Daily Quick Read - August 26, 2019

Actuaries Believe in Climate Change

 Paradise, California      Josh Edelson/AFP/Getty Images

Since 1990 the number of homes built in what is called the wildland-urban interface increased by over 40%.  It is estimated that in California nearly 10 million people live wildfire prone areas.  And, some of the most conservative people in the nation are beginning to think the climate change may be a real problem.  No, not Republican politicians – actually it’s insurance actuaries.

Insurance companies dropped more than 340,000 homeowners from wildfire areas in just four years. Between 2015 and 2018, the 10 California counties with the most homes in flammable forests saw a 177 percent increase in homeowners turning to an expensive state-backed insurance program because they could not find private insurance.

In some ways, this news is not surprising. According to a recent survey of insurance actuaries (the people who calculate insurance risks and premiums based on available data), the industry ranked climate change as the top risk for 2019, beating out concerns over cyber damages, financial instability, and terrorism. While having insurance companies on board with climate science is a good thing for, say, requiring cities to invest in more sustainable infrastructure, it’s bad news for homeowners who can’t simply pick up their lodgings and move elsewhere.

“We are seeing an increasing trend across California where people at risk of wildfires are being non-renewed by their insurer,” said California Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara in a statement.

“This data should be a wake-up call for state and local policymakers that without action to reduce the risk from extreme wildfires and preserve the insurance market we could see communities unraveling.”

Alaska Burning

Speaking of communities built in the wildland-urban interface unravelling, how about Anchorage, Alaska?  Facing an unprecedented drought and extended fire season, global warming is becoming the new reality.  Will the reality of Alaska burning have any impact on oil extraction in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge?  I suspect not.

Major fires are burning this week in south-central Alaska, lengthening the state’s wildfire season, which has usually ended by the beginning of August.

They come after Alaska’s hottest July on record, during which its largest city, Anchorage, had a temperature pass 90F (32C) for the first time. On top of that, the area has seen little rain this summer, resulting in extremely dry conditions.

As firefighters tackle the blazes, officials are facing the longer term challenges of keeping the region safe amid increasing evidence of the impacts of the climate crisis.

“Alaska residents in 2019 have dealt with more fire prone conditions, have dealt with more smoke, and have generally been more concerned and more aware of fire conditions,” said Brian Brettschneider, a climate scientist with the University of Alaska Fairbanks.

This is the result of multiple factors, he said. Alaska’s fire season is usually earlier than the season in the contiguous US, taking place in late spring and early summer. Humidity is lowest, as well as it being the driest and windiest time of year. What usually helps mitigate those conditions, Brettschneider said, is lingering snow cover. But due to global heating, snow in the Anchorage area is melting earlier, extending the length of the season. And as temperatures go up, conditions are getting even drier.

Ban Cats Not Wind Mills

The idiot in charge of the US, falsely claimed that wind turbines, or as he called them “wind mills,” kill massive numbers of birds, specifically bald eagles.  Wind power is a key component of renewable energy and the effect of wind turbines on wildlife needs careful study and effective mitigation plans.  Those plans are actually being implemented, so Trump can relax about the safety of bald eagles.  I don’t know if we can ever convince him that he will still be able to watch TV when the wind isn’t blowing.

According to the WWEA , wind turbines installed by end of 2018 will account for close to 6% of global electricity demand.  The total share of renewable energy in the power sector is expected to increase from 25% in 2017 to 85% by 2050, mostly through growth in the solar and wind sectors, the International Renewable Energy Agency says.

Wind turbines are often citied as being particularly bad for birds and bats. Birds of prey, for instance,  have a blind spot in front of them, and look down as they search for food. Collision with unseen giant blades can easily prove fatal. The towering structures can also force birds to deviate from their regular routes between breeding and feeding areas, meaning they have to travel longer distances which can ultimately leave them with less energy to raise young.

But numerous other studies have shown that bird deaths caused by wind turbines are much lower than other human-related causes such as power lines or collisions with buildings.

Alex Lenferna, social justice campaigner for 350Africa, agrees that ecological concerns related to wind turbines must be taken into account, but also highlights the broader context of the transition.

"In places like South Africa, where coal is very prevalent, the transition to renewable energy is much more beneficial ecologically than continuous reliance on fossil fuels," he told DW.

In most cases, adequate siting and technological improvements can avoid wind turbines conflicting with biodiversity, experts agree. Selective shutdown of turbines in sensitive areas for migratory birds, for instance, can be very effective.

The American Wind Wildlife Institute examined ten separate studies related to bird fatalities as a result of wind turbines and concluded that restricting blade rotation at low wind speeds could reduce the number of bat fatalities by between 50 and 87%.

Coral Need Low Light and Soft Music

This is a big deal.  Coral don’t reproduce and grow in aquariums – usually.  What the folks in Florida did took years of research, modifications and patient effort.  The result will be healthy coral that can be used to repopulate damage reefs.  Still, it is an uphill battle as ocean conditions such as warming and acidification are constantly killing off healthy coral colonies.

After two years and more than $4.5 million, scientists working with the Florida Aquarium have pulled off something no one else ever has: They coaxed imperiled Atlantic Ocean coral into spawning in a laboratory, aquarium officials announced Wednesday.

The fact that this can be done in a lab, they said, is a hopeful sign for saving the Florida coral reef that stretches along the state’s Atlantic coast from Martin County south to the Keys. The corals there have been suffering from the effects of warming water and acidification due to climate change, as well as a disease that has left them in danger of extinction. Scientists hope to cultivate enough lab-spawned pillar coral to rebuild the reef.

The historic event occurred at 12:45 p.m. Saturday in a 350-gallon tank. The tank sits in a small, dark room on the second floor of a wooden building next to a Tampa Electric Co. power plant. Scientists used computer-controlled lighting and manipulated water temperatures and flow to fool the pillar coral into believing it was just after sunset, the right time to spawn.

In just one day of observing those larvae, she said, they learned more about raising them than they had ever known before. The larvae swam around and eventually will settle onto small, square tiles with algae on them. That’s where they will begin to grow.

At some point when they mature, perhaps in two years, the scientists will explore replanting them in the Keys as part of an effort to rebuild the declining reef system, O’Neil said.

Taking Some Plastic Off the Shelf

Dave Lewis, the CEO of one of largest supermarket chain in the United Kingdom says its stores are going to ban “brands that use excessive plastic packaging” from their shelves.  This is where the battle to reduce packaging plastics needs to be fought.  Individual consumers have little agency to force change, but major retailers have much more economic power to drive this sort of change.

Lewis's words are a breath of fresh air in an industry that is moving glacially in response to consumer concerns about single-use packaging. His decision creates pressure on suppliers that is far more intense than anything shoppers can generate; at worst, they can leave an item on the shelf if they don't like its packaging. But in Lewis's case, non-compliance threatens suppliers' ability to sell in 2,658 large stores across the country.

Tesco is walking its own talk by eliminating hard-to-recycle plastics, such as black takeout trays, from its own store-brand products. It is trialling a loose fruits and vegetables aisle at a location in Cambridge, and offering multi-buys of products without the plastic packaging that used to lump them together. But all of this would be more effective if government got involved, regulating recycling and closed-loop production. Lewis hopes others jump on board, too.