Thread by @SherOnHealth

While Ontario and Quebec forests burned this spring and summer, causing dangerous levels of smoke in Canada and the USA, @fordnation kept a lid on a climate change report completed in January that warned of the growing risks of such fires and a cacophony of other dangers.
1/12

By end of the century, Southwest, Central and Eastern Ontario, which now average nine days year in which temps soar above 30°C, are projected to have 60 such extreme heat days a year if our climate warms as much the most dire forecast model used by climate scientists.

2/12

The heat will be on in the North too: Northeast and Northwest Ontario are both anticipated to see rises from 3.8 and 4.1 days now, respectively, to over 35 days per year, on average. Meanwhile, the number of extreme cold days in the North will plummet.

3/12

The rise in temperatures will elevate the risks of floods and threaten our health, safety, environment and economy, risks detailed in a 500 page report two+ years in the making, the Ontario Provincial Climate Change Impact Assessment, which was finished in JANUARY.

4/12

You don't know about? No wonder.
@fordnation did not make it public until seven months after it was done, and did so quietly, not issuing a media release.
So media has not covered what is the most exhaustive climate report in Ontario, one that lays out projected risks.
5/12

While I am not a paid journalist at the moment, I have a responsibility to share and critique this critical report and ask tough questions of the Ontario government: Why did Doug Ford keep this under wraps?
6/12

I can't answer that question for @fordnation
But I do know that in the month this crucial report was slid out under the back door of Queen's Park, Ford faced a different sort of heat: political.
How did six developers get a $8.2 billion windfall from Greenbelt land?
7/12

While the Greenbelt story is big and still subject to a probe by the RCMP, the hiding of this crucial climate report --- and the impact of climate change in Ontario -- will smoulder for considerably longer.

8/12

While media is in the business of competition and I am not getting a dime for my work, it's in the public interest for me to share that work with media and citizens alike. Here's a link to the study:
9/12

ontario.ca/files/2023-08/…

The report is not a road map of what will happen.
It is our best guide to what might happen, who and where is most at-risk in Ontario, and how we could mitigate some risks and adapt to others.

10/12

The climate projection models used for the Ontario report, called RCP8.5 and RCP4.5, were based on assumptions that have not all proven correct.
Here is my synopsis of some of the shortcomings of the former and a helpful link:

11/12 carbonbrief.org/explainer-the-…

I am still reviewing this vital climate report, and will tweet more as I do so, so if you want to learn more, both about our future climate and why this report was kept for so long from citizens, please follow me.

12/12