Kerala Flood Disaster Is Not Natural But Man-made – Warning For India & World

 kerala floods afp

The dreadful Kerala flood disaster (350 deaths and 1 million people displaced) is not a natural disaster – it is a man-made disaster involving local Indian contributions (inadequate water storage hazard response and landslides from deforestation) and a major international contribution from global warming due to ever-increasing greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution, with the prosperous First World and Anglosphere countries being disproportionately high contributors on a per capita basis.

Below is my understanding as a biological chemist of this dreadful flood disaster in otherwise water-blessed Kerala that presently masks a worsening man-made disaster of worsening rainfall deficit (drought) in South Asia and elsewhere, including presently drought-ravaged, fire-ravaged, high-polluting and rich Australia.  The hazard response failure in Kerala should be a cogent warning to India and the World.

  1. The Kerala flood disaster is not natural but is man-made.

Despite a global warming of plus 1C, the unavoidability of a catastrophic plus 2C  and now regular, high energy hurricane catastrophes in tropical Island Nations and low-lying nations, the atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) is relentlessly increasing as is carbon fuel burning for energy.  This relentless climate criminal greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution, climate inaction and consequential floods and droughts are enabled by political short-termism that ignores horrendous current Hazard Response Debt, huge, inescapable and worsening Carbon Debt and the palpable reality that Disasters Are Not Natural. While personal, corporate or national debt can be expunged or evaded in various ways, Hazard Response Debt and Carbon Debt are inescapable – human populations will suffer grievously unless there is adequate  risk management, drought-proofing and flood-proofing [1].

However there are  stark national differences in per capita responsibility  for climate hazards facing the world and in per capita ability to respond to such hazards. Thus:

(a)  annual per capita GHG pollution in tonnes CO2-equivalent  per person is  2.1 for India versus 41.0 for the United States and  52.9 for Australia  (116 if including its huge GHG-generating  exports) [2] ;

(b) a  weighted annual pollution score taking income into account  is  0.3 for India versus 207.1 for the United States and  306.8 for Australia  (or 672.8 if including its huge GHG-generating  exports) [3];

(c) the historical, damage-related Carbon Debt ( 1751-2006 ) in  billion tonnes CO2 is 9.01 for India versus  99.12 for the United States and 5.59 for Australia [4, 5] – at a damage-related Carbon Price of $200 per tonne CO2 [6] this translates  to $1.8 trillion for India versus $19.8 trillion for the United States and $1.1 trillion for Australia;

(d) the per capita, historical, damage-related Carbon Debt (1751-2006 ) in  tonnes CO2 per head of 2018 population is 6.6 for India (population 1,356 million) , 303.0 for the United States (population 327.1 million) and 225.4 for Australia (population 24.8 million) – at a damage-related Carbon Price of $200 per tonne CO2 [6] this translates to $1,320 for India versus $60,600 for the United States and $45,080 for Australia.

(e) The per capita GDP is $1,983 for India versus  $59,501 for the United States and $55,707 for Australia [7].

However climate change does not recognize borders, and in a globalized and steadily robotizing world economy the cost of materials for Hazard Response are much the same in the Third World as in the Developed World. Increasingly  flood-, drought- and elevated temperature-impacted India is hugely impoverished and thus is hugely response-limited relative to the Developed World and Anglosphere countries which, further,  have a disproportionately  high responsibility for these horrendous impacts. Indeed the people of Kerala are hugely response-limited relative to the disproportionately hugely wealthy Indian ruling class who, in a carbon economy context, are  disproportionately hugely complicit in the floods, droughts and elevated temperatures impacting India.

Dr V. S. Vijayan (Environmental scientist and  a member of the expert panel on the Western Ghats) on a man-made flood disaster in Kerala: “This was waiting to happen. Insensible use of land, soil and rocks led to this deluge. Landslips and flash floods happened in areas that witnessed widespread human incursions. I hope everyone will learn a lesson from this. Due to climate change, such tragedies are bound to increase. Nobody can stop rains or control floods. But we can take measures to lower the intensity of such impacts” [8].

