Stop building near the Clyde estuary, flood researchers warn
Plans for new buildings on the low-lying banks of the River Clyde must be halted because they cannot be defended from worsening flooding, scientists have warned.
Some prime real estate in the west of Scotland — such as land around Glasgow airport — will be put at risk from rising sea levels, experts have previously said.
Now a major study has found that the measures proposed to mitigate this threat, including re-creating 'soft' natural environments such as wetlands and salt marshes to slow down and absorb flood waters, will not be enough to save swathes of the area.
Academics from Glasgow University said that avoiding future development 'in the tidal floodplains of large estuaries is the best means of minimising future flood risk in a rapidly warming world'. They said this applied to the UK as well around the world.
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The Independent
4 hours ago
- The Independent
Japan launches a climate change monitoring satellite on mainstay H2A rocket's last flight
Japan on Sunday launched a satellite to monitor greenhouse gas emissions using its mainstay H-2A rocket, which made its final flight before it is replaced by a new flagship designed to be more cost competitive in the global space market. The H-2A rocket successfully lifted off from the Tanegashima Space Center in southwestern Japan, carrying the GOSAT-GW satellite as part of Tokyo's effort to mitigate climate change. The satellite was released into orbit about 16 minutes later. Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, which operates the rocket launch, and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, will hold a news conference later Sunday to give further details of the flight. Sunday's launch marked the 50th and final flight for the H-2A, which has served as Japan's mainstay rocket to carry satellites and probes into space with a near-perfect record since its 2001 debut. After its retirement, it will be fully replaced by the H3, which is already in operation, as Japan's new main flagship. The launch follows several days of delays because of malfunctioning of the rocket's electrical systems. The GOSAT-GW, or Global Observing SATellite for Greenhouse gases and Water cycle, is a third series in the mission to monitor carbon, methane and other greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere. It will start distributing data in about one year, officials said. The liquid-fuel H-2A rocket with two solid-fuel sub-rockets developed by Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency has so far had 49 flights with a 98% success record, with only one failure in 2003. Mitsubishi Heavy Industries has provided its launch operation since 2007. H-2A successfully carried into space Japan's moon lander SLIM last year, and a popular Hayabusa2 spacecraft in 2014 to reach a distant asteroid, contributing to the country's space programs. Japan sees a stable, commercially competitive space transport capability as key to its space program and national security, and has been developing two new flagship rockets as successors of the H-2A series — the larger H3 with Mitsubishi, and a much smaller Epsilon system with the aerospace unit of the heavy machinery maker IHI. It hopes to cater to diverse customer needs and improve its position in the growing satellite launch market. The H3, is designed to carry larger payloads than the H-2A at about half its launch cost to be globally competitive, though officials say more cost reduction efforts are needed to achieve better price competitiveness in the global market. The H3 has made four consecutive successful flights after a failed debut attempt in 2023, when the rocket had to be destroyed with its payload.
The Guardian
11 hours ago
- The Guardian
‘It's something that happens': are we doing enough to save Earth from a devastating asteroid strike?
It is a scenario beloved of Hollywood: a huge asteroid, several miles wide, is on a collision course with Earth. Scientists check and recheck their calculations but there is no mistake – civilisation is facing a cataclysmic end unless the space rock can be deflected. It may sound like science fiction, but it is a threat that is being taken seriously by scientists. Earlier this year, researchers estimated that asteroid YR4 2024 had a 3.1% chance of hitting Earth in 2032, before revising that likelihood down to 0.0017%. This week, new data suggested it was more likely to hit the moon, with a probability of 4.3%. If that happens, the 53- to 67-metre (174ft-220ft) asteroid previously called a 'city killer' will launch hundreds of tonnes of debris towards our planet, posing a risk to satellites, spacecraft and astronauts. Before that, in April 2029, 99942 Apophis – an asteroid larger than the Eiffel Tower – will be visible to the naked eye when it passes within 32,000km of Earth. This attention-grabbing close encounter has prompted the UN to designate 2029 as the international year of planetary defence. When it comes to apocalyptic asteroid strikes, there is precedent, of course. Most scientists believe such an event hastened the demise of non-avian dinosaurs 66m years ago. 'This is something that happens,' said Colin Snodgrass, a professor of planetary astronomy at the University of Edinburgh. 'Not very often, but it is something that happens. And it's something that we could potentially do something about.' As Chris Lintott, a professor of astrophysics at the University of Oxford, told the UK parliament's science, innovation and technology committee this week, the risk posed by an asteroid originating beyond our solar system is minimal. Instead, he said, the greater threat comes from those in our cosmic back yard. 