Top StoriesChina bars its airlines from paying EU carbon tax.China announced Monday it will prohibit its airlines from paying European Union charges on carbon emissions, ratcheting up a global dispute over the cost of combatting climate change. Associated Press Climate change could expose Australians to toxic contamination.Increased flooding, most recently in Queensland and northern NSW, could pump more contaminants into groundwater, rivers, oceans, the food supply and atmosphere as bigger storms overwhelm landfills designed for a different era, scientists warn. International Business Times Bill Gates backs climate scientists lobbying for large-scale geoengineering.A small group of leading climate scientists, financially supported by billionaires including Bill Gates, are lobbying governments and international bodies to back experiments into manipulating the climate on a global scale to avoid catastrophic climate change. The Guardian Giant crack in Antarctica about to spawn New York-size iceberg.With a gargantuan crack slowly splitting it apart, Antarctica's fastest-melting glacier is about to lose a chunk of ice larger than all of New York City, according to scientists, who say "this glacier is really important," and will add mightily to sea level rise. National Geographic News Research team monitors disappearance of Arctic tundra in Canada's Yukon.The latest research suggests that sizable chunks of the Yukon's alpine/tundra world are being taken over by shrub cover that is crowding out those plants that many Arctic animals depend on. Climate warming may well be a reason why this is happening. Edmonton Journal Carbon tax only a good start: report.A carbon price alone will not be enough for Australia to meet its target of a dramatic cut in greenhouse gas emissions by mid-century, an analysis by the Grattan Institute has found. Sydney Morning Herald Glaciers, BC's hydro's melting 'batteries.'Scientists are trying to figure out how rising temps will change the alpine run-off that helps power the province. Vancouver Tyee Giants of the New Zealand forest give climate clues.New Zealand scientists using the rings on kauri trees to look at climate patterns are tipping global warming to bring more big weather extremes in the coming years. Australian Associated Press Battery boom.Battery makers' factories are built or nearly completed. Yet they also find themselves uncomfortably out in front of their biggest customers—the automakers—and in need of other homes for their products while they wait for the coming electric vehicle revolution. Chemical & Engineering News Even after rain, Texas drought persists.Recent heavy rains, including a record-breaking downpour Saturday in Austin, began to refill reservoirs across drought-stricken Texas and pushed the Dallas-Fort Worth area off a federal drought map. But water levels remain low, and many places are still parched. Wall Street Journal Diesel makes a clean break.Diesel-powered vehicles used to get a bad rap for being noisy, dirty and slow. But they have been getting an image makeover thanks to "clean diesel" that emits less pollution - a change that could shake up the race with eco-friendly hybrid and electric vehicles. Osaka Daily Yomiuri Shimbun How to make electricity using plants and sunshine.An international consortium of scientists have created a truly green solar cell—and one that can be made from something as common as grass clippings. Scientific American Wind farms can actually increase climate change by raising temperatures and causing downpours, warn academics.They have long been championed as a way to combat global warming by creating clean energy. But wind farms can actually alter the climate according to a new study by a group of American scientists. London Daily Mail Dueling claims on Obama's energy record ignore production boom and reasons for it.You wouldn’t know it from the Republicans, but these are boom times for American energy. And you wouldn’t know it from President Barack Obama, but he has very little to do with that. Associated Press UK's new energy secretary confirms green targets.Britain's newly-appointed Energy and Climate Change Secretary Edward Davey on Monday confirmed the country's commitment to its green energy targets and its focus on growing the offshore wind power generation capacities. Reuters 100 Tories call for wind-farm subsidy cuts.The Scottish Government has launched a robust defence of its flagship green energy policy after concerns were raised by more than 100 Tory politicians about the cost of subsidies paid for onshore wind farms. Edinburgh Scotsman On Keystone pipeline, GOP plays Buffett card to counter Dems' Koch claims.Senior Capitol Hill Democrats battling the Keystone XL oil sands pipeline are casting the project as a sop to the Koch Brothers, billionaire industrialists who pour money into conservative causes. The Hill Artificial glaciers helping combat climate change.Artificial glaciers are being built in the Himalayas to combat the growing affect climate change is having on natural glaciers. Toronto CTV Tree rings show extreme weather on the rise.If history is anything to go by, periods of droughts and flooding rains could become more common in south-eastern Australia and New Zealand, according to a new study. Australia ABC News Say goodbye to the classic Kiwi summer.More floods, droughts and extreme weather events associated with the El Nino and La Nina cycles can be expected in New Zealand in a warming world, Auckland researchers predict. Auckland New Zealand Herald Global Warming: USGS to assess Arctic impacts.Scientists are just in the early stages of understanding the implications for ecosystems in the region. A new multidisciplinary study by the U.S. Geological Survey may help understand how dynamic ecosystems and their wildlife communities will respond to rapid change in the Arctic. Summit County Citizens Voice County landfill is area’s biggest climate polluter.The Franklin County landfill leaked 11,900 tons of methane in 2010, making it the top industrial source of climate-change gases in central Ohio, according to a first-ever federal inventory. Columbus Dispatch Minneapolis cuts emissions 12.8% since '06.Minneapolis has reduced its greenhouse gas emissions by 12.8 percent since 2006, putting the city on pace to meet longer-term goals designed to confront climate change. Minneapolis Star Tribune China bans airlines from EU carbon scheme.China banned airlines from taking part in a European Union carbon-emissions system designed to curb pollution, saying