Dr V. S. Vijayan is absolutely correct about the need for requisite hazard perception and hazard response [8]. Rational risk management is crucial for societal safety and successively involves (a) accurate information, (b) science-based analysis, this involving the critical testing of potentially falsifiable hypotheses, and (c) science-informed systemic change to minimize risk. Unfortunately, greed and short-termism frequently intervene  to replace science-based risk management with (a) censorship, intimidation, lying and spin , (b) anti-science, spin-based analysis involving the selective use of asserted facts to support a partisan position, and (c)  propaganda and “blame and shame” that inhibit the primary need for accurate reportage. Thus in a global context, 16 million people die avoidably from deprivation each year (4 million in India) on Spaceship Earth with the flight deck run by One Percenters who own 50% of the world’s wealth [9-11].

  1. Probabilistic attribution of extreme floods and droughts to man-made climate change.

Man-made global warming is associated with  increased Sea Surface Temperature (SST), increased evaporation, increased atmospheric moisture and thence increased precipitation. Evaporation is associated with heat absorption (why we perspire to cool down) and, conversely, precipitation is associated with an exothermic release of latent heat which increases the energy of storms. Thus man-made global warming through GHG pollution is increasing the energy of tropical storms (hurricanes, cyclones) and increasing sea level and hence the damaging effects of storm surges.  Increased temperature over land is likewise associated with soil drying and severe drought in the absence of precipitation.

However there is always considerable variability in the day-to-day weather, and there is a probabilistic element in attributing significant weather events to man-made global warming. Thus Quirin Schiermeier writing in  the Scientific American (2018): “The idea behind attribution science is simple enough. Disasters such as record-breaking heatwaves and extreme rainfall are likely to become more common because the build-up of greenhouse gases is altering the atmosphere. Warmer air contains more water vapour and stores more energy; the increasing temperatures can also change large-scale atmospheric circulation patterns. But extreme weather can also arise from natural cycles, such as the El Niño phenomenon that periodically warms sea surface temperatures in the tropical Pacific Ocean” [12].

Eastern Australia is presently suffering a devastating, multi-year drought that is variously impacted by man-made global warming,  a  shift southwards of a major westerly “Roaring Forties” system (that swept European sailors across the Indian Ocean and aided European invasion and colonization of India, Indonesia and Australia) and by the El Niño phenomenon in the Pacific (ocean warming in the Western Pacific leading to drought in Eastern Australia and floods in the  Western parts of the Americas, the converse system being called La Niña). Dr Andrew King and Professor David Karoly (School of Earth Sciences, University of Melbourne): “Whenever we experience heatwaves or cold snaps, droughts or floods, people want to know: was this due to climate change? And until about a decade ago the response was: we don’t know. We can’t link specific extreme weather events to climate change. Now things have changed. While we can’t say climate change caused an extreme event, we can estimate how much more or less likely the event has become due to human influences on the climate. This relatively new and rapidly developing area of science is called “Event Attribution”… Australian climate scientists have been leading the way in event attribution and are at the forefront of new developments in the field. In part, this is because Australia is already experiencing a rapidly changing climate with many extreme events occurring in the last few years. We have assessed the role of human-forced climate change and natural variability (related to El Niño and La Niña) in a range of recent extreme events including the heavy rains of 2011/12, the “Angry Summer” of 2013, and the heatwaves and droughts of the last three years… [e.g.] human activities have exacerbated the impacts of tropical cyclones through sea level rise causing larger storm surges” [13].

The US National Academies of Sciences have similarly stated (2016): “As climate has warmed over recent years, a new pattern of more frequent and more intense weather events has unfolded across the globe. Climate models simulate such changes in extreme events, and some of the reasons for the changes are well understood. Warming increases the likelihood of extremely hot days and nights, favors increased atmospheric moisture that may result in more frequent heavy rainfall and snowfall, and leads to evaporation that can exacerbate droughts. Even with evidence of these broad trends, scientists cautioned in the past that individual weather events couldn’t be attributed to climate change. Now, with advances in understanding the climate science behind extreme events and the science of extreme event attribution, such blanket statements may not be accurate. The relatively young science of extreme event attribution seeks to tease out the influence of human-cause climate change from other factors, such as natural sources of variability like El Niño, as contributors to individual extreme events” [14].