'Most asteroids in the solar system exist in the asteroid belt, which is between Mars and Jupiter, but they become disrupted, usually by encounters with either of those planets, and they can move into orbits that cross the Earth,' said Lintott, who presents the long-running BBC astronomy series The Sky at Night. 'Then it's just a case of whether we're in the wrong place at the wrong time.' The chances of an enormous asteroid – the type that did for the dinosaurs – hitting Earth is admittedly low. 'We think there's one of these every 10m to 100m years, probably,' Lintott told the Guardian. 'So I think you'd be right to ignore that when you decide whether to get up on a Thursday morning or not.' Snodgrass said there were 'precisely four' asteroids big enough and close enough to Earth to be considered 'dino-killers', and added: 'We know where they are, and they're not coming anywhere near us.' But damage can also be done by smaller asteroids. According to Nasa, space rocks measuring about one to 20 metres across collided with Earth's atmosphere resulting in fireballs 556 times over 20 years. Many collisions have occurred over the oceans, but not all. 'Chelyabinsk is the best example,' Lintott said. In 2013, a house-sized space rock – thought to have been about 20 metres across – exploded in the air above the Russian city with a force of nearly 30 Hiroshima bombs, producing an airburst that caused significant damage and hundreds of injuries, mostly from broken glass. Less dramatically, in February 2021 a space rock thought to have been just tens of centimetres across broke up in Earth's atmosphere, with fragments landing in the Cotswold town of Winchcombe in the UK. Thankfully, the damage was confined to a splat mark on a driveway. The types of asteroids we should perhaps be most concerned about are those about 140 metres across. According to Nasa, asteroids around that size are thought to hit Earth about once every 20,000 years and have the potential to cause huge destruction and mass casualties. The space agency has a congressional mandate to detect and track near-Earth objects of this size and larger, and a suite of new technological advances are helping them do just that. On Monday, the first images from the Vera C Rubin observatory in Chile were released to the public. This telescope is expected to more than triple the number of known near-earth objects, from about 37,000 to 127,000, over a 10-year period. In just 10 hours of observations, it found seven previously unspotted asteroids that will pass close to the Earth – though none are expected to hit. Also in the offing, though not planned for launch before 2027, is Nasa's near-Earth object (Neo) surveyor. Armed with an array of infrared detectors, this is 'the first space telescope specifically designed to detect asteroids and comets that may be potential hazards to Earth', the agency says. Lintott said: 'Between those two, we should find everything down to about 140 metres.' He said such observations should give scientists up to 10 years' warning of a potential collision. The European Space Agency (Esa) is planning a near-Earth object mission in the infrared (Neomir) satellite. Slated for launch in the early 2030s, this will help detect asteroids heading towards Earth that are at least 20 metres in diameter and obscured by the sun. Assessing the emerging capabilities, Edward Baker, the planetary defence lead at the UK's National Space Operations Centre (NSpOC) at RAF High Wycombe, said: 'I think we're in a good place. I can't see a situation like [the film] Don't Look Up materialising at all – though I wouldn't mind being portrayed by Leonardo DiCaprio.' As our ability to spot near-Earth asteroids increases, Lintott said, we should get used to hearing about asteroids like YR4 2024, which initially seem more likely to hit Earth before the risk rapidly falls towards zero. He described the shifting probabilities as similar to when a footballer takes a free kick. 'The moment they kick it, [it looks like] it could go anywhere,' he said. 'And then as it moves, you get more information. So you're like: 'Oh, it might go in the goal,' and then it inevitably becomes really clear that it's going to miss.' Of course, scientists aren't just monitoring the risks to Earth. They are also making plans to protect it. In 2022, Nasa crashed a spacecraft into a small, harmless asteroid called Dimorphos that orbits a larger rock called Didymos to test whether it would be possible to shift its path. The Dart mission was a success, reducing Dimorphos's 12-hour orbit around Didymos by 32 minutes. In 2024, Esa launched a follow-up to Nasa's Dart mission, called Hera. This will reach Dimorphos in 2026 and carry out a close-up 'crash site investigation'. It will survey the Dart impact crater, probe how effectively momentum was transferred in the collision and record a host of other measurements. Esa hopes this will provide crucial insights that can be used to make deliberate Dart-style impacts a reliable technique for safeguarding Earth. 'Dart was much more effective than anyone expected it to be,' Lintott said. 'And presumably that's something to do with the structure of the asteroid. I think we need to know whether Dart just got lucky with its target, or whether all near-Earth asteroids are like this.' For the most part, scientists say the threat of an asteroid strike does not keep them up at night. 'We're safer than we've ever been and we're about to get a lot safer, because the more of these things we find, the more we can spot them on the way in,' Lintott said. As Esa has quipped on its merchandise: 'Dinosaurs didn't have a space agency.'
