[MCN] 1, 000-plus years of tree rings confirm historic extremity of 2021 western North America heat wave

[Lance Olsen]

27-Mar-2023
1,000-plus years of tree rings confirm historic extremity of 2021 western North America heat wave
COLUMBIA CLIMATE SCHOOL
PEER-REVIEWED PUBLICATION

In summer 2021, a stunning heat wave swept western North America, from British Columbia to Washington, Oregon and beyond into other inland areas where the climate is generally mild. Temperature records were set by tens of degrees in many places, wildfires broke out, and at least 1,400 people died. Scientists blamed the event largely on human-driven climate warming, and declared it unprecedented. But without reliable weather data going back more than a century or so, did it really have no precedent? A new study of tree rings from the region shows that the event was almost certainly the worst in at least the past millennium.

JOURNAL
npj Climate and Atmospheric Science
 <https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/984034>
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/984034


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“Conservationists have proposed methods for adapting to climate change that assume species distributions are primarily explained by climate variables. .... Our results suggest that protecting geophysical settings will conserve the stage for current and future biodiversity and may be a robust alternative to species-level predictions.”

Anderson MG, Ferree CE (2010) Conserving the Stage: Climate Change and the Geophysical Underpinnings of Species Diversity. PLoS ONE 5(7): e11554. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0011554

 <<http://www.plosone.org/article/fetchObject.action?uri=info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0011554&representation=PDF>>

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