[TheClimate.Vote] November 11, 2019 - Daily Global Warming News Digest
Richard Pauli
richard at theclimate.vote
Mon Nov 11 09:25:31 EST 2019
/November 11, 2019/
[Follow the money]
*The Federal Reserve Acknowledged the Reality of Climate Change. That's
Actually a Big Deal.*
"They stopped pretending that this is someone else's problem."...
"The Fed board of governors in DC has 402 PhD economists," he says.
"Doing something like this does raise the visibility of the issue. It
adds to the seriousness: Sober people are taking climate change
seriously." Though sober people within the banking world have been
taking climate change seriously for some time.
https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2019/11/the-federal-reserve-acknowledged-the-reality-of-climate-change-thats-actually-a-big-deal/
[AOC: "they knew"]
*Ocasio-Cortez: Exxon Mobil 'knew exactly what it was doing'*
"They dumped millions of dollars into lobbying a campaign of doubt,"
Ocasio-Cortez said. "That is exactly why we have to acknowledge that the
climate crisis is not an accident."
"The reason we are in this crisis is because oil and gas has been one of
the most profitable industries of the modern era," she added.
https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/469749-ocasio-cortez-exxon-mobil-knew-exactly-what-it-was-doing
[CNBC - call it a fire storm]
*Warming climate, population sprawl threaten California's future with
more destructive wildfires*
- California's major wildfires have been contained, but the threat of
bigger and more destructive blazes is still on the horizon.
- Climate change is exacerbating the chance of bigger wildfires in
California, drying out vegetation that serves as fuel for devastating
firestorms.
- As humans leave cities and encroach into the forests and wildlands of
California, the risk of bigger and more destructive fire increases...
- - -
"These are not really best described as wildfires. Most people describe
them as fire storms," says Jon Keeley, a research scientist at the U.S.
Geological Survey.
"It is not something that firefighters have much chance of putting out
until the wind dies down."
In some cases, these firestorms can burn 10,000 acres worth of forest
within an hour. Storms of that intensity are practically impossible for
firefighters to contain, often leaving them with no choice but to let
the fire run its course as officials concentrate on getting anyone in
danger out of the way.
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/09/why-californias-wildfires-are-going-to-get-worse.html
[Follow the money]
*Muni Bonds Contain New Fine Print: Beware of Climate Change*
The underwriters of municipal bonds are disclosing more about cities'
exposure to higher temperatures and rising seas.
Investment banks have begun quietly sounding alarm bells about climate
change. Their worries are showing up in the documents that accompany
municipal bonds they underwrite...
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-11-05/how-serious-is-the-climate-change-risk-ask-a-banker
[more changes]
*No more fire in the kitchen: Cities are banning natural gas in homes to
save the planet*
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2019/11/10/climate-change-solutions-more-cities-banning-natural-gas-homes/4008346002/
[Airlines in deceit, need for international controls]
*Climate change: Airlines accused of 'putting profit before planet'*
By Justin Rowlatt - [BBC] Chief environment correspondent
A British Airways whistleblower has revealed an industry-wide practice
that deliberately adds weight to flights, increasing greenhouse gas
emissions.
"Fuel tankering" sees planes filled with extra fuel, usually to avoid
paying higher prices for refuelling at their destination airports.
It could mean extra annual emissions equivalent to that of a large town.
BA said it was common to carry extra fuel for "operational, safety and
price reasons".
BBC Panorama has discovered the airline's planes generated an extra
18,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide last year through fuel tankering.
Cost savings made on a single flight can be as small as just over £10 -
though savings can run to hundreds of pounds.
Researchers have estimated that one in five of all European flights
involve some element of fuel tankering.
The practice on European routes could result in additional annual
greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to that produced by a town of
100,000 people.
- - -
International Airlines Group (IAG), the company that owns BA, says it
wants to be the world's leading airline group on sustainability.
BA boasts it even prints its in-flight magazine on lighter paper to save
weight.
Yet BBC Panorama has seen dozens of internal BA documents that show up
to six tonnes of extra fuel have been loaded onto planes in this way. It
has also seen evidence that Easyjet carries extra fuel in this way.
Airlines can save money from the fact that the price of aviation fuel
differs between European destinations...
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-50365362
[farm suicides]
*'I'm gonna lose everything'*
A farm family struggles to recover after rising debt pushes a husband to
suicide...
PLATTE, S.D. -- Amber Dykshorn stood at her kitchen window and watched
the storm come in.
It was a very dark Saturday night in the middle of the summer in the
middle of a year that is on track to be the wettest in more than a
century. The wind blew over the farm, the rain came down and she heard
the ominous pings on her roof -- pea-sized hail, striking the
still-fragile stalks of the only corn her husband, Chris Dykshorn, was
able to plant before he took his own life in June...
