{"id":360,"date":"2024-10-21T19:03:31","date_gmt":"2024-10-21T19:03:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/e-mailguide.com\/?p=360"},"modified":"2025-01-03T10:57:41","modified_gmt":"2025-01-03T10:57:41","slug":"wwfs-living-planet-report-biodiversity-the-climate-crisis-whats-next","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/e-mailguide.com\/index.php\/2024\/10\/21\/wwfs-living-planet-report-biodiversity-the-climate-crisis-whats-next\/","title":{"rendered":"WWF\u2019s Living Planet Report: Biodiversity, the Climate Crisis & What\u2019s Next"},"content":{"rendered":"

It seems fitting that WWF\u2019s Living Planet Report 2024<\/a> arrived in my inbox the day Hurricane Milton slammed into my hometown.<\/p>\n

I grew up on Little Sarasota Bay, with the Intracoastal Waterway and a view over to Siesta Key in the backyard.<\/p>\n

When we moved into that waterfront house in the summer of 1981, jumping mullet slapped the surface of the bay constantly and pelicans were plentiful. Now you can spend the day in the backyard before you hear a mullet splash, pelicans are rarer, and an alligator was even spotted nearby\u2014runoff makes the bay\u2019s salt water brackish.<\/p>\n

On September 26, 2024, the storm surge from Hurricane Helene flooded homes on our block for the first time; the water was several feet deep in living rooms.<\/p>\n

Less than two weeks later, on Wednesday night, October 9, Milton, the second-most intense Atlantic hurricane ever recorded over the Gulf of Mexico, made landfall in a direct hit to Siesta Key.<\/p>\n

\"Sunset<\/p>\n

Sunset at Siesta Beach in Siesta Key \u00a9 Rebecca Self<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

We are at a Tipping Point<\/strong><\/h2>\n

On the west coast of Florida, we\u2019ve seen multiple hurricanes in a single year before, even in rapid succession, but the scale and intensity of these storms and their storm surges are unprecedented.<\/p>\n

WWF\u2019s report makes clear something Floridians are seeing firsthand: we are at a tipping point.<\/strong><\/p>\n

What is a tipping point? The term has been applied to a wide variety of processes in which, beyond a certain point, the rate of the process increases dramatically. From human behavioral sciences like economics and sociology to epidemiology, ecology and physics, the fundamental notion remains the same. In colloquial terms, if we were being pessimistic, we might call it the point of no return.<\/p>\n

\"sea<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

WWF\u2019s Living Planet Report 2024 authors describe tipping points as:<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cWhen cumulative impacts reach a threshold, the change becomes self-perpetuating, resulting in substantial, often abrupt and potentially irreversible change \u2013 a tipping point.<\/p>\n

The Living Planet Report details numerous case studies in which ecological degradation combined with climate change increases the likelihood of reaching local and regional tipping points:<\/p>\n