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IN TODAY’S RADIO REPORT: Congratulations! You’ve just lived through the hottest ten years on record; GOP Senate confirms former lobbyist as Energy Secretary; California bans all new fracking, for now; PLUS: Teen climate activist Greta Thunberg has a warning for politicians… All that and more in today’s Green News Report!
Green News Report
with Brad Friedman & Desi Doyen
12/5/2019
‘Green News Report’ – December 5, 2019 | With Brad Friedman & Desi Doyen... · · · · · ‘Green News Report’ – December 5, 2019 | With Brad Friedman & Desi Doyen...
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IN ‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (see links below): Natural gas rush drives global rise in fossil fuel emissions; Florida Keys deliver a hard message: as seas rise, some places can’t be saved; Nestlé cannot claim bottled water is ‘essential public service’, court rules; Scientists use novel experiment to restore ecosystems around coral reefs; Pipeline giant sues Texas Railroad Commission for lax oversight of gas flaring; Environmental groups protest Europe burning U.S. wood as ‘climate-friendly’ fuel… PLUS: Need an idea for a climate-friendly gift? We have 79…. and much, MUCH more! …
STORIES DISCUSSED ON TODAY’S ‘GREEN NEWS REPORT’…
- Trump doesn’t understand climate change:
- VIDEO: Trump lies about climate change, pollution (Aaron Rupar, Vox):
“Climate change is very important to me. I’ve done many environmental impact statements over my life and I believe very strongly in very, very crystal clear, clean water and clean air. That’s a big part of climate change.”
- VIDEO: It’s possible that Trump doesn’t actually know what climate change is (Washington Post)
- The Biggest Lie in Trump’s Environmental Speech Today (Mother Jones, 7/8/2019)
- UNFCC COP25 climate summit underway in Madrid, Spain:
- UN Climate Change Conference – December 2019 (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change)
- COP25 Bulletin: A rare press conference from China (Climate Change News):
While diplomats wrangle over the final rules of the Paris Agreement, arguably most important question hanging over climate politics is what China will do in 2020. Will it raise its climate target? By how much?
- The world plans to fix climate change with carbon credits. But do they work? (Quartz)
- COP25: UN climate change conference, 5 things you need to know (UNFCC)
- COP25 really is the ‘point of no return’ in the climate emergency. Here’s why (CNN)
- Climate change: The COP25 talks trying to change the world (BBC)
- WMO: 2019 caps hottest decade ever recorded:
- Earth’s temperature likely marks hottest decade on record: report (Reuters):
Among the report’s findings: Average temperatures for the five-year (2015-2019) and 10-year (2010-2019) periods are almost certain to be the highest on record. 2019 is on course to be the second- or third-warmest year on record. Sea water is 26 percent more acidic than at the start of the industrial era, degrading marine ecosystems…
- Don’t Say Nobody Warned Us: New WMO report shows decade of climate change (Earther)
- Global Carbon Project: Global CO2 hits record highs:
- Global CO2 footprint to break another record in 2019 (E&E News):
Global carbon emissions are expected to hit an all-time high in 2019, scientists say, smashing a previous record set in 2018…There is some good news. The authors expect a substantial slowdown in worldwide fossil fuels emissions for this year. Emissions from coal, oil and natural gas expanded by about 2 percent globally in 2018. For all of 2019, they predict an expansion of just 0.6 percent. Part of the slowdown can be attributed to declines in coal use in the U.S. and much of Europe, and lower-than-expected growth from other key coal consumers this year.
- Natural Gas Rush Drives a Global Rise in Fossil Fuel Emissions (Inside Climate News):
They show that carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels are expected to grow by 0.6 percent this year. That would be significantly slower than last year, when emissions grew by 2.1 percent. But it would mark the third straight year of growth, after three years of stable emissions. The assessment does not include the methane emissions released by producing and shipping fossil fuels.
- Global greenhouse gas emissions will hit yet another record high this year, experts project (Washington Post):
“We’re blowing through our carbon budget the way an addict blows through cash,” said one author.
- Another lobbyist confirmed for Trump’s cabinet:
- Trump Gets Closer to All-Lobbyist Dream Cabinet With New Energy Secretary Nominee (NY Magazine):
Many of these people — as well as those at other, informal positions throughout the administration — have been tasked by Trump with deregulating the sector they are in theory supposed to protect or promote, not to mention selling department services off to the highest bidder…for every 14 political appointees working in the Trump administration, one is a lobbyist. The 281 lobbyists who have been employed by the administration already outnumber what Presidents Bush and Obama totaled for their eight years in office each.
- Senate Confirms Dan Brouillette to Lead Energy Department (NY Times)
- Senate confirms Brouillette, former Ford lobbyist, as energy secretary (Reuters)
- Surprise! Climate models were correct, are correct, and continue to be correct:
- Evaluating the performance of past climate (Geophysical Research Letters)
- Climate Models Have Been Right For Decades (Earther):
Now that the world has lived through the years for which those scientists were churning out global warming estimates, researchers were able to determine that their predecessors did a hell of a job building models that could accurately predict the global surface temperature rise associated with greenhouse gas emissions.
