#post normal

...is the product of a series of changes: the change in capital in which transnational corporations turn to networks for flexibility and global management, production, and trade; the change in individual behaviour, in which networks have become a prime tool for individuals seeking freedom and communication with others who share their interests, desires and hopes; and the change in technology, in which people worldwide have rapidly adopted digital technology and new forms of telecommunication in everyday life.

Nigeria is Experiencing Climate Change At a Level Most Nations Have Yet to See - What Can We Learn From Nigeria?

The State of Nigeria Today

Nigeria is home to the fastest growing mega city – Lagos. It is home to multinational oil companies. It is home to tropical rain forests, grasslands and deserts. And it is the desert which is creating a crisis. That crisis is increased desertification.

Nigeria’s Plateau State is experiencing tribal and ethnic conflict largely resulting from the pressures of the advancing desert. Arable farmland and water are at a premium. Mass migration is the end result. Because if you cannot grow or raise the food you need in this part of the country then you move elsewhere or starve. And what is happening in Plateau State in Nigeria is symptomatic of similar crises occurring in other Sub-Saharan states including Senegal, Guinea, Mali, Niger and Cameroon to name just some.

In a scientific study completed in 2009, researchers concluded that climate change could devastate Africa leading to massive food shortages. Their research showed that Africa was warming faster than other parts of the globe and getting drier. It predicted an increase in average temperatures for the continent of 4 degrees Celsius (7 Fahrenheit) over the next century. Their climate models showed that parts of Africa would see increased rainfall but for the areas of Sub-Saharan West Africa, prolonged drought would be the forecast. Prolonged drought would lead to increased desertification.

The Growth of the Sahara Desert

Many scientists argue that the Sahara Desert is the first evidence of human-induced climate change. They point to the fact that there is evidence of human settlements in the Sahara  10,500 years ago when the Sahara was savanna-like and far more habitable than today. Archaeological digs have found bones from elephants, rhinos, hippos, crocodiles and 30 species of fish, all  thriving in what is today desert.

[...]

Today, many scientists see that same pattern emerging in the Sahel south of the Sahara. Persistent drought, improper land use, increasing human and domestic animal population, over grazing, chopping down of trees for firewood, and depleting aquifers are putting undue stress on an environment already experiencing episodes of drought.

The Consequences of Changes in the Sahara

Desertification is increasing human competition. Increased human competition is leading to mass migration, civil unrest and wars. The mass migration is leading to urban growth. At its current immigration growth rate of 8% per year, Lagos, Africa’s largest city, will exceed 25 million in population by 2015 to become the 3rd most populous urban centre in the World. Many of its newcomers will be climate refugees from the north.

The post normal is amping up the risks involved in mountain climbing, as extreme weather changes everything.

Kirk Johnson, For Climbers, Risks Now Shift With Every Step via NYTimes.com

In climbing lore, coming back down the mountain safely is the ultimate measure of a climber’s success, not the number of summits achieved. And around the world this year, it has been a bad season in that respect. A climbing disaster in the French Alps last week, with nine climbers killed by an avalanche, was only the most recent example.

Scientists, mountaineers and parks managers say it is a pincerlike motion of forces: more people seeking adventure even as the risks involved are becoming more variable.

From a freakish storm-driven flood in the Great Smoky Mountains in Tennessee that killed two people this month to an avalanche here on McKinley in June that killed four climbers in a place where avalanches are historically less of a worry, the new norm is increasingly the lack of a norm. Patterns of the past can no longer be relied on for guidance.

Since November, at least 34 people in the United States alone have been killed by avalanches, and three of the four worst years for fatalities since 1950 have occurred since 2007, according to the Colorado Avalanche Information Center.

“The extremes are becoming more extreme,” said Tucker Chenoweth, a mountaineering ranger at Denali National Park and Preserve. Mr. Chenoweth trains search and rescue teams on McKinley from the ranger station here in Talkeetna, which oversees the mountain and its expeditions about 60 miles from base camp.

In a strange way, Mr. Chenoweth and other experts said, wild places like McKinley are getting wilder, or at least harder to predict.

Sharper seasonal variations of ice and snow and temperature are being repeated all across the world from the Himalayas to the Andes, which scientists say are driven by a higher level of energy in the atmosphere from global warming. As a result, climbers have to think twice about what they might expect one year to the next, or even one day to the next, in places they might have climbed for decades.