the program violates international rules. India, the U.S., and global airlines have also raised objections to the levy, arguing it will raise costs and be less effective than a global solution. Bloomberg News China 'bans' airlines from joining EU carbon tax scheme.China has "banned" all airlines in the country from joining the European Union's Emissions Trading Scheme aimed at cutting carbon emissions. BBC China bans airlines from paying EU carbon charges.China said Monday it has banned its airlines from complying with an EU scheme to impose charges on carbon emissions opposed by more than two dozen countries including India, Russia and the United States. Agence France-Presse China bans airlines from joining EU emissions scheme.The Chinese government said on Monday it has barred the country's airlines from joining a European Union scheme to charge for carbon emissions from flights into and out of Europe and prohibit airlines from charging customers extra because of the EU plan. Reuters Pacific Rim countries eye climate-change plan.Pacific-Rim countries belonging to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation plan to map out strategies to adapt to and mitigate the ill effects of climate change on agriculture via a symposium which kicked off in Pasig City on Monday. BusinessMirror Fracking fracas.Anthony Ingraffea, a professor of engineering at Cornell University, suggests there is confusion about fracking in conventional wells and fracking for natural gas in shale formations. The environmental risks are higher than in conventional drilling, he said, with everything from groundwater contamination to a pipeline leak possible. Toronto Star Greens concerned over Kerala court ruling on infertile paddy fields.The recent Kerala high court observation that paddy fields which were not suitable for cultivation could be converted for alternate use has sparked a heated debate in the state. While paddy field owners have hailed it as pragmatic, the Greens see it as a recipe for catastrophe. Khaleej Times Could drought threaten South Africa's rooibos tea?South Africa's rooibos tea only grows in a small area and erratic weather patterns - blamed by some on climate change - mean the plant and the new industry are now under threat. BBC Sacrificing the desert to save the Earth.Industrial-scale solar development is well underway in California, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado and Utah. The federal government has furnished more public property to this cause than it has for oil and gas exploration over the last decade — 21 million acres, more than the area of Los Angeles, Riverside and San Bernardino counties put together. Los Angeles Times Mexico drought chokes cattle, crops.The worst drought on record in various parts of Mexico has destroyed millions of acres of cropland and left millions of livestock without food, leading to fears about potential food shortages at a time when U.S. states like Texas are also suffering unusually dry weather. Wall Street Journal Planes, trains, automobiles; but bicycles?Today, less than 13 percent of US kids use the old foot-mobile, or ride their two wheelers to class. Making children more mobile was what the Federal Safe Routes to School program was all about. It could soon come to a screeching halt. It’s one of the programs on the chopping block as Congress considers a new federal transportation bill. Living On Earth New transportation bill proposes big changes.The chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee has proposed a sweeping, new transportation bill. The legislation would encourage private companies to build their own toll roads and pay for infrastructure with money from oil companies. Living On Earth Environment agency becomes crunch issue in Rio talks.The UN Environment Programme is emerging as a hot issue in preparations for June's Rio conference, styled as a once-in-a-generation chance to restore a sick planet to good health. Agence France-Presse Winter wildfires a rarity for Reno area but warming climate could make them more common.With a warming climate, invading vegetation and more people living in fire-prone areas, could big winter wildfires become the norm? Some experts say the possibility is there. Reno Gazette-Journal Ssssscotland here we come!Grass snakes from England are colonising Scotland as climate warms. Glasgow Herald 20 million years later, Russians work to drill into lake.Russian researchers in Antarctica are on the verge of piercing a hole through two miles of ice into an ancient lake, untouched by the light of day for some 20 million years. But it'll be a delicate process to break through without disturbing the pristine waters. Weekend Edition Euro Parliament backs low-carbon road map.A European Parliament committee this week approved an EU "road map" to a low-carbon economy that seeks to go beyond current greenhouse gas reduction targets. United Press International Meat trade emissions equal to half of all Britain's cars.If everyone in the UK went vegetarian or vegan it would have the same environmental benefit as talking half of all cars off the road, according to new research. London Independent Massachusetts greenhouse gas pollution sources described by EPA.Power plants throughout eastern Massachusetts are the largest industrial sources of greenhouse gas emissions linked to climate change in the state, according to new data from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Milford Daily News 100 Tories revolt over wind farms.David Cameron has been hit by a major protest by Conservative MPs over the Government’s backing for wind farms. The Telegraph A solar farm's slow going.When Bob Keares proposed building Pennsylvania's largest solar farm, he expected a warm reception, certainly from environmentalists. Since announcing his intentions, however, he has been confronted by the expected opponents, but also some he never unexpected: environmentalists. Philadelphia Inquirer Expanding UNEP is contentious in Rio talks.The UN Environment Programme is emerging as a hot issue in preparations for June's Rio conference, styled as a once-in-a-generation chance to restore a sick planet to good health. Agence France-Presse |
From the Daily Climate NewsroomEnterprise and investigative reporting by DailyClimate.orgIt's the economy. And politics. And not much else.Economics and political cues dictate climate change concern for a public that has a remarkably short attention span on the topic, researchers find. Science-based education efforts have 'only a minor effect.'
