Paul Bakus in a ruined pumpkin patch.Photo: Wonk Room

Cross-posted from the Wonk Room.

Our increasingly extreme climate is devastating American agriculture. Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, strengthened by global warming, caused $1.6 billion in agriculture damage in Louisiana alone. Now it appears that a Thanksgiving mainstay -- pumpkin pie -- is next on the global boiling hit list. On Tuesday, Nestle Baking, “which controls about 85 percent of the pumpkin crop for canning, issued a rare apology and said that rain appeared to have destroyed what remained of a small harvest this year and that it expected to stop shipping the holiday staple by Thanksgiving.” Paul Bakus, vice president and general manager of Nestle Baking, bemoaned the devastating rains that made it impossible to harvest the Morton, Illinois pumpkin crop used for Libby’s canned pumpkin:

If only we could have changed the weather. We hope Mother Nature is nicer to us next year, hopefully delivering less rain and more sunshine.

In addition, waffles are on the hit list, as supplies of Eggos are disappearing. “Heavy rains that soaked Atlanta last month knocked out Kellogg’s waffle operations,” ABC News reported on Tuesday. September’s epic flooding actually exacerbated a shutdown caused by an earlier virulent outbreak of the deadly bacteria Listeria monocytogenes. Kellogg’s initially only referred to the food poisoning threat as “equipment issues,” preferring to let global boiling take the blame.

Unfortunately, we have changed the weather.

“2009 continues to climb up the rainiest-years-ever chart” in Illinois. This year’s rainfall in Peoria of 49.34 inches -- 50 percent above normal -- has already exceeded the total of 2008, itself 25 percent above normal. With only six more inches of precipitation, 2009 will break the record rainfall set in 1990.

Similarly, the Sept. 21 flood in Atlanta, Ga. “was worse than what’s statistically projected to happen once every 100 years -- even worse than every 500 years.” It was “extremely rare”, “epic” and so “stunning,” the U.S. Geological Survey says the “flood has defied its attempts to define it.”

This kind of extreme precipitation is part of the changes to our climate wrought by global warming, which increases the amount of water vapor the atmosphere can hold and changes circulation patterns. As the U.S. Global Change Program reported in June, 2009 on the impacts of climate change in the Midwest and the Southeast:

– In the Midwest, both summer and winter precipitation have been above average for the last three decades, the wettest period in a century. The Midwest has experienced two record-breaking floods in the past 15 years.

– According to climate models, precipitation in the Midwest is projected to increase in winter and spring, and to become more intense throughout the year.

– In the Southeast, average autumn precipitation has increased by 30 percent for the region since 1901. There has been an increase in heavy downpours in many parts of the region.

Update: LinkTV discusses the "fluke storm" in Georgia "that killed almost a dozen people." Scientists say "weather this extreme is becoming the norm, due to rising global temperatures":

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Send your question to Umbra!

Q. Dear Umbra,

This "year with no summer" and some alleged statistics I have seen quoted about earth-wide temperatures for the last ten years have resulted in claims that the earth is not heating -- it may even be cooling. What about it?

Arthur Waskow
Shalom Center, Philadelphia

A. Dearest Arthur,

The oceans are too getting warmer!That would be great. The planet needs some cooling, and humans certainly aren't doing anything to help. But let us remember the difference between weather and climate.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration does confirm that summer 2009 in the contiguous U.S. was 0.4 degrees Fahrenheit below the 20th Century average of 72.1 degrees. We notice no concomitant change in policy from the U.S. Global Change Research Program, or any other reputable source, so we must conclude that a cool summer was only weather, and that in general the overall climate remains on track for warming.

After all, the last decades have included the hottest years on record, when you look at ocean and surface temperatures. Last year was the eighth-warmest on record; full stats are not yet in on 2009, of course, but already we know that the world's oceans set a heat record in July. All this does not seem to indicate ten years worth of cooling temperatures.

As our country pushes further toward actually having an organized response to climate change, it's important for us all to be as informed as we can be, and to be ready to respond to those who are dubious about the need for action. Or who write whatever weird stuff you've been reading about cooling temperatures.

I have given out some resources before, and Grist as a whole is a good resource for tracking climate action in senate chambers, chat rooms, and other tangible and intangible locations. But today I'd like to be sure our browser bookmarks contain lists with some helpful easy-to-read FAQ compilations. These are for use when confused by news stories or "deniers," and are mostly organized by the issues deniers raise.

I'll just give a few. There's Grist's own "How to Talk to a Climate Skeptic" series. There's Real Climate's Start Here page as well as their index, and my beloved Union of Concerned Scientists' Climate FAQ list. Britain's Natural Environment Research Council also has a nice summary of an open session it held a few years ago, organized by debate points.

I hope those will help with the confusing moments.

Cheerfully,
Umbra

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Shovel more, salt less.

In my family, perhaps in every family, there are stories so apocryphal that a simple phrase becomes a stand-in for the whole tale. One of ours is “salting the plants.” That refers to the time my mother, a high-school student prone to merry pranks, snuck in to her school dining hall at night and, well, salted the plants. Needless to say, the plants did not respond well to said prank; nor did my mother’s teachers, and her punishment was swift.

If there’s one lesson I took from that story, it’s this: Man, the ‘50s were a different time, weren’t they? Oh no, sorry, it’s this: salt and vegetation do not mix. Which is why it seems a no-brainer that the huge amounts of salt spread on U.S. roadways each winter—an average of 8 to 12 million tons, according to the National Research Council, and more in snowy winters like this one—is not so eco-friendly.

