nuclear-news

The smoke here in Atlanta has been surreal — Meteorologist Stu Ostro

*****

It’s a script that reads like something from the pages of a dystopian sci-fi novel:

In Dallas, on November 16, the thermometer hit 88 degrees Fahrenheit, breaking a 95 year old record. In Ada, Oklahoma the mercury struck 85 degrees F. Further north in high-elevation Denver, temperatures soared to 78 F — punching through a 75 year old record.

Meanwhile, strange, out-of-season wildfires continued to burn from the U.S. South to North Dakota and New England. In Atlanta, smoke streaming out of nearby wildfires blanketed the city. Red-eyed residents were increasingly forced to don protective masks beneath the choking late-fall pallor. In Chattanooga, over 200 residents were hospitalized from smoke inhalation and shortness of breath.

(NASA satellite image of smoke streaming out from Appalachian wildfires on November 16, 2016. Note that smoke plume stretches over…

Damage caused by rising seas, increased storms and other climate-related problems pose ‘a very serious challenge to poverty eradication efforts in the developing world’

By Ian Johnston

Preventing global warming from rising above 1.5 degrees Celsius will mean the world’s economy is at least 10 per cent bigger by 2050 than it would be if action is not taken to reduce greenhouse gases, according to a new report.
The planet’s average temperature has already risen about 1C in about 130 years, with scientists admitting that restricting this to just 0.5C more will be difficult.
However the report – released by the United Nations Development Programme and a group of 43 developing countries which are highly vulnerable to climate change – argued doing so would be worth it.

As a result, the world’s gross domestic product would fall by $21 trillion by 2050, compared to $33 trillion under a ‘business-as-usual’ approach…

Opinion:

¶ “What President Trump Means for the Future of Energy and Climate” • After a stunning election, the first impulse may be to describe the future in apocalyptic phrases. Game over for the climate! Game over for NATO! Game over for the Clean Power Plan! Game over for Planned Parenthood! But Trump likes to be unpredictable. [DeSmog]

Open pit mine in Wyoming (Bureau of Land Management photo)

¶ “Trump may dismantle the EPA Clean Power Plan but its targets look resilient” • Tied up in the courts, the Clean Power Plan has not yet come into force. But even though its future is
at risk, one thing is clear: Market forces are, to a large degree, already achieving the CO2 emissions cuts targeted with the regulation. [The Conversation US]

World:

¶ Japanese companies are developing a plant that, when it is completed, will be the…

Dozens of military and defense experts advised the president-elect that global warming should transcend politics.
By Erika Bolstad, ClimateWire on November 15, 2016

A bipartisan group of defense experts and former military leaders sent Donald Trump’s transition team a briefing book urging the president-elect to consider climate change as a grave threat to national security.

The Center for Climate & Security in its briefing book argues that climate change presents a risk to U.S. national security and international security, and that the United States should advance a comprehensive policy for addressing the risk.

The recommendations, released earlier this year, were developed by the Climate and Security Advisory Group, a voluntary, nonpartisan group of 43 U.S.-based senior military, national security, homeland security and intelligence experts, including the former commanders of the U.S. Pacific and Central commands.

The briefing book argues that climate change presents a significant and direct risk to U.S…

By Dr Joe Romm

A very warm October ensures 2016 will be the hottest year by far.

NASA Land and Ocean Temperature Index (LOTI) for October.

Last month was the second-hottest October on record, NASA reported Tuesday. Combined with a record-smashing January through September — and a very warm November — this new data guarantee that 2016 will demolish the previous record for hottest year, set way back in 2015.

Of course, 2015 itself crushed the previous record for hottest year that was set in 2014 — a three-year run never seen in the 136 years of temperature records.

Dr. Gavin Schmidt, the director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, wants everyone to know that our current man-made global warming is indifferent to politics:

Climatologists actually predicted this latest “jump” in global temperatures.

There is “a vast and growing body of research,” Climate Central explained in February 2015, indicating that “humanity is about to experience…

By Dr Joe Romm

Politico just linked to a poll that destroys its own argument.

So let’s say you are a centrist media outlet that focuses on the political horse race, rather than, say, policy or stuff that matters to most voters.

Let’s say you don’t get the existential nature of the climate change issue, you mainly talk to the political “experts” who also don’t get it, and you want to focus on things that really matter, things with real drama — like post-election infighting among Democrats.

In short, you are Politico. Your problem, though, is that in covering the political infighting, you want to make the case that Democrats made a mistake by focusing on climate change.

Unfortunately, the polls actually show that climate change is a winning issue. And the head of the ticket, Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, didn’t actually focus on climate change in the campaign. And, furthermore…

Election of climate science denier Donald Trump could speed up talks to preserve elements of the Paris agreement.

By Graham Readfearn

“People were walking around looking pretty shellshocked,” says Dr Bill Hare, perched on a chair in the cavernous media tent at the United Nations climate talks in Morocco. “If you hugged an American there was a good chance they’d burst into tears.”
Donald Trump’s triumph in the US elections cast a shadow over the first week of the 22nd round of talks here in Marrakech. The president-elect has pledged to pull the US out of the global climate agreement – signed by all countries in Paris last year to keep global warming “well below 2C”.
Trump thinks the whole climate change issue is little more than a hoax.

Hare, an Australian climate scientist, is ever-present at these talks. He hugged a few Americans last week. He has advised governments…