Giuling Wang et al. have recently provided a powerful new insight into the basis of increasing rainfall rates with increasing temperature (2017) : “Theoretical models predict that, in the absence of moisture limitation, extreme precipitation intensity could exponentially increase with temperatures at a rate determined by the [thermodynamics] Clausius–Clapeyron (C–C) relationship. Climate models project a continuous increase of precipitation extremes for the twenty-first century over most of the globe. However, some station observations suggest a negative scaling of extreme precipitation with very high temperatures, raising doubts about future increase of precipitation extremes. Here we show for the present-day climate over most of the globe, the curve relating daily precipitation extremes with local temperatures has a peak structure, increasing as expected at the low–medium range of temperature variations but decreasing at high temperatures. However, this peak-shaped relationship does not imply a potential upper limit for future precipitation extremes. Climate models project both the peak of extreme precipitation and the temperature at which it peaks (Tpeak) will increase with warming; the two increases generally conform to the C–C scaling rate in mid- and high-latitudes, and to a super C–C scaling in most of the tropics. Because projected increases of local mean temperature (Tmean) far exceed projected increases of Tpeak over land, the conventional approach of relating extreme precipitation to Tmean produces a misleading sub-C–C scaling rate” [15].

John P. Abraham (engineer, climate scientist and professor of thermal and fluid sciences at the University of St. Thomas School of Engineering, Minnesota) has explained this very clearly in lay terms: “It’s expected that in general, air will get moister as the Earth warms – provided there is a moisture source. This may cause more intense rainfalls and snow events, which lead to increased risk of flooding. But warmer air can also more quickly evaporate water from surfaces. This means that areas where it’s not precipitating dry out more quickly. In fact, it’s likely that some regions will experience both more drought and more flooding in the future (just not at the same time!). The dry spells are longer and with faster evaporation causing dryness in soils. But, when the rains fall, they come in heavy downpours potentially leading to more floods… Traditionally, we have related precipitation events to the local average temperature (Tmean). However, it’s clear that there’s a strong relationship between the peak temperature [for precipitation, Tpeak] and the precipitation rates. In fact, relations reveal that precipitation rates are increasing between 5 and 10% for every degree C increase [in Tpeak]. The expected rate of increase, just based on thermodynamics is 7%…  in some parts of the globe, the relationship is even stronger. For instance, in the tropics, there’s more than a 10% increase in precipitation for a degree Celsius increase in temperature. This is not unexpected because precipitation releases latent heat, which can in turn invigorate storms. From a practical standpoint, this helps us plan for climate change (it is already occurring) including planning resiliency… storing water from times when there is too much for the inevitable times when we have too little (drought), results in better water management and multiple benefits. This shows why climate science is so important. The [Trump] US government is in the process of decimating our climate science infrastructure” [16].

  1. Global warming, Indian Ocean warming, Kerala floods and worsening rain deficits in much of India.

The Times of India has reported findings by the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology that warming of the Indian Ocean has been associated with a weakening land-sea thermal gradient over South Asia, a weakening monsoon and worsening rain deficits in much of India (2015): “The rapid warming in the Indian Ocean has been weakening the monsoon in Central India consistently which has resulted in 10% to 20% deficient rain over Uttar Pradesh, Jhakhand, Madhya Pradesh, Uttarakhand, and Chhattisgarh during the past century… rapid warming of the India Ocean is playing an important role in weakening the monsoon circulation and the rainfall… rainfall has been decreasing over central South Asia – from the south of Pakistan  through central India to Bangladesh. The drop is highly significant over central India where agriculture is mostly rain-fed with a reduction of up to 10%-20% in the mean rainfall over the last 112 years… In an ideal global warming scenario, the monsoon drivers should get stronger,  causing increased rainfall. One of the main monsoon drivers is the land-sea temperature difference in summer, which drives the monsoon circulation towards the subcontinent… the land-sea temperature difference over South Asia domain has in fact reduced in the past decades… primarily contributed by a strong warming in the Indian Ocean” [17].

