Subject: BREAKING NEWS: U.S. climate report warns of dire changes by 2050
From: "POLITICO" <[email-masked]>
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Date: Fri, 23 Nov 2018 13:28:59 -0600
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Federal scientists warned in a new report Friday that changes in the climate will disrupt the economies of every region in the country in the coming years, with costs threatening to reach hundreds of billions of dollars annually by the middle of this century.
 
The message, echoing decades of sobering conclusions from the world's leading climate scientists, is at odds with President Donald Trump's repeated scoffing at the idea of global warming. And the administration chose to release it on Black Friday, the busiest shopping day and one of the slowest news days of the year.
 
But despite the timing, the report is bound to energize the new class of progressive Democrats set to take control og the House in January, many of whom are already pushing for an expansive "Green New Deal" as one of their campaign rallying cries in 2020.
 
The report is the latest scientific work to warn that the planet is due to undergo devastating changes in the coming years that will permanently alter the coastlines, worsen droughts and storms and foster the outbreaks of dangerous diseases as temperatures climb. And while the report said quick action to reduce greenhouse gas pollution could dramatically affect the state of the planet by the end of the century, many of the impacts the U.S. will see in the next two decades appear irreversible.
 
"Because several [greehouse gases], in particular carbon dioxide, reside in the atmosphere for decades or longer, many climate-influenced effects are projected to continue changing through 2050, even if GHG emissions were to stop immediately," said the Fourth National Climate Assessment Vol. II.
 
"While mitigation and adaptation efforts have expanded substantially in the last four years, they do not yet approach the scale considered necessary to avoid substantial damages to the economy, environment, and human health over the coming decades," the report said. 
 
Progressives, led by incoming Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, are pushing House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi to bring back a special committee on climate change and empower it to craft new legislation. Some senior Democrats have opposed that move as an erosion of existing committees' powers.
 
Even before its release, Trump was attacking climate change science this week as cold temperatures bore down on the East Coast, tweeting on Wednesday, "Whatever happened to Global Warming?" (Weather and climate are different things, scientists frequently point out.)
 
The new report, which Congress requires to be issued every four years, was released by U.S. Global Change Research Program. It is the product of 300 scientific experts under the guidance of a 60-member federal advisory committee, and it was open to review by the public, 13 federal agencies and a panel at the National Academy of Sciences.
 
It's the first climate report that is wholly a product of the Trump administration. A previous volume, the Climate Science Special Report published a year ago, was started under the Obama administration but published under Trump.
 
Last year's report said the 1.8 degree Fahrenheit increase in global temperatures since 1901 had lifted temperatures to their highest level in the history of modern civilization, and that it was extremely likely human activities, especially emissions of greenhouse gases, were the dominant cause of the warming since the mid-20th century.
 
The new federal report lays out grim scenarios for each part of the country, including how changes in the amounts and timing of snow and rainfall is leading water stress.
 
For example, hydropower production in the Southwest and the Northwest will be under threat, even as groundwater depletion is worsening drought risk in many parts of the United States, particularly in the Southwest and Southern Great Plains. Dependable and safe water supplies for U.S. Caribbean Hawaii, and Pacific Island communities are threatened by drought, flooding, and saltwater contamination due to sea level rise.
 
The frequency and severity of allergic illnesses, including asthma and hay fever, are expected to increase as a result of a changing climate, it said, and warming temperatures are projected to alter the geographic range of disease-carrying insects and pests, exposing more people to ticks that carry Lyme disease and mosquitoes that transmit viruses such as Zika, West Nile and dengue.
 
"Communities in the Southeast, for example, are particularly vulnerable to the combined health impacts from vector-borne disease, heat, and flooding," the report said.
 
Agriculture will be particularly affected, it said, with new challenges to livestock health, declines in crop yields and quality, and extreme weather will threaten rural livelihoods, sustainable food security and price stability.
 
"Increases in temperatures during the growing season in the Midwest are projected to be the largest contributing factor to declines in the productivity of U.S. agriculture," the report said.
 
The Northeast will suffer from flooding from heavy rainfall, storm surge and rising high tides, which will compound issues with aging infrastructure in the Northeast.
 
Zack Colman contributed to this report.

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