Is this the new normal?

 Jeffrey St. Clair

+ The ocean temperature in Manatee Bay, near Key Largo, reached 101.1F on Monday, the hottest sea surface temperature ever recorded on Earth.

+ The news may be even worse up north off the east coast of Canada, where hundreds of thousands of square miles of ocean experienced sea surface temperatures more than 5°C (9°F) above normal and some areas approaching 10°C (18°F) above normal. Thermal stress from this marine heatwave is certain to have major impacts on marine life in the Northwest Atlantic.

+ The Florida Keys contain the third largest coral reef system in the world and the only one in the continental US. With the extreme ocean temperatures this summer, all of these reefs are at risk of dying out. Many already have. Scott Atwell from The Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary: “We’ve never seen anything like this. Some are not even bleaching, they are going straight to dead.” “We are surprised by the pace. It is unprecedented what we have seen. We’ve never seen anything like this. Some are not even bleaching, they are going straight to dead.”

+ The brutal heat waves pressing down on Europe are eviscerating the continent’s cereal crops. Southern Europe grain yields are likely to be 60% lower than last year and 9.5% lower than the 5-year average.

This summer about 200 million people in cities today are at risk from extreme heat. That number that is expected to increase eightfold by 2050.

+ People keep asking me, as they wipe the sweat from their brow: “Is this the new normal? Is this what summer’s going to be like from now on?” My answer is no. We won’t know what the new normal is until after we’ve stopped burning fossil fuels. And we’re still using more each year than the year before.