Key Facts Of The Day 09/30

Hurricanes

• As of Friday morning, Ian resumed hurricane status, with maximum sustained winds of 85 MPH. Ian was located some 100 miles southeast of Charleston, moving north at 14 MPH.
  • Ian is forecast to become a Category 1 hurricane when it makes second landfall in South Carolina. 
    • The storm is expected to once again push toward land in South Carolina around Friday afternoon, bringing 4 to 7 feet of storm surge flooding above normally dry land to Charleston.
    • Sea level rise from climate change, along with land subsidence over time, makes Charleston one of the most vulnerable cities in the U.S. for flash and surge-related flooding. 
  • Ian is taking aim at the Carolinas and Georgia with life-threatening flooding, storm surge and strong winds.
  • Over 1.8 million people remained without power in Florida as of Friday morning.
    • 99% of customers in Hardee County were without power, 85% in Charlotte and Lee Counties, 80% in DeSoto County, and nearly 50% in Sarasota, Collier, and Manatee Counties.
  • Search and rescue teams reported rescuing more than 700 people in southwest Florida in the aftermath of Ian.
    • More than 500 people in Charlotte and Lee Counties, the hardest hit, had been rescued on Thursday.
  • Florida’s Division of Emergency Management Director Kevin Guthrie announced during a news conference Friday that as many as 21 deaths had been reported in Ian’s wake.
  • On Thursday evening, President Biden declared an emergency in South Carolina and ordered federal assistance as Ian moved toward the state.
  • In some of the hardest-hit locations, Hurricane Ian produced 1-in-1,000-year rainfall.
  • Hurricane Ian’s rainfall was at least 10% wetter because of climate change.
  • Hurricane Ian is expected to financially ruin countless people in Florida whose homes were not covered by flood insurance.
    • In Hardee County, only 100 households have federal flood insurance — out of 8,000 households in the county. Hardee has one of the lowest income levels of any Florida county, and 44% of its residents are Hispanic.
• Two weeks after Hurricane Fiona hit Puerto Rico, the island is still dealing with the devasting aftermath.
  • As of Friday, an estimated 233,000 homes and businesses were still without power in Puerto Rico.
  • Preliminary evaluations show Hurricane Fiona damaged 50% of transmission lines and distribution feeders across Puerto Rico.
  • Luma has promised that electricity would be restored to 90% of clients by Friday in areas not severely affected by the storm. In hard-hit areas, officials have said they might restore power to 90% of clients by next Thursday.
  • The outage in Puerto Rico has forced businesses including grocery stores and gas stations to temporarily close and prevented hundreds of schools from opening. 
  • In Puerto Rico, 16 government medical clinics and seven dialysis centers are still operating on generators.
  • In a policy brief released Thursday, the Puerto Rico-based think tank Center for a New Economy said Puerto Rico already was extremely vulnerable prior to Fiona because only 30% of permanent reconstruction work related to 2017’s Hurricane Maria had started.
• Researchers from Harvard University’s T.H. Chan School of Public Health found that hundreds of hospitals along U.S. coastlines are in danger of flooding when hurricanes strike.
  • The study warns that Florida is one of the most concerning areas. 
  • Cities including Baton Rouge, Louisiana; Virginia Beach, Virginia.; Corpus Christi, Texas; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; and Boston, Massachusetts all saw more than 90% increases in the number of beds at risk from a Category 2 storm.

Wildfires

• As of Thursday, there are currently 92 large active wildfires that have burned 781,455 across CA, ID, MT, OK, OR, WA, and WY. As of Thursday, 53,338 wildfires have burned 6,872,196 acres across the country.
• In California, 2 fires have burned 29,386 acres as of Thursday.
• In Oregon, 6 fires have burned 332,543 acres as of Thursday.
  • The Cedar Creek Fire has burned 115,428 acres and is 25% contained as of Thursday.

Extreme Heat

• On the central Illinois farms that supply most of the world’s canned pumpkin, farmers are adopting regenerative techniques designed to reduce emissions, attract natural pollinators like bees and butterflies, and improve the health of the soil.
  • Regenerative farming has its roots in Indigenous cultures.
  • Regenerative farming goes further than sustainable farming by seeking to improve the land rather than just preserve it.
  • The agricultural sector is responsible for 11% of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions.
  • In mid-September, the Department of Agriculture announced it would invest up to $2.8 billion in 70 projects around the U.S. that will measure and verify the greenhouse gas benefits of regenerative farming.
• According to the NOAA, nearly 300 million acres of crops in the U.S. are currently experiencing drought conditions.
  • An American Farm Bureau survey of western states finds average crop yields could be down 38%.
  • This month, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that food prices jumped 13.5% from August 2021 to August 2022, the largest annual increase in more than four decades.

New Reports and Data

• A September 2022 study found that the practice of flaring natural gas releases five times as much methane as previously thought in major U.S. oil and gas-producing regions.
• A September 2022 study found that hundreds of hospitals along U.S. coastlines are in danger of flooding when hurricanes strike.