Old99Farm Market: Good all-round climate essay: Gwyn Dyer

https://thewalrus.ca/seven-truths-climate-crisis/
Published Apr 1 2024.

Just as an aide-mémoire, these are the inconvenient facts that we must always bear in mind. (And he’s also inclined to the understated side of the truth.)

We Are Running Out of Time

Actually, we probably have run out of time. Like soon-to-be bankrupts, we can go on fiddling the books for a while longer, but we cannot stay below the 1.5°C higher average global temperature that was our recommended maximum increase according to the Paris Climate Agreement of 2015. As Johan Rockström, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, told me in 2020: “We have been lulling ourselves into a comfort zone, believing we have a lot of time, but 2020 is the year when we need to bend the curve down on global emissions. . . . You cannot succeed if you bend later. . . . If you bend later, the speed by which we have to reduce emissions is no longer possible to achieve in any democratic way. You would simply have to bulldoze every coal-fired plant overnight.”

Well, the emissions curve did not bend down in 2020, despite the COVID-19 pandemic, and they haven’t started bulldozing coal-fired power plants either. Global carbon dioxide emissions did drop briefly—by 17 percent—at the peak of the first wave of COVID-19, but over the whole year, the needle barely flickered. The planes stopped flying for a while, but the cows kept burping, the lights stayed on, and the houses of the developed world remained warm in winter and cool in summer.

For all the talk of cuts, the amount of CO2 in the air has increased almost every year since the start of the industrial revolution. In 1800, it was only 280 ppm. By 1988, when global warming first became a public concern, it was 350 ppm. In 2020, it was 415 ppm, and it’s still going up. There is little chance that the curve will turn down before 2025 at the earliest—whereas achieving the aspirational target of not exceeding +1.5°C would have required an already implausible cut in greenhouse gas emissions of 7.9 percent each year of this decade, starting in 2021.

Cutting Emissions Is Not Enough

There’s a dirty secret about the Paris deal and the <1.5°C aspirational limit: the target could never have been achieved by cutting emissions alone. It is abundantly clear from many sources that the negotiators in Paris were counting on “negative emissions” technologies—that is, taking greenhouse gases out of the air—to avoid some of the warming. This is a problem because almost all of these CDR technologies are either slower acting or much more expensive (or both) than simply cutting CO2 emissions, and most are not yet ready for deployment at a global scale. Half of them also have major implications for land use or the health of the oceans. Some of these CDR technologies do have longer-term possibilities as part of an attempt to stabilize the global climate, but they cannot be deployed fast enough to help us stay below the <1.5°C target into the mid-2030s.

Carbon Accumulates

The CO2 that we put in the air stays there for a very long time: 200 years for the average CO2 molecule. Plants absorb some of it each spring and summer as they grow, but they put it back into the air again when they die and burn or rot. Even the rocks absorb some CO2, very slowly—but these natural carbon sinks are largely occupied with playing their role in the natural carbon cycle. Much of the CO2 that human beings put into the air each year stays in the atmosphere and accumulates: even some of the CO2 emitted by the coal-burning boilers on Thomas Newcomen’s eighteenth-century steam pumps is still there.

Now, 450 ppm of CO2 in the atmosphere is the point at which we are effectively committed to +2°C. Beyond that, very bad things begin to happen. With the amount of CO2 in the air already at 425 ppm, we only have 25 ppm left before +2°C average global temperature becomes inevitable. The extra amount of CO2 emissions caused by human activities that accumulated in the atmosphere in 2022 was 2.4 ppm. If we continue at that rate, we will reach 450 ppm around 2032. Even if we cut our emissions by half in the next decade—a heroic but unlikely achievement—we would still reach at least 435 ppm by the middle of the decade (2035).

Nobody in their right mind would willingly go to 435 ppm, because there is not always a predictable, direct relationship between parts per million of CO2 and global average temperature. At various points as the planet warms—unfortunately, we don’t know precisely which—tipping points will be triggered and the global average temperature will lurch rapidly upward. Most climate scientists—and the IPCC’s official best guess—assume that these thresholds are almost all higher than +2°C / 450 ppm, and it might be that the climate really spins out only at +2.2°C. On the other hand, the true never-exceed point could also easily be +1.8°C, in which case 435 ppm would be more than enough to cook our goose.

