1 / 4 i. Climate change is exacerbating extreme weather events

Tell your relatives about Alabama’s “<a href="https://www.huffpost.com/entry/alabama-drought-2016_n_5812b8fee4b0990edc303fb7?aokkqgriuvyqzolxr">worst drought in memory</a>” that’s devastated agriculture and dried up rivers this year. Or how climate change made Louisiana’s deadly floods in 2015 <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/science/2016/sep/08/climate-change-louisiana-floods-increased-risk" target="_blank">at least 40 percent more likely</a>. Destructive <a href="https://www.huffpost.com/entry/extreme-weather-taxpayer-cost_n_57fb3f81e4b068ecb5dfd8b5">hurricanes and storms</a> are projected to increase as temperatures rise, and wildfires are going to be bigger and badder than ever. Since the 1980s, climate change has at least <a href="https://www.huffpost.com/entry/climate-change-wildfires-western-us_n_580863d5e4b0b994d4c47a90">doubled the area affected by forest fires</a> in the Western U.S. <br><br>According to the Environmental Protection Agency, climate change is <a href="https://www.epa.gov/climate-change-science/understanding-link-between-climate-change-and-extreme-weather" target="_blank">increasing the frequency and severity of extreme weather events</a>. And no corner of the country is safe from these disasters. All <a href="https://www.floodsmart.gov/floodsmart/pages/flood_facts.jsp" target="_blank">50 states</a>, for instance, have experienced some sort of flood in the past five years.

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