'Biden-mobile’ or the future of transportation? How EVs got polarized.:
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| 'Biden-mobile’ or the future of transportation? How EVs got polarized. - Washington Post - Climate and Environment |
May 6 · Democrats say they are way more likely than Republicans to buy electric cars. Could that change?
Electric cars have taken off across the United States. Even amid news of slowing sales, the country sold almost 1.2 million fully electric vehicles in 2023, more than quadruple the number in 2019. Grocery stores and rest stops are installing charging stations across the country; electric cars have moved beyond niche status and are being produced by Ford, GM, Hyundai and many others. Read more ...
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'It’s going to be messy’: advocates balance climate action and conservation amid Queensland’s green energy boom:
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| 'It’s going to be messy’: advocates balance climate action and conservation amid Queensland’s green energy boom - Guardian - Energy |
May 4 · 'Some negative projects will get up, but we have to keep our eyes on the broader goals’, says WWF Australia
A map of operating windfarms in Queensland does not take too long to survey – of the 100 or so across Australia, only six of them are in the sunshine state.
But this is about to change in a very big way. According to state government data, there are 46 separate proposals for windfarms in Queensland with four more already under construction.
Many of those plans target the winds that sweep across the spectacular mountains and ridge tops of the Great Dividing Range from central Queensland to the state’s far north.
While this wind-grab will help wrench the ... Read more ...
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2024 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #18:
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| 2024 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #18 - Skeptical Science |
May 5 · "It’s straight out of Big Tobacco’s playbook. In fact, research by John Cook and his colleagues has shown that character assassination has been one of the most common ways in which fossil fuel interests have attempted to deny accountability for the climate crisis."
— Geoffrey Supan
Why go low? Because when one can't fly, one creeps and crawls. Widely remarked: to fall back on ad hominem remarks is to declare intellectual surrender, at best a Hail Mary attempt to change topics— and easily spotted even by children arguing on a playground. "Going ad hom" is a common failure mode when talk turns to human-caused climate change. US Senator (from ... Read more ...
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A Century-Old Company The Government Owns Wants To Solve A Big Energy Problem:
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| A Century-Old Company The Government Owns Wants To Solve A Big Energy Problem - Huffington Post |
May 4 · The Biden administration wants the United States to triple the global supply of nuclear power, with American-designed reactors running on fuel enriched in the West. The goal: Usurp Russia’s near monopoly on atomic energy exports, and keep China from gaining control of yet another green energy industry.
But there’s one big problem: The U.S. isn’t even building any more reactors at home.
After nearly 15 years of billion-dollar cost overruns and delays, the utility giant Southern Company just hooked the second of two new reactors at a power plant in Georgia up to the grid this week - the only two atomic energy units built from scratch in the U.S. in decades. Developers are ... Read more ...
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Are Flight Offsets Worth It?:
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| Are Flight Offsets Worth It? - New York Times - Climate Section |
May 6 · A lot of them don’t work and some might even be harmful. But there are things you can do if you really have to fly.
Credit...Naomi Anderson-Subryan
In recent years, many airlines have phased out the little box encouraging you to “offset your flight’s emissions!” on their checkout pages. Perhaps because so few customers took advantage of them, or perhaps because research has shown that many offset projects are ineffective or worse.
But last we checked, people are still flying. A lot. And the planet is still warming. A lot. So you may still be wondering: Should I offset my air travel? If so, how?
A carbon offset is a credit that you can buy to make up for your ... | By Susan Shain Read more ...
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Brazil mounts frantic rescue effort as flooding kills at least 78:
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| Brazil mounts frantic rescue effort as flooding kills at least 78 - PHYS.ORG - Earth |
May 6 · Authorities in southern Brazil scrambled Sunday to rescue people from raging floods and mudslides in what has become the region's largest ever climate catastrophe, with at least 78 dead and 115,000 forced from their homes.
Entire cities were underwater, with thousands of people cut off from the world by the floodwater, brought by days of torrential rains.
In Porto Alegre, the capital of Rio Grande do Sul state, residents stood on rooftops hoping to be rescued as others in canoes or small boats navigated streets that have become rivers.
After what one climatologist called "a disastrous cocktail" of climate change and the El Niño effect, more than 3,000 soldiers, ... Read more ...
