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IN TODAY’S RADIO REPORT: Influence of climate change on our schizophrenic extreme winter weather; Scientists say geo-engineering is madness, but we should study it anyway (CUE THE CHEMTRAILS!); Shell Oil nixes plan for Canadian tar sands mine; PLUS: There’s a sucker born every minute: man makes money off of bottled snow… All that and more in today’s Green News Report!
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Green News Report
with Brad Friedman & Desi Doyen
2/26/2015
‘Green News Report’ – February 26, 2015 | With Brad Friedman & Desi Doyen... · · · · · ‘Green News Report’ – February 26, 2015 | With Brad Friedman & Desi Doyen...
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IN ‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (see links below): Siberia’s melting permafrost: crater saga is scarier than anyone thought; Berkeley study directly IDs climate change culprit; Even earth scientists struggle to defeat global warming using interactive game; Should California resurrect a plan to pipe in water from Alaska?; TEPCO failed to disclose Fukushima radioactive water leak; Will solar eclipse cause blackouts in Germany? [No.]; Ocean acidification already hurting Pacific NW oyster industry… PLUS: Google wants to help you buy solar panels for your house… and much, MUCH more! …
STORIES DISCUSSED ON TODAY’S ‘GREEN NEWS REPORT’…
- Schizo Winter and the Influence of Climate Change:
- VIDEO: Al Roker: Climate Change Sets the Table for Extreme Weather (Climate Crocks)
- VIDEO: Cold Snap Freezes East, but Across US, It’s Mostly Heat Records that Are Being Set (Climate Crocks)
- NASA Satellites Start Tracking Down the Sources of Climate Change (NBC News)
- Scientific American Series on Extreme Weather, Climate Change, and the Risks We Face (Scientific American)
- Scientists: Geo-Engineering is Madness, But We Should Study It Anyway:
- Geoengineering is an insane way to deal with climate change. Let’s consider it anyway. (Vox.com)
- Panel Urges Research on Geoengineering as a Tool Against Climate Change (NY Times):
In two widely anticipated reports, the panel – which was supported by NASA and other federal agencies, including what the reports described as the “U.S. intelligence community” – noted that drastically reducing emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases was by far the best way to mitigate the effects of a warming planet.
- VIDEO WEBCAST: What’s Next for Climate Engineering? (Resources For the Future, Forum for Climate Engineering Assessment):
On February 10, the US National Academy of Sciences (NAS) released two major reports on climate engineering (also known as geoengineering), to help inform the ethical, legal, and political discussions on climate “intervention.”
- Hack the planet? Comprehensive report suggests thinking carefully first: Geoengineering for climate change could make an expensive mess. (Ars Technica) [emphasis added]:
All told, the report concludes that “there is significant potential for unanticipated, unmanageable, and regrettable consequences in multiple human dimensions from albedo modification at climate altering scales.” It urges against deploying it at this time and recommends caution about doing any research on it. Any tests have the potential to bring these consequences to any nations near the test site-bad on their own, and made worse by the fact that we have nothing in the way of an international political structure to manage the ensuing problems.
- Geoengineering Is Good Insurance (Op-ed, Bloomberg View):
The view that geoengineering should be rejected in principle, because it’s wrong to mess with the climate in this way, ignores the possibility that drastic remedies may be needed to forestall an eventual climate catastrophe. Geoengineering solutions, despite the drawbacks, may one day look better than the alternative, and by that time it might be too late to deal with global warming more sensibly.
- Here’s ONE geoengineering scheme that isn’t crazy (Grist)
- Four Reasons To Study A Bad Idea: Geoengineering (Forbes)
- GOOD NEWS: Shell Cancels Tar Sands Mine, Renewable Energy Booming All Over:
- Shell Withdraws From Largest Tar Sands Project Yet (Climate Progress)
- West Australia wave energy project turned on to power naval base at Garden Island (ABC Australia):
The world’s first wave-energy farm connected to the electricity grid has been switched on in Western Australia….The same system is also used to run a small desalination plant, which will be used to supply up to one-third of the base’s fresh water needs.
- The Eiffel Tower Just Got A Wind Turbine Makeover (Climate Progress)
- Jordan’s 6,000 Mosques Will Soon All Have Rooftop Solar (Climate Progress)
- Unstoppable: Solar Power Comes of Age – How Harnessing the Sun Got Cheap and Practical (Foreign Affairs):
This time really is different: solar power is ready to compete on its own terms. The momentum behind solar power is a result of innovations in regulation, industry, technology, and financing. In a number of markets, it no longer needs public subsidies to compete on price with conventional power sources, such as coal, natural gas, and nuclear power.
- Making Money Off Extreme Weather? There’s a Sucker Born Every Minute:
- VIDEO: Massachusetts snow sale: $89 for six pounds. Who buys this stuff? (CS Monitor):
After record snowfalls, Kyle Waring, of Manchester-by-the-Sea, Mass., is now selling his surplus snow from his yard. Why would anyone buy snow?
