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“If this plays out as forecast, we may see near modern-day record September global temperatures before too long.
“The latest day (Sept. 12) was 1.4C above the 1850-1900 IPCC pre-industrial baseline [after a summer at “only” 1.3C above pre-industrial].” [Prof Eliot Jacobson]
https://x.com/EliotJacobson/status/1967363334816317893
“As the Northern Hemisphere summer has ended with global temperatures ‘only’ +1.3°C above pre-industrial the past three months, anomalies are spiking upwards again.
“We could see the highest daily anomaly in 8 months soon. September 2025 will be about +1.6°C in ECMWF ERA. The Northern Hemisphere shows much more warming and much more variability than the Southern Hemisphere.”
https://x.com/LeonSimons8/status/1948394993984450569
“Drought Hampers Ukraine’s Winter Grain Sowing On 60% Of Land.
“Up to 60% of Ukrainian agricultural land intended for sowing winter grain crops is dry and sowing in these areas is currently impractical, consultancy APK-Inform said on Monday, citing state meteorologists. Ukraine is a major traditional producer of winter grains…”
“LANGDALE MOOR FIRE UPDATE: Battle against the blaze is ongoing as public urged to respect safety restrictions [Yorkshire, UK].
“Emergency services have asked that the public respects closure signs while their efforts are still ongoing to ensure the North Yorks Moors wildfire does not re-ignite. The North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service (NYFRS) are still attending the blaze, which began on August 11.”
“Trump lieutenants tell Europe to stop worrying about climate change.
“Quit stressing about climate change — it’ll all be fine. That was the message from two of U.S. President Donald Trump’s top government appointees during a trip to Brussels last week… As for whether he believes in the science of climate change, Atkins said: “It doesn’t matter what I believe.””
“Europe’s summer of extreme weather caused €43bn of short-term losses, analysis finds.
“The violent weather that battered Europe this summer caused short-term economic losses of at least €43bn, according to an EU-wide estimate, with costs expected to rise to €126bn by 2029… The greatest damage was done in Cyprus, Greece, Malta and Bulgaria.”
“Aemet warns that temperatures will soar up to 40C in these parts of the south of Spain this week.
“Summer is about to officially bow out. But the heat is not. A very warm air mass will take the meteorological lead this week, leaving its mark on the thermometers. In the case of Andalucía, the state weather agency (Aemet) forecasts highs of up to 40C in Cordoba and Seville.”
“Past precipitation year second driest on record. 2024–2025 precipitation year is the second in a row to produce less rain than the climatic norm of 545.3mm. [Malta].
“In total, 457.8 mm of rain fell over the Maltese Islands between September 2024 and August 2025 – 87.5 mm less than average, almost equivalent to the entire monthly quota for December.”
https://www.maltatoday.com.mt/news/national/137044/past_precipitation_year_second_driest_on_record_
“Wildfires are blazing across Africa – but leaders like Trump are turning away.
“…for all the coverage of wildfires Europe and North America, Africa suffers many times the damage to its landscape from wildfires. Satellite data from the Global Wildfire Information System, which is backed by Nasa and the EU’s Copernicus observatory, shows that in 2024, some 7.3 per cent of Africa’s landmass was burnt.”
https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/fires-europe-wildfires-africa-trump-b2817770.html
“EXTRAORDINARY SAUDI ARABIA – 48 [118.4F] DEGREES RIGHT ON THE COAST. 48.0C at Yenbo…
“[And] today the city of Makkah recorded an insanely hot day. (near WORLD RECORD for mid September) – Minimum 34.0C Maximum 46.6C… This is JUST THE BEGINNING. BOTH HEMISPHERES WILL RECORD THEIR ALL TIME RECORDS for this time of the year next week!“
https://x.com/extremetemps/status/1967294691822678493
“Water crisis fears grip Türkiye as reservoir levels drop nationwide.
“Major cities across Türkiye, including Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir, see reservoir and river levels drop below critical thresholds, as the ongoing drought and reduced rainfall threaten drinking water supplies. Drought and declining rainfall linked to climate change have driven reservoir, lake and river levels in Türkiye to critical lows…”
“Rights Group Warns of Humanitarian Disaster Amid Iraq’s Water Crisis…
“The Strategic Center for Human Rights in Iraq on Sunday issued a stark warning over the country’s worsening water shortages, cautioning that the crisis risks triggering a major humanitarian disaster if left unaddressed.”
