Climate Change This Week: Driving Fast n' FREE on Solar, Record Rising Seas, and More!

Climate Change This Week: Driving Fast n' FREE on Solar, Record Rising Seas, and More!
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The EV Revolution Is Here!

Takeaways:

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If we covered the 800 million US parking spaces with solar panels,
the output would be three times the US transportation energy requirements.
We're wasting sunlight.

- notes Desmond Wheatley, CEO of Envision Solar

Build a network of solar powered charging stations,
Where cars can get recharged for free.

- is a goal of Elon Musk, Wunderkind CEO of Tesla.

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A Nissan Leaf Ad: Electric cars can already go 257 miles on a charge, accelerate faster than regular cars, and cruise at 80 mph or more.

SOLAR KEEPS ZOOMING

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SolarCity Will Finance US Home Solar
To Make Rooftop Systems More Affordable
reports Jeff Spross at Climate Progress. Financing installations will overcome the hurdle of ownership costs. Its CEO predicts that such lease-like loans could be half of their new business by the end of 2015.

OO Florida: Thousands of Clean Energy Jobs at Risk - if state caves to pressure to gut energy efficiency goals.

OO Mexico: 250 MW of Distributed Solar Power to Be Developed

OO Australia Commissions 'Oceania's Largest' Solar Farm

OO Keystone XL's TransCanada Buys 3 Solar Plants from Canadian Solar; now all they have to do is transfer their product line completely to clean renewable projects, and clean up their tar sands mess... come on, TC (aka Tarry Calamity), you can do it!

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Check it out here, right now!

GOOD CLEAN NEWS

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Raw Materials Are No Bar To Renewable Energy Future reports Seth Zuckerman at ClimateCast. Shifting world electricity production to renewable sources would reduce air pollution and require a manageable quantity, says a new peer-reviewed life-cycle assessment.

Such a transition would save $1.8 trillion over the next two decades, says a study by the Climate Policy Initiative, which also found that governments and taxpayers will bear the greatest financial risk if fossil fuel reserves are stranded underground.

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This research follows a pair of studies by the International Energy Agency foreseeing that solar power--in a combination of photovoltaic and solar thermalplants--could supply more than a quarter of the world's electricity by 2050.

OO Efficiency Gains Over The Last Decade Saved More Energy
Than China or US Consumed In 2011
- and that's for just the advanced countries...

OO Besides Cleaner Energy, Renewables Are Much Greener to Build says a new study.

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Wikipedia

Americans' Cars Are More Fuel-Efficient Than Ever reports Katie Valentine at Climate Progress. Plus, electric vehicle sales are up in the U.S., and the percentage of Americans who drive to work is down. The EPA announced a new gas mileage record for US cars and trucks: 24.1 mpg! Although gains are slowing as more people own SUVs and trucks.

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OO The Inventors Of A 'Revolutionary' Climate Solution
Just Won A Nobel Prize

OO CA's Drought Cuts Hydropower By Half
But Wind, Solar Help Fill the Gap

OO Northern Chile Has Top Renewables Market

WHAT WORKS

Speaking Out:

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Peterforsyth at Wikimedia Commons

OO Hundreds Of Hunting And Fishing Groups
Speak Out For Action On Climate Change

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OO Greenpeace Sinks Lego's Deal With Shell Oil Over Arctic Drilling - which included having toddlers get their plastic cars "filled" at Shell Gas stations... makes your heart curdle, just thinking about it...

OO Glasgow Becomes First University In Europe To Divest From Fossil Fuels

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OO Nobel Laureates Call For A Revolutionary Shift
In How Humans Use Resources

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OO Australian Anglicans Join Divestment Movement

OO Orange Country, CA: Growing Numbers Call for End to Fracking in GOP Area

Good Ideas:

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International Lawsuits Could Punish Carbon Emitters
Even If Governments Don't
reports Jeff Spross at Climate Progress. Improving climate science and the workings of international litigation could make courtrooms the next climate change battlefield, according to a new report.