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‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (Stuff we didn’t have time for in today’s audio report)…
- Siberian Crater Saga Is More Widespread And Scarier Than Anyone Thought Washington Post):
At the end of last summer came news of a bizarre occurrence no one could explain. It was a massive crater that just one day showed up. Early estimates placed it at nearly 100 feet in diameter, nestled deep in Siberia’s Yamal Peninsula, a place called ‘the ends of the Earth.’
- EPA To Investigate North Carolina for Civil Rights Violations (Environmental Health News):
The EPA will investigate whether a North Carolina state agency’s regulation of industrial pig farms discriminates against communities of color.
- Berkeley study directly IDs climate change culprit (SF Gate) [emphasis added]:
“We have known for decades that there must be an effect, but getting a direct measurement and isolating the carbon dioxide component are a technological coup,” Christopher B. Field, a senior scientist at the Carnegie Institution for Science at Stanford University who has led two major IPCC reports, said in an e-mail. The Berkeley scientists’ study, he said, provides concrete evidence for the first time of carbon dioxide’s effect on global warming.
- Google Wants To Help You Buy Solar Panels For Your House. Seriously. (Climate Progress):
The search giant, valued at $370 billion, is once again boosting its investment in SolarCity’s residential solar power model by $300 million, both companies announced Thursday. Combined with a new financing structure from SolarCity, the companies say this will result in a new fund worth $750 million to help install distributed rooftop solar on homes across the country.
- It’s only a game, but even earth scientists struggle to defeat global warming (Science Magazine) [emphasis added]:
[L]ike the corporate executives and high school students who have played the game in the past, even a few dozen climate researchers, grad students, and teachers had difficulty grappling with the choices required to manage human-induced climate change.
- US oyster, clam farms face economic blow from acidification: study (Reuters):
U.S. shellfish producers in the Northeast and the Gulf of Mexico will be most vulnerable to an acidification of the oceans linked to climate change that makes it harder for clams and oysters to build shells, a study said on Monday.
- Fukushima fishermen blast TEPCO over failure to disclose radioactive water flow (Asahi Shimbun):
They lambasted TEPCO at a meeting on Feb. 25 over the utility’s failure for half a year to disclose the flow into the ocean of water contaminated with radioactive materials from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant.
- Solar eclipse will simulate widespread solar power storage (Germany Energy Transition):
On 20 March 2015, a partial solar eclipse will pass over Germany….[T]he impact will provide a glimpse of a future in which most households not only have solar roofs, but also battery storage.
- Why Obama Is So Autocratic About Environmental Policy: Because you can’t have a serious conversation with most Republicans about climate change. (Slate):
[T]here is a reason that Obama has chosen to go it alone on energy: The GOP’s utter refusal to reckon with the reality of climate change has left him no choice.
- Should Californians Resurrect a Plan to Pipe in Water From Alaska? (Wired):
It’s so crazy it just might work! Or is it? Hare-brained schemes to bring out-of-state water to California are nothing new, and this idea doesn’t come from nowhere. It was born in the late 1980s by Alaskan governor Wally Hickel, who was always exuberant about selling his state’s resources.
- The Slick Willie of Climate Denial – Science as “Deliverables” for the Disinfo Machine (Climate Crocks)
- Deeper Ties to Corporate Cash for Doubtful Climate Researcher (NY Times) [emphasis added]:
[N]ewly released documents show the extent to which Dr. Soon’s work has been tied to funding he received from corporate interests. He has accepted more than $1.2 million in money from the fossil-fuel industry over the last decade while failing to disclose that conflict of interest in most of his scientific papers. At least 11 papers he has published since 2008 omitted such a disclosure, and in at least eight of those cases, he appears to have violated ethical guidelines of the journals that published his work.
- “More research” into geoengineering is not such a hot idea (Grist):
Regarding albedo modification, I cannot improve on the piquant words of environmental scientist Raymond T. Pierrehumbert: “the idea of ‘fixing’ the climate by hacking the Earth’s reflection of sunlight is wildly, utterly, howlingly barking mad.”
…
If it’s crazy today, it would be crazy tomorrow, so why not just abandon it? - Now’s Your Chance to Help Save the Imperiled Monarch Butterfly-and Get Paid to Do So (Take Part) [emphasis added]:
Another threat, according to Grant, has been well-intentioned individuals who have planted a tropical form of milkweed, which competes with native varieties and is not beneficial to monarchs or other pollinators.
- It’s Not Too Late To Stop Climate Change, And It’ll Be Super-Cheap (Climate Progress):
I rarely disagree with Dave Roberts. But he has a column on Grist, “We can solve climate change, but it won’t be cheap or easy,” that is wrong, pure and simple….The most important climate issue is the cost and consequences of inaction.
FOR MORE on Climate Science and Climate Change, go to our Green News Report: Essential Background Page
But exactly how bad is still an open question, and a lot depends not only on how we react, but how quickly. The rate at which humans cut down on greenhouse gas emissions–if we do choose to cut them–will have a large bearing on how the world turns out by 2100, the forecasts reveal.
Restraining global warming to no more than 2 degrees Celsius will require changing how the world produces and uses energy to power its cities and factories, heats and cools buildings, as well as moves people and goods in airplanes, trains, cars, ships and trucks, according to the IPCC. Changes are required not just in technology, but also in people’s behavior.
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