Month: June 2020

Part of a remarkable series on “Rising Risks” from climate change to real estate by CNBC’s Diana Olick.

John Cook has done a lot of work on conspiracies and misinformation in the climate space, and here takes a look at the similar mechanisms in play during the pandemic period.

Cook’s Conspiracy Theory Handbook is available for download.

I posted a segment from Ayana Elizabeth Johnson’s recent piece in the Washington Post last week, and now I’ve come across several video clips of her further climate observations.
Urgent and well stated.
More to come tomorrow.

Sierra Club:

During the street protests and marches of the past two weeks, many people carried signs that read “Racism Is Killing Us.” It’s no exaggeration to say that racism and white supremacy harm all of us, because in addition to robbing us of our humanity, racism is also killing the planet we all share.

An idea—a long-overdue realization—is growing in the environmental movement. It goes something like this: “We’ll never stop climate change without ending white supremacy.” This argument has entered the outdoor recreation and conservation space thanks to the leadership of Black, Indigenous, and other people of color in the climate justice movement. The idea has taken on new force as folks in the mainstream environmental movement do our best to show up for George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, and all the Black people still living and subject to police violence.

I know that a lot of people are struggling with the thought that addressing the environmental crises must involve dismantling white supremacy. At Sierra Club meetings, some people hear me say something like that and think, “Damn, fighting climate change wasn’t hard enough already? Now we have to end racism and white supremacy too? Seriously, man?”

I get that feeling of being overwhelmed. It’s a lot to carry. It’s a lot to hold. We all have enough to do without feeling like we’re taking on even more.

But I want to share another lens from which we can view this moment. I really believe in my heart of hearts—after a lifetime of thinking and talking about these issues—that we will never survive the climate crisis without ending white supremacy. 

Here’s why: You can’t have climate change without sacrifice zones, and you can’t have sacrifice zones without disposable people, and you can’t have disposable people without racism. 

We’re in this global environmental mess because we have declared parts of our planet to be disposable. The watersheds where we frack the earth to extract gas are considered disposable. The neighborhoods near where I live in Los Angeles, surrounded by urban oilfields, are considered disposable. The very atmosphere is considered disposable. When we pollute the hell out of a place, that’s a way of saying that the place—and the people and all the other life that calls that place home—are of no value. 

Continue reading “I Can’t Breathe: Solve Racism to Solve Climate”

CNBC:

The Earth had its hottest May ever last month, continuing an unrelenting climate change trend as 2020 is set to be among the hottest 10 years ever, scientists with the Copernicus Climate Change Service announced on Friday. 

It’s virtually certain that this year will be among the top hottest years in recorded history with a higher than 98% likelihood it will rank in the top five, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

“The last month has been the warmest May on record globally and this is unquestionably an alarming sign,” said Freja Vamborg, a scientist at Copernicus Climate Change Service, an intergovernmental agency that supports European climate policy.

“Even more concerning is the fact that average temperatures of the last 12 months have become one of the hottest 12-month periods ever recorded in our data set,” she said. 

The most above-average temperatures were recorded over parts of Siberia — where temperatures were up to 10 degrees Celsius above average — as well as Alaska and Antarctica, according to the new research.

The last 12-month period, from June 2019 to May 2020, was nearly 0.7 degrees Celsius (about 1.3 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than average. Globally, May was 0.63 degrees Celsius (about 1.1 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than the average May recorded from 1981 to 2010. 

The continuous upward trend in global temperatures results from greenhouse gas emissions that change the climate. 

2019 was the second-hottest year ever, capping off the world’s hottest decade in recorded history. And six of the warmest years on record were during the past decade. 

The rising temperatures are accompanied by countless climate disasters, including rapid ice melt in Greenland and Antarctica, devastating wildfires from Australia to California and more intense and frequent hurricanes and heat waves. 

Hindustan Times:

Investigators have determined that the leakage of of 20,000 tons of diesel (about 150,000 barrels) from a reservoir at a power plant in Russia’s Far North was caused by damage from thawing permafrost—just the latest sign of the catastrophic effects climate change is having in the Arctic.

Continue reading “Hottest May on Record. Of Course, it’s 2020”

Bridge Magazine (Michigan):

MIDLAND — The owner of a Gladwin County dam that failed and prompted widespread evacuations Tuesday was cited repeatedly by federal officials for safety violations, including failing to fix spillways used to prevent flooding, records show.

Federal authorities revoked the licenses of owners Boyce Hydro Power LLC in 2018, alleging that it “failed for many years to comply with significant license and safety requirements, notwithstanding having been given opportunities to come into compliance.”

In court papers and federal records, regulators wrote that Boyce Hydro of Midland had a “history, going back to 2004” of missing deadlines to make repairs on the Edenville Dam that failed.

“That long history of noncompliance ranges from failing to report structural instability to inadequate water quality monitoring — but Boyce Hydro’s failure, in particular, to increase the spillway capacity to address flood risk has raised serious concerns about public safety,” the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission wrote in a federal lawsuit over regulations in 2017.

Another fascinating Fully Charged conversation.