Today, the Earth got a little hotter, and a little more crowded.
Saving BUB, beautiful unique biodiversity, like this painted bunting that lives in southern US woods, is another reason to conserve carbon storing forests. Credit B. Hoag
Forests: the cheapest way to store carbon
OO Zombie Forest Carbon Emissions Haunt The Planet-Deforestation has several long-lasting effects on climate and biodiversity. Decomposing trees release a huge volume of lagging CO2, killing species and hobbling efforts to fight global warming, shows a new study.
Takeaways:
- Deforestation starts off long term climate-changing emissions
- Extinguishes species in the short and long term
- Replaces the habitat with a warmer, drier, degraded one.
- An acre of forest is lost every second.
- Half the world's forests are already gone.
With the continuing loss of natural carbon storage systems, "We're losing the ability to really solve the climate crisis," said Jeff Horowitz, the founder of the nonprofit Avoided Deforestation Partners.
When we harm forests, we harm ourselves.
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VISUALIZE GLOBAL WARMING...
These videographics show how our fossil fuel burning is leading to an 'out of control' climate via (left to right) using up our carbon budget, increasing levels of CO2, and increasing surface temperature. That last one shows how heating has accelerated especially in the last decade.
OO Perfect Illustrations Of How The Climate Is Spiraling 'Out Of Control'
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GOOD IDEAS
Credit Randy Scott Slavin
How Much More Space Is There For US?
OO Clean Energy Won't Save Us - Only A New Economic System Can - time to pour our creative energies into imagining a new global economy. Infinite growth is a dangerous illusion.
Daily Climate Editor Pete Myers notes: The "energy density of renewables is insufficient to substitute for current uses of fossil fuels. We can live on 100% renewables, but society will be on a different operating system."
An eco village in Amsterdam. Source EFFEKT at ReGen
OO How Eco-Friendly Communes Could Change The Future Of Housing - An increasing number of US landowners want to build commune-style villages that are completely self-sufficient and have a low carbon footprint.
OO Engineers Work To Cut Costs And Emissions In Geothermal Power where the US leads the world with 3+ gigawatts. Takeaways:
- There is far more US geothermal potential;
- The US Department of Energy is spending11+ Million
- On projects to improve geothermal prospecting
- And develop underground carbon storage.
OO US Company Launches a Corporate Clean Energy Research Network - Schneider Electric created the online network to help other businesses accelerate the adoption of renewables in the U.S. and abroad.
The New Energy Opportunities (NEO) Network helps corporate end users, solution providers, banks, law firms and others get the resources they need to accelerate renewable energy investments.
Drinking Water Is Endless - If You Desalinate ItThe Sorek desalinization plant in Israel. Courtesy of IDE Technologies
OO Israel Ups Its Water Efficiency driven by dry necessity. Researchers at the Zuckerberg Institute:
- have pioneered new techniques in drip irrigation, water treatment and desalination.
- have developed resilient well systems;
- and biological digesters than can halve the water usage of most homes.
While the Middle East is drying up, "The only country that isn't suffering acute water stress is Israel" says an institute researcher.
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SOCIAL REPERCUSSIONS
Credit Vadim Ghirda at AP
OO Climate Change Increases The Risk Of War, Scientists Prove The heatwaves, droughts and other natural disasters expected to increase because of global warming are helping to push countries into armed conflict, particularly those already split along ethnic lines.
A statistical analysis of conflict outbreaks and climate calamities between 1980-2010 showed that
nearly 25% of conflicts in ethnically divided countries coincided with "climatic calamities."
OO The Flood Next Time: Warming Raises The Risk Of Disaster
OO Rising Seas Threaten To Swamp U.S. Military Bases By 2050 along the East and Gulf Coast.
OO Baltimore, MD: Heavy Rains Cause Flash Flooding,
Stranding Drivers And Knocking Out Power To Thousands
Coming To Puerto Rico, and the rest of the US? Climate change has enabled zika carrying mosquitoes to spread.
OO Puerto Rico: Zika Could Affect 10,000 Pregnancies By Year's End says the US Center for Disease Control, putting hundreds of babies at risk of catastrophic birth defects.