“Climate change is fast shrinking the world’s largest inland sea.
“Once a haven for flamingos, sturgeon and thousands of seals, fast-receding waters are turning the northern coast of the Caspian Sea into barren stretches of dry sand. In some places, the sea has retreated more than 50km. Wetlands are becoming deserts, fishing ports are being left high and dry, and oil companies are dredging ever-longer channels to reach their offshore installations.”
https://theconversation.com/climate-change-is-fast-shrinking-the-worlds-largest-inland-sea-265239
“Ak-Shyirak massif (max. 5000 m, Kyrgyzstan) one week ago.. Not the slightest accumulation zone!
“As if global warming weren’t causing glaciers to disappear fast enough, mining is doing it even faster! This gold mine today worth ~20% of KGZ’s GDP!” [Melaine Le Roy]
https://x.com/subfossilguy/status/1967181946280350172
“Pakistan’s monsoon floods leave millions displaced.
“What began as a particularly strong monsoon season in late June has turned into one of the worst flood events in living memory, with the eastern Punjab province seeing its most severe inundation in history. Millions of people have been affected…”
https://www.earth.com/image/pakistans-monsoon-floods-leave-millions-displaced/
“Melted like wax. The Western Himalayas have taken a severe hit this monsoon, as shifting wind patterns fuel extreme weather events across the region….
“The states of Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh and the Union Territories (UTs) of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh were battered by a series of extreme weather events, from heavy rains to cloudbursts to flash floods, as soon as the monsoon season officially began on May 24.”
https://www.downtoearth.org.in/natural-disasters/melted-like-wax
“2 missing as heavy rain triggers cloudburst in Dehradun [Uttarakhand], washes away cars and shops.
“A cloudburst in Dehradun triggered by heavy rain washed away cars and shops and resulted in two people going missing. Rescue personnel are at the spot to search and rescue the missing persons.”
“Manipur [NE India] rivers breach embankments, flooding farmlands and sweeping away iron bridge.
“Two major rivers breached embankments in different parts of Manipur’s Imphal valley on Sunday night, flooding large tracts of agricultural land and residential areas, officials said on Monday.”
“After so many heat records, at last one cold record this month: Homalin, MYANMAR today dropped to 18.0C [64F], its lowest September temperature on record.
“Previous record:18.3C 18 Sept, 2000. Data since 1965.”
https://x.com/extremetemps/status/1967601119116632173
“Hail strikes Beijing again.
“A severe convective weather storm suddenly struck Beijing on the night of the 13th, with residents in many regions capturing images of thunder, lightning, and falling hail. In some areas, heavy accumulation of hail created a blanket of ice and snow, prompting netizens to describe the scene as an “Ice Age.””
http://www.xinhuanet.com/20250914/637e0107183a45b19b8a86f1365ad291/c.html
“China’s heat continues, with 35 stations breaking mid-September records on Sept. 12th, 25 on Sept. 13th, 16 on Sept. 14th, and 19 today!
“High temps are expected to reach their peak tomorrow, with areas like Shanghai and Zhejiang potentially breaking September records!”
https://x.com/yangyubin1998/status/1967575028838588612
“BRUTAL HEAT IN JAPAN:
“Record heat never ends in Japan with thousands of records falling no-stop since early June. Today’s new records of September highest temperatures: 35.8 [96.4F] Kimotsuki Maeda; 34.9 Ume; High Min: 26.3 Cape Muroto. Much hotter next days!”
https://x.com/extremetemps/status/1967540674926178545
“Japan: As lightning incidences increase significantly, the amount of related insurance payments also goes up.
“…in the quarter century (1999 – 2023) the lightning incidences increased by 16.3% to 209 days per year according to the Nihon Keizai Shimbun’s analysis of the Japanese Meteorological Agency’s 50 years of data released by Yonhap News agency.”
“Sabah [Malaysia] reels from deadly landslides and floods: 11 dead, hundreds evacuated.
