why would they begin to bloom in January and February????? Not normal or natural in WV.
The weather extremes effect my health. I have autoimmune disorders and the hot and humid in the summer make it hard to spend time outside with my grandkids. The frigid air in the colder months here in NWPA, make my lungs burn. It also creates Pleural Effusion and Pericarditis putting my life in danger. Of course then I can't play in the snow with my grandkids. It's frustrating personally and infuriating when people say there's no such thing as climate change or global warming.
I remember, as a teenager in the 1960s, wondering about all the garbage that people throw out and how it would affect our earth. So what I fail to grasp at this point is, why has it never occurred to our mature intelligent leaders to do something about it? And I'm talking about all pollution, not just garbage. I'm baffled.
I’ve lived in Montana my whole life. The past twenty years has left us with long term droughts, pine beetles destroying our forests, and little to no actual winter.
Every summer is hotter with extreme temps above 105, as a child it was rare to get over 100. Winters are shorter and warmer. More extremes such as severe ice storms, hurricaines, tornadoes, floods. Butterflies and fireflies are gone.
A couple years ago, here in the Pacific NW, I started noticing that many western hemlock trees (Tsuga heterophylla) were dying or dead. I searched extensively on the subject and couldn't find anything about it to refute or confirm my local observations, but eventually did find a few articles that talked about it, and it boiled down to some kind of beetle that is more easily thriving as the mean temperature sneaks ever upward. Nowadays it's pretty rare to see a living one, let alone a healthy one. It was deeply disturbing because of how many hemlocks there are around here, probably 5-10% of the total canopy, and they're pretty much all dying. If the trend goes on to take out douglas fir or red western cedar the Pacific NW is going to end up looking like Southern California minus the palm trees. Don't even get me started about the salmon.
I’ve been learning a lot about this topic in terms of the impacts of agriculture to our environment. I’ve been eating a plant based diet for the last 3 weeks and I’m loving it. One benefit is not contributing to the outrageous use of land and water. This is going to grow in its importance within my lifetime and it’s scary.
When we first moved into our house, there was a little swampy area in the school yard that was right behind our street. We could here the frogs at night. That area was drained to make a football field surrounded by a paved track. I suppose that was a good development for the kids, but I miss the frogs. There are hardly any more bumble bees around any more either. I don’t know if the loss of that little wet area had anything to do with the loss of the bumble bees but I miss them too and the frogs.
I am 67, and have had asthma since I was 2; my allergies and asthma are significantly worse, due to warmer climate in the normally chilly part of the country where I live, and due to air pollution— increased particulates and ozone in warmer air. Fires in the west and in Canada cause brilliant sunsets and hazy skies, and folks like me can’t breathe. Also, I moved here for my love of spruce and pine.. they are dying from opportunistic diseases because our climate is no longer suitable for them. Little green frogs have disappeared from my yard. The variety of birds and butterflies has decreased significantly. My daughter and her family live in California, with dwindling water sources and burning forests.
Winters are quite a bit milder. I remember school closures from 30 below zero air temperature, at least 2-3 times a year. We used to install engine block heaters on our cars. The growing season is longer.
I look out onto beautiful landscapes from local trails, and hurt for the koalas in Australia, the wild horses and Condors in the west, the polar bears in the Arctic, the lions. I say prayers for the beautiful trees, maple, pine, oak, because I believe they too have souls. All these living beings, and we humans, will disappear with coming climate disasters.. but the earth over eons will heal, and life will return...
Such a great topic of importance. In Hawke's Bay, New Zealand in the past 12 months we have had a record breaking drought (significantly affecting me as a farmer) followed by record breaking rainfall and floods. I have recently published a blog about climate change and the importance of nurturing our environment, I would really appreciate any feedback https://www.themessenger.nz/blog
I have lived in Oregon for over 20 years. Forest fires were not a disruptive, nor regular occurrence in the 90s/2000s. They were viewed as part of the natural process necessary to the health of the forest. Our climate has changed in the last two decades! The months of August and September are now known as fire season. Large, destructive and long burning fires are now expected in the PNW. These fires bring with them long stretches of poor air quality, damage to communities, financial strain to the state and overall sense of chaos and fear. Most of the country witnesses these fire events through their media devices. Online platforms and media images can not replicate the the fear of being evacuated, breathing in poor air quality for days and weeks, watching live as flames move across the treetops as winds increase. You can't know, until you have experienced it first hand. I have a general sense that this is a "West Coast" problem. I can't help but think if more Americans experienced fire season "in person" we would see a greater climate action response.
