A Hotter Future Is Certain, According to Climate Change "Report"

During 150 years the global temp has gone up by 1 degree Celsius. Nobody noticed it at the time but it coincided with a period of great human progress and prosperity. Why should a repeat of the process lead to disasters instead? It is just another false prophecy

They list natural disasters but their cause is speculative. They have always been with us. They go back to the Bible

Humans have already heated the planet by roughly 1.1 degrees Celsius, or 2 degrees Fahrenheit, since the 19th century, largely by burning coal, oil and gas for energy. And the consequences can be felt across the globe: This summer alone, blistering heat waves have killed hundreds of people in the United States and Canada, floods have devastated Germany and China, and wildfires have raged out of control in Siberia, Turkey and Greece.

But that’s only the beginning, according to the report, issued on Monday by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a body of scientists convened by the United Nations. Even if nations started sharply cutting emissions today, total global warming is likely to rise around 1.5 degrees Celsius within the next two decades, a hotter future that is now essentially locked in.

At 1.5 degrees of warming, scientists have found, the dangers grow considerably. Nearly 1 billion people worldwide could swelter in more frequent life-threatening heat waves. Hundreds of millions more would struggle for water because of severe droughts. Some animal and plant species alive today will be gone. Coral reefs, which sustain fisheries for large swaths of the globe, will suffer more frequent mass die-offs.

“We can expect a significant jump in extreme weather over the next 20 or 30 years,” said Piers Forster, a climate scientist at the University of Leeds and one of hundreds of international experts who helped write the report. “Things are unfortunately likely to get worse than they are today.”

Not all is lost, however, and humanity can still prevent the planet from getting even hotter. Doing so would require a coordinated effort among countries to stop adding carbon dioxide to the atmosphere by around 2050, which would entail a rapid shift away from fossil fuels starting immediately, as well as potentially removing vast amounts of carbon from the air. If that happened, global warming would likely halt and level off at around 1.5 degrees Celsius, the report concludes.

But if nations fail in that effort, global average temperatures will keep rising — potentially passing 2 degrees, 3 degrees or even 4 degrees Celsius, compared with the preindustrial era. The report describes how every additional degree of warming brings far greater perils, such as ever more vicious floods and heat waves, worsening droughts and accelerating sea-level rise that could threaten the existence of some island nations. The hotter the planet gets, the greater the risks of crossing dangerous “tipping points,” like the irreversible collapse of the immense ice sheets in Greenland and West Antarctica.

“There’s no going back from some changes in the climate system,” said Ko Barrett, a vice-chair of the panel and a senior adviser for climate at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. But, she added, immediate and sustained emissions cuts “could really make a difference in the climate future we have ahead of us.”

The report, approved by 195 governments and based on more than 14,000 studies, is the most comprehensive summary to date of the physical science of climate change. It will be a focal point when diplomats gather in November at a U.N. summit in Glasgow to discuss how to step up their efforts to reduce emissions.

A growing number of world leaders, including President Biden, have endorsed the goal of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, though current policies in the major polluting countries are still far off-track from achieving that target. The 10 biggest emitters of greenhouse gases are China, the United States, the European Union, India, Russia, Japan, Brazil, Indonesia, Iran and Canada.

The new report leaves no doubt that humans are responsible for global warming, concluding that essentially all of the rise in global average temperatures since the 19th century has been driven by nations burning fossil fuels, clearing forests and loading the atmosphere with greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide and methane that trap heat.

The changes in climate to date have little parallel in human history, the report said. The last decade is quite likely the hottest the planet has been in 125,000 years. The world’s glaciers are melting and receding at a rate “unprecedented in at least the last 2,000 years.” Atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide have not been this high in at least 2 million years.

Ocean levels have risen 8 inches on average over the past century, and the rate of increase has doubled since 2006. Heat waves have become significantly hotter since 1950 and last longer in much of the world. Wildfire weather has worsened across large swaths of the globe. Bursts of extreme heat in the ocean — which can kill fish, seabirds and coral reefs — have doubled in frequency since the 1980s.

In recent years, scientists have also been able to draw clear links between global warming and specific severe weather events. Many of the deadly new temperature extremes the world has seen — like the record-shattering heat wave that scorched the Pacific Northwest in June — “would have been extremely unlikely to occur without human influence on the climate system,” the report says. Greenhouse gas emissions are noticeably making some droughts, downpours and floods worse.

Tropical cyclones have likely become more intense over the past 40 years, the report said, a shift that cannot be explained by natural variability alone.

