We enter into another Fall weekend and right on cue a new News Dump….
Locally–I am old so let’s talk about the weather….still temps above average but a little more rain which will help the drought a bit….but some cooler weather approaches.
Let’s begin this Saturday with some weather news….
A new analysis of 4,000 climate-related extreme weather events has put the worldwide cost over the past decade at $2 trillion. The US sustained the largest economic loss, according to the report commissioned by the International Chamber of Commerce, at $935 billion. China was second at $268 billion in losses over 10 years. The estimates cover the total cost of violent weather, the Guardian reports, rather than only events that can be tied to climate change. The ICC suggested the findings push the Cop29 climate summit, which began Monday in Azerbaijan, to take action
The summit is to wrestle with setting amounts that wealthy countries should pay to help poor countries deal with the damage and adapt to the increasingly violent weather. A study released last month found that more than half of the 68,000 heat deaths in Europe in summer 2022 were caused by climate breakdown. An ICC official said the matter is urgent. “The data from the past decade shows definitively that climate change is not a future problem,” said John Denton. “Major productivity losses from extreme weather events are being felt in the here and now by the real economy.”
The costs of extreme weather—including flash flooding, hurricanes, and fires—increased gradually between 2014 and 2023, the report says, as fossil fuel pollution has turned up the temperature. The toll amounted to $451 billion in the past two years alone, per the Guardian. Poor countries are hit hardest. The ICC called for quick action to help countries financially that need it to reduce pollution and make changes to better handle extreme weather. “Financing climate action in the developing world shouldn’t be seen as an act of generosity by the leaders of the world’s richest economies,” Denton said, adding that the money is an investment in a more resilient global economy.
The extreme weather will cost us if not now soon.
Climate change is a huge problem and another possible solution to help has come to light….
In volcanic ocean vents off the coast of Italy, researchers have discovered a new strain of cyanobacteria that could pack a particularly effective punch when it comes to capturing carbon dioxide, one of the driving forces of climate change.
The cyanobacterium, or alga, is officially known as UTEX 3222, but the team behind its discovery have given it the far catchier nickname of “Chonkus” – because, in the presence of carbon dioxide, this thing grows very, very quickly.
Chonkus was first collected in seawater samples taken from shallow volcanic seeps near the island of Vulcano. Since these vents get a healthy dose of both sunlight and gases, researchers suspected that they might make a good place to search for photosynthetic organisms well-adapted to not only thrive in the presence of CO2, but even capture it.
“An incredible amount of microbial diversity exists out there in the world, and we believe it’s more efficient to seek out the microbes that have already evolved to succeed in human-relevant environments rather than trying to engineer all of the traits we want into lab-grown E. coli bacteria,” said Braden Tierney, co-corresponding author of the study describing the findings, in a statement.
Will this yet another possible solution that we hear about and is never heard of again?
Some health news that is disturbing….diabetes.
Thursday was World Diabetes Day, but it’s not exactly a celebration—at least not according to new research published Wednesday in the Lancet. According to findings from a new global analysis carried out by the NCD Risk Factor Collaboration and the World Health Organization, 828 million adults around the world had either Type 1 or Type 2 diabetes in 2022, more than four times the 198 million that claimed the same in 1990, per a release. In that 30-year-plus span, global diabetes rates for both men and women doubled, rising from 6.8% to 14.3% for the former, and from 6.9% to 13.9% for the latter. Researchers put together their study, said to be the first global analysis of trends in diabetes rates and treatments in all nations, by compiling data from more than 1,000 studies on upward of 140 million adults worldwide.
The Guardian notes that more than half of the diabetes cases found worldwide were centered in four nations: India (212 million), China (148 million), the United States (42 million), and Pakistan (36 million). Indonesia and Brazil also ranked high on the list. Among wealthy countries in the West, the United States and the UK claim the highest diabetes rates, with 12.5% and 8.8% of the population suffering from the condition, respectively. Fueling the rise in diabetes cases are an aging population, more prevalent obesity, unhealthy diets, and lack of available treatment, especially in developing nations. About 445 million patients ages 30 and over, or 59% of those with diabetes, didn’t see treatment in 2022—3 1/2 times more than the number logged in 1990.
“[Diabetes] has reached pandemic proportions, posing a profound threat to public health and economies alike,” Chantal Mathieu, head of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes, tells the Guardian. Study co-author Ranjit Mohan Anjana adds: “Our findings highlight the need to see more ambitious policies, especially in lower-income regions of the world, that restrict unhealthy foods, make healthy foods affordable, and improve opportunities to exercise, through measures such as subsidies for healthy foods and free healthy school meals, as well as promoting safe places for walking and exercising, including free entrance to public parks and fitness centers.”
Remember when the big deal was that we eat 3 meals a day?
It’s likely you eat three meals a day – modern life is designed around this way of eating. We’re told breakfast is the most important meal of the day, we’re given lunch breaks at work, and then our social and family lives revolve around evening meals. But is this the healthiest way to eat?
Before considering how frequently we should eat, scientists urge us to consider when we shouldn’t.
Intermittent fasting, where you restrict your food intake to an eight-hour window, is becoming a huge area of research.
Giving our bodies at least 12 hours a day without food allows our digestive system to rest, says Emily Manoogian, clinical researcher at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in California, and author of a 2019 paper entitled “When to eat”.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/should-we-be-eating-three-meals-a-day
Nuts make the nuts (not talking about politicians here)….
In a sprawling plant in the heart of California’s farmland, millions of shells rush down a metallic chute and onto a conveyor belt where they’re inspected, roasted, packaged, and shipped off to groceries around the world. Pistachios are growing fast in California, where farmers have been devoting more land to a crop seen as hardier and more drought-tolerant. The crop generated nearly $3 billion last year in California, and in the past decade, the United States has surpassed Iran to become the world’s top exporter of the nut, per the AP. “There has been an explosion over the last 10 or 15 years of plantings, and those trees are coming online,” said Zachary Fraser, president and CEO of American Pistachio Growers, which represents more than 800 farmers in the southwestern US. “You are starting to see the fruit of people’s vision from 40 years ago.”
California grows more than a third of the country’s vegetables and three-quarters of its fruit and nuts, per state agricultural statistics. Pistachios have surged over the past decade to become the state’s sixth-biggest agricultural commodity in value, ahead of longtime crops such as strawberries and tomatoes, the data shows. Much of the crop heads to China, where it’s a popular treat during Lunar New Year. But industry experts said Americans also are eating more pistachios, which were rarely in grocery stores a generation ago and today are a snack food found almost everywhere. They’re sold with shells or without, and flavors range from salt and pepper to honey roasted.
Pistachios are poised to weather California’s dry spells better than its even bigger nut crop, almonds, which generated nearly $4 billion in the state last year. Pistachio orchards can be sustained with minimal water during drought, unlike almonds and other more sensitive crops. The trees also rely on wind instead of bees for pollination and can produce nuts for decades longer, said Rob Yraceburu, president of Wonderful Orchards, part of the $6 billion agricultural firm Wonderful Company. Over the next few years, pistachio acreage is expected to continue to grow. “You see all the value the pistachio industry is providing to California agriculture is approaching that of almonds, with a lot less acreage,” said David Magana, a senior analyst at Rabobank. “I haven’t seen pistachio orchards being pulled out.” More here.
Will they still be going to China once the trade war begins? Will they get cheaper in this country?
I believe is enough for us to think about on this Saturday….
Enjoy your weekend and as always….Be well and Be Safe….
I Read, I Write, You Know
“lego ergo scribo”