Today, the Earth got a little hotter, and a little more crowded.
When Peruvian Amazon forests disappear, so does this insect, and webs of amazing beautiful wildlife.
Forests: the cheapest way to store carbon
OO Peru To Crack Down On Palm Oil-Related Amazon Deforestation by placing the palm oil plantations under federal rather than local authority.
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Most Of South Carolina Is Flooded with towns all over breaking rainfall records. Several people have died.
OO South Carolina Flood Is 6th 'One in a 1,000 Years' Storm
Since 2010 - Partly Due to Climate Change - Most scientists agree that continued global warming will create ever more extreme weather. Takeaways:
- As Earth warms, air holds more water;
- This creates more intense downpours;
- Warmer coastal waters help create more extreme storms;
- Extreme flooding results.
Related Headline:
OO Floods May Increase 300-Fold On Atlantic, Gulf Coasts says a new study.
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Family Counts: The UN has created a list of goals to provide a sustainable future for all our children - but accessible and adequate family planning is necessary to achieve them.
@@ Video: How Family Planning Can Help the Climate - rare straight talk on how family planning can be a major solution to climate change!
Related Headline:
OO Family Planning Rights and Climate Change:
Connecting the Two Is the Right Thing to Do
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Credit Pat Bagley at the Salt Lake Tribune -- modified
OO Exxon Confirmed Global Warming With Own Research In 1982 -
Then Campaigned Against Climate Action such as reducing fossil fuel emissions.
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Pope Francis addresses the US Congress. Source www.ibtimes.com
OO Pope Francis Backs Urgent Action On Climate Change,
Lauds Obama's Climate Plan
Related Headlines:
@@ Bill Maher on the Pope's Science - HBO's Bill Maher and his panel, Ron Reagan, Jr., S.E. Cupp, and John Cleese cut loose with jokes -- and insight -- on the Pope and science.
OO Pope Francis Addresses Poverty and Climate to Congress
OO Pope's Climate Change Concern Prompts Notre Dame To End Coal Use
OO Despite Pope's Climate Call, US Church Leases Drilling Rights in several dioceses and other Catholic institutions in the heart of U.S. oil country.
OO The Ultimate Denial: Senator Inhofe
Denies Pope Spoke On Climate Change to Congress
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US and Chinese Presidents Barak Obama and Xi Jinping.
OO US, China To Explore Green Tech Collaboration
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A Double Whammy: Melting Arctic permafrost will release gigantic amounts of global warming gases, while melting of the summer ice cap will greatly increase how much heat the Earth absorbs. Both will speed up global warming significantly.
OO Scientists Calculate The Dramatic Economic Cost Of A Warming Arctic from melting permafrost in a new study. Takeaways:
- the total worldwide cost of climate change by 2200 is estimated at326 Trillion
- melting permafrost will up that by43 Trillion
- most studies tend to underestimate the effects of climate change... here, they haven't added in the extra heat from a disappearing planetary thermal shield, the Arctic summer ice.
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Global Companies Go Green with 9 more big are setting long-term targets for powering operations entirely with renewable energy, joining the 38 that have already done so.
OO 9 Massive Global Companies Pledge To
Use 100% Renewable Electricity
Related Headline:
OO Global Companies Joining Climate Change Efforts
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Crop Art: By planting different varieties of rice, Japanese farmers can grow art as they grow food. Source www.mazra3a.net
OO El Niño Takes Toll On US Rice Farmers - Prices To Rise as weather causes planting delays; experts wonder if parts of Asia will be next.
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OO Cutting Greenhouse Gas Emissions Won't Slow Global Economic Growth says a new report.
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So Many Planets Appear Dead - Are We Next? By our own actions? Ponders NASA's William Borucki; many of the points of light in this hubble telescope photograph are whole galaxies loaded with innumerable stars and many habitable planets. But we haven't heard from any of them. Source hubbesite.org
OO Exploring Space Led Top NASA Scientist
To Worry About Earth's Climate
"Unless we have the wisdom and technology to protect our biosphere, it could become like many other dead worlds." -- William Borucki, NASA
Many inhabitable planets probably exist among these stars, but transporting significant numbers of people to them is extremely unlikely. Source hubbesite.org
"Climate change causes the oceans to change. Climate change causes the temperatures to change. All these things dramatically affect the biosphere," -- William Borucki, NASA
Earth: A Very Special Place. It's the only home we have. Let's take care of it. Source NASA
"So it really worries me to see who really don't fully understand what we're doing and the complexities of the system, changing it in such a drastic fashion."
-- William Borucki, NASA
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OO Study: EPA May Be Underestimating Landfill Methane a potent global warming gas because the agency may be drastically underestimating how much garbage is being deposited in landfills.
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Credit Tom Toles at the Washington Post
OO BP Tops List Of Firms Obstructing Climate Action In Europe according to a ranking of companies by their efforts to obstruct carbon-cutting initiatives. Ah, the Mother of All Climate Villians.
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A First: US Senate Candidate's Top Priority Is Climate Action says candidate and Iowa state senator Rob Hogg, who wants to develop far more clean energy in his state.
OO Senate Democrats To Unveil Aggressive Climate Change Bill though the measure will not pass the Republican-controlled Congress.
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OO Most Republicans In Congress Still Don't Believe Climate Change Is Real
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Credit Khalil Bendib at www.otherwords.org
OO The Price of Promoting Climate Change:
Leading Countries Spend $200 Billion A Year Subsidizing Fossil Fuels says a new report from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.
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Almond blossoms. Wikipedia
OO The California Drought Is Killing Almond Trees, Too - salty groundwater has become a huge problem, as it becomes the only source of irrigation, and it's killing trees across the state.