Yet these figures feel so small that it’s hard to take them seriously. What’s the difference between 1.8°C and 2.2°C? Or between 435 ppm and 450 ppm? Well, it’s similar in effect to the difference between a human body temperature of 36.5°C (normal), 38.5°C (fever), 40.5°C (brain damage), and 43°C (death). So yes, take it seriously. The better informed people are, the more frightened they are.

Predicting the Climate Is Hard

As meteorologist Edward Lorenz realized in 1960, if a butterfly flaps its wings in a certain way in Beijing in March, then by August, hurricane patterns in the Atlantic could be completely different. The climate system is so complex and so interconnected that we cannot predict the weather for even one week, so how can we possibly predict the climate?

Alan Robock, distinguished professor in the department of environmental sciences at Rutgers University, explains: “We don’t have any data on the future, and there’s a lot of chaos in the climate system. We can predict the ‘envelope’ of possible weather, but not the specific weather. Then there’s natural variability: some years are warmer than average; some are colder. Some years you get El Niño, some you get La Niña, and you can’t predict those very far in advance. This is a problem that climate scientists have always had. We don’t have a laboratory with test tubes and accelerators to do our experiments; the laboratory is the real world, and the best we can do is the climate models we create. We write down the equations that describe everything we understand and do multiple runs with slightly different initial conditions, putting in the flapping of butterfly wings and so on, and we get a swarm of potential climates. The real world will only go through one of those potential climates, but probably it will be somewhere within that swarm. Then we test those models on the past. If they do a good job simulating the effects of known volcanic eruptions, or if they do a good job simulating the global warming of the past century, then we have more faith in them for the future.”

That’s all we have, so it will have to be good enough.

Averages Lie

The average global temperature is an indispensable concept when discussing the broad topic of global warming, but it is very unreliable as a guide to what the temperature will be in any specific location. Moreover, there is a big difference between temperatures at sea and on land. Temperatures are generally more extreme on land, because it heats up more quickly in sunshine and loses heat more quickly at night and in winter. The further away from the sea, the truer this is, which is why it’s deep in the interiors of the continents that most of the record temperatures, both high and low, have been observed.

But since two-thirds of the planet’s surface is covered by oceans, the average global temperature is always closer to the average temperature over the oceans than it is to the average land temperature. These values are not usually calculated, but a rise in average global temperature of 2.0°C really means a rise of roughly 1.0°C in average maritime temperature and a rise in average land temperature of between 3.0°C and 4.0°C (depending mainly on how far inland).

The Atmosphere Does Not “Bounce Back”

Even if we do manage to achieve net zero by 2050, that doesn’t mean everything goes back to normal. We would have stopped adding more greenhouse gases to the atmosphere each year, but all the CO2 that drove the temperature up to +2.0°C or more would still be there, and it won’t leave of its own accord. If we want our old climate back, and we are not willing to wait thousands of years for the rocks to do the job, we’ll have to take the excess CO2 out of the air ourselves: a massive, centuries-long task.

Since the alternative is living indefinitely with the brutal climate of a +2.0°C world, we will probably try to do that. Indeed, that is likely to be the long-term role of the various CDR techniques now being researched or, in a couple of cases, developed.

“Runaway” Is Possible

Terms like “runaway” and “hothouse Earth” do not mean Venus-like conditions, inhospitable to all life. Our planet is considerably further from the sun than Venus is. It will not experience the extreme conditions of that planet until the sun has heated up another 6 percent, around a billion years from now. But if tipping points cascade, a rise in average global temperature of 4°C or more is possible by the end of this century. Low-probability but high-impact events are precisely what you buy insurance for, but unfortunately, they tend to be omitted from most official climate documents.

Temperature rises of up to 6°C would still not mean the extinction of the human race throughout its range (pretty much the entire land surface of this planet), but it would drastically shrink the climate niches where humans could survive, implying a die-back in global population of perhaps 90 percent. Hundreds of thousands or even millions of other species would become extinct, but such temperatures and mass extinctions have happened before, and this would not be the end. Our current civilization would be unlikely to survive, and it might become impossible to build another one, but actual human extinction is quite unlikely.