Mathew Koll Roxy (Centre for Climate Change Research, Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology, Pune) on the notable warming of the western tropical Indian Ocean (2014): “Recent studies have pointed out an increased warming over the Indian Ocean warm pool (the central-eastern Indian Ocean characterized by sea surface temperatures greater than 28.0°C) during the past half-century, although the reasons behind this monotonous warming are still debated. The results here reveal a larger picture—namely, that the western tropical Indian Ocean has been warming for more than a century, at a rate faster than any other region of the tropical oceans, and turns out to be the largest contributor to the overall trend in the global mean sea surface temperature (SST). During 1901–2012, while the Indian Ocean warm pool went through an increase of 0.7°C, the western Indian Ocean experienced anomalous warming of 1.2°C in summer SSTs. The warming of the generally cool western Indian Ocean against the rest of the tropical warm pool region alters the zonal SST gradients, and has the potential to change the Asian monsoon circulation and rainfall, as well as alter the marine food webs in this biologically productive region. The current study using observations and global coupled ocean–atmosphere model simulations gives compelling evidence that, besides direct contribution from greenhouse warming, the long-term warming trend over the western Indian Ocean during summer is highly dependent on the asymmetry in the El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) teleconnection, and the positive SST skewness associated with ENSO during recent decades… the land-sea thermal gradient over South Asia has been decreasing, due to rapid warming in the Indian Ocean and a relatively subdued warming over the subcontinent” [18].

Mathew Koll Roxy and colleagues from the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology have warned of the prospect of large-scale drought in South Asia linked to Indian Ocean warming (2015): “There are large uncertainties looming over the status and fate of the South Asian summer monsoon, with several studies debating whether the monsoon is weakening or strengthening in a changing climate. Our analysis using multiple observed datasets demonstrates a significant weakening trend in summer rainfall during 1901–2012 over the central-east and northern regions of India, along the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna basins and the Himalayan foothills, where agriculture is still largely rain-fed. Earlier studies have suggested an increase in moisture availability and land-sea thermal gradient in the tropics due to anthropogenic warming, favouring an increase in tropical rainfall. Here we show that the land-sea thermal gradient over South Asia has been decreasing, due to rapid warming in the Indian Ocean and a relatively subdued warming over the subcontinent. Using long-term observations and coupled model experiments, we provide compelling evidence that the enhanced Indian Ocean warming potentially weakens the land-sea thermal contrast, dampens the summer monsoon Hadley circulation, and thereby reduces the rainfall over parts of South Asia… overall weakening trend of monsoon rainfall over South Asia is a matter of grave concern since the socio-economic livelihood in this region, including agriculture, water resources and power generation are irrevocably dependent on it. The role of Indian Ocean warming might not be solely limited to weakening the Asian monsoon. Research based on climate proxy records and models point out that the climate signals forced by warm SST anomalies over the tropical Indian and western Pacific oceans synergistically contribute to widespread drying over South Asia and mid-latitudes, an ideal scenario for a large-scale drought” [19].

Kerala is a very high rainfall area of India but in the last 6 weeks rainfall in Kerala increased 37% above  normal whereas rainfall for the rest of India ranged from plus 16% (Sikkim) and plus 15% (Jammu and Kashmir) to minus 18% (Bihar), minus 19% (West Bengal, Delhi and Haryana), minus 24% (Tripura), minus 25% (Assam), minus 27%  (Gujarat and Jharkhand), minus 29% (Nagaland), minus 38% (Arunachal Pradesh), minus 43% (Meghalaya) and minus 66% (Manipur), with a third of India by area receiving below-average rainfall [8]. Crucially, one notes that evapotranspiration from vegetation in the Western Ghats (along the western side of India from Tamil Nadu through Kerala, Karnataka and Goa to Maharashtra) accounts for about 25% of rainfall in the Indian Peninsular and, for example, supplies up to half the rainfall in Tamil Nadu [20]. Professor Raghu Murtugudde (Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center, University of Maryland, US) : “Any reduction in rainfall due to deforestation of the Western Ghats would lead to a warming of peninsular India as well. This can be expected since the monsoon rains typically bring a significant cooling over India by dragging down the dry cool air from the upper atmosphere. This cooling is a lifesaving relief from the scorching pre-monsoon temperatures and heatwaves. Continued deforestation is of great concern for the ecological community due to the loss of precious flora and fauna. This study puts a finer point on the value of the Western Ghats biodiversity as a significant source of moisture for rainfall over parts of India that are constantly struggling for water for agriculture as well as domestic and industrial use. The battle cry for protecting biodiversity hotspots and the overall forest cover over the Western Ghats just got louder” [20].

Final comments.

