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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Climate champion Sen. Bernie Sanders exits 2020 Presidential race; New study finds air pollution may increase risk of dying from COVID-19; Great Barrier Reef suffering another extreme bleaching event; PLUS: Good news for breathers, as polluting coal plant closes in Kentucky... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Unchecked Global Warming Could Collapse Whole Ecosystems, Maybe Within 10 Years; The World Is on Track to See Its Biggest Yearly Drop in Carbon Pollution Ever; John Prine’s ‘Paradise’ Taught Us Why We Can't Give in to Climate Hell; Why we need to transition, quickly, from fossil fuels to clean energy; In the Midwest- anti-renewable zealots push fear, not facts; With Boats Stuck in Harbor Because of COVID-19, Will Fish Bounce Back?... PLUS: 'Dinosaurs walked through Antarctic rainforests'... and much, MUCH more! ...

STORIES DISCUSSED ON TODAY'S 'GREEN NEWS REPORT'...

• Sen. Bernie Sanders exits 2020 Democratic presidential race:
• VIDEO: Senator Bernie Sanders Suspends Presidential Campaign (C-SPAN)
• Bernie Sanders, Candidate With Most Ambitious Climate Plan, Drops out of 2020 Race (EcoWatch)
• What a difference Bernie Sanders made (Washington Post)
• Bernie Sanders Was Right (NY Times)
• Bernie Sanders on Climate Change: Where the Candidate Stands (Inside Climate News)
• Sanders’s Climate Ambitions Thrill Supporters. Experts Aren’t Impressed. (NY Times):
  
  Climate scientists and energy economists say the plan is technically impractical, politically unfeasible, and possibly ineffective.
• Air pollution may increase risk of dying from COVID-19, new study finds:
• A national study on long-term exposure to air pollution and COVID-19 mortality in the United States (Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health)
• New Research Links Air Pollution to Higher Coronavirus Death Rates (NY Times):
  
  For weeks, public health officials have surmised a link between dirty air and death or serious illness from Covid-19, which is caused by the coronavirus. The Harvard analysis is the first nationwide study to show a statistical link, revealing a “large overlap” between Covid-19 deaths and other diseases associated with long-term exposure to fine particulate matter.
• Air pollution linked to far higher Covid-19 death rates, study finds (Guardian UK):
  
  The study, by researchers at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health in Boston,analysed air pollution and Covid-19 deaths up to 4 April in 3,000 US counties, covering 98% of the population. “We found that an increase of only 1µg/m3 in PM2.5 [particles] is associated with a 15% increase in the Covid-19 death rate,” the team concluded...The authors said the results highlighted the need to keep enforcing existing air pollution regulations, and that failure to do so could potentially increase the Covid-19 death toll. They noted that the US Environmental Protection Agency suspended its enforcement of environmental laws on 26 March.
• Study: The tiniest bit of air pollution makes COVID-19 more deadly (Grist):
  
  Many studies have linked high levels of PM 2.5 to heart disease, chronic bronchitis, diabetes, and other respiratory illnesses. Researchers have estimated that PM 2.5 contributed to 4.2 million deaths worldwide in 2015 alone.
• Covid-19 death rate rises in counties with high air pollution, study says (CNN)
• EPA scientists find black communities disproportionately hit by pollution (The Hill, 2/23/2018)
• For Communities of Color, Nearby Industry Leads to Pollution but Not Employment (Pacific Standard, 11/15/2018)
• African-Americans dying at far higher rates from COVID-19, and pollution is likely a factor:
• Black Americans Face Alarming Rates of Coronavirus Infection in Some States (NY Times)
• African Americans are disproportionately dying from coronavirus (Axios)
• Black and Hispanic Americans Suffer Disproportionate Coronavirus Infections (EcoWatch)
• polluting industries located in communities of color
• Hispanics and Blacks Are Hardest Hit by COVID-19 in New York City (US News & World Report)
• Fauci says the coronavirus is 'shining a bright light' on 'unacceptable' health disparities for African Americans (Business Insider)
• Australia's Great Barrier Reef suffering another extreme bleaching event:
• Great Barrier Reef's third mass bleaching in five years the most widespread yet (Guardian UK)
• This is likely the last generation to see the Great Barrier Reef as humans have known it (Quartz):
  
  For 500,000 years, the Great Barrier Reef has grown steadily in the cool, clear waters off Australia. But after surviving five glacial periods, the reef’s billions of inhabitants may not survive humanity.
• Great Barrier Reef Is Bleaching Again. It's Getting More Widespread. (NY Times)
• Kentucky coal plant closes permanently, despite pressure from Trump, McConnell:
• Iconic Plant's End Spells Doom for Struggling Coal (AP):
  
  President Donald Trump tried to stop it from happening. The top Republican in the Senate, Mitch McConnell, did too. Despite their best efforts to make good on Trump’s campaign promise to save the beleaguered coal industry, including an eleventh-hour pressure campaign, the Tennessee Valley Authority power plant at Paradise burned its last load of coal last month.

'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

• The World Is on Track to See Its Biggest Yearly Drop in Carbon Pollution Ever (Earther)
• Unchecked Global Warming Could Collapse Whole Ecosystems, Maybe Within 10 Years (Inside Climate News)
• John Prine’s ‘Paradise’ Taught Us Why We Can't Give in to Climate Hell (Earther)
• 'Dinosaurs walked through Antarctic rainforests' (BBC)
• Why we need to transition, quickly, from fossil fuels to clean energy (op-ed, Rep. Sean Casten, The Hill)
• Trump EPA’s ‘Secret Science’ Rule Would Dismiss Studies That Could Hold Clues to Covid-19 (Inside Climate News)
• With Boats Stuck in Harbor Because of COVID-19, Will Fish Bounce Back? (Smithsonian Magazine)
• VIDEO: In the Midwest- anti-renewable zealots push fear, not facts (Climate Crocks)
• Republicans Are Failing America: Coronavirus Response Mirrors Climate Response (Clean Technica)
• Oil Cut Deal Faces Multiple Challenges (E&E News)
• Inside a Cross-Border Battle Against Cancer And Pollution (Environmental Health News)
• Exxon's Snake Oil: 100 years of deception (Columbia Journalism Review)
• 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)
• 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

• NASA climate change video: This is the U.S. in 2100 (NASA).

                 

Article Categories: Environment, Kentucky, Green News, Bernie Sanders, Mitch McConnell, Coal, Climate change, Extreme weather, Australia, Election 2020, Coronavirus/COVID-19