Surely the nations are like a drop in a bucket;
they are regarded as dust on the scales;
he weighs the islands as though they were fine dust. — Isaiah 40:15

As the United States Senate dithers over the possible costs of global warming policy, the world’s increasingly unstable climate is extracting a deadly toll.

Surely the nations are like a drop in the bucket . . . Residents of Georgia, Alabama and Tennessee now have “a chance to mourn, recover and repair after devastating floods” killed ten people earlier this week. Gov. Sonny Perdue “has declared a state of emergency in 17 flood-stricken counties, and State Insurance Commissioner John Oxendine estimated that the flooding has caused an estimated $250 million in losses.” The catastrophic flooding comes after a “two-year regional drought that had residents more used to water restrictions than inundated interstates.” In 2007, Gov. Perdue prayed for rain.

They are regarded as dust on the scales . . . Eastern Australia is suffering an “unprecedented” dust storm, a catastrophic combination of “earth, wind and fire.” The epochal dust storm, “carrying an estimated 5 million tons of dust,” has “turned Sydney into Mars.” Up to “75,000 tons of dust an hour” are being blown across Sydney by winds of more than 60 miles per hour. Much of the dust is dessicated topsoil, as eastern Australia enters its twelfth year of severe drought. Since 1979, “all but four years have been warmer than average in Australia.” The catastrophic dust storm follows Australia’s unprecedented wildfires in March. This August, the heart of the Australian winter, Australian mean temperatures were “2.47°C (4.4°F) above the long-term average, breaking the previous record by 0.98°C.”

He weighs the islands as though they were fine dust. Each year, the oceans, swelled by heat and melting glaciers, further submerge the islands of the world. “If things go business-as-usual, we will not live, we will die,” Maldives President Mohammad Nasheed told the UN General Assembly on Tuesday. “Our country will not exist. We cannot come out from Copenhagen as failures. We cannot make Copenhagen a pact for suicide. We have to succeed and we have to make a deal in Copenhagen.”

Once-in-a-century drought followed by once-in-a-century flooding — Hell and High Water — that’s something larger and larger swaths of this country will need to get used to, especially if their Congressional reps keep opposing action on climate change.

Douglas county Georgia was “hit by 21 inches of rain in a 24-hour period from Sunday to Monday, knocking out the drinking water supply to most residents, and forcing others to boil their water,” the NYT reports.  “As much as 15 to 20 inches of rain pounded counties around Atlanta for more than 72 hours.”

On Tuesday, Reuters reported “a state climatologist said this was the worst [flooding] in 100 years in some parts of Atlanta.”  Today, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution listed the records set.  Here are just a few:

Among the flooding records, a nearly 90-year-old mark was broken Monday when the Chattahoochee River reached 29.61 feet near Whitesburg, west of Palmetto. The old record was 29.11 feet, set on Dec. 11, 1919.

Downstream, the Chattahoochee on Tuesday beat another nine-decade record near Franklin, reaching 29.97 feet. The new record bested a Dec. 15, 1919 mark.

The largest jumps came at Utoy Creek, near Atlanta, where the water level surged to 27.54 feet, nearly 11 feet over the May 2003 record of 16.86 feet, and Sweetwater Creek at Austell, where Tuesday’s crest of 30.17 feet topped the previous record of 21.81 feet set in 2005.

I have called this type of rapid deluge, “global warming type” record rainfall, since it is one of the most basic predictions of climate science — and its an impact that has already been documented to have started (see below).

And on top of the direct storm-related deaths, it is a broad threat to human health.  As the AJC reported yesterday:

The record rains of the past few days flooded out sewage treatment plants in Fulton, Cobb and Gwinnett counties, dumping millions of gallons of untreated sewage into local waterways.

So, water already polluted by oil and gasoline, trash, pesticides and other ground contaminants will also be carrying debris and bacteria from human waste….

The damaged plants around metro Atlanta continue to dump untreated, or not-fully-treated sewage into floodwaters that then end up rising into homes and businesses.

The main reason I am writing about Georgia’s once-in-a-century flooding, though, is that just a short while ago, the region was hit by a once-in-a-century drought (see “And the drought goes on“).  This is the climatic whipsawing of Hell and High Water.  Here is how things looked in October 2007:

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I like the Green Inc, blog.  Indeed, CP routinely cites their work, especially in the news Roundup, including today.  But what exactly is one to make of this headline:

Inhofe Pans Obama Climate Speech

This isn’t even “dog bites man,” which now that I think about it, doesn’t seem to happen that much anymore.  I mean, when was the last time you heard about a really serious dog bite?  Heck, that’d be news, unlike, say, the fossil Senator who asserted “global warming is the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American public” dissing Obama’s big UN speech on climate.

No, this headline is more like, “Study: Multiple Stab Wounds May Be Harmful To Monkeys“:

“We’re looking at building a new gas-fired generation plant, but this solution would mitigate the need to build the size power plant that we had anticipated.“

Tell me again why we need a new coal plant in North Carolina?  Efficiency is cheaper, cleaner, and smarter.  The caption for the figure: “Residents in a smart grid pilot project in North Carolina can manage their electricity usage online.”

N.C. smart grid pilot cuts usage 20%

A smart grid pilot project in Fayetteville, N.C., has resulted in an initial 20 percent decline in average electricity consumption, according Consert, a Raleigh, N.C. technology company.

Those numbers are based on the first month of the project, a joint effort between Consert and I.B.M. that installed energy management systems for 100 residential and business customers of the Fayetteville Public Works Commission, the local utility.