Weather extremes and efforts to increase scientific literacy have minimal to no impact, the study concluded.
Authors of Wall Street Journal climate piece downplay industry ties.
Half of the 16 scientists who penned a controversial Wall Street Journal opinion piece proclaiming there is "no need to panic" about global warming have ties to either the oil and gas industry or groups dedicated to debunking climate science, a DailyClimate.org investigation has found. The article, criticized by climate scientists and environmental groups, says that the field of climate science is dominated by opportunists and that "a large and growing number of distinguished scientists and engineers do not agree that drastic actions on global warming are needed." more Shareholders boost carbon disclosure – study.Disclosures about greenhouse gas emissions and carbon-reduction strategies can lift a company's economic value, a new study has found. Researchers tracking stock prices of 172 firms in the days after those companies voluntarily released carbon emission information found that prices jumped – an average of just under half a percent over five days. more The scientist: Jim Hansen risks handcuffs to make his research clear.NASA's chief climate scientist built his career studying Earth's atmosphere and modeling humans' potential impacts on climate. Then he realized that laboratory work was only part of the equation. A Climate Query. Low-carbon cement paves a development path (or sidewalk).Carbon emissions from cement are set to grow explosively as developing countries such as India create a "first-world" infrastructure. Scientists and entrepreneurs are struggling to push alternative technologies out of the lab and onto the street. As developing countries strive for "first world" living standards, they will be building more sidewalks, roads and housing, the International Energy Agency predicts. In many places, the growth spurt is already underway: Construction in India alone has jumped 10 percent per year for the past decade, according to the World Green Building Council. more Pushed to brink, swans rebound with help from global warming.
Hunted to near extinction in the 19th century, the trumpeter swan is taking advantage of warmer, longer summers to expand its range and numbers - one of the few good news stories of global warming, at least for now.
A warming climate is helping, expanding the swans' summer range northward into habitat never before used in their ancestral boreal forest, allowing populations to flourish, according to new study by Alaska scientists.
The skier: An industry exec takes stock of winter and prepares for change.Aspen Skiing Co. has a long reputation within the ski industry for efforts to reduce its environmental impact. Auden Schendler, the man overseeing Aspen's efforts, looks at the changes coming and says those efforts are not enough. A Climate Query. Opinion: Much ado about methane.The climate change story has many frightening pieces. Methane venting from oceans and the Arctic has grabbed the public's imagination lately, but it is not the scariest part of the tale. It's the unknown that grabs attention. more The new look of NIMBYism.Traditional "not-in-my-backyard" activism shifted in 2011. Renewable energy projects are increasingly drawing the ire of local opposition. And it's not just Big Solar. So-called "NIMBY" activism, once reserved for projects like landfills, prisons and big box stores, has started to impact proposed renewable energy projects throughout the nation. more Letter: Look for climate journalism outside the (Europe & U.S.) box.
Most media surveys don't look at journalism in India, China, Brazil, Mexico or Africa, where coverage of the issue has recently – and rapidly – increased. But some of the best coverage on climate is now coming from outside Europe and North America. As anyone who has spent time at the past two United Nations talks can attest, reporters from developing and non-English-speaking countries are making up an increasingly larger share of the press room. As a North American reporter in Durban and Cancun, I felt pretty lonely. more Climate coverage down again in 2011.Media coverage of climate change continued to tumble in 2011, declining roughly 20 percent from 2010's levels and nearly 42 percent from 2009's peak, according to analysis of DailyClimate.org's archive of global media. "If you thought last year ... was the year that media coverage collapsed, the headline this year would be 'What coverage???' " said Robert Brulle, a professor of sociology and environmental science at Drexel University in Philadelphia. more Facing rising seas, islanders call on their music.The applause was raucous. The dancers breathless. But cloaked in the music was a message. Stymied in global climate negotiations, three tiny Pacific island nations used songs and dances to plead for action.
The performers – fishermen, farmers, homemakers and students – traveled 7,000 miles to perform for U.S. audiences.
Analysis: A world apart.
In San Francisco, a massive meeting discussed climate science while in Durban, another huge gathering debated climate politics. Two roads, on opposite sides of the Earth, diverge – and send progress along at very different speeds.
The American Geophysical Union meeting now draws 20,000 scientists annually to parse the data, looking for science's cutting edge. The United Nation climate talks gather 16,000 delegates and others to hash and rehash negotiating texts, trying to find common ground.
