China’s heatwave:

[T]he heat wave that baked China for weeks was startling in its scale, duration and intensity. Through July and August, it shattered temperature records, dried up rivers, withered crops, sparked wildfires and caused deaths from heatstroke. It may have been the most severe heat wave ever recorded.

And it laid bare frightening realities about how humanity is expected to adapt.

With temperatures as high as 113 degrees Fahrenheit, electricity usage soared as hundreds of millions of Chinese switched on air-conditioners. But where was that power supposed to come from? Severe drought had dried up the rivers on which the country depends for much of its clean hydroelectricity, crippling output.

This forced China, which pumps more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere than any other nation, to double down on carbon-belching coal to make up the power shortfall. The heat wave had created a vicious cycle that, if replicated across the globe during future extreme weather events, will deeply complicate efforts to combat some of the worst effects of climate change.

“Complicate” looks like a euphemism there. Burning more coal doesn’t so much “complicate” efforts to fight climate change as it renders them useless.

We drove through normally verdant farmland toward Sichuan’s provincial capital, Chengdu, passing miles of withered cornfields and bumper-to-bumper traffic that flowed in the opposite direction toward the mountains. With hydropower output crippled, the authorities had imposed power-saving blackouts that closed businesses and rendered air-conditioners useless. People were fleeing to higher, cooler ground.

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Chengdu wasn’t the only place. At least 262 weather stations nationwide tied or set heat records, and rivers that are important arteries for shipping and transportation became unnavigable. Water levels in the Yangtze, the world’s third-longest river, hit record lows, dropping as much as 20 feet below recent averages.

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The Chinese government has now warned that the autumn harvest is at risk, prompting fears that increased demands for food imports could exacerbate a global food crisis. And ominously, the power crunch caused by the heat wave has given rise to calls for China to slow down its transition from coal to renewable energy in order to keep the economy running.

Not good.