The Guardian
11 hours ago
- The Guardian
‘Positive cascades could help accelerate change': social tipping points expert on fixing climate crisis
Timothy Lenton is a professor of climate change and Earth system science at the University of Exeter. He started working on tipping points in the 1990s, making him one of the first scientists in the world to study this form of planetary risk. In an upcoming book, Positive Tipping Points: How to Fix the Climate Crisis, he argues the Earth has entered an 'unstable period' but humanity can still prevail if we can trigger positive social and economic tipping points to reverse the damage that has already been done. On 30 June, he will host a global conference on tipping points. How do you define a tipping point?A tipping point is where change becomes self-propelling within a system, meaning it will shift from one state to another. That can happen because the balance of feedback in the system switches from damping feedback to amplifying feedback. The result can look very rapid and irreversible. How has our understanding of these risks changed?We first published a map of climate tipping elements in 2008, Since then, we have added much more than we have subtracted from that map. And, unfortunately, in the intervening 17 years, the evidence suggests we're much closer to some of these tipping points than we thought. Which tipping points might we have passed?Things are undoubtedly happening faster than anticipated. The tipping points of greatest concern include the West Antarctic ice sheet, where the loss of a significant chunk of the ice sheet is self-propelling, which could raise the world's sea levels by about 1.2 metres. There is also the Greenland ice sheet, which is losing mass at an accelerating rate. Then we have the permafrost, parts of which are already passing localised tipping points – and that's adding methane and carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. Then there's the unprecedented bleaching and dieback of coral reefs, which hundreds of millions of people depend on for their livelihoods. And which are close?There's a tipping point in the circulation of the north Atlantic Ocean, when deep water stops forming in the middle of the subpolar gyre south-west of Greenland. That system seems quite volatile, and a tipping point there is like a small version of a bigger tipping point of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (Amoc), which studies suggest is at much greater risk than we thought even a few years ago. That in turn could trigger monsoon tipping points in west Africa and India. I'd also note the risk of tipping Amazon rainforest dieback from a mixture of climate change and direct human disruption. Unfortunately, I could reel off quite a few more. How accurate are the predictions?If anything, we have underestimated the risks. When we did our first assessment in 2008, we thought Greenland was close to a big tipping point. We haven't changed that judgment, but we thought West Antarctica would need at least 3C of warming [above pre-industrial levels]. Unfortunately, everything that's been observed since suggests we were way too optimistic. As a rule, the more we learn, the closer we think the tipping points are – and meanwhile we've been warming the planet up. It's like running faster into a sea that is rising to drown us. Why has it taken so long for the world to talk about these catastrophic threats?In the climate science community, we have tended to concentrate on assessing what's the most likely thing to happen, but the more important question is: what's the worst thing that could happen? That's the difference between a scientific assessment and a risk assessment. I would argue we've not been treating climate change as a risk assessment. That is also because a lot of well-funded entities have been systematically undermining the knowledge consensus on climate change, which has forced the scientific community to defend what's in effect 19th-century physics. That hasn't put us in a great position to emphasise tipping point risks, which inherently have more uncertainty around them. Why do we need to talk about them now?Because tipping point risks are real and potentially existential. If we have a tipping point in the Atlantic Ocean – the so-called Amoc – we could lose more than half the area for growing staple crops worldwide. It would cause water security crises and severely disrupt the monsoons in west Africa and India, which would affect billions of people. We have to level up to those risks, better understand them and how close they are, and what things we can do in response. Even if we can't stop the events happening, we can do things that reduce the vulnerability of people exposed to the risks. That is why we are drawing attention to tipping points. This is not as a council of despair; on the contrary, it is more like a council of practicality. In terms of the upfront costs to decarbonise the global economy, it is a great investment for the return you get, which is lowering the risk of otherwise catastrophic outcomes. It would help if the IPCC [the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change] took a more in-depth look at tipping points. A large number of countries wanted to see an IPCC special report on tipping points in this assessment cycle, but