Category Archives: climate

Following up on the picture of George Will refusing to listen to the facts, here’s a record of the off-camera exchange on "This Week" that ensued, via Framing Science: In a roundtable exchange about climate change on ABC NEWS’ THIS WEEK with George Stephanopoulos, resident conservative George Will stuck to the standard conservative framing byContinue reading “George Will Snaps at the Facts”

Here’s a great image (via Crooks and Liars) of George Will giving the international sign for "don’t bother me with the facts." Will predictably took the Wall St. Journal line on global warming, saying that "any solution requires trillions of dollars of sacrifice from world economic growth." This flat denial ignores the vast potential costsContinue reading “Don’t Bother George Will with the Facts”

Says Time. I’ll post their excellent story below the fold with one note: Here at last is a mainstream publication willing to say what is obvious to people who have been watching the issue…that yes, cyclones like Larry in Australia, clocked at an unprecedented 180 mph, are a manifestation of global warming. Why is that so difficult for reporters to put down on paper?

Florida and the East Coast, if the Greenland ice sheet melts:

This from a formidable (but actually, excitingly good) shareholder report put out by the group called CERES, for California Environmental Resource Evaluation System).

Remarkably, in contrast to the head-in-the-sand stance of the Bush administration, it documents how a shocking number of big American corporations have taken on the fact and challenge of climate change, including Chevron, DuPont, and GE, and how these corps are making big changes in their operation and their attitude.

And then there are the "laggards," like the villainous ExxonMobil, Sempra, Phelps Dodge, and ConAgra.

I’ll post and briefly discuss the report below the fold.

This month has seen a flood of alarming news about warming in the Arctic regions, but a report last week revealed a potential silver lining. Ozone created in the lower atmosphere–the troposphere–as air pollution is now believed to contribute substantially to warming in the Arctic, especially in the winter months. (That’s because ozone is destroyedContinue reading “Strange Good News”

You don’t need to be a climatologist to see which way the weather is heading. It’s getting warmer. Glaciers around the world are vanishing into the sky; if the current warming trend continues, Glacier National Park will be without glaciers by 2030. The Greenland ice sheet is melting at 250 percent the rate it wasContinue reading “The Future Taps Us On the Shoulder”

Water managers in California have been concerned about global warming for years, knowing that if the Sierra snow pack doesn’t accumulate, or melts early, we simply do not have the reservoir capacity to compensate. More action has been taken than many realize; in Ventura County, for example, a major underground reservoir was constructed for theContinue reading “If Only We Watched the Snowpack the Way We Watch “American Idol””

By fate or design, this past week saw the posting of several different takes on flying. From the relentless optimists at WorldChanging, a thoughtful post on a new biofuel under development at the University of North Dakota that is believed to be capable of replacing jet fuel and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. From the confrontationalContinue reading “Flying and Emissions: The Good, the Bad, and the Discussion”

From a story in the Washington Post: "It looks like the [Antarctic] ice sheets are ahead of schedule" in terms of melting, [glaciologist Richard] Alley said. "That’s a wake-up call. We better figure out what’s going on." Concise wrap-up from Mark Lynas focuses on the surprise element of the news, and touches on the questionsContinue reading “Antarctica Losing Ice at Unexpected Rate”

That’s according to the Canadian Forest Service. Hat tip to the Washington Post, for an excellent story about the spread of the Mountain Pine Beetle, a tiny little critter that for eons has been controlled by cold winters…but no longer. "It’s pretty gut-wrenching," said Allan Carroll, a research scientist at the Pacific Forestry Centre inContinue reading ““Largest Insect Epidemic in North American History””