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Cyclone bears down on flood-hit Kenya, Tanzania:
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| Cyclone bears down on flood-hit Kenya, Tanzania - PHYS.ORG - Earth |
May 5 · Beaches were deserted and many shops closed on Saturday as heavy rains and winds from a tropical cyclone buffeted coastal areas of Tanzania and Kenya.
Both countries have gone on alert for Tropical Cyclone Hidaya, after weeks of torrential rains and floods that have wreaked havoc in many parts of East Africa and claimed more than 400 lives.
But there were no reports of casualties or damage as of Saturday afternoon as the cyclone rolled in from the Indian Ocean and made landfall in Tanzania.
"It's so strange today to see only few people at the beach. We are used to seeing crowds, especially during the weekend," said Yusuf Hassan, a resident of Tanzania's main city ... Read more ...
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Electric vehicles will start to cut emissions and improve air quality in our cities - but only once they're common:
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| Electric vehicles will start to cut emissions and improve air quality in our cities - but only once they're common - PHYS.ORG - Technology |
May 4 · Is this view correct? Yes—but only once uptake accelerates. Despite the recent boom in EV purchases, they're still a tiny minority of the cars on the road.
We would get more immediate benefit by focusing on electrifying buses, which are a surprisingly large source of air pollution, and finding ways to cut rapidly growing emissions from diesel trucks.
While the electricity sector still produces the largest share of emissions in Australia (32.3%), emissions are falling. But emissions from transport (21.1%) are already the third-largest contributor—and are rising faster and faster.
Critics say EVs just shift the emissions and pollution from tailpipe to ... Read more ...
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Empowering Pacific & NE Asia Youth: Peacebuilders & Climate Advocates Workshop | United Nations:
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| Empowering Pacific & NE Asia Youth: Peacebuilders & Climate Advocates Workshop | United Nations - Climate Change (United Nations - Playlist) |
May 4 · The video follows young peacebuilders and climate advocates from the Pacific and Northeast Asia regions as they participate in a strategic foresight youth workshop in Samoa co-organized by the United Nations Department of Political and Peacebuilding Affairs (UNDPPA) and UNDP Samoa. \n\nCo-created by Youth for Youth, participants utilized strategic foresight tools to explore pathways to a peaceful, just, and sustainable future and transition in line with the 1.5 degrees Celsius benchmark in the Paris Agreement and important regional frameworks such as the Pacific Islands Forum Boe Declaration (2018) and the 2050 Strategy for the Blue Pacific Continent.\n\nProduced for the Department of ... | By United Nations Read more ...
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Extreme heat drives Chile wildfires leaving at least 51 dead:
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| Extreme heat drives Chile wildfires leaving at least 51 dead - PHYS.ORG - Earth |
May 5 · Chileans Sunday feared a rise in the death toll from wildfires blazing across the South American country that have already killed at least 51 people, leaving bodies in the street and homes gutted.
Authorities warned Sunday of "complicated" conditions as they battled fires in the coastal tourist region of Valparaiso amid an intense summer heat wave, with temperatures soaring to 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) over the weekend.
Dense gray smoke blanketed the city of Vina del Mar on the country's central coast Saturday, forcing residents to flee.
Rosana Avendano, a 63-year-old kitchen assistant, was away from home when the fire began to sweep through the ... Read more ...
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Fish are shrinking around the world. Here’s why scientists are worried.:
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| Fish are shrinking around the world. Here’s why scientists are worried. - Washington Post - Climate and Environment |
May 4 · Figuring out the reason why has big implications, with billions of people depending on seafood for protein.
There’s something fishy going on in the water. Across Earth’s oceans, fish are shrinking - and no one can agree why.
It’s happening with salmon near the Arctic Circle and skate in the Atlantic. Nearly three-fourths of marine fish populations sampled worldwide have seen their average body size dwindle between 1960 and 2020, according to a recent analysis. Read more ...
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Floods in southern Brazil kill 55, force 70,000 from homes:
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| Floods in southern Brazil kill 55, force 70,000 from homes - PHYS.ORG - Earth |
May 5 · Raging floods and mudslides have killed at least 55 people in southern Brazil and forced nearly 70,000 to flee their homes, the country's civil defense agency said on Saturday.
At least 74 people were injured and another 67 missing from the catastrophic flooding, civil defense said.