'Peak water' and glacier melt pose thorny problems downstream.New data underscores the bleak prospects facing glaciers across the world as emissions continue to rise. In many instances, particularly the tropics, researchers expect the ice serving as key mountain reservoirs will disappear or severely degrade, leaving downstream communities to cope with scarce and unreliable supplies. Exhibit A is the Andes, where the glacial runoff provides water for hundreds of thousands throughout Peru and Ecuador. Where scientists once thought the region had 10 years to 40 years to adapt to reduced runoff, that time is now up, said Michel Baraër of McGill University in Montreal. more New perils seen to even modest warming.Amounts of warming previously thought to be safe may instead trigger widespread melting of the world's ice sheets and other catastrophic impacts, scientists said Tuesday.
Accelerating melting on the world's ice sheets and other new observations have scientists concluding that even a two-degree Celsius rise in temperatures – a benchmark long seen as safe in global climate talks and other emissions reductions scenarios – could lead to an 80-foot rise in sea levels, among other widespread and potentially nonadaptable effects.
Hotter, drier, meaner: Trends point to a planet increasingly hostile to agriculture.A host of data – from sediment cores to ongoing drought in East Africa to computer models – point to one conclusion: Our increasingly hotter, drier planet is going to be a tough place to farm. The Horn of Africa is in the midst of its worst drought in 60 years: Crop failures have left up to 10 million at risk of famine; social order has broken down in Somalia, with thousands of refugees streaming into Kenya; British Aid alone is feeding 2.4 million people across the region. more The angler: A Montanan takes stock of spills, growth, and 2011's big run-off.
Dave Kumlien has fished and guided some of the most famous fly fishing holes in the United States for 40 years. In that time some Montana rivers have seen three "100-year" floods, the population has tripled and a pipeline spill has soiled his favorite river. But Kumlien still finds solitude – and trout. Climate change may boost a lethal disease.For 17 years, the Hendra virus smoldered in its host bat population, only rarely crossing to humans. Then it exploded, likely triggered by heavy rains and floods in Australia earlier this year. And that has public health doctors nervous about climate change. "The interesting change was the big floods in January," said a disease ecologist at Pennsylvania State University. "Floods are expected more frequently with climate change – so, if they are linked, climate change may increase disease." more Opinion: We are smarter this time around.When news broke last week that another cache of emails had been released purporting to show that climate scientists had "cooked the books," parties around the world looked carefully, this time with a doubtful eye. They had a right to doubt. The same ploy won't work again. The science is too robust. A few things are different this time around. Most importantly, many journalists now realize they were played the fools last time around. They were told that these emails showed scientists "hiding declines in temperature" and conspiring against others. These same media outlets had a lot of work cleaning egg off their face when it became clear that the correspondence said nothing of the sort. In a "fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me" manner, the media is largely ignoring these new emails, or they are reporting the real story: The emails are taken out of context, the science is robust and has been upheld by every investigation of the 2009 release, and that climate change is already underway. more Opinion: Snippets of stolen emails cannot make the Earth flat.Out-of-context snippets from stolen emails can change neither the well-understood science nor the extreme weather we are all witnessing. There is nothing new here. Out-of-context snippets from stolen emails cannot change the well-understood science nor can they change the extreme weather we are all witnessing. These “new” emails are actually from the same set of two-year-old emails stolen from the Climate Research Unit at East Anglia University in Britain in November 2009. The original release of these hacked emails was a hoax, a manufactured scandal designed to smear climate scientists. Of course, climate scientists were vindicated in multiple investigation more The historian: A hunt for the motives behind doubt-mongering.
Naomi Oreskes found herself under attack in 2004, when she called attention to the scientific consensus on climate change. Her search for those behind the broadside led her to document the evolution of doubt-mongering. IPCC author: A strong signal.Today's IPCC summary on extreme weather makes clear that no one will escape the changes being driven by our greenhouse gas emissions. Change is happening now. Will we act in time? I helped author the report because I am deeply concerned about what happens to the least advantaged when extreme events hit. As a researcher who has worked with communities impacted by weather disasters, I know how keenly climate-related catastrophes are felt at the most local level - in homes, schools, religious groups and other communities. If people understand the effects of their greenhouse gas emissions, hopefully they will strive to cut these emissions to avoid suffering the consequences of inaction. more Winter forecast offers no hope for Texas.The oceans have absorbed 93 percent of the heat generated by our emissions over the past 50 years. And it's the Pacific Ocean that's driving Texas' punishing drought right now - and that could bring a bounty of snow to Rocky Mountain skiers this winter, forecasters with the Climate Prediction Center said Thursday. Federal weather forecasters released their best guess for this winter's weather for the United States on Thursday, and for many regions of the country the forecast calls for more of the same: Yet more hot, dry conditions for drought-parched Texas and the southern plains, potential for another big snowpack in the Northwest and northern Rocky Mountains. more The filmmaker: A push to broaden the reach of 'ski porn.'David Mossop and Sherpas Cinemas are transforming ski flicks, turning the usual plot-less, context-less jumble of skiing images into a message about environmental destruction, mass consumption and climate change. A Climate Query. Opinion: Taking a stand for science.We need vocal and public leadership on the science of climate change. We cannot sit idly by as research and science are discarded or ignored. If university leaders don't stand up, who will? Simply put, I believe it is my ethical obligation to act in every acceptable way possible to provide a viable future for the students in college today. more Extreme measures: The push to make climate research relevant.