OO Los Angeles, CA: Wildfire Chases 20,000 People From Homes Nearby as it continued to rage through nearby drought-parched canyons and foothills.
Justice Is Calling
OO World's Largest Carbon Producers Face Landmark Human Rights Case - the world's largest oil, coal, cement and mining companies have been given 45 days to respond to a complaint that their greenhouse gas emissions have violated the human rights of millions of people living in the Philippines.
OO India: 1+ Million People Hit As Floods Worsen In Assam Tea Region submerging hundreds of villages, and inundating large swathes of farmland and damaged roads, bridges and telecommunications services recently.
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A SWEET SPOT IN CREATING SUSTAINABLE POPULATIONS
Triple Win: Using Profits to Provide Needed US Family Planning - Medicines360.org is key to creating a sustainable US population and bright futures for women - AND saving taxpayers many billions yearly in community costs by preventing unintended pregnancies. Source medicines360.org
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CLIMATE CHANGE COSTS
Wikimedia Commons
OO Southern Africa: Herdsmen To Central Bankers Count Drought Cost
For Years To Come as drought wiped out livestock, pushed up food prices and caused power shortages and protests.
OO France To Support Grain Farmers After Crops Hit By Torrential Rains and lack of sunshine in late spring.
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FIXING CLIMATE CHANGE
@@ A Simple And Smart Way To Fix Climate Change given by Dan Miller in 2014 at a Ted talk suggests a way to profit as we tackle climate change, by finally charging those who sell and use fossil fuels - and distributing the revenues back to all of us.
The strategy is sure to speed transition to clean renewable energy. What's not to like? Check it out!
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NATURAL REPERCUSSIONS
Changing Seas Are Changing Fish like this Ocellated Wrasse. Credit Natascia Tamburello, University of Palermo
OO Climate Pollution Can Change Fish Mating Behaviors - exacerbating stresses on entire ocean ecosystems, already stressed by overfishing, warming, acidifying waters and plastic and oil pollution.
Source www.roverpass.com
OO Lake Tahoe, CA, Is Warming At Alarming Rate,
Reflecting Rapid Sierra Climate Change and is showing some severe impacts from the changing climate.
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MELTDOWN
Climate Change in Action - runoff from a melting Tibetan glacier. Credit Wayne McAllister
OO Melting Tibetan Ice Sheet Threatens 1+ Billion People in Asia - Takeaways:
- the largest ice sheet outside the North and South Poles;
- aka the Third Pole, it is the source of Asia's 10 largest rivers, and their fertile deltas.
- It is also a major engine of global weather.
- Those rivers and deltas support 1+billion people in
- China, India, Nepal, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan.
Measuring the Melt Chinese scientists have bee monitoring the area for several years. Credit Wayne McAllister
- The Third Pole has heated 1.5 C (3 F) in 50 years;
- 500 glaciers have disappeared and the largest are melting rapidly,
- Far faster than expected.
Watering Desert Oases Tibetan glaciers are also supplying water to 56 million people along part of the historic silk road in China. Credit Wayne McAllister
- Initially, the melt will provide more water, but
- Over the next 30 years it will decrease,
- Drastically affecting agriculture in Asia,
- And affecting weather globally.
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FOSSIL FUEL FOLLIES
Got Enough Pipelines Yet? This is a 2012 US pipeline map. Source US Dept of Transportation
OO Pipeline Expansion Threatens US Climate Goals,
Study Says - pumping natural gas from the Appalachian fracking hub to consumers throughout the eastern U.S., commits the country to high carbon emissions.
OO Texas: Big Coal's Tax Dodge Puts Schools, Hospitals In Dire Straits
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SPEAKING OUT
Following the Coal Pollution Sierra Club kayakers have been protesting it for years. Source www.commercialappeal.com
OO Environmentalists Blast TVA Plan To Leave Coal Ash At Power Plants
OO Environmentalists Target Another TransCanada Proposed Pipeline that could send hundreds of supertankers laden with crude oil down the Atlantic coast to refineries in Texas and Louisiana.
Keeping It Beautiful A Colorado-based nonprofit, the Conservation Lands Foundation, has helped the Bureau of Land Management, the nation's largest landlord, conserve and maintain its holdings.
