Antinuclear

A survivor of the 1945 atomic bombing of Hiroshima has called for the creation of a new global treaty to prohibit nuclear weapons.

Toshiki Fujimori spoke in New York on Sunday at a meeting of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons. The NGO group held the meeting ahead of the start of UN negotiations on a legally binding international nuclear ban treaty.

Fujimori experienced the bombing when he was 16 months old. He is scheduled to speak on the first day of the UN negotiations.

Fujimori expressed hope for the talks, which he referred to as an attempt to draw up a treaty that has yet to arrive due to strong pressure from nuclear powers.

He said the voices of atomic bomb survivors and their numerous supporters have spurred momentum to ban the weapons. He said such voices remind the world of the inhumanity of nuclear weapons, which cause…

“The rate of CO₂ growth over the last decade is 100 to 200 times faster than what the Earth experienced during the transition from the last ice age. This is a real shock to the atmosphere.” — Pieter Tans, lead scientist at NOAA’s Global Greenhouse Gas Reference Network

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It wasn’t too long ago that we were talking about atmospheric CO2 crossing the key 400 parts per million threshold. That was 2014. But now, just three years later, atmospheric levels of this key heat-trapping gas are climbing to within striking distance of another, and still more dangerous, atmospheric milestone. 410 ppm.

That’s an increase in the peak atmospheric CO2 value of around 3 ppm per year or more. One that gibes with record annual rates of atmospheric accumulation of this heat trapping gas during 2015 and 2016. And as we approach a new high water mark for…