This future is not yet inevitable. A hyper-aggressive worldwide programme of emissions cuts combined with the super-charged development and deployment of CDR techniques capable of extracting vast amounts of CO2 from the air and getting rid of it somehow might make it possible to stay below +2°C even into the 2040s—and by then, like stepping stones to the future, better means for reducing emissions and removing CO2 from the atmosphere might have become available.

If that doesn’t happen, the same goal of staying below +2°C might be achieved quite quickly, even at the next-to-last moment, by reflecting back enough incoming sunlight (aka SRM) to cool the planet’s surface by a degree or two. This could not be a permanent solution, but it might win us a few extra decades to work on reducing emissions and deploying CDR techniques without crossing the tipping points and without suffering extreme warming that would topple global civilization into famine, mass migration, and war.

Posted by: Ian Graham at Wednesday April 03, 2024 09:38 AM EDT

Statesboro Market2Go: Mushrooms!

Just added – mushrooms! And don’t miss the fresh strawberries just coming in!

Order before 10 tonight!

Click to order at Market2Go!

Posted by: Market Manager at Tuesday April 02, 2024 07:14 PM EDT

Connie's Cornucopia: Beef Bone Broth In Stock

We have had a lot of customers ask for Beef Bone Broth so through a lot of searching we have found a Farmer that carries it. This is pasture raised beef.

Click to start shopping.
conniescornucopia.locallygrown.net

Thanks
Connie

Posted by: Connie Hoyt (V) at Tuesday April 02, 2024 05:06 PM EDT

Champaign, OH: Tuesday Last Call

Don’t forget…the market closes at 8am, this morning!

Get those orders in!

XOXO,
Cosmic Pam

Posted by: Pamela Bowshier at Tuesday April 02, 2024 06:43 AM EDT

Statesboro Market2Go: Strawberries!

Fresh strawberries are now available on Market2Go! There’s so many ways to enjoy these beautiful bountiful berries
Some sensational serving suggestions include:

Smoky savory Barbecued Strawberry Chicken (made with a locally bottled barbeque sauce of your choice!)
Spicy Strawberry Chili Relish ( a great way to add a bit of a kick to your snack or your supper!)
Salmon with Strawberry-Wine Sauce (a simple yet elegant seafood dish!)
And of course, sweet treats like popsicles, smoothies, and sorbet!)

Order before 10 on Tuesday night!

Click to order at Market2Go!

Posted by: Market Manager at Monday April 01, 2024 06:04 PM EDT

Fayetteville Farmers' Market: Still time to order for Thursday pickup!

We hope you had a great spring and Easter weekend!

If you already ordered, we thank you!

You may still order or add items until 6 am on Wed morning April 3. Pick up is Thursday April 4. Your credit card will be charged only once, after you pick up, to insure that all items you ordered were delivered to you.

https://fayettevillearkansas.locallygrown.net/market.

MONDAY UPDATES:

Dripping Springs added radishes!

Check out the jams and other products from Hatch Farm, salsas from Gina’s, and hot sauce from Margaret’s.

The hens are laying more eggs these days! Fresh local eggs still available online.

Fresh produce, local meats and plenty of bakery items still available!

Fayetteville delivery is available FREE if you already donate for delivery, for SNAP, for seniors over 70, or any age if you are not able to drive to the library. $7 per order for other Fayetteville deliveries—all delivery funds are given to Seeds that Feed who provides this as a community service.

If you add items to your order, they will be combined into one order and your card will be charged just once.

Drive by pickup at the library is Thursday April 3 from 4:30-5:30 pm.

Questions? Reply to this email or call/text 479-935-5111.

If you no longer want to order or receive emails about the online market, just scroll down to the very bottom of the email message and click on the blue unsubscribe link. NOTE: Unsubscribe will prevent you from future ordering until you contact the online market to reactivate your account.

Posted by: Teresa Maurer at Monday April 01, 2024 05:30 PM EDT

Yalaha, FL: Market Open

Remember you can always email or text me if you want to place an order and I forgot to open the Market. Often flexible here though not always predictable.

