Vulnerability

Recent reporting on how global warming is disrupting lives and livelihoods

irinnews.org

Warnings on the dire consequences of climate change in the coming years have been ramping up recently.

Hundreds of millions of people may be at risk of climate-related poverty, especially in developing countries, if the global economy does not cut greenhouse gas emissions, a UN report warned in October. It also noted that food shortages, fires, floods, and droughts would put ever larger numbers of lives and livelihoods at risk within the next 12 years. And in November scientists noted that the oceans have been warming at faster rates than previously thought – which could mean that coastal and island communities will experience greater flooding and storms will become fiercer, among other things.

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Hackers working for Russia compromised power companies' networks, giving them the ability to cause blackouts, federal officials warn.  Getty Images

Hackers could have caused blackouts, federal officials tell the Wall Street Journal.

cnet.com - by Steven Musil - July 24, 2018

Hackers working for Russia were able to gain access to the control rooms of US electric utilities last year, allowing them to cause blackouts, federal officials tell the Wall Street Journal.

The hackers -- working for a state-sponsored group previously identified as Dragonfly or Energetic Bear -- broke into utilities' isolated networks by hacking networks belonging to third-party vendors that had relationships with the power companies, the Department of Homeland Security said in a press briefing on Monday.

Officials said the campaign had claimed "hundreds of victims" and is likely continuing, the Journal reported.

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submitted by Diane Tucker

A tree toppled by Hurricane Maria rests over damaged graves in the Villa Palmeras cemetery in San Juan, Puerto Rico, in December 2017.  Mario Tama/Getty Images

CLICK HERE - STUDY - NEJM - Mortality in Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria

npr.org - by Richard Harris - May 29, 2018

Perhaps 5,000 people died in Puerto Rico in 2017 for reasons related to September's Hurricane Maria, according to a study that dismisses the official death toll of 64 as "a substantial underestimate."

A research team led by scientists at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health didn't simply attempt to count dead bodies in the wake of the powerful storm. Instead, they surveyed randomly chosen households and asked the occupants about their experiences.

From that approach, they concluded that between Sept. 20 and Dec. 31, 2017, there were 4,645 "excess deaths" — that is, deaths that would not have occurred if the island hadn't been plunged into a prolonged disaster following the devastating storm.

A dead Bodó fish in front of stranded floating houses on the bed of Negro River, a major tributary of the Amazon River, during a drought in 2015. Photograph: Raphael Alves/AFP/Getty Images

CLICK HERE - ipbes - Biodiversity and Nature’s Contributions Continue Dangerous Decline, Scientists Warn

Unsustainable exploitation of the natural world threatens food and water security of billions of people, major UN-backed biodiversity study reveals

theguardian.com - by Jonathan Watts - March 23, 2018

Human destruction of nature is rapidly eroding the world’s capacity to provide food, water and security to billions of people, according to the most comprehensive biodiversity study in more than a decade.

Such is the rate of decline that the risks posed by biodiversity loss should be considered on the same scale as those of climate change, noted the authors of the UN-backed report, which was released in Medellin, Colombia on Friday.