Grist’s Pick

Give ice melt a miss. If you must use it, avoid sodium chloride.

As awareness grows about the drawbacks of wanton salt spreading—including not only damage to roadside vegetation but pollution of water supplies and corrosion of cars and bridges—consumers are beginning to search for alternatives. While municipalities study the best approach (and test creative alternatives), homeowners are left to their own devices. I decided to investigate the options. I’ll lay out three useful lessons I learned, then review three of the products I found.

Read the ingredients, not the claims. As is the case with food and beauty products, the ice-melt industry has cottoned on to the fact that people want green. Which means eco-claims abound. Read ingredient lists. If there’s no ingredient list on the package, don’t buy the stuff. And avoid sodium chloride; that common concoction is the worst of all the salts (and also, of course, the cheapest). For more details on alternative ingredients, see products below.

“Pet-friendly” means eco-friendly. Some brands may be more focused on safety to dogs, cats, and horses than safety to the landscape or water supply, but it’s a pretty good bet that if they advertise as pet-friendly, they’re better for your plants, your kids, and you.

Sometimes traction is enough. Do you really need to melt the ice, or can you just make it walkable? Everyday products like sand, sawdust, kitty litter (non-clumping), and ashes are proven ways to add traction to a slippery surface. They’re better for you, comparatively better for your immediate environment, and often cheaper too.

Now back to our regularly scheduled testing. Note: The products below represent just a few of the eco-options out there; availability will vary based on location. This list is not intended as an endorsement.

Earth Friendly Products Ice Melt
Eco-claims: Safe for pets and vegetation
Active ingredients: Magnesium chloride hexahydrate, calcium chloride (2-3%), potassium chloride (0.5-1%), sodium chloride (0.5-1%)
Price paid: $12/6.5 lbs.

Translated into English, this ingredient list reads, “salt, salt, salt, and salt.” Still, the bulk of the product is magnesium chloride, a safer and less corrosive salt than the more common sodium chloride. The melt’s white color can make it hard to see, which is both a plus (if you don’t want your driveway to look dirty) and a minus (if you’re trying to see where you’ve already spread). Performance was solid.

Paws Applause Ice Melt ‘n’ Traction Crystals
Eco-claims: Paws down, the pet-friendliest ice-melt formula
Active ingredients: Magnesium chloride hexahydrate, urea, Dolomitic limestone
Price paid: $15.32/20 lbs.

This pet-safe brand relies on magnesium chloride too, and includes urea, a fertilizer component whose use in deicers is controversial: it works, yes, but is damaging to waterways. This gray-black blend looks a bit like birdseed when spread, and just made things look dirty after a few hours. Of the three I tested, it was slowest to take effect, although it eventually did the job.

Inferno Ice Melter
Eco-claims: Melt the ice … protect your landscape
Active ingredients: Calcium magnesium acetate, potassium acetate, pure sea sodium, urea
Price paid: $19.90/50 lbs.

This blend contains two acetates, widely hailed for being less corrosive and damaging than salts (though recent research shows that potassium acetate, adopted by a majority of airports as a deicing agent, may damage aquatic life). Products containing CMA tend to be more expensive—sometimes 10 to 20 times more than salt—though in this case the price was good. And while Inferno’s lurid aqua hue (a tint intended for ease of use) makes your driveway look like a fishbowl, the stuff does work.

The Bottom Line: While all three of the ice melts I tested were effective, each contains at least one controversial ingredient. In fact, there is no perfect ice melt out there—so the best step on this slippery topic may be to avoid the stuff altogether.

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The Atlantic hurricane season officially ended Sunday, marking the close of the second-most-costly season since 2005, and the fourth-busiest season overall since 1944. This year was "the only year on record in which a major hurricane existed in every month from July through November in the north Atlantic," according to the National Climatic Data Center.

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Photo: Marni Rosen

Children who moved into FEMA trailers after losing their homes in Hurricanes Katrina and Rita have alarming rates of sickness and mental health problems, according to an in-depth review of medical records. Forty-two percent of the children studied suffer from respiratory troubles that may be linked to formaldehyde in the trailers.

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Nearly two months after Hurricane Ike reared its head on the Texas and Louisiana coast, workers are still cleaning up what may be a record amount of debris. The wee bright side: only some 15 percent of the wreckage is headed to the landfill, while the rest is reused or recycled.

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Hurricane Ike caused plenty of problems for Gulf Coast humans, but now it looks like the storm has also messed with area wildlife. Ike's storm surge helped turn some freshwater wetlands as far as 20 miles inland into salty marshes hostile to many freshwater fish, as well as other wildlife. "[The salt infusion] exasperates everything that needs freshwater," said Jim Sutherlin, superintendent of a Gulf Coast wildlife area. "If we don't get a lot of rain soon, then it's gloom and doom for fish, insects, and some mammals." Algae blooms have also been a problem; caused by untreated sewage rushing into Galveston Bay after the storm, algae blooms have been sucking oxygen out of the water, leaving little available for marine life. Ike's high winds also shredded many mulberry trees that migrating birds depend on for fuel to cross the Gulf of Mexico. "This will have a huge impact on the birds," said Gina Donovan of the Houston Audubon Society. "Without the food to fatten them for a 600-mile journey, the birds will starve and perish."

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