[TheClimate.Vote] December 19, 2020 - Daily Global Warming News Digest

[Richard Pauli]

/*December 19, 2020*/

[Reviewing]
*The Energy 202: These are the top climate stories of 2020*
By Alexandra Ellerbeck
Dec. 17, 2020
with Dino Grandoni

A presidential election. A national reckoning over race and justice in 
America. A worldwide pandemic that ground economies to a halt.

2020 was a momentous year. Yet looming over each of those events is 
climate change, which has pushed global temperatures to about 1 degree 
Celsius above preindustrial levels, a threshold that has already led to 
rising seas, a thawing Arctic and devastating droughts.

Here are some of the top stories on climate change in 2020:

*1. With Joe Biden’s victory, the United States is set for an about-face 
on climate change policy.*
The contrast between President Trump and President-elect Joe Biden on 
climate change could not be starker. While Trump pulled the United 
States out of the Paris climate accord, Biden has promised to reenter it 
on his first day in office. Trump has questioned the science behind 
climate change and rolled back more than 100 environmental regulations. 
Biden has endorsed a $2 trillion climate plan, committed to at least 10 
executive actions to protect the climate on Day 1 and vowed to reach 
net-zero emissions by 2050.
But many of Biden’s most ambitious climate plans are likely to be 
sharply curtailed by the political realities of working with Congress. 
Control of the Senate is yet to be decided by two runoff races in 
Georgia, but the best outcome Democrats can hope for is 50 members in 
the chamber, which would allow then-Vice President Kamala D. Harris to 
cast tie-breaking votes but provide little margin for ambitious legislation.
With much of Biden’s influence over climate likely constrained to trade 
agreements and executive actions, some environmentalists are pushing the 
incoming administration to declare climate change an “emergency.” That 
designation could give Biden broader powers to take executive actions, 
such as funneling military money toward renewable energy. In recent 
remarks, however, the president-elect signaled that he doubts the 
feasibility of some of the more ambitious executive actions touted by 
liberals.
*2. The coronavirus caused a temporary drop in emissions and devastated 
oil companies.*
The pandemic caused travel to grind to a halt and production to falter, 
leading U.S. emissions to plummet by 9.2 percent to their lowest levels 
in three decades, inadvertently putting the United States back on track 
to meet its commitments under the Paris accord.Still, the decreased 
emissions were partially offset by the carbon released from wildfires, 
and greenhouse gas production is likely to pick up again next year. 
Meanwhile, the blip of declining emissions is not enough to register in 
overall atmospheric CO2 levels, which have built up over decades.

The stalled economy also caused demand for oil to plummet, at one point 
pushing the price into negative territory, as producers scrambled to 
offload a glut of excess oil in offshore tankers.

Although demand has recovered somewhat since the spring, the recovery 
has been slow. The decline in demand, along with a race to adopt 
electric vehicles and shifting political winds around climate change, 
has led a spate of energy analysts to speculate the world may have 
already reached its peak oil demand.
Big Oil is simply not as big as it once was. ExxonMobil was kicked off 
the Dow Jones industrial average this year and saw its market share 
briefly eclipsed by renewable energy giant NextEra. The pandemic also 
forced the company to scale back capital projects and investments in 
exploration, although those decisions may not have been all good for the 
climate. When push came to shove, the oil company opted to scrap a 
carbon capture project, while still spending $9 billion to expand crude 
operations off the coast of Guyana.
*3. Climate changed fueled extreme weather in the United States.*
The impacts of climate change hit home for many U.S. families, as 
wildfires in the West and hurricanes on the Gulf and East coasts 
destroyed homes, shut down power grids and forced a record number of 
Americans into emergency shelters.
Fires burned 9.5 million U.S. acres, nearly 3 million more than the 
10-year average, and killed more than 40 people. The intensity of the 
blazes produced virtually unprecedented fire behavior, including 
thunderstorms of smoke and ash soaring 10 miles high, multiple blazes 
that advanced more than 25 miles a day and powerful twisters made of 
smoke and flame.

Scientists worry the West is approaching a new normal, as climate change 
leads to hotter and drier conditions. California’s frequency of fall 
days with extreme-fire weather has doubled since the 1980s.

Still, when California leaders raised the issue of climate change with 
Trump, the president, who has repeatedly blamed the fires on poor forest 
management rather than climate change, quipped: “It will start getting 
cooler.”
Climate scientists say it won’t. The past six years are likely to be the 
six warmest on record, according to the U.N. World Meteorological 
Organization climate report, and there’s a chance that once December 
data is incorporated, some agencies will rank 2020 as the warmest year 
ever recorded.
Meanwhile, the Gulf Coast and Eastern Seaboard grappled with the busiest 
Atlantic hurricane season on record. This year saw 30 named storms, 
compared with an annual average of 12, as well as the most U.S. 
landfalls on record.