This year's rash of severe weather is changing climate science. As policymakers call for better information, scientists are scrambling to understand the link between increasing emissions and natural disasters. As they do so, researchers are shifting from hypothetical scenarios to short-term forecasts. The goal: To provide better information to policymakers and local officials who must plan for and adapt to changes. more Yukon delivers a plug of mercury in response to a changing climate.The Yukon River is delivering upwards of five tons of mercury a year to the Arctic environment, likely in response to a warming climate, scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey announced Tuesday. Thawing permafrost and industrial pollution are fingered as culprits. The river is pumping three to 32 times more mercury into the environment than similarly sized river basins, based on limited data. more High in the sky, with a keen focus on below.
A constellation of satellites offers unsurpassed insight on our changing planet, allowing scientists - and the public - to draw conclusions and connect seemingly disparate trends. But the fleet is aging. "There are days when we're seeing things before the scientists," said Mike Carlowicz, editor of the NASA Earth Observatory, which is posting and archiving a vast array of satellite imagery for the public. "Some of it is showing how beautiful the planet is. But some of it is giving people a new way of looking at something they already know about. And some of it is just 'Gee whiz.' " more Evidence builds that scientists underplay climate impacts.Far from being "alarmist," predictions from climate scientists in many cases are proving to be more conservative than observed climate-induced impacts, researchers say.
Reality, in many instances, is proving to be far worse than most scientists expected.
The oceanographer: Making a splash studying mountains, snow and wolverines.
A desire to connect the dots led oceanographer Synte Peacock to the isolated, alpine wolverine. In a pioneering study, she found changes to the spring snowpack endangered their survival in the western U.S. - and means problems for all of us. A Climate Query Opinion: Can we please stick to the science?The Galileo Movement, an Australia group dedicated to exposing flaws behind the country's push for a carbon tax, responds to a Daily Climate article and counters that modern climate variations are natural. Two articles published by The Daily Climate on Aug. 16 criticize and attempt to rebut statements made by the Galileo Movement. Galileo members are themselves concerned with combating the misleading arguments - many of which stem from the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change - that are being used to justify an environmentally ineffectual and expensive new tax on carbon dioxide emissions in Australia. more EPA accused of cutting corners on climate-health finding.The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency pushed back strongly against a claim by a government auditor that the agency should have sought a separate scientific review of its "highly influential" assessment on the human impacts of climate change, a necessary step before regulators can restrict greenhouse gas emissions. The White House, the EPA and others defended the agency's efforts, noting the science underpinning the administration's report was never questioned and remains sound. more The rower: Saving the oceans one lonely oar-stroke at a time.Roz Savage, the first woman to row solo and unassisted across both the Atlantic and Pacific, expects to finish her solo Indian Ocean crossing next week. In her hands, oars are a tool to change her life, push some boundaries and save the environment. A Climate Query. The insider: A reputation for straight talk in a jungle of spin.
Frank Maisano, a senior figure at one of the nation's top lobbying firms, keeps thousands of reporters, lawyers, industry players and others in the loop on energy, ice hockey and heavy metal. A Climate Query. Essay: Pipeline roulette.
As the Obama Administration leans toward approving a pipeline carrying tar sands oil from Canada to Texas, a Montanan picks up his paddle and canoes a cherished river sullied by our unquenched demand for fossil fuels. What riveted my attention, lately, was not the looming juggernaut of the Keystone XL pipeline chugging sludge from Alberta to Texas, that pipeline that has been getting all the press, and getting protesters arrested in Washington, D.C. What got my attention was the news, in July, of the Silvertip Pipeline break underneath the Yellowstone River, near Laurel, Mont.: Some 50,000 gallons of crude - by industry estimates - poured into the river from a break in the 12-inch, 20-year-old pipeline feeding the Exxon-Mobil refinery in Laurel. more Al Gore is back.Five years after the release of "An Inconvenient Truth," Al Gore returns to the world stage with an updated slide show. Can his message be any more successful this time around? The problem, some media observers say, is that Al Gore has become the brand: No one else with anything approaching his stature has taken up the climate cause, yet his personality is wooden and his style didactic. Having spent almost a quarter century as the face of climate change, the messenger has become inseparable from the message, they say. more Research skewers claim that clouds cause climate change.New findings published Tuesday appear to undermine a controversial study - oft-cited by those who downplay the human impacts of climate change - that claimed variations in cloud cover are driving temperature changes across the globe. In taking on University of Alabama climatologist Roy Spencer's claim that clouds are a main driver of observed temperature swings, an atmospheric scientist at Texas A&M University finds evidence of cherry picking and errors. more Opinion: Damaging impact of Spencer's science.In his bid to cast doubts on the seriousness of climate change, University of Alabama's Roy Spencer creates a media splash but claims a journal's editor-in-chief. The science doesn't hold up.
