Some like it HOT

 

Jeffrey St. Clair 

+ Iraq’s agricultural production has fallen by 40% in 4 years. Much of the decline is due to drought and heat. Over the next few decades, the UN projects temperatures in Iraq will rise by another 2 degrees. Livestock numbers have crashed.

+ On Tuesday, temperatures hit 106.7 degrees Fahrenheit in Buenos Aires, the second-highest mark ever. Other parts of Argentina saw temperatures as high as 113 degrees Fahrenheit. The heat was so intense in Argentina that air temperatures rose to 129 degrees F, making it for a few hours the hottest place in the world–until it was obliterated by a reading of 123 degrees F in Onslow, Western Australia, the highest temperature ever recorded in the Southern Hemisphere.

+ It was downright scorching in Texas in December, where the average temperature was an astounding 12.1°F above the 20th century normal and nearly 6°F warmer than any other December in the last 126 years…

+ The Great Barrier Reef seems likely to be hit by another mass bleaching by the end of January, the fourth such coral killing event in the last seven years.