The Daily Climate: Fatalistic Friday

Introducing a new feature here at Stop Global Warming: Fatalistic Friday. A selection of the week's bad, sad, worrisome, and downright scary news about the impacts of our destabilizing climate -- gathered into one weekly update of woe.

The US Department of Energy (DOE) released its 2007 Greenhouse Gas Emissions report this week. Some highlights fromDeSmogBlog:

• Human-caused greenhouse gas emissions rose from 7.1 million metric tons in 2006 to 7.2 million metric tons in 2007 - a one year increase of 1.4%
• 81% of all greenhouse gas emissions in the United States were related to energy usage in 2007
• Emissions of carbon dioxide have risen every year (except for a minor fall in 2006) since 1990
• The United States will account for 19.6% of the world's greenhouse gas emissions in 2030.

More compelling bad news about global warming after the jump...

"Climate change is not simply a future threat - for millions around the world, it's already a reality.  From Afghanistan to Vietnam, Bangladesh to Yemen, climate change is wreaking havoc, creating ever larger humanitarian catastrophes," writes Michael Kleinman, our own Humanitarian Relief editor. He reports that aid groups are already finding themselves overwhelmed as increasingly intense droughts, storms and floods disrupt or destroy communities. At the international climate talks in Poznan, Poland, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs has just launched a campaign to raise awareness of how climate change is contributing to humanitarian disasters. The UN estimates that disasters spurred by the changing climate may displace six million people a year.

The U.S. communities most at risk from similar disasters are not preparing for the, according to a new report from Yale University. ""Despite a half century of climate change that has already significantly affected temperature and precipitation patterns and has already had widespread ecological and hydrological impacts, and despite a near certainty that the United States will experience at least as much climate change in the coming decades just as a result of current atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases, little adaptation has occurred," reports author Robert Repetto. Just a few highlights of this report, via The Weather Guys at USA Today:

• New York City's flood maps are based on historical data and not on climate change modeling data. Increases in sea levels and storm surges associated with stronger storms could inundate JFK Airport and lower Manhattan, including the subway entrances and tunnels into Manhattan.
• Federal planning guidelines that states and municipalities must follow to receive funding for transportation investments don't require that climate change be considered in the design and siting of highways and rail lines.
• Municipal public health agencies in Los Angeles, Chicago and Philadelphia, among others, have not factored climate change into plans for confronting public health risks, despite the belief that climate change will increase the incidence and severity of vector-borne diseases and respiratory illnesses.

Drought and growing population have already stressed the Colorado River. Global warming is going to make it worse. Scientists meeting at the University of Utah this week reported that seven Western states will face more water shortages in coming years. "Without fundamental shifts in water management, the result will be shortages and difficult decisions about who in the seven states the river serves will get water and who will go without," reports the Associated Press. Says Dave Wegner, science director for the Glen Canyon Institute, which organized the one-day conference, "To me, it's not going to be a pretty debate."

Congress seems to be on the verge of loaning billions to the Big Three automakers, who are promising to create a bright green automotive future. Not so fast: "In less than two years, the auto industry has spent $120 million lobbying Congress - much of which was used to fight legislative proposals to boost fuel economy requirements, reports Marcus Baram The Huffington Post. "In the first nine months of this year, they've spent almost $50 million, with more than $20 million of that from the Big Three."