“At least 11 people have been confirmed dead and several more missing following a series of landslides triggered by continuous heavy rain across Sabah, as authorities brace for further flooding and damage. Two of the worst incidents occurred in Inanam and Papar.”
“Against the tide: Filipinos battle rising sea on sinking island…
“The gradual sinking, known as land subsidence, is an “alarming” phenomenon caused by the overextraction of groundwater, and exacerbated by rising sea levels due to global warming, Lagmay said.”
https://phys.org/news/2025-09-tide-filipinos-sea-island.html
“HISTORIC HEAT IN SE ASIA:
“A few days after the extraordinary 29.1C [84.4F] Minimum at Itbayat, HOTTEST SEPTEMBER NIGHT IN PHILIPPINES HISTORY, now new record highest minimum also at Calayat with a min of 27.5C. Every corner of the tropics is breaking records, specially of hot nights.”
https://x.com/extremetemps/status/1967179686703927704
“‘Cascading, compounding’: five key takeaways from Australia’s national climate risk assessment.
“What’s clear from the report is that every aspect of life in Australia is being disrupted and changed. Nothing is spared, with an overwhelming array of impacts that cut across each other. The risk to eight “key systems” are assessed in the report…”
“ANTARCTICA RECORD MILDNESS:
“Another record day in Antarctica with an “absurd” mildness for this time of the year: +6.8C [44.2F] Vernadsky (Ukraine base); +5.9C Palmer Station (US base). Both smashed their records of September highest temperatures.”
https://x.com/extremetemps/status/1967021653768237150
“SOUTH AMERICA:
“Another blistering day with 42.4 [108.3F] at Puerto Suarez, Bolivia. That’s just the appetizer. Next weekend HISTORY WILL BE REWRITTEN. Sunday can be the HOTTEST SEPTEMBER NIGHT IN SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE HISTORY; MINIMUMS can remain >30C in West Paraguay!
(Filadelfia). Buckle up!”
https://x.com/extremetemps/status/1967711963015942513
“EXTRAORDINARY HEAT IN THE CARIBBEAN:
“34.4C [93.9F] today at Roosevelt Int. Airport ST EUSTATIUS HOTTEST DAY IN ALL CLIMATIC HISTORY. 100% of all tropical countries and territories (Pacific, Atlantic, Indian, Caribbean) are smashing every record no-stop, every single day.”
https://x.com/extremetemps/status/1967048002226602081
“Floods in Los Reyes, La Paz [central Mexico], affect homes, the Mexican Social Security Institute (IMSS) hospital, and Metro Line service.
“Floods of up to one meter high were recorded in the Valle de los Reyes neighborhood , affecting two stations on Metro Line A and causing sewage to infiltrate the IMSS General Hospital of Zone 73.”
“Insane 24 Hour Rainfall Totals Across North Dakota.
“…[and] we just broke a record for the most tornado warnings in a single year, with 88. Yesterday’s tornado outbreak also shattered North Dakota’s September tornado record. Yesterday’s tornadic storms also brought torrential rains with them, prompting flash flooding across south-central North Dakota. Nearly two and a half inches of rain fell in the Capital City in a short amount of time.”
https://us1033.com/north-dakota-flooding-rainfall-totals/
“It’s been 18 days since we’ve had an active tropical system in the Atlantic.
“The last time the Atlantic was shut out from August 28th through September 15th was 1939 (never in the modern satellite era).” [Michael Lowry]
https://x.com/MichaelRLowry/status/1967594090096382387
“It’s hard to overstate just how off the charts warm the Pacific is right now.
“The swath of the basin from California to Japan (a HUGE area) from 25N to 60N is ~3F (1.6C) above normal. To put it into math terms that is 6 Sigma/ standard deviations above the mean.” [Jeff Berardelli]
https://x.com/WeatherProf/status/1967769229182292269
“Zany Climate Ideas Show How Far Off Track We Are. Curtains, pumps and glass beads won’t save the polar regions…
“…some of the proposed methods, which would instead seek to treat the symptoms rather than the cause, may actually put the cold ends of the planet at greater risk, and would require unprecedented levels of global cooperation and feats of engineering beyond anything we’ve seen before.”