The jury is still out on whether climate change contributes to increased 
frequency of storms, but scientists are fairly confident that warming 
oceans make the storms bigger and quicker to intensify. This is what 
happened in August with Hurricane Laura, which rocketed from a Category 
1 storm to a Category 4 monster in 24 hours, battering Lake Charles, 
La., with 150 mph winds. Proving just how active the Atlantic was this 
year, the same area was pummeled a second time by Hurricane Delta just 
six weeks later.
*4. Companies and countries promised dramatic cuts to their emissions.*
AT&T, Apple, Ford, McDonald’s and Walmart are among companies that 
announced new net-zero targets this year, amid growing pressure from 
activists and investors. The Business Roundtable, a lobbying group 
representing more than 200 companies, endorsed a carbon tax and a goal 
of an 80 percent emissions reduction by 2050. Even fossil fuel companies 
got in on the action: Royal Dutch Shell and BP have promised to slash 
their emissions to net zero by 2050.
Climate experts welcome these commitments as a sign of cultural and 
economic changes but caution that the corporate pledges are less than 
they seem. BP and Shell, for instance, have only pledged to eliminate 
emissions produced by extracting oil and gas and running their 
operations. Their net-zero promises don’t extend to whatever happens to 
the gas later, when, for instance, someone uses it to power their car, 
releasing carbon dioxide back into the atmosphere.

Companies weren’t the only ones to make net-zero commitments.

Governments also set targets for slashing their emissions and ramping up 
their offsets. The biggest announcement came from China, the No. 1 
emitter of greenhouse gases, which promised to reach net-zero emissions 
by 2060. The move signals China’s emergence as a climate leader, 
although some environmentalists say they would like to see 
more-ambitious near-term targets, too. Conservationists hope to see more 
countries make ambitious commitments during the UN Climate Change 
Conference in Glasgow, which was pushed to 2021 due to the coronavirus.
*5. Financial institutions started to take into account the risks of 
climate change.*
The Federal Reserve called out climate change as a financial risk for 
the first time this year, warning that floods, hurricanes, wildfires and 
a rapidly changing climate could threaten the stability of the financial 
system. The central bank also announced on Tuesday that its board had 
voted to join an international effort to price climate risk into 
investments. The Fed’s climate moves have sparked a sharp backlash among 
some congressional Republicans, who fear they could lead banks to drop 
financing for oil and gas companies.
The concern over climate risk was also reflected by the Commodity 
Futures Trading Commission, which released a report in September with a 
stark warning: “Climate change poses a major risk to the stability of 
the U.S. financial system and to its ability to sustain the American 
economy.”

Financial regulators have already taken a prominent role in climate 
change decisions in Europe, but the moves by the CFTC and the Fed 
represented a major U.S. shift and could have ripple effects throughout 
the economy.

Other investment companies have also taken the cue: BlackRock, the 
world’s largest asset manager, has promised to put climate at the center 
of its investment decisions. BlackRock has signaled that it intends to 
support more climate-related shareholder resolutions, even though it has 
sometimes fallen short of its promises. Meanwhile, a separate consortium 
of investors managing $9 trillion in assets has committed to a goal of 
net-zero emissions by 2050 or sooner.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/12/17/energy-202-these-are-top-climate-stories-2020/


[cetaceans and heat]
*Devastating skin disease covering up to 70% of a dolphin's body tied to 
climate change*
by The Marine Mammal Center
Scientists at The Marine Mammal Center in Sausalito, CA—the largest 
marine mammal hospital in the world—and international colleagues have 
identified a novel skin disease in dolphins that is linked to climate 
change. The study is a groundbreaking discovery, as it is the first time 
since the disease first appeared in 2005 that scientists have been able 
to link a cause to the condition that affects coastal dolphin 
communities worldwide. Due to the decreased water salinity brought upon 
by climate change, the dolphins develop patchy and raised skin lesions 
across their bodies—sometimes covering upwards of 70 percent of their 
skin...
- -
This study comes on the heels of significant outbreaks in Louisiana, 
Mississippi, Alabama, Florida and Texas and Australia in recent years. 
In all of these locations, a sudden and drastic decrease in salinity in 
the waters was the common factor. Coastal dolphins are accustomed to 
seasonal changes in salinity levels in their marine habitat, but they do 
not live in freshwater. The increasing severity and frequency of storm 
events like hurricanes and cyclones, particularly if they are preceded 
by drought conditions, are dumping unusual volumes of rain that turn 
coastal waters to freshwater. Freshwater conditions can persist for 
months, particularly after intense storms such as hurricanes Harvey and 
Katrina. With the increasing climate temperatures, climate scientists 
have predicted extreme storms like these will occur more frequently and, 
consequently, will result in more frequent and severe disease outbreaks 
in dolphins.

