News — climate change

Her expressions, articulation, and poetic language inspires!

at IPCC conference    

the "Our house is on fire"  speech 

the Ted talk in Sweden about human survival being a black or white issue, about species extinctions, and about social justice

The air was full of smoke from forest fires here in Boulder and across the west. This summer there were 4 fires over 100,000 acres at once in the US: the Ranch Fire (over 600 square miles in N. CA), the Carr Fire in N. CA, the South Sugarloaf Fire in N. NV, and the Spring Creek Fire in S. CO. Also, there were over 500 fires in British Columbia. Sweden had forest fires above the Arctic Circle. 90 people died in forest fires during an extreme heat wave in Greece. California state agencies said that maximum daily temperatures could rise by 8.8 degrees by 2100, and 2/3 of beaches in CA would be lost to sea level rise by 2100. And Trump is trying to relax Obama's Clean Power Plan, which limits the greenhouse gases from coal power plants. Trump's plan would let states set theirweak limits, so it would increase the emissions of greenhouse gases. Also, there would be 1400 more deaths per year from pollution from power plants. from "Fire Alarm", by Elizabeth Kolbert, The New Yorker, Sept 10,2018

It appears that melted Antartica glacier fresh water is creating a top layer of less dense cold water, preventing the usual sinking of cold dense salt water, which usually stores heat and CO2 deep into the depths of the ocean. The lack of the usual sinking of the dense cold salt water may weaken ocean currents too, as seems to be happening in the northern hemisphere off of Greenland and Iceland.

/www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2018/04/23/one-of-the-most-worrisome-predictions-about-climate-change-may-be-coming-true/?utm_term=.70066f4a7367

Editorial cartoonist Toles says people have to demand action, not just support action. And that the media must quit just pretending there are two sides to the issue of climate change. And politicians must quit being bought off.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/opinions/wp/2018/04/24/which-tips-first-runaway-climate-change-or-public-demand-for-action/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.afb137d39c3b

"Can Dirt Save the Earth?" by Velasquez-Manoff, 4-18-18

www.nytimes.com/2018/04/18/magazine/dirt-save-earth-carbon-farming-climate-change.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news

"Clearing Forests May Transform Local and Global Climate" "The 'biotic pump' theory argues that natural forests act as a “pump” that draws moisture inland. condensation, rather than temperature differential, is a primary driver of weather...." "Here's a snapshot of the concept: The concentration of trees in wooded areas means a high rate of transpiration. This moist air cools as it ascends and the water vapor condenses, producing a partial vacuum. This creates an air pressure gradient, whereby the forest canopy sucks in moist air from the ocean. According to Gorshkov and Makarieva, forests don't merely grow in wet areas, they create and perpetuate the conditions in which they grow. Without forest cover—specifically mature, natural forest to ensure sufficient biomass and resilience—moisture is no longer pulled in, the physicists say. Rain becomes erratic and ultimately stalls."

Boulder voters pushed forward to continue to progress towards a local, renewable electric utility! All the volunteers's hard work is paying off. Despite a snowstorm that made get-out -the vote efforts more difficult, dark money violating the spirit of the campaign finance law, the self-interest of cable companies that want to avoid competition by public utilities that can offer superfast and cheap public broadband, heavy-anti slant to the new in the Daily Camera reporting and editorials, It looks like the forces for a local, transparent, resilient municipal electric utility are winning. Last night we were behind by 2,000 votes at first. Late we were only behind by 1,000 votes. This noon we are ahead by 450 votes. Some volunteers have been tabling, canvasing, phoning, writing letters to the editors an writing guest editorials for for months. Kudos to the students at New Era; the activists at Empower Our Future, 3560 Colorado, and Clean Energy Action; the Sierra Club; the Boulder Weekly reporters; and the pro-muni campaigns for Mary Young, Sam Weaver, Mirabai Nagle, Cindy Carlisle, JillGrano, and John Gerstle, All five of the winning city council candidates supported the municipal local utility!