If you Want to pick up the order at the Chillax Drum Circle in the Villages Sunday Afternoons, just let me know so I can bring it along. If you are with a homeschool group or other facebook group I attend events regularly, Let me know so I can plan accordingly. Otherwise when ordering, remember to let me know when you want to come pick up at the farm. If I don’t email you back to confirm, the order may not have gone through. To make an order you must be signed in, and you add products to your cart individually and then to check out you must go to your cart (Left side of screen near the top of the Market page) to do the check out and actually place the order.

The regular ordering window is now (as in whenever I open the Market) through Thursday 8am for Friday-Sunday pickup. (Or check with me tclynx@aquaponiclynx.com or text 407-342-8515 if you might want to pick up sooner or for special arrangements, I’m usually flexible.)

I may still be able to take orders after Thursday Morning but can’t guarantee availability of things as I may have already packed them for the Restaurants.
Ordering window is Monday Afternoon (or when I open it) through Thursday Morning and pick up will be Friday-Sunday by appointment until we expand more, Please indicate when you would like to pick up when you place your order.

I’m repeating myself now…..

Remember to tell me when you want to pick up! (and if I don’t reply to confirm within a day, bump my e-mail or text me 407-342-8515. Though I have cleaned up my e-mail so hopefully I won’t Miss Anyone.)

Sign in to order. https://yalaha.locallygrown.net/market

You have to sign in to see the add to cart button. Then set the number and click the add to cart button on the items you want to buy (it is the little picture right next to the quantity box.) Remember you need to check out before your order will be placed.
Remember to let me know when you want to pick up on Sat or maybe even Friday late afternoon or on Sunday. (If I don’t send you an e-mail confirmation of your order and pick up time, please make sure you checked out and completed your order.)

Posted by: Aleece Landis at Monday April 01, 2024 04:33 PM EDT

Stones River Market: REMINDER -- Still time to get your order in by 10pm

Hope everyone has had a blessed Easter weekend and enjoyed the nice weather. There is still time to get your order in for this week, Market will Close at 10 PM tonight.

Welcome to the March 31st and April 1st online Stones River Locally Grown Market,
pickup orders on Wednesday April 3rd between 5:00 to 6:30pm. (NOTE..we are back to our original hours.)

Delivery Service is available, if we have not delivered to you before, please put directions in the Comments with your order.

Weather is improving several of our Growers are in their fields and gardens preparing for a great 2024 harvest this year. Their is alot to select from this week, Special cuts of Beef and Pork and Chicken and Lamb, Fresh Farm Eggs, Jams and Jellies, Relishes, several dessert items, snacks, you can probably find alittle of everything to help with preparing your special meals.

Here is some Growers News:

Growers News: Always check back over the market anytime it is open, some Growers add or update their inventories.

Oakview Farm:
We will have some of its customer favorites this week: Scandanavian Buttermilk Sourdough Bread, Artisan Sourdough bread, Roasted Strawberry Jam, and Homemade Peppermint Patties! Our hens have been laying like crazy, so we have fresh eggs, too.

From our garden, we have our Salad Greens Mix, Cabbage, Rainbow Swiss Chard, and Spinach. We don’t use any chemical fertilizers or pesticides on our produce, so you know it’s good for you and the environment.

Quarter Spring Farm: has all the affordable luxury that you need this spring. From our moisturizing soaps to our delicious meats and eggs, we have all the goodies to pamper you. You work hard, so treat yourself to an incredible dining experience with our lamb or chicken. It’s healthier and tastier than conventionally grown meats, and better for the planet, too. Our amazing goat milk soaps and lotions will leave your skin feeling like you just dropped 2 grand at a high end spa. You deserve nice things, so let us provide them to you.

Safe and Sound Soap Co.:
This week I am featuring my small batch bar soap. It’s all natural made with nurturing ingredients for your skin, like olive oil and coconut oil, sweet almond oil, oats, and honey from my family’s bee farm. You will LOVE our Honey and Oat soap. It will soften up your skin after one use! Also if you haven’t tried our laundry soap yet, you need to grab some this week. It comes in a 64 oz container that washes 32 loads, as well as a 128 oz container that will wash 64 loads. Both sizes have a handle on the container for easy pouring. My laundry soap comes in Lemon Eucalyptus, Lavender, Orange Bergamot, Citrus, and Lemon Lavender Mint. Each of these are scented with a special blend of high quality essential oils that will not only freshen your clothing with a light scent, but also has cleaning properties to help disinfect your clothing! Don’t forget I also sell my own bottled hand sanitizer spray and non-toxic car air fresheners. These items make excellent gifts for Easter baskets, Mother’s Day, or Birthdays!