The toll did not include two people who died in an explosion at a flooded gas station in Porto Alegre, witnessed by an AFP journalist, where rescue crews were attempting to refuel.
Fast-rising water levels in the state of Rio Grande do Sul were straining dams and particularly threatening economically important Porto Alegre, a city of 1.4 million.
The Guaiba River, which flows ... Read more ...
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Heating cities with sand and water:
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| Heating cities with sand and water - Just Have A Think |
May 5 · The Green Energy Transition is starting to tease out some very smart solutions to ditching fossil fuels. Our friends in the North are leading the way in the decarbonisation of buildings and industry. Here's a couple of perfect examples.\n\nHelp support this channels independence at \nhttp://www.patreon.com/justhaveathink \n\nOr with a donation via Paypal by clicking here\nhttps://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick\u0026hosted_button_id=GWR73EHXGJMAE\u0026source=url \n\nYou can also help keep my brain ticking over during the long hours of research and editing via the nice folks at BuyMeACoffee.com \n\nhttps://www.buymeacoffee.com/justhaveathink\n\nVideo Transcripts available at ... | By Just Have a Think Read more ...
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Hopes fade for production curbs in new global pact on plastic pollution:
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| Hopes fade for production curbs in new global pact on plastic pollution - Climate Change News - Energy |
May 3 · With no further talks scheduled on limiting plastic production before final negotiations in November, the treaty may focus instead on recycling
Negotiators discuss the text in Ottawa (Photo: Kiara Worth - IISD/ENB)
Hopes for a new global treaty to include limits on rocketing production of plastic worldwide have faded after government negotiators sidestepped the issue at UN talks in the Canadian capital of Ottawa earlier this week.
At the fourth – and penultimate – round of talks, negotiators did not agree to continue formal discussions on how to cut plastic production before a final session in the Korean city of Busan set for November, making it less ... | By Joe Lo Read more ...
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How evolving landscapes impacted First Peoples' early migration patterns into Australia:
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| How evolving landscapes impacted First Peoples' early migration patterns into Australia - PHYS.ORG - Earth |
May 4 · Using a dynamic model charting the changing landscape, researchers have provided a more realistic description of the of the areas inhabited by the first humans to traverse Sahul: the landmass combining what is now Australia, Tasmania and New Guinea.
Led by Associate Professor Tristan Salles from the School of Geosciences at the University of Sydney, the research model factors-in evolution of the landscape, driven by climate, during the time of human dispersal. This is a novel approach; previous studies of migration patterns have relied heavily on archaeological findings.
"One aspect overlooked when evaluating how people spread across the continent is the evolution of the ... Read more ...
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How the world wastes hundreds of billions of meals in a year, in three charts:
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| How the world wastes hundreds of billions of meals in a year, in three charts - VOX -Environment |
May 4 · Think twice before throwing out your leftovers.
A billion meals are wasted every single day, according to a recent report from the United Nations. And that’s a conservative estimate.
It’s not just food down the drain, but money, too. The 2024 UN Food Waste Index report - which measured food waste at the consumer and retail level across more than 100 countries - found that over a trillion dollars worth of food gets thrown out every year, from households to grocery stores to farms, all across the globe.
Such waste takes a significant toll on the environment. The process of producing food - the raising of animals, the land and water use, and the subsequent pollution ... Read more ...
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Ikea is guiding its customers toward sustainable consumption. Here’s how:
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| Ikea is guiding its customers toward sustainable consumption. Here’s how - Greenbiz |
May 6 · The giant furniture retailer is using its procurement clout and in-store promotions to nudge millions of customers toward lower-emissions products.
Close to 860 million people visited Ikea stores last year, helping it generate more than $50 billion in sales. The world’s largest furniture retailer is using that exposure to drive a unique net-zero goal: a pledge to cut the climate footprint from products Ikea customers use at home by 70 percent by 2030.
So far, Ikea has managed a 52 percent reduction to the baseline it set in 2016, according to Ikea’s sustainability report for 2023.
The retailer calculates that claim by looking at the material composition and energy ... | By Heather Clancy Read more ...