Man-made global warming is evidently impacting Humanity around the world with severe flooding, severe droughts, sea level rise, more intense tropical storms and catastrophic forest fires. My country, Australia, is experiencing  a drying trend in the south as a key rain-bearing weather system shifts southwards, increased precipitation in the tropical north, increased sea level and drought.  Presently a large part of Eastern Australia (New South Wales and Queensland)  is in the grip of a circa 5-year drought and New South Wales is experiencing severe forest fires (bushfires)  in winter. The Australian Climate Council: “Climate change is likely making drought conditions in southwest and southeast Australia worse. Climate change has contributed to a southward shift in weather systems that typically bring cool season rainfall to southern Australia. Since the 1970s late autumn and early winter rainfall has decreased by 15 percent in southeast Australia, and Western Australia’s southwest region has experienced a 15 percent decline in cool season rainfall. Climate change is also driving an increase in the intensity and frequency of hot days and heatwaves in Australia, exacerbating drought conditions” [21].

In India global warming has meant dangerous and deadly  temperatures  of circa 50C in some urban centres [22, 23], sea level rise, more intense tropical storms and a  weakening of  the summer monsoon that is  associated with a decrease in the land-sea thermal gradient arising from a warming Indian Ocean and  a relatively decreased land warming (with this in turn linked to anthropogenic land cooling from industrial,  transport and agricultural air pollution that is also associated with about 1 million Indian air pollution deaths annually [24, 25] ). Over 2 decades ago an international agronomy study concluded that cereal prediction in tropical and sub-tropical areas of the Americas, Africa and Asia would be badly impacted by increasing atmospheric CO2 and global warming [26, 27]. Thus Ian Chambers and  John Humble (2007): “ Climate Change potentially  reduces the ability of the human race to produce the three main crops which provide the backbone of food production – wheat, rice and corn, For example, a 1 degree centigrade rise has been shown to reduce crop yields from between 5 and 7 per cent in major crops, such as rice. A forecast increase of 2 degrees [C]  in global temperature, as a result of global warming, could significantly reduce the ability of crops to be pollinated to produce the grain that are harvested for food” [28].

Mathew Koll Roxy and colleagues from the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology have warned of the prospect of large-scale drought in South India linked to Indian Ocean warming (2015): “Overall weakening trend of monsoon rainfall over South Asia is a matter of grave concern since the socio-economic livelihood in this region, including agriculture, water resources and power generation are irrevocably dependent on it” [19]. Presently 16 million people (4 million of them Indians) die preventably from deprivation each year. However several leading climate scientists have warned that failure to address man-made global warming may kill all but 0.5 billion humans this century in a worsening Climate Genocide in which about 10 billion people (including 2 billion Indians) will die prematurely  this century at an average of 100 million deaths per year [29].

The dreadful Kerala floods (350 people dead, and about 1 million people displaced) have been impacted by (a) global warming-enhanced precipitation and (b) inadequate hazard response. Thus the BBC reports: “Officials and experts have said the floods in Kerala would not have been so severe if authorities had gradually released water from at least 30 dams. The state has 44 rivers flowing through it” [30]. The Kerala disaster was not natural – it was man-made. However the present Kerala flood disaster masks a worsening  man-made disaster for populous India  involving  a weakening summer monsoon,  a worsening rainfall deficit and drought in South Asia. The fundamental problem is inadequacy of hazard response in India and the world as a whole.

Professor Hans Joachim Schellnhuber (founding director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, and a senior advisor to Pope Francis, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and the European Union) has bluntly stated: “Climate change is now reaching the end-game, where very soon humanity must choose between taking unprecedented action, or accepting that it has been left too late and bear the consequences” [31]. It is now effectively too late to avoid a catastrophic plus 2C temperature  rise [32-35] but we are all obliged to do everything we can to make the future “less bad”  for ourselves, our children and future generations.

References.

[1]. Gideon Polya, “Mendacious Mainstream Presstitutes Ignore Huge Carbon Debt & Horrendous Hazard Response Debt: Disasters Are Not Natural”, Countercurrents, 13 August 2018: https://countercurrents.org/2018/08/13/mendacious-mainstream-presstitutes-ignore-huge-carbon-debt-horrendous-hazard-response-debt-disasters-are-not-natural/ .

[2]. Gideon Polya, “Revised Annual Per Capita Greenhouse Gas Pollution For All Countries – What Is Your Country Doing?”, Countercurrents, 6 January, 2016: https://countercurrents.org/polya060116.htm .

[3]. Gideon Polya, “Exposing And Thence Punishing Worst Polluter Nations Via Weighted Annual Per Capita Greenhouse Gas Pollution Scores”, Countercurrents, 19 March, 2016: https://countercurrents.org/polya190316.htm .