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Sleek, Graceful and Starving Hundreds of hungry and exhausted seabirds, like these Great Western Grebes, continue to flood a Fairfield bird rescue center because of rising sea temperatures, leaving the center strapped for resources and volunteers. Credit Joe Johnston at the Tribune News
OO Starved, Beached Seabirds Flood Northern California Rescue Centers
Related Headline:
Tropical seabirds--such as Laysan albatrosses, black-footed albatrosses and Bonin petrels--that breed on low-lying islands in the Pacific Ocean are threatened by projected rising seas, says a new study.
OO Rising Seas To Drown Breeding Areas For Pacific Island Seabirds says a new study.
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The Wrong Lobbies For a Safe Climate Credit Michael Lukovich
OO Lobbying, Not Cost Arguments,
Are Key to a Political US Climate Policy says a new MIT study.
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Bees' tongues are adapting to different wildflowers as climate changes, but most wildflowers are not adapting fast enough.
OO Global Warming, Evolution Are Clipping Bees' Tongues says a new study that shows bees' tongues shortening fast as the flower species available for pollination have changed. Flowers themselves show few signs of adapting well to our changing climate.
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OO Obama Says Paris Climate Talks Bound to 'Fall Short' despite his hopes for aggressive carbon emissions cuts.
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Colorful Reasons to Divest - climate change threatens many beautiful wildflowers, some only recently discovered.
OO Fossil Fuel Divestment Has Kicked into Overdrive - More than 400 organizations and 2,000 individuals worldwide with $2.6 trillion in assets have pledged to divest from fossil-fuel companies, says a new report - up from just $50 billion a year ago.
Related Headline:
OO Divestment Efforts Starting To Hit Coal And Oil Firms - Pension funds and other institutional investors are growing wary of an increasing "carbon risk" faced by coal and oil companies.
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FOSSIL FUEL FACTS
Whether gas or diesel fumes, both create harmful pollution. Source cartrials.com
OO Fossil Fuels Are Fossil Fuels:
Europe Went From Gas To Diesel,
Upping Deadly Air Pollution
Related Headline:
OO Number of U.S. Coal Mines Falls to Lowest on Record
OO Renewable Energy Outstrips Coal For First Time In UK Electricity Mix
OO U.S. Taxpayers Duped Into Shelling Out $51 Million
in Green Subsidies for 'Clean' VW Vehicles
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Waterpipe Energy: Portland, Oregon, became the first city to harness electricity from its water pipes and sell it to the electric grid. Source www.portlandoregon.gov
OO From Oregon to Johannesburg, Micro-Hydro Offers Solution to Drought-Hit Cities where power from big hydro dams declines with drought.
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A Living Coral and Its Ghost - the dead one in the front has no fish; the living one behind it does.
OO The Third Recorded Global Coral Bleaching Event May Be Underway - Coral reefs worldwide, from Hawaii to the iconic Great Barrier Reef, to the Bahamas and beyond, are at risk of severe damage or even dyeath from a dangerous spike in ocean temperatures, due to the El Nino climate event and climate change itself.
OO World's Richest Reef System Could Soon Succumb To Climate Change says the World Wlidlife Fund; Scientists predict the death of most coral reefs by as early as 2050. The Coral Triangle is the richest of them all and could be the first to go.
Related Headline:
Sea Stars Winking Out Scientists are racing to understand why once densely packed intertidal starfish, key predators, have drastically declined in some locations - and the decimation is spreading.
OO Is Climate Change Killing American Starfish? A virus appears to be, but hot water is helping.
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Extremely disastrous weather, like Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines, helped by global warming fuel emissions, keeps many people from escaping poverty.
OO Rising Emissions Threaten Goal Of Poverty-Free World says a new study.
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OO China to Adopt Cap-and-Trade System to Limit Emissions
US officials announced.
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@@ President Obama's Letter to Keystone XL Pipeline Fighters these landowners are members of Bold Nebraska, the grassroots organization trying to keep the Keystone XL Pipeline off their land. Bernie Sanders and now Hillary Clinton oppose the pipeline.
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OO Hillary Clinton Unveils Plan to Make U.S. 'Clean Energy Superpower'
The plan:
- make current energy infrastructure cleaner, safer
- unlock new investment resources
- forge a North American climate pact
- promote clean energy development
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If we do not grow sustainably,
Our children will die inhumanely.
WHAT YOU CAN DO
Tell the media to start covering the role overpopulation plays in conflicts and disasters worldwide.
And there are many more actions you can do, right here.
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SOLAR KEEPS SMILING
OO SolarCity Launches Solar Service for Affordable Housing
In CA
OO Total SA, a Major Fossil Fuel Company, Plans
$500 Million Annual Investment in Renewable Energy
A Wal-Mart Solar Roof - batteries can help store extra energy when the grid doesn't. Courtesy WalMart
OO Want A Solar-Powered Home?
Here's A New Battery For You - As solar panels and wind turbines spread worldwide, they'll need batteries to store power for times when they don't produce it. Harvard debuts a promising prototype.
OO SunEdison Partners With A Big Customer to Speed Development
Before Tax Credits Drop
Check it out here, right now!
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WHAT WORKS
Speaking Out:
Dominique Browning is leading a charge of hundreds of thousands of moms (and dads!) with a simple message to leaders--clean up our air.
OO Moms On A Mission: Q&A With The Co-Founder Of Moms Clean Air Force
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WHY WE SHOULD ACT NOW: RISING RISKS
Daily Climate Change: Global Map of Unusual Temperatures, Oct 5, 2015
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 Arctic is unusually warm and melting the permafrost. A new study estimates that economies worldwide will lose several trillions of dollars over the next two centuries just from this.
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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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 african wildflower I photographed one spring. 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.
