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IN TODAY’S RADIO REPORT: More fossil fuel disasters — Deadly natural gas explosion levels homes in Baltimore; Fuel spill creates ecological disaster for island nation Mauritius; Buckle up for a hyperactive hurricane season; July 2020 was the third hottest July ever recorded globally; PLUS: And then there were none — Canada’s last intact ice shelf collapses… All that and more in today’s Green News Report!

Green News Report with Brad Friedman & Desi Doyen 8/11/2020

‘Green News Report’ – August 11, 2020  |  With Brad Friedman & Desi Doyen...   · · · · ·   ‘Green News Report’ – August 11, 2020  |  With Brad Friedman & Desi Doyen...

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IN ‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (see links below): Trump EPA lifts controls on climate-warming methane; Interior proposes easing royalty calculations for public lands extraction; Deadly derecho leaves path of destruction across Midwest; Investors launch climate plan to get to net zero emissions by 2050; Warming world will be ‘devastating’ for frozen peatlands; Big oil remembers ‘friend’ Trump with millions in campaign funds; BP’s green energy targets will be tough to meet… PLUS: ‘As the tundra burns, we cannot afford climate silence’: a letter from the Arctic… and much, MUCH more! …

STORIES DISCUSSED ON TODAY’S ‘GREEN NEWS REPORT’…

• Fossil fuel destruction: Deadly natural gas explosion levels homes in Baltimore:
• Death toll rises to 2 people from Baltimore gas explosion (AP)
• VIDEO: Neighbor’s Ring camera catches the rowhome explosion in Baltimore (Fox-Baltimore)
• Most American homes are still heated with fossil fuels. It’s time to electrify. (David Roberts, Vox, 7/2/2018)
• Fuel spill creates ecological disaster for Indian Ocean island nation of Mauritius:
• VIDEO: Satellite images show oil spill disaster unfolding in Mauritius: “We will never be able to recover” (CBS):
  Wildlife workers and volunteers ferried dozens of baby tortoises and rare plants from an island near the spill, Ile aux Aigrettes, to the mainland as fears grew that worsening weather on Sunday could tear the Japanese-owned ship apart along its cracked hull.
• The ship that leaked oil into pristine Mauritian waters could break in two. That would be an environmental catastrophe (CNN)
• Sea life around Mauritius dying as Japanese ship oil spill spreads (Reuters)
• NOAA updates forecast to “extremely active” hurricane season still to come:
• ‘Extremely active’ hurricane season possible for Atlantic Basin (NOAA)
• CSU researchers now predicting extremely active 2020 Atlantic hurricane season (Colorado State University)
• NOAA’s new hurricane outlook shows so many storms, we may have to turn to the Greek alphabet (Washington Post):
  About 95 percent of hurricanes and major hurricanes form from August to October, National Weather Service director Louis Uccellini said during a news conference call…It would take only 21 named storms before all the names on the Atlantic list, determined ahead of time by the World Meteorological Organization, are exhausted and forecasters would turn to the Greek alphabet. This happened only once before, in 2005, a devastating season that was the most active on record.
• Worst of 2020 hurricane season likely still to come (NBC12)
• VIDEO: Experts predict active 2020 hurricane season, w/ CBS Meterologist Jeff Berardelli (CBS)
• July 2020 was third hottest July ever recorded globally:
• Surface air temperature for July 2020 (Copernicus):
  Temperatures in the Arctic were much above average along the Northern Sea Route (along the northern coast of Siberia), as well as over the Canadian Archipelago and over the central Arctic Ocean. Globally, it was the third warmest July in this data record, behind 2016 and 2019.
• July 2020 was record hot for many U.S. states (NOAA)
• State of the climate: 2020 set to be first or second warmest year on record (Carbon Brief)
• Three of the hottest Julys on record in past five years (RTE)
• Canada’s last intact ice shelf collapses:
• Nunavut’s Milne Ice Shelf Suddenly Collapses (Carleton University):
  Collapsed Arctic ice shelf adds ‘exclamation point’ to dire climate trends, say scientists (CBC):

  There are signs that Arctic ice may become unstable earlier than predicted…”I knew every square inch of these ice caps,” he said. “I knew them as friends too, you know, and now they’re gone…. It’s like losing an old friend.”
• VIDEO: Canada’s last intact Arctic ice shelf has collapsed (CBS):
  “It is lucky that we were not on the ice shelf when this happened, our camp area and instruments were all destroyed in this event,” researcher Derek Mueller of Carleton University in Ottawa said Thursday.
• VIDEO: Canada’s last intact ice shelf collapses into the sea (Global News)
• Canadian ice shelf larger than Manhattan collapses into the sea (CNN)

‘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

• Trump E.P.A. to Lift Obama-Era Controls on Methane, a Potent Greenhouse Gas (NY Times)
• Deadly derecho leaves path of destruction across Midwest, 1 million without power (USA Today)
• Investors launch climate plan to get to net zero emissions by 2050 (Reuters)
• ‘As the tundra burns, we cannot afford climate silence’: a letter from the Arctic (Guardian UK)
• Climate change: Warming world will be ‘devastating’ for frozen peatlands (BBC)
• Winter is coming: Why America’s window of opportunity to beat back Covid-19 is closing (Stat News)
• Big oil remembers ‘friend’ Trump with millions in campaign funds (Guardian UK)
• BP’s green energy targets will be tough to meet (Reuters)
• Interior Proposes Easing Royalty Calculations For Public Lands Drilling (The Hill)
• Biden says he opposes uranium mining around Grand Canyon, citing importance to tribes (Arizona Republic)
• Biden vows to block Pebble mine project if elected (AP)
• Deadly diseases from wildlife thrive when nature is destroyed, study finds (Guardian UK)
• Arctic Sea Ice Shrank to Record Lows in July (Bloomberg)
• Groups Threaten To Sue DOE Over 26 Delayed Efficiency Standard Updates (The Hill)
• Alarm As Pesticides Spur Rapid Decline Of US Bird Species (Guardian UK)
• Lake Erie’s Toxic Green Slime is Getting Worse With Climate Change (Inside Climate 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).