- - -
In farm country, mental health experts say they're seeing more suicides
as families endure the worst period for U.S. agriculture in decades.
Farm bankruptcies and loan delinquencies are rising, calamitous weather
events are ruining crops, and profits are vanishing during Trump's
global trade disputes.
A 2017 study found that farm owners and workers were three to five times
as likely to kill themselves on the job compared with other occupations.
Researchers studying more recent data have not yet determined if farmer
suicides are increasing, but leaders and social workers in rural America
say that, anecdotally, they're seeing more of these deaths.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2019/11/09/im-gonna-lose-everything/?arc404=true
[Global Weather Hazards]
*Southern Africa observes a poor start to the rainy season, while high
flood risk persists across East Africa*
https://fews.net/global/global-weather-hazards/november-8-2019
[Nov 2019 Rolling Stone]
*Jay Inslee Isn't Going Away*
The Washington governor may be out of the 2020 race, but his ideas are
shaping the future of climate policy
By JEFF GOODELL
Jay Inslee is no Greta Thunberg. The 68-year-old governor of Washington
state is a founding father of the climate movement, a man who speaks
with the wonky wisdom of experience, not the moral outrage of a
16-year-old girl who sees her future stolen by greedy and corrupt
politicians. And whereas Thunberg has inspired millions of activists to
take to the streets, Inslee never rose above two percent in the polls
during his short-lived campaign for the Democratic presidential
nomination. But in the long run, Inslee's contribution to fighting the
climate crisis may turn out to be as important as Thunberg's.
He was the first serious presidential candidate in history to make it
the central theme of his campaign. His six-part climate plan is by far
the most ambitious and thoughtful road map to solving the crisis that
has ever been put forward by a presidential candidate. It not only
forced other Democrats to up their climate game, but large parts of it
were immediately borrowed by other candidates, including Elizabeth
Warren. So even if Inslee's presidential campaign was a failure, his
larger campaign to push U.S. climate politics to a new level of
sophistication and ambition was a raging success, providing the policy
DNA for the next generation of climate leaders.
*I don't think anyone in the climate movement expected a 16-year-old
girl to galvanize millions of people. How do you explain the power of
Greta Thunberg?*
It's quite a unique occurrence, when you think about social
movements. Has there ever been a moment where one person captured
the whole world? Gandhi caught one subcontinent. You might argue
that Nelson Mandela caught the world's heart, changed the course of
history. In some sense, Greta's in that realm because the movement
she started is worldwide; it's organic; it is based on a high moral
sense of justice and a combination of undeniable, useful morality
coupled with a sense of rage, which is justified and understandable.
It's a unique moment. The world is in peril. And being saved by
children is maybe not such a bad thing.
I think the message of moral indignation is not only justified but
necessary to the moment. And it's, to some degree, been a missing
element of a generational responsibility. I'm a member of the
Woodstock generation, and we would like our generation to be known
for more than just one incredible weekend of rock, but rather that
we didn't destroy our grandkids' future.
*You mentioned Greta's moral outrage. Former U.N. climate chief
Christiana Figueres argues that self-interest -- economic benefit -- is
a better tool to inspire change.*
Well, I don't believe they're mutually exclusive. I wrote a book
about the economic benefits of this 10, 12 years ago. I'm now
standing arm in arm with kids like Greta. I consider myself the
oldest climate striker in the country.
*Some activists admit privately that President Trump is the best thing
that's happened to the climate movement because his moronic views and
obvious corruption by the fossil-fuel industry have galvanized so many
people to take action. Do you buy that argument?*
Well, I am genetically incapable of attaching the word "best" to
Donald Trump in any circumstances at any time. I really don't share
that view because I just think the urgency of the science is what's
galvanizing. If you look at the oceans report that came out [in
September, from the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change], it was a bombshell that revealed the catastrophic
consequences of ocean acidification and temperature changes. And
that's what's really galvanizing this movement. So, no, I would not
describe any benefit to his presidency whatsoever.
*Let's talk about the Green New Deal. There is a lot of debate about how
broad or narrow the agenda should be. The Green New Deal includes
environmental justice, health care for all, full employment. If the
central goal is to get to zero carbon by 2050, is it smart to be pushing
forward an agenda that's festooned with many, many other things? I mean,
the politics of any one of these issues is incredibly fraught.*
I think that's a fictional debate. It's clear we want to embrace
environmental justice throughout these systems. I've been pleased
that candidates have been embracing some of the things I had
originally proposed, to embed an idea that you're not going to
perpetuate income inequality. You're going to look for ways to
reduce that as you're going about this revolution [to cut carbon]. I
mean, if you look at Elizabeth Warren, who has now embraced the very
concrete, certifiable guarantees of reducing fossil-fuel usage,
there's nothing in her plan that would create any such schism, or
hardship, or is being overly broad. To me, that's right on the money.