And as global temperatures keep rising, the report notes, so will the hazards. Consider a dangerous heat wave that, in the past, would have occurred just once in a given region every 50 years. Today, a similar heat wave can be expected every 10 years, on average. At 1.5 degrees Celsius of global warming, those heat waves will strike every 5 years and be significantly hotter. At 4 degrees of warming, they will occur nearly annually.

The new report is part of the sixth major assessment of climate science from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which was created in 1988. A second report, set to be released in 2022, will detail how climate change might affect aspects of human society, such as coastal cities, farms or health care systems. A third report, also expected next year, will explore more fully strategies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and halt global warming.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/09/climate/climate-change-report-ipcc-un.html

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Test of ten latest EVs on sale show they miss range claims on average by 15%

Even some of the best-rated electric cars on the market today are missing their claimed battery range figures by almost a third, according to real-world test results revealed on Wednesday.

A test of ten of the latest EVs in showrooms revealed that some fell just 3 per cent short of the quoted ranges, while others missed theirs by as much as 29 per cent, according to What Car? magazine.

While a new £25,000 Fiat 500 was furthest shy of its official range in terms of percentage points, a £50,000 Ford Mustang Mach-e - which has a tested range 20 per cent less than advertised - posted the biggest disappearance of miles.

With a claimed range of 379 miles and calculated real-world measurement of 302 miles, it means 77 miles is wiped off what the sales brochure says it can do on a full charge - that's around the same distance to drive from London to Southampton.

The tests were conducted as part of the auto title's Electric Car of the Year Awards 2021.

Topping the test was the ultra-expensive Porsche Taycan 4S Performance Battery Plus.

It was voted the Best Electric Performance Car, but doesn't come cheap, setting buyers back a whopping £88,710.

What Car?'s test team found it could cover 281 miles in the real world, which was just 3 per cent - or 9 miles - less than the quoted 290 miles.

The test was conducted on closed roads on a 15-mile route consisting of 2.6 miles of simulated stop-start urban traffic, 4 miles of steady 50mph driving and 8 miles of driving at a constant speed of 70mph, to simulate motorway journeys.

Each of the 10 vehicles was fully charged and left outside for 15 hours, before being fully charged again ahead of the test.

The cars were then driven until they ran flat, with on-road position and driver changes at the end of each lap.

The range achieved was then compared to the official, Worldwide Harmonised Light Vehicle Test Procedure (WLTP) that is used by manufacturers for their quoted figures.

The test was conducted on closed roads on a 15-mile route consisting of 2.6 miles of simulated stop-start urban traffic, 4 miles of steady 50mph driving and 8 miles of driving at a constant speed of 70mph, to simulate motorway journeys +7
The test was conducted on closed roads on a 15-mile route consisting of 2.6 miles of simulated stop-start urban traffic, 4 miles of steady 50mph driving and 8 miles of driving at a constant speed of 70mph, to simulate motorway journeys

The Porsche Taycan 4S beat the Mazda MX-30 SE-L Lux into second place, with that falling just 7.1 per cent short of its quoted 124-mile range - also a loss of 9 miles.

At the opposite end of the spectrum, Fiat's 500 42kWh Icon was farthest away from its official range, falling 29 per cent shy of its 198-mile WLTP figure, translating to a missing 58 miles.

Meanwhile, the Ford Mach-E Extended Range RWD fell 20 per cent short of its official figure, but achieved the highest outright test mileage, covering 379 miles before its battery ran out - which is 77 short of what Ford says it should do.

On average, the 10 vehicles tested achieved a shortfall of 14.8 per cent from their quoted WLTP range.

A similar test of nearly 100 petrol, diesel and hybrid cars earlier this year - also conducted by What Car? - found that the latest models with internal combustion engines are, on average, 6.3 per cent less efficient than claimed miles per gallon figures would lead customers to believe.

Steve Huntingford, editor of What Car?, said: 'Range is one of the key criteria for new and used electric car buyers.

'Our real-world driving test shows that some electric vehicles can get incredibly close to their quoted figures in the real world, while others are farther behind, so it's important buyers do their research and organise test drives when considering a new electric vehicle.'

What Car? Electric Car Awards 2021 winners included the Volkswagen ID.3 Pro Performance Life, which was named Best Electric Family Car, while the Kia e-Niro 64kWh 2 – a previous What Car? Car of the Year – was named Best Electric Small SUV. Kia also took home the Reader Award, for the EV6, with this title going to the upcoming electric vehicle that What Car? readers are most excited about.

The big-selling Tesla Model 3 took home the Best Electric Executive Car title, while BMW's 330e M Sport was named Best Hybrid Executive Car. Skoda's Enyaq 60 Lodge won Best Electric Large SUV.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/money/cars/article-9835811/Some-electric-cars-miss-quoted-battery-ranges-THIRD.html

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