- Scientists have gotten predictions of global warming right since the 1970s (Vox):
This is contrary to deniers, who claim that models overestimate warming, and contrary to the bizarre op-ed the New York Times ran in November, which claimed that scientists underestimate warming. As it happens, models have roughly hit the mark all along. It’s just, nobody listened….There is one important nuance to keep in mind here, which helps illuminate the ways that climate models are evolving and improving over time:
predicting physics vs. predicting humans. - CMIP6: the next generation of climate models explained (Carbon Brief)
- How reliable are climate models? (Skeptical Science)
- CA Governor temporarily bans new fracking, mandates state purchase low-emissions fleet vehicles:
- California Announces New Oil and Gas Initiatives (CA Dept. of Conservation)
- Newsom blocks new California fracking pending scientific review (LA Times):
In a victory for critics of California’s oil drilling industry, Gov. Gavin Newsom on Tuesday stopped the approval of new hydraulic fracturing in the state until the permits for those projects can be reviewed by an independent panel of scientists. Newsom also imposed a moratorium on new permits for steam-injected oil drilling, another extraction method opposed by environmentalists that was linked to a massive petroleum spill in Kern County over the summer.
- California Governor Cracks Down On Fracking, Requires Audits And Scientific Review (NPR):
“These are necessary steps to strengthen oversight of oil and gas extraction as we phase out our dependence on fossil fuels and focus on clean energy sources,” Newsom said in statement. “This transition cannot happen overnight; it must advance in a deliberate way to protect people, our environment, and our economy.”
- California Governor Gavin Newsom Provides A Preview Of A Federal Fracking Ban (Forbes)
- VIDEO: California To Stop Buying Cars From Automakers Siding With Trump On Emissions (Huffington Post):
“Carmakers that have chosen to be on the wrong side of history will be on the losing end of CA’s buying power,” Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) tweeted. The state will stop “purchasing vehicles from carmakers that have refused to protect our air & chosen to follow the regressive ways” of Trump, he added.
- California will no longer buy cars made by automakers aligned with Trump against clean air (Electrek)
- Greta Thunberg has a message about youth anger for politicians
- VIDEO: Greta Thunberg Blasts World Leaders’ Inaction On Climate Change (NBC News)
- Greta Thunberg arrives in Lisbon after three-week voyage from US (Guardian UK)
- Greta Thunberg’s Atlantic crossing: ‘Why I wanted to help’ (BBC)
- Greta Thunberg arrives in Lisbon for COP25 after sailing across Atlantic (CNN)
- ‘Alternative Nobel Prize’ awarded to Greta Thunberg and other activists (Deustche-Welle News)
‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (Stuff we didn’t have time for in today’s audio report)…
For a comprehensive roundup of daily environmental news you can trust, see the Society of Environmental Journalists’ Daily Headlines page
- Need an idea for a climate-friendly gift? We have 79. (Grist)
- Natural Gas Rush Drives a Global Rise in Fossil Fuel Emissions (Inside Climate News)
- Florida Keys Deliver a Hard Message: As Seas Rise, Some Places Can’t Be Saved (NY Times)
- Nestlé cannot claim bottled water is ‘essential public service’, court rules (Guardian UK)
- Scientists used loudspeakers to make dead coral reefs sound healthy. Fish flocked to them. (Washington Post)
- Pipeline Giant Sues Railroad Commission For Lax Oversight Of Gas Flaring (Texas Tribune)
- Europe Is Burning US Wood As Climate-Friendly Fuel; Green Groups Protest (NPR)
- “Bananas on Steroids” Could Help Tropics under Climate Change (Climate Crocks)
- Hot weather raises risk of early childbirth, study finds (Guardian UK)
- Cranky Uncle: The smartphone game designed to fight climate denial (The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists)
- Climate Tipping Points Are Closer Than We Think, Scientists Warn (Inside Climate News)
- Soil as the Ultimate Carbon Sink (Climate Crocks),/li>
- What Does ’12 Years to Act on Climate Change’ (Now 11 Years) Really Mean? (Inside Climate News)
- VIDEO: A Message From the Future With Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (The Intercept)
- This Is How Human Extinction Could Play Out (Rolling Stone)
- SEJ Backgrounder: Green New Deal Proposes Sweeping Economic Transformation (Society of Environmental Journalists)
- Explainer: The ‘Green New Deal’: Mobilizing for a just, prosperous, and sustainable economy (New Consensus)
- What genuine, no-bullshit ambition on climate change would look like: How to hit the most stringent targets, with no loopholes. (David Roberts, Vox)
- A Global Shift To Sustainability Would Save Us $26 Trillion (Vox)
- Project Drawdown: 100 Solutions to Reverse Global Warming (Drawdown.org)
- An Optimist’s Guide to Solving Climate Change and Saving the World (Vice)
- The great nutrient collapse: The atmosphere is literally changing the food we eat, for the worse. And almost nobody is paying attention. (Politico)
- The world’s bleak climate situation, in 3 charts: We’ve got a long way to go and a short time to get there. (Vox)
- The Climate Risks We Face (NY Times):
To stabilize global temperature, net carbon dioxide emissions must be reduced to zero. The window of time is rapidly closing to reduce emissions and limit warming to no more than 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit or 2 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels, the goal set in the Paris climate accord. The further we push the climate system beyond historical conditions, the greater the risks of potentially unforeseen and even catastrophic changes to the climate – so every reduction in emissions helps.
- The Uninhabitable Earth: When will climate change make earth too hot for humans? (New York Magazine):
Famine, economic collapse, a sun that cooks us: What climate change could wreak – sooner than you think.
- A beginner’s guide to the debate over 100% renewable energy (Vox):
Clean-energy enthusiasts frequently claim that we can go bigger, that it’s possible for the whole world to run on renewables – we merely lack the “political will.” So, is it true? Do we know how get to an all-renewables system? Not yet. Not really.
FOR MORE on Climate Science and Climate Change, go to our Green News Report: Essential Background Page
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