Global warming- Greece

[jennylamb1]

In Rhodes, Greece. Have been holidaying here for over 30 years, as have family here. Yearly average at this time of year is high 30 low 24, this week if will be 39/24 and compared to the usual pleasant heat and balmy evenings, it is like being in an oven.
I know it's global warming, however the increase in the number of heat waves here has ramped up significantly and I feel as if for the first time we're experiencing it firsthand which is sobering.

it is pretty funny to be starting a thread about global warming whilst you’re actually on holiday having flown there!

just smiling at the irony of where you are and how you got there

The OP is rising above this smug arse, but they have pissed me off being so sanctimonious and patronising.

No wonder there is resistance to recognising climate change if discussing it means your holiday patterns (past as well as present) are sniggered at by some superior muppet.

To the OP: I agree that it is only recently that the effects of climate change are being significantly felt by the general population. I believe that in Europe the increase in temperatures is more on average compared to other parts of the world. Also Europe is more densely populated with more infrastructure, so the effects will be more pronounced. 3

We have holidayed a lot over the years in Croatia but last week was ridiculously hot and this week it is almost 40.

Yes, and global south countries are feeling the impact much more than us, the Indian subcontinent have been impacted by significant heat waves recently, as has the Middle East and the consensus is that Europe will experience encroaching desertification especially in southern regions.

Interesting data . Could you let me have a link please?

This is certainly true. But the concerning thing now is the longer and sustained duration and earlier onset of these temps. Whilst some years ago you may have had the odd 3,4 day run of extreme temp, what we’ve had this year, for example, where it begins as early as June, snd doesn’t abate, is certainly unprecedented.

Doesnt help that it’s a total concrete city with a massive lack of green space and the thankfully now ex- mayor of the capital over the last few years seemed obsessed with removing every tree he could find,

I don’t know so much that it’ll ever affect tourism that much. People still go to Dubai even when it’s hotter than Satan’s arsehole. More of a concern for me is everyday citizens and businesses, when the basic salary is not even 900€/mo and the electricity prices are amongst the highest in Europe, many people cannot afford to cool their homes.

In terms of tourism, more of a concern is the noises the current PM is making about Greece becoming a ‘year round’ or 10-month holiday destination due to global warming. Overtourism is as much an issue here as it is in eg Barcelona or Amsterdam, and removing the winter respite will have a ruinous effect especially on islands where teachers, doctors etc are already struggling to find housing for half the year.

It’s really quite scary

To put another spin on things the winters are also much milder in Canada. We barely saw below -10 last winter in the East coast.

Which sounds good, but puts a spanner in the works for winter sports

It's from the Windows weather app.

In Greece at the moment (mainland), temperatures around 38 degrees every day. The locals telling us they have had no rain for two months. Dry spells are normal but it is happening earlier and for longer apparently. They are worried.

@itistooeasy goodness you are judgemental!

Are you a climate activist or an armchair activist out just having a bad day?

@ruffler45

The planet's climate cycles dramatically: true. It has been both much hotter and much colder. These cycles take hundreds of thousands of years; even the shockingly fast ones took thousands to complete.

We're still coming out of the last ice age: true. This is why many of the global temperature charts we see go back 11,000 years - that's when the ice cover had retreated enough to allow the warmed surface to melt more ice, so the overall temperature started climbing faster.

Global warming would be happening naturally, then: true.

Humans can't stop the planet warming: partially true. We now have enough data, and clear enough climate science, to show that our CO2 and CH4 emissions are causing much faster warming. Tellingly, the temperature gradient becomes steeper as fossil-fuelled industrial activity increases. This is still ongoing.

It doesn't matter anyway: false unless you don't give a shit about the future of your own species. On a global scale, humans have a very small tolerance window. If we want to give future generations time to figure out how to thrive on a changing Earth, we need to stop heating the climate.