- helped push President Obamas to create 4 million, mostly BLM acres of National Monuments;
- created several "friends" groups to help BLM conserve its lands;
- helped market BLM's National Conservation Lands
- help distract BLM from acceding to commercial exploitation of its resources
- helped up donations to the BLM
Bob Inglis Source www.pri.org
OO Ex Republican Congressman: His Party's
Denial of Climate Science
is 'Courting Disaster' With Voters says Bob Inglis of South Carolina. The position is "out of step with where the science is and where the smart money is [which] is already moving to act on climate."
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GOOD CLEAN NEWS
OO European Offshore Wind Investment Hits €14 Billion In 2016
OO Rockefeller Fund Divests From Fossil Fuels,
Now Invests In Renewables - providing $10 million to Mainstream Renewable Power Ltd. to expand renewable energy in Africa.. The investment will help finance as much as $1.9 billion for green energy in Africa.
OO Chicago, IL: RedWave Energy Raises $5.5 Million to Turn Heat Into Electricity
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OO Molten Storage and Thermophotovoltaics Offer New Solar Power Pathway - by capturing heat from thermal solar plants and storing it in liquid metal, for ultimate conversion to electricity. The estimated costs would be a magnitude lower than turbine conversion systems, suggests a new study.
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CLIMATE LEADERSHIP
OO GOP And Democratic Platforms Highlight Stark Differences On Energy And Climate - Takeaways:
- Republicans embrace fossil fuels,
- Democrats push for climate action.
- Legislators tend to hew to party platforms.
A Stark, Clear Difference in the two major candidates: one will act on climate change, the other's policies will contribute to it.
Related Headlines:
OO Climate Change Divide Bursts To Forefront In Presidential Campaign - Hillary Clinton highlights her plans to combat global warming. Donald J. Trump dismisses the science as a hoax.
OO Clean Energy Groups See Opportunities In Clinton's Jobs Plan
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OO EPA Finding Clears Way For Limit On Aircraft Climate Changing Emissions
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ELECTION YEAR:
If You Don't Vote For Climate Action, You Can Forget The Rest - in a climate-changing world of famine, drought, rising seas, giant storms and heat waves, there will be no security in jobs, health, wealth, or national safety. There will be chaos ensuing from increasing crises and disasters. Vote.
OO Global Warming Policies We Set Today Will Determine The Next 10,000 Years - of global warming, a new study shows -- and whether our civilization survives or not: history shows that harmful climate change has destroyed civilizations before.
This time, it could be worldwide. Let's keep "The Hunger Games" in the realm of fiction.
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If we do not grow sustainably,
Our children will die inhumanely.
@@ The Cost of Unintended Pregnancy: Too Young
Teen childbearing cost US taxpayers $9+ Billion in 2010
And the costs of raising a child usually ensures decades, if not a life, of poverty for its mother.
- US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
WHAT YOU CAN DO
Help prevent unintended pregnancies in your community:
publicize where women can access affordable contraception.
They can go here to find locations:
And there are many more actions you can do, right here.
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SOLAR KEEPS FLYING
Spanish Eagle Patrol Salutes Solar Plane Source Solar Impulse
OO Sun-Powered Airplane Completes Historic Trip Around the World using only solar power. Although mechanical setbacks meant the entire trip spanned over a year:
- The plane flew 23 days in 17 stages nearly 27,000 miles;
- Solar powered by day, it glided by night.
"I'm sure that within 10 years we'll see electric airplanes transporting 50 passengers on short to medium haul flights," said co-pilot Bertrand Piccard.
OO Minnesota: 'Value of Solar' Gains Another Foothold
- Avoided transmission investments,
- Positive health and environmental impacts of clean energy
- Helping the grid on sunny days when extra power is often needed.
The state is the first to adopt a VOS approach for determining how much community solar customers will be paid for the power their projects produce.
Check it out here, right now!
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WHY WE SHOULD ACT NOW: RISING RISKS
Daily Climate Change: Global Map of Unusual Temperatures, Aug 11, 2016
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: despite cool surface temperatures, the drought continues in California.
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 wild flower 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.