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You can read the previous “Climate” thread here. I’ll be back tomorrow with an “Economic” thread.


Re the last article – it’s very interesting how the most advertising strategy nowadays is to hype things up as simultaneously miraculous and catastrophic. Self-criticism has become a selling point. You point out all the ways that a thing is or can be bad, except the way in which it can be bad is also what makes it so cool and miraculous. It’s a kind of power fantasy. So AI is simultaneously miraculous and catastrophic, climate “mitigation” is our last best hope but also potentially harmful etc etc.
Yesterday I was listening to an interview of a supposed OnlyFans “manager”. Apparently OnlyFans is ripping apart the fabric of society because tens of millions of young woman are opting for this easy yet morally questionable route to fabulous wealth. I cut it off at about the 10 minute mark because I knew exactly what was going on – a two hour ad for OnlyFans.
Obviously all of the claims made by that person are either lies or half-truths. OnlyFans income distribution is similar to that of any other form of monetized online content creation – less than 1% of very high earners, 1 to 5 % earning a middle class income and everyone else earning peanuts. But spin a yarn to make it look like this techno golem that will change/destroy everything… and all of those pesky little factoids drop like flies.
Bernays sold cigarettes to women by calling them freedom torches. AI, OnlyFans and climate mitigation are being sold as torches that could set fire to the world. Well, at least no one can accuse the advertisement industry of not having kept pace with the times!
On point comment!
Viewing all this from my eyes as a thirty-seven year old is straight up horrific.
Jupiviv, thank you – there is food for thought there. I guess media stories that have competing raisons d’être and generate conflicting emotions are good for engagement. Many viewers enjoy being simultaneously outraged and titillated by the likes of an Only Fans exposé.
I’m amazed by how quickly tragedies are recycled into spectacle via Netflix and its ilk these days. They’ll justify it by talking about giving the victims a voice or shining a light on the darker corners of human nature or some such, but of course people really watch it for the thrills.
I did not know that about Bernays; interesting:
“Edward Bernays: The Original Influencer… An uncanny ability to mould public desire made Edward Bernays one of the 20th century’s most influential – yet invisible – characters, the architect of modern mass manipulation.”
https://www.historytoday.com/miscellanies/original-influencer
Hee, hee, hee.. Friends, Romans, Countrymen…lend me your ears
https://oilprice.com/Latest-Energy-News/World-News/IEA-Reverses-Course-on-Oil-and-Gas-Investment.amp.html
The world needs to develop new oil and gas resources just to keep output flat amid faster declining rates at existing fields, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said on Tuesday in a major shift in its narrative from 2021 that ‘no new investment’ is needed in a net-zero by 2050 scenario.
The rates of decline at operating oil and gas fields have accelerated in recent years, largely due to higher reliance on shale and deep offshore resources, said the IEA.
The agency is under pressure from the Trump Administration to return to its core mission to help protect global security of supply, instead of pushing the net-zero agenda it has been doing so far this decade.
A new IEA report, The Implications of Oil and Gas Field Decline Rates, said on Tuesday that if the industry has to maintain current levels of production, more than 45 million barrels per day (bpd) of oil and around 2,000 bcm of natural gas would be needed in 2050 from new conventional fields.
Congratulations to all here that guided this change. They couldn’t have done it without you….
Well. Back to finishing up my bucket of hand wash in cold water and hanging the wet cloths outside on the line to dry in the sun….now that’s what I call demand destruction…
Shell promises 10-minute EV charging with its magical battery fluid
By Abhimanyu Ghoshal
Shell says it’s developed a thermal management fluid for electric vehicles (EV) that can help speed up battery charging dramatically – we’re talking 10%-80% in under 10 minutes. Not bad for an oil and gas company, eh?
See, even the oil companies are doing their part.. bless their oily 🥰 hearts
In collaboration with automotive engineering firm RML Group, Shell has created a fluid that “reduces thermal stresses very significantly allowing much higher cell charging currents to be tolerated.”
The non-conductive fluid essentially fills all the gaps in a battery pack to maximize contact with each cell inside, and enables highly efficient heat transfer. That’s what makes it possible to push charging speeds without risking damage through overheating
We’ll be alright…just needs a bit of fine tuning
Time is money and, as efficiency gains go, this magical Shell fluid doesn’t sound a bad one, as long as it is not prohibitively expensive.