Seven in 10 registered voters support government action to address
climate change. You made the climate crisis the central issue in
your campaign, but you weren't polling above two percent. What do
you think about that reality gap between the 70 percent and the two
percent?
I don't believe that my electoral results are a reflection on the
issue. I just simply didn't have the horsepower or the dollars to
introduce myself to the public, even on this issue. So you can't
reach a conclusion that people didn't like my climate plan. They
just didn't know who the heck I was. And I just didn't have enough
capacity to communicate. That's the real story of the campaign.
*Climate change plays very well with progressive voters in California
and Massachusetts and places like that. But the general election is
likely to be won or lost in states like Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, big
fossil-fuel and industrial states. How does the Democratic candidate
talk about the climate crisis in places like that?*
Well, the same way. This is a jobs message. It's a jobs message in
Washington, where I just dedicated one of the biggest biofuel
refinery operations, in the little town of Roosevelt, Washington. In
Bellingham, I recently visited the largest manufacturer of solar
panels in North America. These are jobs. So this is something you
can argue across the Midwest.
- - -
And this is a very rapidly moving political dynamic. I've seen
things switch in a heartbeat. It was true with marriage equality,
and I think we're reaching the tipping point on this issue as well.
Because every time there's a new hurricane, or fires, or floods --
and every time we have a new [sustainable] industry and every time a
neighbor gets an electric car -- this thing is moving forward. As
Wayne Gretzky said, "Don't skate where the puck is, skate where the
puck is going."
*Now that you're out of the race, who's the best climate candidate?*
Well, quite a number of them have embraced portions of what I had
proposed, and that's gratifying. I think they all have -- not all,
but quite a number of them -- upped their game from when they
started their campaigns, and that's great for the party and the
country. The progress we've made in the Democratic internal
discussion, that's really good news.
I'm particularly impressed by Senator Warren's embrace of the idea
that we have to have regulatory caps on a sector-by-sector basis
[transportation, electricity, etc.]. I think her plan recognizes, as
mine did, that the most necessary and effective tool at our disposal
is sector-by-sector caps on carbon dioxide and particular kinds of
usage of particular kinds of fuels.
*If there's a Democratic administration in 2021, do we need a
Cabinet-level post on climate, a climate czar?*
The administrative goal for the next president is to make sure that
every agency has climate as a central part of its portfolio. And I'm
not sure a czar is the best way to do that. I will say that the more
important part of this is to inculcate into every agency this basic
mission statement. This has to be a central tenet of performance.
The next president needs to expect the secretary of agriculture to
help farmers increase carbon sequestration of crops. The secretary
of defense needs to find ways to get more electrical vehicles into
the military. The secretary of transportation has to look for ways
to decarbonize our transportation system.
*To get anything done in Washington, you need some level of
bipartisanship. How do you build that around climate, when you have a
tribal atmosphere in Washington? Right now, there is zero common ground
on climate.*
Get rid of the filibuster [a yes vote from at least 60 senators for
legislation to pass, as opposed to a simple majority vote]. It's
pretty easy. You get a majority vote in two chambers and a visionary
president, and it gets done. The filibuster has created this image
that the country has to be paralyzed until the last Republican in
Alabama signs off on a deal, and that's just not the way the system
was built. We need to have a democracy that can act in the face of
life-threatening peril. If you get rid of the filibuster, then the
will of the majority will be followed, which is that we shouldn't
let ourselves perish worshiping at the altar of oil-and-gas special
interests.
The second thing I would say is that more and more Republican
citizens are now asking for action on climate change. It just has
not reached the political elected class. We are developing a more
unified tribe, which is a tribe of Homo sapiens in America. And more
and more Republicans are joining that effort. But the word hasn't
gotten to their politicians because they're still answering to
special interests and lobbyists.
The more I think about this, the more I understand this challenge as
a lack of imagination, in two ways. One, some people can't imagine a
world that is as degraded as science tells us it's going to be. They
have trouble imagining a world without coral reefs, or a way to grow
grapes in California; they can't imagine that. But more importantly,
they can't imagine a world where we are driving electric cars, where
we are powering the grid with a combination of renewable energy and
have much more energy-efficient homes.
We have done this before, with the mobilization for World War II. We
have reorganized our economy. We have built new technologies. We
have reoriented the kind of vehicles that we produce. We made 70
jeeps by 1941. We made 640,000 by 1945. Don't tell me we can't
transition to electric cars.