I live in San Antonio, TX. Enough said.
I live in Southern California and am a boater. The kelp forests have mostly disappeared from the front side of Catalina Island. They were like forests of Giant Sequoias in the sea. 35 years ago they were year round, then they slowly started disappearing in the summer, and now they don't come back when the water cools. The rocky reefs are covered with algae and small plants and I don't think kelp hold-fasts are able to take root anymore. The larger fish that used the kelp for cover, and for fry nurseries are gone. And now we see lots of sea turtles, where they were once a very rare sight.
Dear Mr. Rather,
What isn’t getting enough coverage is not how the climate crisis is affecting me and those I care about, but that it never had to happen – and, most important, not just for the reasons that have become almost anodyne in the way our blind acceptance of them enables, and even leads to the promotion of dangerous half-truths.
Certainly, fossil fuels should be slowly replaced by “green” energy sources, and people should use their legs and bikes more, and double up in their cars and vans. But there is something that each and every human on this earth, of every age and circumstance, could do, and that a few are doing already, the benefits of which would redound not just to the individual, but to our dying planet. And while it would entail an adjustment for most people, it is one that those of us who have made the choice and regretted only that we didn’t make it sooner, have found personally gratifying as well, not just for our health, but for our conscience, especially those of us who have always loved animals, but failed to make the connection between those we know and those, equally intelligent, equally capable of feeling love, terror, and agony, whose hacked-up body parts we always blithely, blindly consumed.
Data from a variety of sources offer scientific support – and even describe an urgent need -- for such a choice. (The following are links, but do not seem to appear as such here. However, they can be Googled.)
Climate crisis: Animal farming producing greater total emissions in EU than all cars and vans combined, analysis finds | The Independent
The Global Climate Crisis & Animal Agriculture: Doha and Beyond | HuffPost
UN Report Urges Plant-Based Diets to Combat Climate-Change | Animal Equality | International Animal Protection Organization
You’ll find the occasional article in the mainstream media, and politicians who don’t fear the potentially devastating financial backlash from their deep-pocketed “animal ag” donors speak up on rare occasions as well. But it clearly is not enough.
Our planet is dying. It is freezing where it shouldn’t be freezing – as you have experienced all too tellingly – and burning where it has never burned before. And taking us with it.
And we could – no, we MUST, and (to borrow a famous phrase), YES WE CAN -- stop it. All it takes is the will. We have it in us. We just need to find it. And use it.
I've noticed a lot of extreme weather since about 2010 and environmentalists say it is due to climate change. In 2010, Connecticut suffered 800-plus roof collapses due to snow load. In 2011, we had TS Irene and a heavy wet snowfall in October. Between them, we had no power in the house for 11 days. In 2012, we had TS Sandy resulting in another extended outage and a lot of damage to buildings along the shoreline. In 2013, a snowfall of 35 to 40 inches socked us in for three days. Construction equipment was necessary to open the roads. I'm 68 and have lived in the state all my life. I have never seen so much extreme weather in such an abbreviated period of time.
My husband and I live in the Northern Adirondack region of New York State. Over the 30+ years that we have recreated and (eventually) lived here, we've observed the winters becoming ever milder and plant and animal species formerly confined to regions south of us extending their range northward. This is already having an effect on local economies as winter tourism for activities such as skiing, snowshoeing, and snowmobiling are curtailed. Summers are becoming buggier, ticks are expanding their range to higher elevations, bringing with them the threat of Lyme disease, and new insect pests are affecting the timber industry. Climate change is NOT some vague, distant future threat. It's very real. It's happening now, folks.