the IPCC said no. Instead there's due to be a chapter in the next assessment report. Is there an alternative?Yes. I and more than 200 other researchers have published a global tipping points report, and we're writing another one for Cop30, [the UN climate change summit which takes place in Brazil, in November]. We felt the risk was important to communicate and this is a timely moment. So we are trying to fill in the assessment gap in an accessible way. People are crying out for that. I understand the global tipping points conference will also look at positive tipping points in technology, economics and politics?Yes. [There are some] more optimistic scenarios; the impacts of wind power and photovoltaic innovation, or the knock-on effects of campaigning by Greta Thunberg and others. There are also policy feedbacks that could create a change in the landscape in a good way, where you start a policy path towards the renewable energy revolution that's very hard to reverse. That is arguably what the architects of the German feed-in tariffs for renewables managed to do. They made it hard for the doubters to change course even after a change of government. Has renewable energy reached a positive tipping point?Yes, our analysis suggests that solar photovoltaic power is now in a phase of self-propelling global uptake with exponential growth of installed generating capacity, doubling every two years or less. Factoring in the cost of battery storage, solar is already the cheapest source of new power in most of the world, and for every doubling of installed capacity its price drops by nearly a quarter. This is rapidly making solar power the cheapest source of electricity ever, which brings many benefits, including access to electricity for the roughly 700 million people who don't currently have it. And electric vehicles?Yes, the price of batteries plummeted nearly tenfold in a decade as the range you can get from a given mass of battery increased by nearly a factor of three. This has brought China and several European markets to the tipping point where adoption of EVs is self-propelling: the more EVs that get bought, the better and the cheaper they get, encouraging further adoption. The US is lagging behind, but the global south is starting to reap the benefits of electrifying mobility, as it is much cheaper to run an electric rickshaw in India or an electric motorbike taxi in east Africa than their fossil-fuelled equivalents. Any other examples of potential positive tipping points?I'm working on regenerative nature. We already see cases where degraded ecosystems have been tipped back into a better state – for example, when wolves were reintroduced to Yellowstone National Park and started preying on elk, it triggered abrupt vegetation recovery, or when sea otters returned to north Pacific coastal ecosystems and started feasting on sea urchins it tipped the recovery of kelp forests. We also see social tipping points that are nature-positive, where community conservation initiatives, like locally managed marine protected areas, spread rapidly and widely among and across societies. Can you explain cascading feedbacks?In all complex systems – such as the climate and the economy – if you can tip one thing, it can have consequences for other bits of the system. If you tip one part of the system it can make tipping another part of the system more likely. For example, if you've suffered a medical shock it can have knock-on effects on other parts of the body. In the climate, these causal connections can be quite significant and strong. In Earth's history, when there were tipping points in the overturning circulation of the Atlantic Ocean, that tipped major shifts in the tropical monsoons of west Africa and India. In the economy, a cascade can be more positive. For example, an investment in renewable energy can bring forward a tipping point in other sectors. It basically means renewables are making electricity cheaper than it has ever been, and that incentivises electrifying mobility, like cars and trucks and buses, or electrifying heating in homes. At the same time, batteries get cheaper because of economies of scale, which then helps to balance renewable electricity supply and demand. So feedbacks between sectors of the economy can create tipping points that reinforce each other. We've recently mapped out a bunch of positive tipping cascades that could help accelerate change to zero greenhouse gas emissions. What should the world do at Cop30 in Belém to address tipping points?We need policymakers to implement policies that bring forward the positive tipping points we need to stop greenhouse gas emissions and prevent the bad climate tipping points. If the EU and China were to coordinate, it could be enough to shift the balance towards clean green alternatives. Even with Trump in the United States, the beauty of tipping points is you don't need everybody, you typically only need a fifth to tip to the new alternative and then you get to a situation where everybody else is compelled to follow. Tipping points – in the Amazon, Antarctic, coral reefs and more – could cause fundamental parts of the Earth system to change dramatically, irreversibly and with devastating effects. Here, we ask the experts about the latest science – and how it makes them feel. Read more