Unfortunately this is not the first time the science conducted by Roy Spencer and colleagues has been found lacking.
The renegade: Christine Whitman argues for the environment.In an interview with DailyClimate.org, New Jersey's first female governor dismisses Texas Gov. Rick Perry's climate statements, rates Obama's environmental record and divulges her golf handicap. First in an ongoing series of Q&As with players large and small in the climate arena. Field book, s'mores, bug spray ... and climate education?The National Park Service sees an opportunity to educate the public on climate change by leveraging its rangers' authority and expertise. But progress remains sporadic.
In national parks across the country, the impacts of climate change are sobering. Those changes - some of which are readily apparent to park visitors - make communication easier, and park rangers have the skills, authority and experience to be effective climate change communicators.
Federal auditors find no evidence to support 'Climategate' accusations.The National Science Foundation has closed its investigation into Pennsylvania State University climatologist Michael Mann after finding no evidence of scientific misconduct related to his research.
It is the latest in a string of investigations to exonerate scientists involved in the so-called "Climategate" email scandal.
Galileo Movement fuels Australia climate divide.Two Australian retirees invoke the 'father of modern science' in their fight against the hegemony of settled climate science. But their arguments - and the advisors supporting them - draw from a deep history of climate science denial and distortion. Close examination of the Galileo Movement's arguments shows that the effort is recycling many of the same straw man arguments and distortions about the science that other groups have previously employed to scuttle a cap-and-trade bill in the U.S. Congress last year, a stricter emissions trading scheme in New Zealand three years ago and other regional and national efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. more Carbon facts don't tell the whole story.In making a case against CO2 as a greenhouse gas, the Galileo Movement lists a number of irrelevant facts while omitting pertinent ones.
John Smeed, the movement's co-founder, says the case against carbon dioxide as a global warming culprit is simply a matter of "junior school physics."
Power thirsty: The surprising link between energy and water.
Power and water are more interconnected than you might think, and that has serious consequences for a changing world, especially the American West.
By now, everyone knows you save energy by turning out lights. And you conserve water by taking shorter showers. But it's just as true that saving water may be one of the most effective ways to save energy - and vice versa.
Economists find flaws in federal estimate of climate damage.A new report concludes that each ton of carbon dioxide emitted in the atmosphere inflicts as much as $900 in environmental harm – almost 45 times the amount the federal government uses when setting regulations. The gap, advocates say, disguises the true value of emissions reductions. A truer value, according to the analysis, would be equivalent to adding $9 to each gallon of gas. Viewed another way, with the United States emitting the equivalent of close to 6 million tons of carbon dioxide annually, the higher figure suggests that avoiding those emissions could save the nation $5.3 trillion annually, one-third of the nation's economic output. more Battling an ancient scourge, with satellites and sari cloth.Rising temperatures and gene mutations have given apparently unflagging legs to the current cholera epidemic. But researchers are finding ways to fight back. Where the previous pandemics lasted five to 25 years, this one started in 1961. "We are in the 50th year of this and it shows no evidence of abating. If anything, it's revving up," said Edward T. Ryan, director of tropical medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital. "We are in this for the long haul." more 'Green' positions on climate change can help all candidates, survey finds.Against all political intuition, Republican candidates could win votes by taking “green” positions on the controversy over climate change, according to new poll results released Tuesday.
Voters tend to favor political candidates who believe that humans have contributed to global warming and that the nation should take action by switching from fossil fuels to solar and wind power, according to Stanford University’s national survey.
Armadillos move north across a warmer North America.The armadillo is moving north into areas never expected by biologists, who are also seeing climate-related migration of mice and other small mammals. In many cases, they find the most common species in the ecosystem is changing, with potentially significant results. Charting a planet's changing rhythms, through a physician's eyes.A pioneering public health doctor makes the connection between our planet's changing climate and a host of threats to our well-being.
Paul Epstein sees the whole. Associate director of Harvard Medical School's Center for Health and Global Environment, Epstein started his career as a physician caring for the poor in Mozambique and Boston.
Climate rap, yo!Climate scientists take on the denier crowd with a Beastie Boy-style rap. Really.
The media landscape is dotted by climate believers and deniers, but why are those who do much of the speaking about climate science rarely climate scientists?
