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Why are Pakistan’s floods so extreme this year?
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Re: Why are Pakistan’s floods so extreme this year?
#82"Pakistan is home to over 7,200 glaciers, more than anywhere outside the poles. Rising temperatures, linked to climate change, are likely making many of them melt faster and earlier, adding water to rivers and streams that are already swollen by rainfall." https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2022/8/30/23327341/pa...
> Pakistan is home to over 7,200 glaciers, more than anywhere outside the poles
It seems odd to give a measure of ice as the count of the pieces.
Re: Why are Pakistan’s floods so extreme this year?
#83Earlier quoted context omitted.
When Gabe Brown switched from conventional agriculture to regenerative agriculture, he increased water infiltration in his soil from 0.5 inches (1.25cm) per hour to 30 inches (75cm) per hour. So imagine if he and all his neighbors had the same beautiful soil -- flooding just couldn't happen. I haven't seen a list of such measurements from permaculture, but I know it can be used to regreen deserts (as shown in Jordan,…
Any link to read about this 0.5 - 30 inch/hr conversion? Cultivated soil or already wetted soil will absorb much more readily than not, was this a carefully controlled experiment? Anyway it would take some serious modelling not handwavy yes or no as to whether permaculture/regenerative techniques (and a well defined definition of success of mitigation) could work. I absolutely admit that it could help on the margins,…
Living in similar conditions in Florida, I know at about 4 inches per hour on a plain, you're screwed. It floods badly. And we have excellent drainage systems.
Re: Why are Pakistan’s floods so extreme this year?
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
Highlighted by the stupidity of not buying directly from Russia at normal prices but instead buying the same hydrocarbons extracted by Russia from war washing third parties like China and India who resell Russian hydrocarbons to those who for political reasons can’t buy directly but can buy indirectly at inflated prices!! It’s the height of stupidity.
As far as I can tell, e.g. (1), the EU does not get gas from China or India. (1) https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/commodities/europea...
Re: Why are Pakistan’s floods so extreme this year?
#85I read someone else suggest Permaculture as a way of mitigating some of the affects of monsoons in these types of areas. Does anyone have any evidences of such a thing working?
I can't see how it could help having tons of plastic also floating in the river and expensive gravel filling the river bottom. The best way would still be to work with the monsoon, not against it.
But maybe I'm not understanding the solution. Can you explain more the idea?
Re: Why are Pakistan’s floods so extreme this year?
#86Earlier quoted context omitted.
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00376-022-2034-1 Unlikely. At least a single volcanic eruption is not enough to change the long-term climate trend, you need a clusters of eruptions to persist through centuries for that. HTHH will likely decrease the global mean surface temperatures by 0.004°C in the first year. Compared to that human activity is a thousand times more significant, everything else is statist…
> At least a single volcanic eruption is not enough to change the long-term climate trend, you need a clusters of eruptions to persist through centuries for that. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1883_eruption_of_Krakatoa “ The eruption caused a volcanic winter.[17] In the year following the eruption, average Northern Hemisphere summer temperatures fell by 0.4 °C (0.72 °F).[18] The record rainfall that hit Southern Ca…
Also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Year_Without_a_Summer with Mount Tambora
There's good evidence this has happened multiple times in history by a single eruption.
Re: Why are Pakistan’s floods so extreme this year?
#87Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think it's a political problem, not a technical problem. If we can imagine that our best climate models could drive decision making to enable geoengineering... why don't our best climate models drive earlier interventions?
Geoengineering is a unique prospect in that it's inexpensive-- Cheap enough that a couple of billionaires could pay for it if they wanted. In terms of interventions, it's a much easier pill to swallow than something in the trillions of dollars. The pushback comes from the risk. While we know that it'll cool the planet, we don't necessarily know how it'll affect weather patterns. If we can figure that out with some le…
I think there are probably several billionaires who independently have the resources the pursue significant stratospheric aerosol injection. I wonder how such an individual would imagine their liability for stochastic effects on agriculture. Those risks make me think it's most likely a government with a nuclear arsenal would pursue this... perhaps India? Mumbai could become a very difficult place to live in a few decades.
Re: Why are Pakistan’s floods so extreme this year?
#88Earlier quoted context omitted.
Except it has happened about every 12 years throughout history The ancients even created a name for it: La Nina.
Except this is our third La Nina year in a row, the first time that's ever happened: https://www.reuters.com/business/environment/wmo-forecasts-f...
That article only says it’s the first this century.
Re: Why are Pakistan’s floods so extreme this year?
#89Climate change is real and has changed the temporal distribution of rainfall, often increasing the interval between rainfalls, while also increasing the amount that falls, during rainy periods. Longer durations of 'no rain' cause the ground harden to a much less porous, concrete-like surface that cannot absorb the rain, when it does come, fast enough. So the water pools and flows, causing flood conditions.
Except it has happened about every 12 years throughout history The ancients even created a name for it: La Nina.
Whatabout this thing that can happen at the same time as the climate changing due to human pollution?
Re: Why are Pakistan’s floods so extreme this year?
#90I'd love to see nature write an article about why a certain part of the world has had such unusually moderate temperature and precipitation of late. Also, if you want to search the whole globe for something extreme happening, you're guaranteed to find it in spades.