[4]. “Carbon Debt Carbon Credit”: https://sites.google.com/site/carbondebtcarboncredit/ .

[5]. (James Hansen, “Letter to PM Kevin Rudd by Dr James Hansen”, 2008: http://www.aussmc.org.au/documents/Hansen2008LetterToKevinRudd_000.pdf .

[6]. Chris Hope, “How high should climate change taxes be?”, Working Paper Series, Judge Business School, University of Cambridge, 9.2011: http://www.jbs.cam.ac.uk/fileadmin/user_upload/research/workingpapers/wp1109.pdf  .

[7]. “List of countries by GDP (nominal) per country”, Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)_per_capita .

[8]. Chetan Chauhan and Ramesh Babu, “For Kerala’s flood disaster, we have ourselves to blame”, Hibndustan Times, 17 August 2018: https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/what-is-behind-the-kerala-monsoon-fury/story-2NxvHfTDAmS10k9hHofiiO.html .

[9]. Gideon Polya, “Body Count. Global avoidable mortality since 1950”, that includes a succinct history of every country and is now available for free perusal on the web: http://globalbodycount.blogspot.com/  .

[10]. Gideon Polya, “4 % Annual Global Wealth Tax To Stop The 17 Million Deaths Annually”, Countercurrents, 27 June, 2014: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya270614.htm .

[11]. “1% ON 1%: one percent annual wealth tax on One Percenters”: https://sites.google.com/site/300orgsite/1-on-1 .

[12]. Quirin Schiermeier, “Droughts, heat waves and floods: how to tell when climate change is to blame” ”, Scientific American, 30 July 2018: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/droughts-heat-waves-and-floods-how-to-tell-when-climate-change-is-to-blame/ .

[13]. Andrew King and Professor David Karoly, “How we can link some extreme weather to climate change’, Pursuit, 18 March 2016: https://pursuit.unimelb.edu.au/articles/how-we-can-link-some-extreme-weather-to-climate-change .

[14]. US National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, “Attribution of extreme weather events  in the context of climate change:, Washington, DC: The National Academies Press, 2016: http://www.nap.edu/catalog/21852/attribution-of-extreme-weather-events-in-the-context-of-climate-change?utm_source=Division+on+Earth+and+Life+Studies&utm_campaign=7c39de3f77-BASC_PRB_OSB_Extreme_Events3_11_2016&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_3c0b1ad5c8-7c39de3f77-233946077&mc_cid=7c39de3f77&mc_eid=a55d8dfb66 .

[15]. Giuling Wang et al., “The peak structure and future changes of the relationships between extreme precipitation and temperature”, Nature Climate Change volume 7, pages 268–274,  2017: https://www.nature.com/articles/nclimate3239 .

[16]. John Abraham, “Global warming is increasing rainfall rates”, The Guardian, 22 March 2017: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2017/mar/22/global-warming-is-increasing-rainfall-rates .

[17]. Neha Madaan, “Warming Indian Ocean impedes rains: Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology”, Times of India, 17 June 2015: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Warming-Indian-Ocean-impedes-rains-Indian-Institute-of-Tropical-Meteorology/articleshow/47698910.cms .

[18]. Mathew Koll Roxy, “The curious case of Indian Ocean warming”, Journal of Climate, 4 November 2014: https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/10.1175/JCLI-D-14-00471.1 .

[19]. Mathew Koll Roxy , Kapoor Ritika, Pascal Terray , Raghu Murtugudde , Karumuri Ashok , & B. N. Goswami , “Drying of Indian sub-continent by rapid Indian Ocean warming and a weakening land-sea thermal gradient”, Nature Communications, volume 6, Article number: 7423, 2015: https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms8423 .

[20]. Raghu Murtugudde, “Western Ghat’s biodiversity is a major source of moisture for monsoon”, The Hindu Business Line, 4 May 2018: https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/news/science/western-ghats-biodiversity-is-a-significant-source-of-moisture-for-monsoon/article23772839.ece .

[21]. Climate Council, “Fact sheet: climate change and drought”, June 2018: https://www.climatecouncil.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/CC_MVSA0146-Fact-Sheet-Drought_V2-FA_High-Res_Single-Pages.pdf .