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Loss and damage board speeds up work to allow countries direct access to funds:
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| Loss and damage board speeds up work to allow countries direct access to funds - Climate Change News - Finance |
May 3 · At its first meeting, the fund’s board decided to fast-track the selection of its host country so money can be disbursed as fast as possible to disaster-hit people
The first board meeting was held in the UAE, where extreme rainfall caused widespread flooding last month. REUTERS/Amr Alfiky
The board of the loss and damage fund is set to pick its host nation in July as it speeds up the process to ensure hard-hit countries can directly access money to help them recover from the unavoidable effects of climate change.
As the 26-member board held its first three-day meeting in Abu Dhabi this week, discussions centered on the administrative steps needed to get the ... | By Matteo Civillini Read more ...
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Market-based schemes not reducing deforestation, poverty: Report:
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| Market-based schemes not reducing deforestation, poverty: Report - PHYS.ORG - Earth |
May 6 · Market-based approaches to forest conservation like carbon offsets and deforestation-free certification schemes have largely failed to protect trees or alleviate poverty, according to a major scientific review published on Monday.
The global study - the most comprehensive of its kind to date - found that trade and finance-driven initiatives had made "limited" progress halting deforestation and in some cases worsened economic inequality.
Drawn from years of academic and field work, the report compiled by the International Union of Forest Research Organizations (IUFRO), a group of 15,000 scientists in 120 countries, will be presented at a high-level UN forum starting ... Read more ...
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New Computer Algorithm Supercharges Climate Models and Could Lead to Better Predictions of Future Climate Change:
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| New Computer Algorithm Supercharges Climate Models and Could Lead to Better Predictions of Future Climate Change - Science Daily - Earth and Climate |
May 24 · Earth System Models -- complex computer models which describe Earth processes and how they interact -- are critical for predicting future climate change. By simulating the response of our land, oceans and atmosphere to manmade greenhouse gas emissions, these models form the foundation for predictions of future extreme weather and climate event scenarios, including those issued by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
However, climate modellers have long faced a major problem. Because Earth System Models integrate many complicated processes, they cannot immediately run a simulation; they must first ensure that it has reached a stable equilibrium ... Read more ...
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Radio astronomers bypass disturbing Earth's atmosphere with new calibration technique:
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| Radio astronomers bypass disturbing Earth's atmosphere with new calibration technique - PHYS.ORG - Earth |
May 6 · The technique allowed astronomers to take clear radio images of the universe at frequencies between 16 and 30 MHz for the first time. This was thought to be impossible, because the ionosphere, at about 80 kilometers above the Earth, interferes with observations at these frequencies.
Thanks to the new images, it appears that the radio emission from these clusters is not evenly distributed across the entire cluster, but rather there is a spot pattern. "It's like putting on a pair of glasses for the first time and no longer seeing blurred," said research leader Christian Groeneveld of Leiden University.
The motivation for the research was that at high frequencies, around ... Read more ...
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Researcher: Climate models can run for months on supercomputers - but my new algorithm can make them ten times faster:
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| Researcher: Climate models can run for months on supercomputers - but my new algorithm can make them ten times faster - PHYS.ORG - Earth |
May 4 · Not surprisingly, these models are expensive. The simulations take time, frequently several months, and the supercomputers on which the models are run consume a lot of energy. But a new algorithm I have developed promises to make many of these climate model simulations ten times faster, and could ultimately be an important tool in the fight against climate change.
One reason climate modeling takes so long is that some of the processes being simulated are intrinsically slow. The ocean is a good example. It takes a few thousand years for water to circulate from the surface to the deep ocean and back (by contrast, the atmosphere has a "mixing time" of weeks).
Ever since the ... Read more ...
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Seismic shifts are underway to find finance for loss and damage:
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| Seismic shifts are underway to find finance for loss and damage - Climate Change News - Finance |
May 3 · Comment: The new UN fund can channel taxes and other innovative ways of raising money to pay for climate loss and damage – we just have to decide to apply them
Residents sift through the rubble as they recover their belongings after the Nairobi river burst its banks and destroyed their homes within the Mathare Valley settlement in Nairobi, Kenya, April 25, 2024. (Photo: REUTERS/Monicah Mwangi)
Avinash Persaud is Special Advisor to the President of the Inter-American Development Bank on Climate Change. Previously he was a member of the negotiation committee to establish the Loss and Damage Fund and an architect of the original ‘Bridgetown Initiative’ on ... | By Avinash Persaud Read more ...
