Climate Change: Bad News For Beer Lovers

Red alert, everyone, this is not a drill. Climate change is affecting the taste of beer. Shut down every oil drill, scrap all the cars, stop breathing out, this is now officially not a joke.

Okay, maybe you can keep breathing, but our rapidly changing climate is affecting both the quantity and quality of European hops. From 1971 to 2018, many hop-producing areas have seen a reduction in yield of 20%, and the alpha bitter acids that give the hops their flavor have also been reduced, meaning that the hops we are getting don't have quite the same kick they once did. By 2050 hops could have 30% less alpha acids than they're supposed to have.

Specifically, hop yields are going down because Europe as a whole is getting drier, and hotter, drier, more volatile summers aren't good for hops. They need mild summers, like those traditionally found in Europe and the Pacific Northwest. Hot, humid summers like we have here in Maryland are rough for hop plants, unless you're the Monocacy hop, that is. Maybe we'll have to introduce the Germans to our own specialized hop variation. It's either that, or we suffer through blander, more expensive beer. And that's truly a nightmare scenario.

Rare Parrot Moved To The Mountains To Get Away From People

New Zealand isn't exactly swarming with people. 50 per square mile, 5 million people overall, not a very densely populated place, but what would you expect from Middle Earth? However, even a few people was still too much for the auk, the only alpine parrot in the world. The auk is highly endangered and was previously thought to be in even more trouble because of the loss of their alpine environment. But as a new study has shown, the auk isn't as specialized as previously thought. In a comparison with another New Zealand parrot that lives in forested areas, no significant genomic difference was found regarding living at high altitude. The auk isn't specifically adapted to living in the mountains; it could live wherever it wants. It chooses to limit itself, and the scientists behind the study theorized it was trying to avoid people, a completely understandable reason. People are dumb.

Funny enough, the fact that the auk isn't actually specialized for mountain life may prove to be the species' salvation as its habitat disappears. They could literally just move somewhere else and be fine. For now though, they'll probably stick with the mountain life. I can certainly think of worse places to live than the mountains of New Zealand, though you don't want to get stuck in a mountain fortress while 10,000 Uruk-Hai trap you in. That wizard won't always show up at dawn of the fifth day.

Germany Is Running Out Of Beer Bottles

Talk about a strange problem.

It's been a hot summer in Europe this year. Well, hot for them. A 90 degree day there is like a 100 degree day here in Maryland. Those Europeans are just less tolerant of the heat, so they've been fighting against it by drinking lots of beer. I can think of worse reasons to drink. But there's a problem in Germany with the heavy drinking: They're running out of beer bottles.

There is a good explanation for this issue. Well, there is an explanation. Germans don't do canned beer (I don't care much for cans either, so I can sympathize). They prefer bottled beer (again I can sympathize, I even prefer bottled to beer from a glass). Germans also like recycling their beer, but they have a very specific system to handling beer bottle recycling, which I won't describe. The point is, there are a limited number of bottles in the country, and most of them are sitting in people's homes. Smaller breweries are starting to beg people to return their bottles so they can be reused.

Now, I don't want to criticize the German commitment to recycling, there is certainly a very good argument for being environmentally friendly. But, guys, this is a really dumb problem to be having.

Today in Irony

An icebreaker was scheduled to make a trip to the Arctic to measure and survey the effects global warming was having on the Canadian Arctic. It will not be able to make this trip because Arctic sea ice is unusually active, making the trip too dangerous. So yes, the climate change study was cancelled because of climate change. Whoops.

More Snow Does Not Equal a Cooler Climate

Lake-effect snow in action.

In fact, it basically means the opposite of that. The massive snowstorms that have hit the Great Lakes region have been well-publicized, and for good reason. Buffalo, New York under several feet of snow, in November? They get a lot of snow, but not that much, not this early anyway. It's also been very cold basically all over the country, and no, it's not because of the "polar vortex."

It's complicated, because weather always is; but a typhoon that was in the Pacific maintained cohesion much further north than it should be able to, because ocean waters are warmer than they should be. The jet stream is weaker than normal because the Arctic is warmer than it should be, and when the typhoon remnants smacked into it, the jet stream dipped south, bringing cold air with it. That's why it was so cold everywhere. Lake-effect snow occurs when cold air moves over an unfrozen lake, and the Great Lakes were very unfrozen. Water temperatures were about 50 degrees Fahrenheit above air temperatures, and that is a lot. This is a bad time for lake-effect snow anyway, but that temperature differential equates to prodigious snowfall totals for Buffalo. If the lakes were a bit cooler, like they should be in mid-November, the snow would not have been so bad. Still a lot, but not 7 feet.

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