*I understand the World War II analogy, but the other reality about
climate politics is that it's always getting pushed out of the
foreground by some seemingly more urgent crisis, whether it's a school
shooting or immigration or impeachment. If a Democrat wins in 2020, he
or she is going to have a lot of stuff on their plate. How do you make
sure that climate is at the top?*
I think that we need to not be paralyzed by the scope of the entire
task. It's like the guy who was climbing a mountain and fell over a
cliff. The guy fell 150 feet and shattered his femurs and pelvis and
everything. He had to crawl, like, five miles on his elbows. What he
learned was the only way he had a chance was to say to himself,
"Look, I'm not even thinking about getting to that tent five miles
from here. All I'm going to do is, I'm going to try to get to that
rock."
And I think that's a metaphor for what we need to do here, which is,
we've got to pick one action we can do today or in the next month
and do that -- get to the next rock. And that'll keep you from being
paralyzed by the enormity of this. If you take that action and put
that on an equal footing with your immediate goals with impeachment
or whatever else, we'll get there just like he did.
Except to cut carbon pollution in half by 2030 and to zero by 2050
is going to take more rapid motion than just crawling along on our
elbows.
Listen, I think it's important not to be dissuaded by the difficulty
of the task. I mean, yeah, it's a tall mountain we've got to climb.
But you do it one step at a time.
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/jay-inslee-climate-plan-influence-902461/
['Ampersand' sarcastic cartoon metaphor]
*The Existence of Trains Debate*
August 19th, 2019 Barry
image:
https://i1.wp.com/leftycartoons.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/23/2019/08/climate-change-train-global-warming-denialism-1.png?resize=675%2C708
Transcript of Cartoon
This cartoon has nine panels, arranged in a three by three grid, with a
small "kicker" panel under the bottom of the cartoon.
Panel 1
We see two people on the train tracks. They are not tied to the tracks,
but they are tied together, so neither one could move without the other.
One person has black hair in a pony tail; the other has wavy hair and is
wearing capri pants. Ponytail has a panicked expression, while Capri
looks wryly amused.
PONYTAIL: I can't believe we're tied together on the train tracks.
CAPRI: Are we sure these are train tracks?
Panel 2
Ponytail turns her head back towards Capri to urgently suggest a plan.
PONYTAIL: If we work together, we can crawl off before a train comes.
CAPRI: There's no evidence any train is coming.
Panel 3
Ponytail shouts a bit, angry, and Capri laughs.
PONYTAIL: The train comes at this time every day!
CAPRI: HA! What's happened in the past can't predict the future.
Panel 4
Ponytail panics, yelling, and Capri responds with amused dismissal.
PONYTAIL: The tracks are shaking!
CAPRI: it's natural shaking. Haven't you heard of earthquakes.
Panel 5
Ponytail angrily yells, and Capri sneers. (It's a mix of a grin and a
sneer).
PONYTAIL: LISTEN TO ME! I'm a train engineer, and
CAPRI: Pfft! "Engineers" are just in it for the money.
Panel 6
A close up of their heads. Ponytail is terrified now, sweat droplets
flying off her. Capri remains amused.
PONYTAIL: Let's get off the tracks, just in case! HURRY!
CAPRI: Expend all that effort over what might be nothing?
Panel 7
Ponytail yells, her eyes as big as dessert plates.
PONYTAIL: I CAN SEE THE TRAIN! WE'RE GONNA DIE!
CAPRI: You're being hysterical.
Panel 8
This panel contains only a sound effect, in big overlapping letters,
with stars flying around: CRASH
Panel 9
The same two characters are hovering in the sky, in angel outfits,
including wings and halos. Capri is shrugging but still smiling;
Ponytail is yelling angrily.
CAPRI ANGEL: Okay, maybe there was a train.
PONYTAIL ANGEL: WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU?
Small kicker panel under the bottom of the cartoon.
A bald guy talks to a fat guy with a ponytail and glasses (i.e., me, the
cartoonist).
BALD GUY: Cute cartoon, but what if some readers don't get that it's
an allegory for global warming denial?
BARRY: I'll find some subtle way to let them know!
http://leftycartoons.com/?s=train+tracks
https://i1.wp.com/leftycartoons.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/23/2019/08/climate-change-train-global-warming-denialism-1.png?resize=675%2C708
- - -
more similar http://leftycartoons.com/?s=global+warming
*This Day in Climate History - November 11, 2011- from D.R. Tucker*
The New York Times reports:
"Denmark, a tiny country on the northern fringe of Europe, is
pursuing the world’s most ambitious policy against climate change.
It aims to end the burning of fossil fuels in any form by 2050 --
not just in electricity production, as some other countries hope to
do, but in transportation as well."
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/11/science/earth/denmark-aims-for-100-percent-renewable-energy.html?mwrsm=Email
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