"This devastating skin disease has been killing dolphins since Hurricane 
Katrina, and we're pleased to finally define the problem," said Duignan. 
"With a record hurricane season in the Gulf of Mexico this year and more 
intense storm systems worldwide due to climate change, we can absolutely 
expect to see more of these devastating outbreaks killing dolphins."...
- -
The deadly skin disease was first noted by researchers on approximately 
40 bottlenose dolphins near New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

"As warming ocean temperatures impact marine mammals globally, the 
findings in this paper will allow better mitigation of the factors that 
lead disease outbreaks for coastal dolphin communities that are already 
under threat from habitat loss and degradation," said Duignan. "This 
study helps shed light on an ever-growing concern, and we hope it is the 
first step in mitigating the deadly disease and marshalling the ocean 
community to further fight climate change."
https://phys.org/news/2020-12-devastating-skin-disease-dolphin-body.html



*Lighting the Way*
An Anthology of Short Plays About the Climate Crisis

Lighting the Way: An Anthology of Short Plays About the Climate Crisis 
includes 49 inspiring plays by writers from around the world. The plays 
were commissioned for Climate Change Theatre Action 2019, a global 
distributed theatre festival that coincided with the 25th United Nations 
Conference of the Parties (COP 25) held in Madrid, Spain under the 
presidency of the Chilean government. Responding to a prompt asking them 
to “give center stage to the unsung climate warriors and climate heroes 
who are lighting the way toward a just and sustainable future,” the 
writers offer a diversity of perspectives and artistic approaches to 
telling the stories of those who are making a positive impact. Whether 
exploring the definition of climate heroism, new technologies like mango 
leather, or giving legal rights to Nature, the plays go beyond the 
dystopian worlds and apocalyptic scenarios favored by blockbuster movies 
and sci-fi novels to tell nuanced and empowering stories – stories that 
give us the courage to get up in the morning and fight for the world we 
all deserve. Included in this anthology are plays by Hassan Abdulrazzak, 
Elaine Ávila, Chantal Bilodeau, Yolanda Bonnell, Philip Braithwaite, 
Damon Chua, Paula Cizmar, Hanna Cormick, Derek Davidson, Sunny Drake, 
Clare Duffy, Brian Dykstra, Alister Emerson, Georgina Escobar, David 
Finnigan, David Geary, Nelson Gray, Jordan Hall, Kamil Haque, Monica 
Hoth, Zainabu Jallo, Vinicius Jatobá, Vitor Jatobá, Marcia Johnson, 
MaryAnn Karanja, Andrea Lepcio, Joan Lipkin, Philip Luswata, Abhishek 
Majumdar, Julie McKee, Giovanni Ortega, Mary Kathryn Nagle, Lana Nasser, 
Yvette Nolan, Matthew Paul Olmos, Corey Payette, Katie Pearl, Shy 
Richardson and Karina Yager, Kiana Rivera, Madeline Sayet, Stephen 
Sewell, Lena Šimic with Neal and Sid Anderson, Caridad Svich, Elspeth 
Tilley, Peterson Toscano, Mike van Graan, Meaza Worku, Marcus Youssef, 
and Nathan Yungerberg. An introduction by Chantal Bilodeau and essays by 
Julia Levine, Charissa Menefee, Thomas Peterson, Triga Creative, and 
Brooke Wood, illustrating various aspects of the Climate Change Theatre 
Action process and analyzing its impacts, accompany the plays.

https://www.lulu.com/en/us/shop/thomas-peterson-and-chantal-bilodeau/lighting-the-way/paperback/product-kj6ydq.html?page=1&pageSize=4



[Digging back into the internet news archive]
*On this day in the history of global warming - December 19, 2007 *

EPA administrator Stephen Johnson, under orders from the Bush White 
House, denies a request by seventeen states, including California, for a 
Clean Air Act waiver that would allow the states to cut carbon pollution 
from vehicles.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/19/AR2007121902012.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/20/washington/20epa.html

http://youtu.be/hf_HYL92rgQ

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2008/05/19/174039/waxman-white-house-epa/


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