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Impacts to the Great Lakes. Lake ecosystems will also be affected by the changing climate. Warmer temperatures may cause more algal blooms, which can harm fish and degrade water quality. If severe storms become more frequent, then sewer overflows will become more frequent, and more pollutants are likely to run off from the land into the Great Lakes, which could threaten water supplies and require recreational beaches to be closed more often for health reasons (Page, 4, What Climate Change Means for Upstate New York, Rochester’s Climate Action Plan ) It isn’t just the flooding Some of us in the Northeast are often astonished when we read stories about continual flooding in Southeast coastal cities and, despite all evidence, state agencies are discouraged from using ‘Climate Change’ when planning for damaging sea level rise. The Republican-controlled state legislature drew ridicule in 2012 for attempting to “outlaw” climate change by prohibiting state agencies from planning for sea-level...

Greenhouse Gas Inventory Results | The inventoried emissions within the City of Rochester jurisdictional boundaries for all activities and sources listed above totaled 2.8 million MTCO2e in 2014. For purposes of the CAP, large emitters, other fuels, and airline travel emissions were removed from the inventory due to the limited opportunity to be easily impacted or directly influenced through traditional community climate action strategies. (Large emitters are facilities that emit more than 25,000 MTCO2e per year; these facilities report to the EPA’s Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program3.) After this adjustment, the City of Rochester total GHG emissions were 1.8 million MTCO2e in 2014, which is the factor used throughout the CAP for goal setting and development of strategies. This is equivalent to 380,000 passenger vehicles being driven in any given year or the energy used by 190,000 homes for one year4. (Page 20, Rochester Climate Action Plan ) Figuring out how much greenhouse gasses (GHGs...

“The best available climate science and supporting research indicate that the key climate stressors for Rochester are warmer summers, increasing storms, warmer waters, colder winters, and increasing drought.” (Page 24, Rochester’s Climate Action Plan ) Scientists have been telling us for some time now that our climate system is very sensitive to energy input. Trapping more energy (heat) from the sun with our greenhouse gas emissions from the mid-1800’s has already produced unprecedented wildfires, floods, and extreme weather around the world. Even if we stop emitting more of these emissions right now, we are still likely to overshoot the Paris Accord goal of 2C by the end of this century. This will make us very vulnerable. EARTH WILL WARM TWO DEGREES THIS CENTURY, SCIENTISTS PREDICT Researchers have confirmed that Earth is likely to warm by more than 2 degrees by the end of the century, an increase often cited as a “tipping point” by climate scientists—and one that people sho...