Consert attached controllers on hot water heaters, air conditioners and pool pumps and then let customers go online and set targets for their monthly electricity bill. Smart meters and a wireless communications system provide real-time electricity consumption data to allow the utility to cycle appliances on and off to achieve the savings and help it manage peak demand.

The customer sets up a profile detailing when they wake up in the morning, go to work, return home and what temperature they’d like in their home.

“The consumer can say ‘I want my utility bill to be not to be greater than $200 a month,’ and then we’ll look at their past bill history to see if that’s achievable and ask what they want to do to achieve their goals,” said Jack Roberts, Consert’s chief executive.

The company’s software takes into account the customer’s billing history, local weather conditions and other factors to manage the home’s appliances. Mr. Roberts said Consert can control up to 256 devices but expects most savings will come from appliances such as air conditioners and water heaters.

“One of the things that was a bit of a surprise to us was how much pool pumps and hot water heaters contributed to peak demand,” said Mr. Roberts, who noted that one household had reduced electricity use by 50 percent. “On an August afternoon you’re less likely to notice that your pool pump is off for three hours than that your air conditioner is off for 10 minutes,” he said.

The Consert system, which is based on IBM software, would allow the Fayetteville Public Works Commission to selectively reduce demand among its 80,000 customers without having to, say, shut off everyone’s air conditioners at the same time.

Utilities typically spend hundreds of millions of dollars building so-called peaking power plants that provide electricity when demand spikes, and otherwise sit idle for most of the year.

Keith Lynch, an executive at the Fayetteville Public Works Commission, said the utility hopes the Consert system will help it to cut such capital costs and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

“We’re looking at building a new gas-fired generation plant, but this solution would mitigate the need to build the size power plant that we had anticipated,” he said.

Storing CO2 in soil should be on U.N. agenda: Gore

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China’s emissions pledge shakes up Capitol Hill debate

… “That’s encouraging,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.). “That will help us make decisions on our emission problems.”

Sen. Evan Bayh (D-Ind.) said … “that’s a step in the right direction.”

That’s the E&E News PM (subs. req’d) headline and a couple of excerpts from their story on Chinese President Hu Jintao’s UN speech.

We already knew that all evidence suggests China will lead (see “Peaking Duck: Beijing’s Growing Appetite for Climate Action“) “” if the Congress passes a climate bill (see “ ‘China will sign’ global treaty if U.S. passes climate bill, E.U. leader says“).

Yesterday, Hu said (speech here):

We will endeavor to cut carbon dioxide emissions [per] GDP by a notable margin by 2020 from the 2005 level.Second, we will vigorously develop renewable energy and nuclear energy. We will endeavor to increase the share of non-fossil fuels in primary energy consumption to around 15 percent by 2020.

Third, we will energetically increase forest carbon … we will endeavor to increase forest coverage by 40 million hectares and forest stock volume by 1.3 billion cubic meters by 2020 from the 2005 levels.

Fourth, we will step up our efforts to develop green economy, low carbon economy … and enhance research, development and dissemination of climate-friendly technologies.

Certainly, China is going to eat our lunch on clean energy jobs if we don’t pass the clean air, clean water, clean energy jobs bill (see “Invented here, sold there”).  And certainly we need to hear the specific details about the carbon intensity pledge — I’d like to see them commit to reduce CO2 per GDP by more than 50% from 2005 to 2020.

But is the growing willingness of China to make real commitments going to change the dynamics in the Senate, where China’s suppose an unwillingness to act has been one of the two or three biggest objections?  Here are more some excerpts from the E&E story:

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A key lesson of Katrina is that global warming “adaptation” is a cruel euphemism “” and prevention is far, far cheaper. But we certainly need to prepare for the catastrophes we know are inevitable — all the more so if the global warming deniers and delayers succeed in blocking U.S. climate action.  The scientific literature, such as the journal Nature, makes clear that hurricanes ARE getting fiercer “” and it’s going to get much worse.  In particular, land-falling Gulf Coast hurricanes will likely grow more and more destructive (see Why global warming means killer storms worse than Katrina and Gustav, Part 1 and Part 2).  So it is particularly self-destructive for Senators from Gulf Coast states to offer knee-jerk opposition to even the mildest of planning efforts, as guest blogger Brad Johnson makes clear in this repost.

Sen. David Vitter (R-LA) is trying to prevent the United States from being ready for the next Hurricane Katrina. Vitter, who denies the human influence on global warming, has submitted an amendment (S. Amdt. 2450) to the Interior appropriations bill (H.R. 2996) to block funding for centers that study and prepare for the impacts of climate change:

SEC. 423. PROHIBITION ON USE OF FUNDS TO DEVELOP REGIONAL CLIMATE CHANGE OFFICES.

No funds made available by this Act may be used to develop Regional Climate Change offices within the Department of the Interior.

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EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson signed the Final Mandatory Reporting of Greenhouse Gases Rule today in efforts to better monitor the emission of greenhouse gases across the country. The final rule will require for fossil fuel suppliers, vehicle and engine manufacturers, and facilities that emit over 25,000 metric tons of greenhouse gases annually to report their emissions to the EPA.

Starting in January 2010, some 10,000 facilities across the country will begin their emissions reporting for the first time, accounting for roughly 85% of American greenhouse gas emissions. The new rule is targeted at large manufacturers and facilities that do most of our polluting, and Administrator Jackson reported that the majority of small businesses will be exempt from this rule. In statement released by the EPA today, this will account for the equivalent of emissions by 4,600 motor vehicles annually.

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