OO We Can Meet 2C Climate Target,
But Success Depends On Immediate Action
say energy experts.

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OO Americans Can Save More Money By Not Burning It on fossil fuels, says a new study, through energy efficiency and accelerating a switch to clean energy - or pay far more later from ever worsening climate catastrophes.


New Insights:

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OO Sea Level Rise Over Past Century Unmatched In 6,000 Years says study.

OO NOAA: Record Antarctic Sea Ice Growth Linked To Its Staggering Loss Of Land Ice as the freshwater flow from melting glaciers lowers the freezing temperature in the surrounding sea.

YOU CAN ACT

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Be A Climate Voter November 4 - the most important things you can do right now to promote climate action are register, vote, volunteer, and speak up publicly as a climate voter.

Please let candidates and the news media know that you are looking for candidates who will support climate action.

Speaking up makes a big difference. As one elected state senator notes,
"it is always reassuring to me as an elected official when my constituents tell me they support my work to promote climate action and sustainability, and it encourages me to do more.." Iowa State Senator, Rob Hogg.

Volunteer at a "climate voter" effort: the League of Conservation Voters, NextGen Climate, Climate Hawks Vote, and Vote-Climate.

Great March for Climate Action - a cross-country march from Los Angeles to Washington, DC, to support climate action - is now in Pennsylvania and scheduled to arrive in Washington, DC, on Saturday, November 1. You can join at any point for however long -- go here for details.

EPA Carbon Pollution Rules - Please Comment: Many groups are collecting signatures and comments in support of these rules; you can send comments directly to the EPA here.


Join the Citizens Climate Lobby.

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Pledge to VOTE here, then

MAKE A PLAN TO VOTE so that the daily demands of life doesn't sidetrack you. Here's a checklist to help:
* What time of day are you planning to vote on Tuesday, November 4th?
* How are you planning to get to the polls?
* Are you planning to bring the kids with you? Yes / No

Thinking through your plan to vote now makes it more likely that you'll vote on Election Day.
Need info on where you should vote? Go here.

WHAT DOESN'T WORK

Fossil Fuel Follies:

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Your dollars, going up in smoke, bringing you pollution and climate change.
Peter Essick

OO Bank of England Governor: Most Fossil Fuel Reserves Can't Be Burned - so coal, gas and oil assets are at risk of economic collapse.

OO Biomass Energy: Another Type of Climate Change Denial

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US Methane 'Hot Spot' Is Huge, But It's Nothing
Compared To Our Other Methane Sources
reports Emily Atkin at Climate Progress. A new study highlights the discovery of the spot, created from natural gas projects, but much more US methane, a short term but very potent greenhouse gas, is emitted yearly from U.S. agriculture, land use, forestry, landfills, and energy production in general.

OO Methane Emissions Soar In Drilling Boom

OO Growing Fracking Dilemma:
How To Dispose Of Radioactive Oil And Gas Waste?

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Tar Sands Mining: The fossil fuel industry doesn't want you to think that this is dirty.
Howl Arts Collective at Flickr

OO Intense Industry Pressure Causes European Union
To Stop Calling Tar Sands Dirty

OO US Oil Trains Now Delay Transport of
Vital Consumer and Industrial Goods

Clueless Leadership:

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Even elephants can't survive on oil. Credit: Mary Ellen Harte

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OO Three GOP State Legislators Want To Kill
Michigan's Popular Clean Energy Law



OO Fossil Fueled 'Scientist' Congressman: There's No Manmade Climate Change - says this professional medical GOP doctor, supported by the fossil fuel industry. Remind me to consult a climate scientist the next time I feel sick... which is right about now...

OO Senate GOP Candidate: Yeah, We Cause Climate Change - So What?

WHY WE SHOULD ACT NOW: RISING RISKS

Today, the Earth got a little hotter, and a little more crowded.