My tiny carbon footprint won't make much difference: mostly true. The main culprit is industrial activity. Countries like China, India and others are entering a peak Industrial Age, burning fossil fuels, polluting waters and disturbing seismology at the rate Europe saw 150 years ago. And they are bigger.

It's not worth trying: false. Eight billion people, each producing a bit more carbon waste, add up to a significant impact. Every little helps.

The UK's being crap: false. Like other European nations, we have massively reduced our carbon impact and continue to improve. The USA's doing a heck of a lot worse.

There's no real hope: FALSE! After reading a very cheering series of articles in the Economist, I made this post about the near future with 'clean' energy. Have a look 😎https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5115812-to-tell-you-gen-z-and-alpha-will-live-in-a-prosperous-world-of-new-ideas

Back to the original point: I used to go to Greece every September, in the 1980s. It would be around 25°, compared to July-August when it was an uncomfortable 35° or more. Forest fires occurred every summer.

The difference is the extended hot season. A PP wrote that she visits in October: 40 years ago, October in Greece was distinctly winterish with cool temperatures, heavy clouds and storms.

These places will have a big challenge to adapt to climate change. They will become unpopular as tourist destinations in high summer due to the temperatures and increasing cost of flights. They would need to control wildfires if islands like this are to remain an attractive destination. Agriculture will also become more difficult. I feel sorry for the residents.

its the position of the gulf stream
someone needs to give it a nudge so we get some sun

The most cost effective means of reducing climate change and all other environmental impacts is through contraception to reduce the global population.

And one of the most effective methods of contraception is women's education.

Greece (or that part of it anyway) has had this for the past few years.

Fires. Scorching heat. It's becoming the norm

The earth is a bit big and I struggle to relate ice cores from the arctic to hot weather in Greece. They can only relate them to recently recorded history (100 - 200 years) in the arctic. Modelling the whole worlds historical weather from some 6 inch cores drilled in ice seems to me to be statistically dubious.

The earth is constantly evolving and that sea and land fossils, mud from thousand of years ago can give a truely scientifically valid history to relate to modern times is a bit of a stretch.

The met office (and similar organisation) struggle to forecast a few days/weeks in front with all the technology and records they have to hand.

Incorrect

It takes too long to reduce the population, and it's only the richest population that needs to reduce

Population * average emissions per person is what matters

And the western lifestyle has huge emissions per person - cars, meat eating, flying , buying stuff , heating and cooling large homes ( compared to the global average not the western average)

The cores are usually 1 metre to 6 metres. Where there's thick enough ice, cores of up to 40 metres are retrieved. Cores of up to 4 kilometres have been extracted, containing 800,000 years of climate history.

You'd have to be very thick not to see why ice cores are particularly relevant, as well as being a convenient record of what was in the atmosphere throughout history.

https://icecores.org/about-ice-cores

Yes and I think that over a period of 40 years there is a real lived experience sense of how things have shifted. Holiday companies and governments have a vested interest in keeping it quiet. There have always been forest fires in regions like Greece and they have often been started by arsonists, however drier tinder conditions make them more likely to spread and to be less controllable.

I’ve been to Egypt this week. We often go at the very beginning of July. I have never experienced it this hot and I’ve been eight times in the past 20 years. I saw three people faint and one poor guy had a severe epileptic seizure around the pool. It’s been ridiculously hot. We came straight home and looked at trying to amend our late august holiday to somewhere cooler than Cyprus.

I go to Greece every August. Have done for years. Never have I experienced 30 degrees. It's always been 37-40.

Interesting. Where did you access that data?

@garlictwist, it's screenshot from the Windows weather app (side menu, if you have it).

I mean it's happening everywhere, but this was from last year: amp.theguardian.com/politics/2023/jul/25/rhodes-wildfires-wake-up-call-greek-island-climate-uk

It's all miserably depressing.

Also, What's the point of taking temperatures that don't reflect the reality - ie not helpful.