Floating into the future.A safer generation of airships is trying to usher in a low-carbon future for air cargo. The initial target: Developing markets - China, Africa, northern Canada - where transportation infrastructure is nonexistent. Airships "give you access and much larger payloads at much lower costs," said Peter DeRobertis, project leader for commercial hybrid air vehicles at Lockheed Martin's Aeronautics and Skunk Works division in Fort Worth, Texas. "It's also a green aircraft; you're not polluting." more The Ice Man drilleth.Climate science research often involves a little derring-do mixed in with a lot of tedium. Some scientists scramble up equatorial peaks to measure melting glaciers; others scour dry African lake beds. For paleoclimatologist James White, adventures begin when a C-130 transport plane drops his team in the middle of Greenland's ice cap. In conditions that redefine the word "cold" for this native Tennessean, White drills through ancient ice to unlock clues to the Earth's past climate - and predict its future. more Review: Bringing climate change in from the cold.Ah, the stale, wonky world of climate change, where policy is opaque, the science dense and the rhetoric stuck in predictable ruts. Time to call in Tex Cassidy. He's the hero of "Melting Down," a new political thriller that shifts the global warming debate to a mass-market world of intrigue, action and suitcase nukes.
The premise is straightforward, the plot anything but: Scientific reports of melting ice caps, disappearing lodgepole pine and freak winter storms haven't yet gotten the public interested in global warming. So why not a tale about rogue Russian agents, stolen nukes, crisis in the White House situation room and a hero who's a crack shot from a zooming snowmobile?
Surging renewable sector pulls even with nuclear power in U.S.Declining nuclear power and a strengthening renewable fuels sector have left the two energy sources neck-and-neck for their share of U.S. energy production, according to the most recent figures from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
The percent of domestic energy production obtained from renewable fuels - biomass, geothermal, solar, wind and water - rose to 10.9 percent last year, up from 10.6 percent in 2009. Meanwhile nuclear energy dipped from 11.5 percent in 2009 to 11.3 percent in 2010.
Shift in boreal forest has wide impact.Boreal forests across the Northern hemisphere are undergoing rapid, transformative shifts as a result of a warming climate that, in some cases, is triggering feedback loops producing even more regional warming, according to several new studies. Russia's boreal forest - the largest continuous expanse of forest in the world - has seen a transformation in recent years from larch to conifer trees, according to new research by University of Virginia researchers. more 'Energy Star' cities make gains: EPA.List of cities with the most energy-efficient buildings shows "dramatic" growth, with 6,200 buildings certified in 2010, according to federal environment officials. Los Angeles leads the pack for the third year running. All told, more than 6,200 commercial buildings earned the Energy Star label in 2010, an increase of nearly 60 percent compared to 2009, according to the agency. more States cede the front lines in push for climate policy.A year ago states and cities were driving domestic climate policy. Now they're putting on the brakes. Some 24 state attorneys general have sued or threatened to sue to prevent the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency from regulating carbon emissions. A Montana lawmaker introduced a resolution calling global warming beneficial. A few states are seeking to nullify federal environmental rules. more Sniffle, snort, achoo! Allergy season is extending, scientists find.Pollen season is lengthening in proportion to warming observed in North America: An extra two weeks, on average, across Wisconsin, Nebraska, Minnesota and almost a full month in the Canadian breadbasket.
The new research, published Monday in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, finds the longer pollen seasons correlate with the disproportionate warming happening around the planet and attributed to greenhouse gas emissions.
In Peru, hopes for carbon deal wash away with the soil.
A newly paved highway has sparked a Klondike-style gold rush in Peru's rich rain forest, threatening the country's chances to strike carbon-offset deals on the international market. Peru's Environment Ministry hopes to conserve the country's forests by peddling its rich carbon stocks on international markets. The gold fever luring as many as 200 people a day to the remote Madre de Dios region threatens to bury those plans under meters of mercury-laden mud. more Opinion: Gliding past a 'monster.'
Oversized loads bound for a Montana oil refinery are working their way through Idaho, presaging an effort to turn a scenic byway into an industrial artery for Alberta's oil sands and rekindling one Montanan's 25-year-old memories of sub-Arctic destruction. Our canoe emerged from an unsettled river canyon, past the confluence with the Clearwater River, and into the stunning industry of the oil sands. We coasted past high banks of bermed-up sand. Yellow machines the size of houses roared down the roads, tore into the ground, stripped up the layers of earth to get at the seams of bitumen, or tar. Our mouths fell open - the scale of it, the sounds, and the effluent pouring back into the river that we had come to know. more Ethical dilemma profoundly sways climate economics.Do we worry now about the consequences of our carbon-intensive lifestyle, or do we let our children cope? The answer has a considerable impact when assessing the economic costs of a warmer planet.
We benefit mightily from burning cheap coal and will shoulder most of the expense associated with switching the global economy to low-carbon fuel sources.
Sunny, sweltering ... Scandinavia?What's the economic cost of giving snow-loving Sweden the balmy climate of Italy? The science is silent. "If Sweden becomes the climate of Italy, people are will still be alive and working and doing something there, but there's no acknowledgment that Sweden isn't Sweden anymore." more Revised data show feds understate climate costs.Preliminary analysis suggests impacts from climate change could run twice as high as previous estimates, giving regulators more firepower to justify emissions-cutting regulations.
