Measuring climate change: It's not just heat, it's humidity
CTV
When it comes to measuring global warming, humidity, not just heat, matters in generating dangerous climate extremes, a new study finds.
Researchers say temperature by itself isn't the best way to measure climate change's weird weather and downplays impacts in the tropics. But factoring in air moisture along with heat shows that climate change since 1980 is nearly twice as bad as previously calculated, according to their study in Monday's Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The energy generated in extreme weather, such as storms, floods and rainfall is related to the amount of water in the air. So a team of scientists in the U.S. and China decided to use an obscure weather measurement called equivalent potential temperature -- or theta-e -- that reflects "the moisture energy of the atmosphere," said study co-author V. "Ram" Ramanathan, a climate scientist at the University of California San Diego's Scripps Institution of Oceanography and Cornell University. It's expressed in degrees, like temperature.
"There are two drivers of climate change: temperature and humidity," Ramanathan said. "And so far we measured global warming just in terms of temperature."
But by adding the energy from humidity, "the extremes -- heat waves, rainfall and other measures of extremes -- correlate much better," he said.
Northvolt AB has filed for bankruptcy protection in the United States, but said the move will not jeopardize the manufacturer's planned electric vehicle battery plant in Quebec — though hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars invested in the parent company could be lost.
A popular series of Murphy beds that had been sold online is under a recall in Canada and the U.S. after several reported instances of the furniture detaching from walls.
Even though sales of electric vehicles aren't growing as fast as in past years and President-elect Donald Trump may ditch tax credits for EV buyers, automakers are moving ahead with new models that should appeal to mainstream buyers.
Countries of the world took turns rejecting a new but vague draft text released early Thursday which attempts to form the spine of any deal reached at United Nations climate talks on money for developing countries to transition to clean energy and adapt to climate change.
The Canadian Space Agency (CSA) is inviting Canadians to choose the name of the first Canadian Lunar Rover.
A Dallas anesthesiologist was sentenced Wednesday to 190 years in prison for injecting a nerve-blocking agent and other drugs into bags of intravenous fluid at a surgical center where he worked, leading to the death of a coworker and causing cardiac emergencies for several patients.
CTVNews.ca wants to hear from digital nomads who have taken up location-independent jobs and can work from anywhere with an internet connection.
In Canada a car is stolen every six minutes, though some vehicles are more sought after than others.
A major storm swept across the northwest U.S., battering the region with strong winds and rain, causing widespread power outages and downing trees that killed at least one person.
SpaceX on Tuesday launched another Starship rocket, but passed up catching the booster with giant mechanical arms.
Caring for a senior pet is no walk in the park, especially when the pet can't walk at all. A Colorado woman was shocked to find her dog's wheelchair missing from the porch Tuesday morning