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Tailwinds build for sustainable aviation fuel:
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| Tailwinds build for sustainable aviation fuel - Greenbiz |
May 6 · As the aviation industry lobbies for sustainable jet fuel, new tax breaks could help lower the carbon footprint of business travel.
Illustration of a jet's shadow over a field sunflowers. Credit: Shutterstock/Scharfsinn
U.S. airlines use sustainable fuel in less than 0.1 percent of flights. Yet the government wants 10 percent of the industry to run on sustainable fuel by 2030, and to reach 100 percent by 2050.
The scale of the challenge is massive: United Airlines used 7 million gallons of sustainable fuel last year, according to company spokesman Sam Coleman. "That was a threefold increase from the year before, which is great, except that United Airlines burns ... | By Elsa Wenzel Read more ...
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The benefits of crown-of-thorns starfish control on the Great Barrier Reef:
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| The benefits of crown-of-thorns starfish control on the Great Barrier Reef - PHYS.ORG - Biology |
May 4 · The study led by the Reef Authority in collaboration with research and delivery partners demonstrated up to a six-fold reduction in starfish numbers and a 44% increase in coral cover across regions that received timely and sufficient control effort. The research is published in the journal PLOS ONE.
While crown-of-thorns starfish are native to the Reef, outbreaks can cause broadscale coral loss and reef degradation, which are another pressure on top of culminative impacts like coral bleaching and cyclones, further impacting on reef health.
Reef Authority Chief Scientist Dr. Roger Beeden said this long-term data demonstrated that suppressing outbreaks of the coral-eating ... Read more ...
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The great corporate decarbonization derby is on:
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| The great corporate decarbonization derby is on - Greenbiz |
May 6 · Are any technologies capable of solving the climate crisis at scale?
To tackle big risks requires big imagination and big bucks. And, except for annihilation from global thermonuclear warfare, no set of risks loom larger than the continuing atmospheric buildup of greenhouse gases, chiefly carbon dioxide. Earth is responding to this buildup through rising temperatures, melting glaciers, expanding seas, migrating species and disease vectors and a host of other impacts. Scientists and policymakers believe that the Paris accord goal of restraining warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2030 is or soon will be surpassed and that temperature increases of up to 7F ... | By Terry F. Yosie Read more ...
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Why India is key to heading off climate catastrophe:
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| Why India is key to heading off climate catastrophe - Skeptical Science |
May 6 · A farmworker cleans the solar panels of a solar water pump in the village of Jagadhri, Haryana Country, India. (Photo credit: Prashanth Vishwanathan/ IWMI)
Decisions made in India over the next few years will play a key role in global efforts to head off the most catastrophic effects of climate change.
The country has one of the world’s fastest-growing economies, and its energy consumption is growing rapidly as a result — but it still relies largely on fossil fuels. India has a general election that will wrap up in June 2024, and both major parties say they support moving the country away from fossil fuels as quickly as possible, a position backed by a ... Read more ...
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Why some corals are better off dead:
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| Why some corals are better off dead - Washington Post - Climate and Environment |
May 5 · As scientists rush to save ailing corals elsewhere, in Venezuela locals are trying to kill off this stinky variety.
VALLE SECO, Venezuela - Estrella Villamizar grabbed the soft red and white coral by its stem and hacked it off with a blow of her wooden knife before tossing it in a bucket with other pieces she’d already ripped out of the Caribbean waters lapping against this deserted beach.
On the sea bed, stretching for a distance as far as the eye could see, a blanket of the dark coral swayed in the warm current. Read more ...
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World Champion Sasha DiGiulian Talks Climate Advocacy & Equality in Sports | United Nations:
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| World Champion Sasha DiGiulian Talks Climate Advocacy & Equality in Sports | United Nations - Climate Change (United Nations - Playlist) |
May 5 · World Champion rock climber and Protect Our Winters (POW) Athletes Alliance member Sasha DiGiulian takes time from training to talk about her personal experiences with climate change that lead to her advocacy work.\n\nSasha DiGiulian joined other elite athletes and leaders in the sport industry to participate in the United Nations celebration of the International Day of Sport for Development and Peace (IDSDP) and share insights into how athletes can make an impact on climate action, promote sustainability and gender equality, and foster industry partnerships. \n\nWatch the whole #SportDay event: www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPlxx7p7zm4\u0026amp;t=6584s | By United Nations Read more ...
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