planted city

It’s Gettin’ Hot in Here: ‘Key Climate Change Impacts’ (Slideshow)

- An average temperature increase of 1.6 degrees Celsius across Canada compared to a global increase of 0.7 degrees Celsius, and a 2.1-degree-Celsius increase in the Canadian north from 1948 to 2010;

- Combined spending of $1.2 billion by the governments of Canada, British Columbia and Alberta to respond to the mountain pine beetle epidemic that is resulting in the loss of 8,000 jobs and the closure of 16 lumber mills by 2018;

- Economic losses of $5.8 billion and 41,000 jobs lost because of droughts in Alberta and Saskatchewan in 2001 and 2002 that have affected the agriculture industry;

- A 20-day annual increase since the 1950s in the average number of days with rain;

- The year 2010 was the warmest on record with average temperatures three degrees Celsius above normal; it was also the 14th consecutive year with above-normal temperatures;

- Massive Arctic ice melting is opening the door to a doubling of cruise ship voyages and new opportunities for gas exploration; it’s also opening the door for transmission of diseases across oceans and species;

- Melting permafrost creating risks to waste containment and resulting in a 130-kilometre retreat in the southern limit of Quebec’s permafrost, as well as up to $50 million in costs to the province of Manitoba in a season to airlift fuel and food that could not be transported by ground;

- Lower water levels in the Great Lakes, forcing ships to lighten their cargo, causing multimillion-dollar decreases in business shipping volumes, as well as reducing hydroelectricity outputs and compromising wetlands that filter contaminants and absorb excess storm water;

- Record costs of up to $400 million to fight forest fires in a single season in British Columbia, with the three most expensive seasons recorded over the last decade;

- Hundreds of millions in damage in recent years from extreme weather and rain events that have affected Toronto, Atlantic Canada and other regions;

Fossil Fuels | ‘Infographic: How Tar Sands Oil Is Produced’

From NPR:

The oil product extracted from Canada’s tar sands isn’t like conventional crude. Known as bitumen, it’s sticky and so thick, it can’t flow down a pipeline without extensive processing. There are two methods for getting bitumen out of the ground and turning it into usable products. Both are complex, energy-intensive and expensive processes – but high oil prices are finally making tar sands profitable.

Related:

• ‘When This Oil Spills, It’s ‘A Whole New Monster’ (NPR)
• ‘Oil Sands: Canada’s 10 Ethical Challenges: The Series’ (The Tyee)
• ‘Oh Canada: The Government’s Broad Assault on Environment’ (Yale e360)

From The Guardian:

A quintessentially Canadian winter tradition – outdoor ice hockey – could be facing extinction within decades because of climate change, a new study says.

Pick-up games of ice hockey, also called shinny or pond hockey, are a way of life during the long winters. Many towns are studded with neighbourhood ice rinks, some families even freeze over their backyards. Ottawa has the Rideau Canal, the 5-mile skate run through the nation’s capital. But such pursuits are in peril as milder winters and earlier springs pare down the outdoor ice season.

The ice season has shortened noticeably over the last 50 years, especially in southern British Columbia and Alberta and parts of the prairie provinces, the study in the Institute of Physics’ journal, Environmental Research Letters, says. 

…

It takes a long cold spell to be able to build a good foundation for ice sports – at least three days in a row at -5C, the researchers determined, from interviews with public rink officials.

But temperature records from 142 weather stations across the southern belt of Canada, where most of the population lives, showed a distinct warming trend from 1951-2005.

Check out the rest of the article here.

(Photo credit: Globe & Mail)

From The CBC:

A new NASA study predicts massive ecological changes for Canada’s Prairies and boreal regions by the year 2100.

Those areas are in “hot spots” highly vulnerable to massive environmental changes this century due to global warming, the study states.

Much of Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba is predicted to see major shifts northward of plant and animal species.

“By about 2100, the climate change projections that we have today would suggest that there would be pressure on that grassland so prevalent in [the Canadian Prairies] to move further northward — and at the expense of the forest moving further northward as well,” said NASA climate scientist Duane Walliser, who spoke with CBC News from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.

Walliser said that all across the globe, whole ecological zones such as deserts and tundra will be on the move because of “unprecedented” warming at a pace faster than at any time in 10,000 years.

But Western Canada will be among the areas hardest hit.

A map of the globe on the NASA study shows much the Prairies in bright red “hot spots” of ecological stress, where 100 per cent of the landscape is predicted to see major changes in plant species.

…

The NASA study says 37 per cent of Earth’s land surface will transform from one major ecosystem zone, or biome, into another, while 49 per cent of land surfaces will see at least some changes in plant species.

Bergengren said some wildlife will not survive these transformations.

“Obviously, it is much easier for plants and animals to migrate or adapt to this level of climatic change over 10,000 years than it is over 100 years,” he said.

Check out the rest of the article here. You may also be interested in the recent study that found Canada’s ’Boreal ducks threatened by climate change’.

(Image credit: NASA; Photo credit: CBC)

From the Vancouver Sun:

A “massive” store of clean, renewable energy is sitting at Canadians’ feet, according to a federal report on geothermal energy.

Tapping into hot rocks that are tantalizingly close to the surface in western and northern Canada could generate more electricity than the entire country now consumes while generating few greenhouse gas emissions, says the report by a team of 12 scientists led by Stephen Grasby at the federal Geological Survey of Canada.

“As few as 100 projects could meet Canada’s energy needs,” according to the team’s findings, to be presented at a geothermal conference in Toronto on Thursday.

The 322-page report suggests the clean, renewable source of energy could be a gamechanger.

“Canada’s in-place geothermal power exceeds one million times Canada’s current electrical consumption,” the report says.

The heat is closest to the surface in large swaths of British Columbia, Alberta, Yukon and Northwest Territories, but the report says geothermal energy opportunities exist across Canada.

It notes that geothermal has distinct advantages over not only fossil fuels and nuclear energy but also wind, solar and biofuels, as the Earth’s heat is available 24 hours a day, yearround.

Grasby said that geothermal is not without technological and environmental risks. But there is no question there is a vast amount of clean energy underfoot, he said, and the country is well placed to start drilling for it.

Check out the rest of the article here. You can find more on the report at Energy Boom, including the map above.

(Photo credit: Vancouver Sun)