Models used to generate current cost impacts contain gaps and, in some cases, outdated assumptions. As those models are refined and updated, they show greater economic harm as global temperatures rise in response to greenhouse gas emissions.
What's the cost of climate change? Pick a number.Cost estimates for the damages wrought by climate change run a wide gamut, from $-9 to $3,243 per ton of carbon dioxide emissions, based on a review of scientific estimates. Within that universe, the federal estimates look low. Values are generally represented as a price per ton of carbon dioxide emitted. The higher the price, the greater the perceived impact of carbon emissions on society. The histogram here shows the central range of values (standardized to 2007 dollars) obtained by recent studies. more A matter of scale.Many climate models lack the resolution to see the full range of impacts from a warmer world. A two-week heat wave can be devastating, but it gets masked in many climate models.
"Running (a climate model) on a daily time stamp is a massive computing problem, so it's understandable why they do what they do," said University of California, Berkeley, economist Michael Hanemann.
Can eating less meat curb climate change?A conservation-minded Texas mom assesses her contribution to climate change, one meal at a time.
Our planet's 6.8 billion people include 1 billion hungry and 1.6 billion overweight, and scientists' best predictions have the population rising to 9 billion by 2050 before leveling off. How will we feed so many people without utterly ravaging the Earth?
Coastal shipping offers Rx for highway congestion.Shifting freight from trucks to barges could cut U.S. fuel consumption - and provide a big economic boost. But domestic political hurdles block a path being exploited by China, India and Europe.
Among the long-standing obstacles to such a transition, the Merchant Marine Act of 1920 imposes a bit of industrial protectionism that critics contend has outlived its usefulness.
2010 in review: The year climate coverage 'fell off the map.'After spiking upward in response to the Copenhagen talks and 'climategate' uproar, media coverage of climate change has plummeted to levels last seen in 2005, according to analysis of Daily Climate's archives and other databases.
Despite the trend, some outlets and reporters remain prolific. Reuters lead the pack, publishing 1,683 stories last year - 4.6 stories a day. The New York Times had 1,116; the London Guardian, 941; the Associated Press, 793.
A glacier in flux plunges seaward.
On the edge of one of the planet's most ice-covered regions, an Alaska glacier is ignoring all climate signals as it advances to the sea. Scientists aim to find out why - and what it means for sea levels around the world. As the Yahtse glacier advances, it is also thinning, underscoring the mystery behind exactly how tidewater glaciers change over time. Recent research has fingered the ocean as a trigger. Now a team of University of Alaska scientists are investigating what happens when an advancing glacier meets a warmer ocean. more Fear and loathing in the warming world.
It felt like a sucker punch. Someone had been on our land, cutting trees, heaping up unsightly brush piles, hauling off timber. "My propane bills killed me last winter," offered our neighbor - the culprit. In a carbon-constrained, resource-pinched world, is this our future?
All night, camped amidst the piles of brush, I stewed. I pictured this man working at his leisure, waving at the trucks passing by, stopping to have lunch, sitting on a freshly cut stump, mentally calculating the bills he wouldn't have to pay.
Power to the people?
The black metal barrier halted all progress across the four-lane highway, and a phalanx of police emphasized the point: Nobody was getting through. It's a tradition as old as the UN's climate talks themselves - concurrent forums and protests giving voice to those shut out of the opaque official process. This year three separate forums are lifting that voice. They are centered on a theme - "change the system, not the climate" - and have focused on climate justice, the principle that the globe's poorer nations be accorded full participation and consideration in treaties that have historically been shaped by and, they claim, favor wealthier nations. more Climate Clippings: Heavy crude, crowdsourcing, and being a low-carbon rock star.New and noteworthy from Daily Climate's news desk. This week: Refinery emissions could double, the Cancun climate talks get 'crowdsourced,' and New York's biggest music video production studio goes solar. Tidal energy tests the waters.Tidal power may be destined to remain no more than a niche player in the United States' energy portfolio, but the low-carbon energy source has one advantage over wind and solar: It's as dependable as the moon's phases. Investors and public utilities are taking notice. tidal power is garnering increasing attention as a niche supplier of renewable alternative energy in Washington, Maine and Alaska. The tides, some say, have the potential to light five percent of the nation's homes - nearly nine gigawatts of generating power. more Opinion: Feds fall short in pricing climate disruption.As the Obama Administration prices climate change impacts to help justify emissions limits, it encounters a fundamental problem: Many of the biggest disruptions are impossible to value. What's the price of giving Sweden the climate of Spain?
I'm loathe to use the numbers derived so far by the working group to evaluate whether or not to limit greenhouse gas emissions.
Let there be solar.Faith communities around the world are taking action - both personal and political - as the moral implications of climate change become more apparent. While politics is split on climate change and governments worldwide have failed to pass meaningful climate legislation, faith communities are becoming a powerful force in the transition to green energy. By focusing on values rather than politics, they are transcending partisan pigeonholes and taking care of what they see as God's creation, and the people - particularly the poor - who depend on it. more |