NashPhilly:
Few new items this week.- Chicken, prosciutto pesto lasagnas for spring. We are taking the journey of exploring different and special lasagnas this spring and summer season. Delicious pesto sauce with spinach, sun dried tomatoes and of course lots of Italian herbs and cheeses.

Bruschetta. It’s tomato time and we have been wanting to do this for a while now. Tomatoes marinated in extra virgin olive oil, balsamic vinegar, fresh basil and of course raw garlic. A great snack with some crackers, toast points, or you can even put it in a bed of salad greens.

Roasted Garlic and cauliflower soup. We roast the cauliflower with garlic, shallots, and thyme in the oven for one hour before blending it with vegetable stock. And finish it with truffle oil and fresh squeezed lemon juice. It’s a gluten free, dairy free, and vegetarian. And it’s a home run of a soup.

Kumaika Coffee:
If you have not started your morning with our Coffee, you are missing out! We have Dark, Medium and Light Roasted Beans. We are a Certified USDA Organic Product provider. We have a small coffee roaster business. We specialize in roasting and crafting small batches of organic, high altitude single origin and fair trade coffee beans. We bring the coffee beans directly from Nicaragua and roast small batches in our home located in Lascassas TN. We have Beans and/or Ground Coffee available or can’t decide order our Sampler of all 3.

Tailwynds Farm:
Several cuts of Beef on Sale and other assorted cuts of beef available, Coconut Pie, Oreo Cookie Pie and Strawberry Pie.

Valley View Farm & Garden:
Crocheted Baby Blankets and Decorative Eastern Bluebird Nesting Boxes and several selections of Dried HOT Peppers along with dried Floral Bouquet.

Lavender Cottage:
We are excited to be adding a few more new items. Some seasoning mixes as well as a new powder to our line up. When weather permiting, we plan to be on the porch Wednesday during pickup so you can view and purchase from our inventory.

Pinky’s Micros:
This is our WINTER microgren blend! Every season we create new blends to represent the time of year. OUR WINTER blend has ’YELLOW BEETS, RED PAC CHOI, IGLOO CAULIFLOWER and CURLY WATERCRESS.
What better way to start the New Year than with highly nutritional greens called Mirogreens? They pack 40 to 100% more vital nutrients than the adult verion. We grow organically with NON-GMO seeds and nutrient-dense soil. We look forward to providing the best for you in 2024.

RC Farms:
We have several items restocked and frozen produce, and delicious desserts, we’ve been working and preparing our tunnels for spring produce. Spring will be here before you know it!

Triple LLL Farm:
We have our “MARCH” and a few February specials posted. We also have added Chicken Thighs and Drumsticks still on sale. We also have added more eggs available

Flying S Farms:
FRESH FARM EGG SPECIAL, WE LOWERED OUR PRICE THIS WEEK…The ladies are very happy with the weather getting warmer, we are overrun with eggs! So we have a really good Eggcellent Special this week, single dozen or 3 dozen Fresh Farm Eggs Special. Also our have our delicious Sour Dough Breads, along with delicious Brownies, Biscuits, Various Friendship Breads, few Jams available, we will Jamming soon updating our inventory.

Growers News: Always check back over the next couple days, some Growers add or update their inventories.

Oakview Farm:
We will have some of its customer favorites this week: Scandanavian Buttermilk Sourdough Bread, Artisan Sourdough bread, Roasted Strawberry Jam, and Homemade Peppermint Patties! Our hens have been laying like crazy, so we have fresh eggs, too.

From our garden, we have our Salad Greens Mix, Cabbage, Rainbow Swiss Chard, and Spinach. We don’t use any chemical fertilizers or pesticides on our produce, so you know it’s good for you and the environment.

Quarter Spring Farm: has all the affordable luxury that you need this spring. From our moisturizing soaps to our delicious meats and eggs, we have all the goodies to pamper you. You work hard, so treat yourself to an incredible dining experience with our lamb or chicken. It’s healthier and tastier than conventionally grown meats, and better for the planet, too. Our amazing goat milk soaps and lotions will leave your skin feeling like you just dropped 2 grand at a high end spa. You deserve nice things, so let us provide them to you.

