Facts Of The Day 9/13

Extreme Heat

• Due to the ongoing drought, Hopi farmers in Arizona face the possibility of seeing no corn harvest, a crop that is vital to the Hopi culture and religion.

• Flower markets in California, which has been supported by immigrants and people of color, are feeling the effects of climate change as warmer weather has caused flowers to rot, mutate, bloom at different times or die off en masse.

• In Maryland, Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. is expecting to pay more than $40 million in 2021 to trim trees to reduce risk of power outages during storms, a 50% increase from 2016 and may result in raised rates for customers.

• Due to the ongoing drought, farmers have struggled to adequately water apple orchards and pumpkin patches in Minnesota, which may mean more expensive and smaller pumpkins for customers.

• The Colorado River Basin may never recover from drought because of the over-allocation of water, population growth and climate change continuing to deplete water availability.

• Drought in Texas has forced one farmer to switch from corn to growing grass that are more resilient against dry conditions as pasture for cattle in the hope he can pass the farm onto his son.

• Excessive heat forced scientists to pause on catching and tagging sockeye fish in an ongoing study in Washington state in June, meaning the fish could not be tracked for their migration patterns and spawning.

• All the beaches in Sarasota County in Florida have reported they are free of red tide as of Friday, although officials will continue to monitor the waters.

• On Friday, the Biden administration issued an emergency order to allow some natural gas power plants in California to operate without pollution restrictions to shore up the state’s energy supplies.

• The failure of the Texas power grid, along with the state’s abortion law has caused people and tech firms to reconsider moving to the state.

• After February’s winter storm in Texas, the Austin area has seen a 1000% spike in generator installation permits, leading to a supply and installation backlog.

Wildfires

• As of Monday, there are currently 81 large active wildfires that have burned 3,150,696 acres across CA, CO, ID, MN, MT, NV, WA, OR, UT, WA, and WY. This year to date, 44,461 wildfires have burned 5,567,600 acres across the country.

• Disabled people struggle with significant challenges when evacuating from wildfires and living in shelters not fully able to meet their needs.

• President Joe Biden will tour wildfire damage in California, and visit the National Interagency Fire Center in Idaho on Monday.

• A new fire sparked in California on Sunday – the Route Fire burned 464 acres and 63% contained. One fire was contained – the Knob Fire burned 2,421 acres.

• A federal judge will question a PG&E Corp. worker on Monday about why it took the company more than 10 hours to respond to a reported outage that may have led to the Dixie Fire in California.

• One new fire sparked in Wyoming on Sunday – the Remington Fire burned 500 acres and was 50% contained.

Hurricanes

• Tropical Storm Nicholas is expected to make landfall sometime on Monday anywhere from between Corpus Christi and Galveston, Texas.

  • As of Monday morning, Nicholas was located about 210 miles south of Port O’Connor, Texas, and 40 miles southeast of the mouth of the Rio Grande River, moving north at a speed of 5 MPH with maximum wind speeds of 60 MPH.

  • A hurricane watch is in effect for Port Aransas to Freeport, Texas as of Monday morning.

  • Parts of the coast of Texas from the mouth of the Rio Grande to High Island, Texas were under a tropical storm warning as of Monday morning.

  • A tropical storm watch was issued from areas ranging from the mouth of the Rio Grande to Port Aransas, Texas, with other parts of the Texas coast under storm surge warnings.

  • Louisiana declared a state of emergency and Texas raised the emergency alert level on Sunday.

  • Louisiana could see heavy rains and flooding from Nicholas in areas still recovering from the 2020 hurricanes of Laura and Delta.

  • Nicholas could develop into a hurricane, but as of Monday morning, wind shear was preventing the storm from becoming a Category 1 hurricane.

• Hurricane Ida may cost insurers anywhere from  $20 billion and $30 billion including factors such as onshore residential, commercial, industrial properties, and automobiles for their building, contents, and time element coverage.

• The disruption of Hurricane Ida on top of the COVID pandemic has meant more than 169,000 Louisiana students continue to have their education interrupted after many students returned to in-person learning in August.

  • Marginalized communities in Louisiana struggle with a steep climb when recovering from Ida, with one woman returning to a waterlogged bed, clothes, and furniture and eviction for the second time this year.

  • More than 11,000 members of the Houma Nation across 6 Louisiana parishes, including Terrebonne and Lafourche, suffered significant losses including entire homes due to Ida.

  • Louisiana residents facing issues such as caved-in ceilings and damage to carpets and furniture from Ida now must brace for rain from Tropical Storm Nicholas.

• Hurricane Ida became an extratropical cyclone, where the storm’s warm air collided with a front of cold air, creating a spin that caused tornados and a rainfall seen every hundreds of years in New York.

  • Hurricane Ida has caused at least $50 million in damage in New York.

• As of Monday morning, 29 people in New Jersey have died in the aftermath of Hurricane Ida, with 1 person still missing.

  • 21 of those deaths were people who drowned in their cars or on foot from the floodwaters.

  • The missing person was also swept away by floodwaters.

  • 2 people trapped in cars drowned in Hillsborough Township, which received 8.7 over the course of the storm and 2 people died in Hopewell Township, which got 7.8 inches.

• Olaf dropped from a hurricane to a tropical storm on Friday evening, with winds at 40 MPH and located 45 miles west-southwest of Cabo San Lazaro.

  • At least 700 residents spent the night in shelters with another 20,000 tourists remaining in hotels.

  • Hotels reported minor damage and some neighborhoods reported lost power but there were no reports of deaths.

  • Olaf moved out to the Pacific later Friday evening.

• Between August 2017 and August 2020, homes sold by the Department of Housing and Urban Development were 75 times more likely to be in federally designated flood zones compared to all the homes sold nationwide in that time period.

Climate Studies