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Daily Climate Change: Global Map of Unusual Temperatures, Oct 20, 2014

How unusual has the weather been? No one event is "caused" by climate change, but global warming, which is predicted to increase unusual, extreme weather, is having a daily effect on weather, worldwide.

Looking above at recent temperature anomalies, much of the US and the waters surrounding it are experiencing warmer than normal temperatures: the eastern Pacific warm spot continues to prevent much rain from reaching California, sending it into further drought.

Much of the areas surrounding the North Pole are experiencing much warmer than normal temperatures - not good news for our Arctic thermal shield of ice. Hotter than usual temperatures continue to dominate human habitats.

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OO 'The Other CO2 Problem':
How Acidic Oceans Will Cost Our Economy Billions
- and $1 Trillion annually worldwide, a U.N. report predicts, if carbon pollution is not curbed

*
*

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OO September Was Warmest on Record, NASA Data Shows

OO California Could Be Facing A Mega-Drought - think 30 to 100 years or more; 'our current ground water withdrawal levels are so dangerous that "We are essentially borrowing on tomorrow's future. We'll pay that price over time," says the director of the CA Department of Water Resources.

OO Not Just California: Droughts Extend Across Americas - a dry spell has killed cattle and wiped out crops in Central America; parts of Colombia are rioting over scarce water, and southern Brazil is facing its worst dry spell in 50 years.

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Via Climate Central

OO Cyclones Under Climate Change to Cost World $10 TRILLION by 2090 - if the prediction of fewer but stronger cyclones hold under worsening climate change. Most climate change predictions tend to underestimate emerging problems, though....

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Extreme rainfall that caused flooding in England is just one of many extreme weather events that scientists could be exploring as a possible tie to climate change for the upcoming supplement to the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society.

OO 2014 Extreme Weather: Looking for Climate Ties

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Wild wx at wildwx.com

Sea Level Rise Making Floods Routine for US Coastal Cities reports John Upton at Climate Central. East coast city tidal floods could triple by 2030 for some, says a new report, and increase 10 times by 2045.

OO Picture This: Monster Typhoon and Miami's King Tides

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Wikipedia

OO Price of Coffee Beans Soar To 2½-Year High nearly doubling this year, with thin rainfall clipping output from the world's biggest coffee grower and fueling worries about how already-weakened trees will fare next season.

OO Zimbabwe: Climate Change Hits Banana Farmers

KEEPING CARBON STORED: FORESTS UPDATE
Forests: the cheapest way to store carbon

Julia Roberts is Mother Nature; see other hard hitting voices of nature here.

OO Next Big Idea In Forest Conservation? Empower Youth Leaders

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Forest Fragmentation's Carbon Bomb: 700+ Million Tonnes C02 Annually reports Jeremy Hance at Mongabay. When forests are slashed into fragments, winds dry out the edges leading to dying trees and rising temperatures. Biodiversity often drops, while local extinctions rise and big animals vanish - and carbon emissions rise.

OO Brazil: Needs New Incentives for Ranchers to Keep Cutting Deforestation says new study.

OO Alaska: Summer Heat, Invasive Insects Cutting Down Birch Trees

OO Borneo: Indonesia To Set Up Palm Oil Monitoring In Bid To Cut Deforestation 80%

There is, of course, much more news on the consequences and solutions to climate change. To get it, check out this annotated resource list I've compiled, "Climate Change News Resources," , at Wordpress.com here. For more information on the science of climate change, its consequences and solutions you can view my annotated list of online information resources here.

To help you understand just what science does and does NOT do, check this out!

Every day is Earth Day, folks, as I was reminded by this daisy I photographed in the African wilderness recently. Making the U.S. a global clean energy leader will ensure a heck of a lot more jobs, and a clean, safe future. If you'd like to join the increasing numbers of people who want to TELL Congress that they will vote for clean energy candidates you can do so here. It's our way of letting Congress know there's a strong clean energy voting bloc out there. For more detailed summaries of the above and other climate change items, audio podcasts and texts are freely available.

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