[22]. Agence France Presse, “India records its hottest day ever as temperature hits 51C (that’s 123.8F)”, The Guardian, 20 May 2016; https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/may/20/india-records-its-hottest-day-ever-as-temperature-hits-51c-thats-1238f

[23]. BBC News, “Anger over India’s “poor response” to heatwave crisis”, 27 May 2015: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-32895602

[24]. “Stop air pollution deaths”: https://sites.google.com/site/300orgsite/stop-air-pollution-deaths .

[25]. Gideon Polya, “Latest lancet data imply Adani Australian coal project will eventually kill 1.4 million Indians”, Countercurrents, 21 April 2017: https://countercurrents.org/2017/04/21/latest-lancet-data-imply-adani-australian-coal-project-will-kill-1-4-million-indians/ .

[26]. Cynthia Rosenzweig & Martin L. Parry, “potential impact of climate change on world’s food supply”, Nature volume 367, pages 133–138, 13 January 1994: https://www.nature.com/articles/367133a0 .

[27]. Gideon Polya, “Jane Austen and the Black Hole of British History. Colonial rapacity, holocaust denial and the crisis in biological sustainability”, G.M. Polya, Melbourne, 1998, 2008 that  is now available for free perusal on the web: http://janeaustenand.blogspot.com/  .

[28]. Ian Chambers and  John Humble “Plan for the Planet: A Business Plan for a Sustainable World”, Gower Green Economics and Sustainable Growth Series, 2007.

[29]. “Climate genocide”: https://sites.google.com/site/climategenocide/ .

[30]. Navin Singh Khadka, “Why the Kerala floods proved so deadly”, BBC News, 21 August 2018: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-45243868 .

[31]. David Spratt and Ian Dunlop, “Take unprecedented action or bear the consequences, says eminent scientist and advisor”,   Renew Economy, 20 August 2018: https://reneweconomy.com.au/take-unprecedented-action-or-bear-the-consequences-says-eminent-scientist-and-advisor-45081/  .

[32]. “Too late to avoid global warming catastrophe”: https://sites.google.com/site/300orgsite/too-late-to-avoid-global-warming .

[33]. “Are we doomed?”: https://sites.google.com/site/300orgsite/are-we-doomed .

[34]. “Methane Bomb Threat”: https://sites.google.com/site/methanebombthreat/ .

[35]. “Nuclear weapons ban, end poverty and reverse climate change”: https://sites.google.com/site/drgideonpolya/nuclear-weapons-ban .

Dr Gideon Polya taught science students at a major Australian university for 4 decades. He published some 130 works in a 5 decade scientific career, most recently a huge pharmacological reference text “Biochemical Targets of Plant Bioactive Compounds” (CRC Press/Taylor & Francis, New York & London , 2003). He has published “Body Count. Global avoidable mortality since 1950” (G.M. Polya, Melbourne, 2007: http://globalbodycount.blogspot.com/ ); see also his contributions “Australian complicity in Iraq mass mortality” in “Lies, Deep Fries & Statistics” (edited by Robyn Williams, ABC Books, Sydney, 2007: http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/ockhamsrazor/australian-complicity-in-iraq-mass-mortality/3369002#transcript

) and “Ongoing Palestinian Genocide” in “The Plight of the Palestinians (edited by William Cook, Palgrave Macmillan, London, 2010: http://mwcnews.net/focus/analysis/4047-the-plight-of-the-palestinians.html ). He has published a revised and updated 2008 version of his 1998 book “Jane Austen and the Black Hole of British History” (see: http://janeaustenand.blogspot.com/  ) as biofuel-, globalization- and climate-driven global food price increases threaten a greater famine catastrophe than the man-made famine in British-ruled India that killed 6-7 million Indians in the “forgotten” World War 2 Bengal Famine (see recent BBC broadcast involving Dr Polya, Economics Nobel Laureate Professor Amartya Sen and others: http://www.open.edu/openlearn/history-the-arts/history/social-economic-history/listen-the-bengal-famine  ;  Gideon Polya: https://sites.google.com/site/drgideonpolya/home  ; Gideon Polya Writing: https://sites.google.com/site/gideonpolyawriting/ ; Gideon Polya, Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gideon_Polya ) . When words fail one can say it in pictures – for images of Gideon Polya’s huge paintings for the Planet, Peace, Mother and Child see: http://sites.google.com/site/artforpeaceplanetmotherchild/ and http://www.flickr.com/photos/gideonpolya/  .

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