If I were pondering purchasing an EV, which I’m not, remotely, then having at least 20 minutes knocked off the charging time might sway me.
Stop worrying about it until you have no insurance, no house, no food or water. Right everything is great when you have flash heat wave! Stop worrying and love the 6th mass extinction. Everything great when the economic situation implodes again.
Heather, insurance and housing concerns featured in that Australian risk assessment mentioned in the thread:
“The National Climate Risk Assessment… reveals that up to 185,000 homes in Queensland are now at ‘very high risk’ from floods, cyclones, bushfires and heatwaves. Many of these properties could soon be uninsurable, sparking urgent questions over the role of government, the insurance industry and long-term planning.”
https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/queenslands-property-nightmare-are-politicians-ignoring-climate-housing-collapse-1744306
Hello Pan … the “red queen” asks you to dance,
An ever-accelerating waltz that makes you dizzy and always ends up at the same point, The fossil industry must run much faster… but it doesn’t know where to run to
The IEA has flipped its spreadsheets. In 2021, “no new investment” fit the Net Zero storyline; now it’s in black and white: without new oil and gas resources, global output will slide.
Decline in existing fields is accelerating; nearly 90% of annual upstream capex already goes to merely slowing that decline. To keep 2050 production at today’s level, the IEA tallies more than 45 million barrels per day of oil and 2,000 bcm of gas from new conventional projects. Conventional—sure—as if there’s a shopping basket waiting.
That’s where the spreadsheet ends and reality starts.
Where are those “new” barrels? Frontier deepwater, extra-heavy, Arctic, politically bumpy. Projects with long lead times, high capital intensity, and discount rates that no longer fit in Excel given today’s risks and interest rates.
Most of those barrels need a sustained price band of roughly $90–$110 for fifteen to twenty years. That’s not an investment condition; it’s a prayer.
Meanwhile LNG is siphoning capital, and 90% of the sector already runs on Red-Queen economics: running faster to stand still.
So the IEA is really saying two things at once. First: geology wins; decline is the elephant in the room. Second: “the industry must run much faster.” Except… there’s no route. The pipeline of bankable projects is thin, the clock is short, and every extra barrel costs more steel, more energy, and more political credit.
Thanks, Zip. The IEA’s change of message has been pretty startling, although it is exactly what one would expect, I suppose, of the “mindless, energy dissipating structure” (h/t Nate Hagens) that we have created and on which we are now helpless passengers.
Javier Blas on Twitter observes: “What would happen if all investment in new or existing oil and gas fields stopped? It isn’t pretty, says the IEA: “For oil, this drop would be >5.5m b/d every year […], equivalent to losing more than the entire current oil production in Brazil and Norway.”
https://x.com/JavierBlas/status/1967927338584453192
“Quit stressing about climate change — it’ll all be fine.”
next article:
“Europe’s summer of extreme weather caused €43bn of short-term losses, analysis finds.”
Yeah, nothing to worry about… I wonder if insurance companies think the same way?
Yes, Atkins’ brand of mindless optimism is at loggerheads with reality on the world’s fastest warming continent. Unless, of course, he knows there’s not much we can do about it and is indirectly suggesting we just party on, dude.
From the once-hailed “dryest continent on Earth”..
In 2019, Australia came to the end of a decades long mega-drought with headlines that the Great Artesian Basin was “dead” after more than a century of intensive agriculture and mining and drilling and back-to-back “worst droughts on record”..
But after 5 years of “flooding rains” the basin is not just recovered, but overflowing with leaky springs and oases..
Go figure…
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1AwqMBsTCr/
Rain, that is heartening, even if the tilting from one extreme to the other is not. The Basin has apparently had another type of lucky escape:
“The Queensland government plans to legislate to ban the Great Artesian Basin (Gab) from being used for carbon capture and storage, ruling out future proposals similar to a Glencore development that was knocked back earlier this month.”
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/article/2024/may/30/worth-protecting-queensland-government-to-ban-carbon-capture-and-storage-in-the-great-artesian-basin