Safe and Sound Soap Co.:
This week I am featuring my small batch bar soap. It’s all natural made with nurturing ingredients for your skin, like olive oil and coconut oil, sweet almond oil, oats, and honey from my family’s bee farm. You will LOVE our Honey and Oat soap. It will soften up your skin after one use! Also if you haven’t tried our laundry soap yet, you need to grab some this week. It comes in a 64 oz container that washes 32 loads, as well as a 128 oz container that will wash 64 loads. Both sizes have a handle on the container for easy pouring. My laundry soap comes in Lemon Eucalyptus, Lavender, Orange Bergamot, Citrus, and Lemon Lavender Mint. Each of these are scented with a special blend of high quality essential oils that will not only freshen your clothing with a light scent, but also has cleaning properties to help disinfect your clothing! Don’t forget I also sell my own bottled hand sanitizer spray and non-toxic car air fresheners. These items make excellent gifts for Easter baskets, Mother’s Day, or Birthdays!

NashPhilly:
Few new items this week.- Chicken, prosciutto pesto lasagnas for spring. We are taking the journey of exploring different and special lasagnas this spring and summer season. Delicious pesto sauce with spinach, sun dried tomatoes and of course lots of Italian herbs and cheeses.

Bruschetta. It’s tomato time and we have been wanting to do this for a while now. Tomatoes marinated in extra virgin olive oil, balsamic vinegar, fresh basil and of course raw garlic. A great snack with some crackers, toast points, or you can even put it in a bed of salad greens.

Roasted Garlic and cauliflower soup. We roast the cauliflower with garlic, shallots, and thyme in the oven for one hour before blending it with vegetable stock. And finish it with truffle oil and fresh squeezed lemon juice. It’s a gluten free, dairy free, and vegetarian. And it’s a home run of a soup.

Kumaika Coffee:
If you have not started your morning with our Coffee, you are missing out! We have Dark, Medium and Light Roasted Beans. We are a Certified USDA Organic Product provider. We have a small coffee roaster business. We specialize in roasting and crafting small batches of organic, high altitude single origin and fair trade coffee beans. We bring the coffee beans directly from Nicaragua and roast small batches in our home located in Lascassas TN. We have Beans and/or Ground Coffee available or can’t decide order our Sampler of all 3.

Tailwynds Farm:
Several cuts of Beef on Sale and other assorted cuts of beef available, Coconut Pie, Oreo Cookie Pie and Strawberry Pie.

Valley View Farm & Garden:
Crocheted Baby Blankets and Decorative Eastern Bluebird Nesting Boxes and several selections of Dried HOT Peppers along with dried Floral Bouquet.

Lavender Cottage:
We are excited to be adding a few more new items. Some seasoning mixes as well as a new powder to our line up. When weather permiting, we plan to be on the porch Wednesday during pickup so you can view and purchase from our inventory.

Pinky’s Micros:
This is our WINTER microgren blend! Every season we create new blends to represent the time of year. OUR WINTER blend has ’YELLOW BEETS, RED PAC CHOI, IGLOO CAULIFLOWER and CURLY WATERCRESS.
What better way to start the New Year than with highly nutritional greens called Mirogreens? They pack 40 to 100% more vital nutrients than the adult verion. We grow organically with NON-GMO seeds and nutrient-dense soil. We look forward to providing the best for you in 2024.

RC Farms:
We have several items restocked and frozen produce, and delicious desserts, we’ve been working and preparing our tunnels for spring produce. Spring will be here before you know it!

Triple LLL Farm:
We have our “MARCH” and a few February specials posted. We also have added Chicken Thighs and Drumsticks still on sale. We also have added more eggs available

Flying S Farms:
FRESH FARM EGG SPECIAL, WE LOWERED OUR PRICE THIS WEEK…The ladies are very happy with the weather getting warmer, we are overrun with eggs! So we have a really good Eggcellent Special this week, single dozen or 3 dozen Fresh Farm Eggs Special. Also our have our delicious Sour Dough Breads, along with delicious Brownies, Biscuits, Various Friendship Breads, few Jams available, we will Jamming soon updating our inventory.