[TheClimate.Vote] June 25, 2020 - Daily Global Warming News Digest

[Richard Pauli]

/*June 25, 2020*/

[Minnesota Attorney's General starts a legal process - Press Release:]
*AG Ellison sues ExxonMobil, Koch Industries & American Petroleum 
Institute for deceiving, defrauding Minnesotans about climate change*
Claims violations of state and common law regarding consumer fraud, 
deceptive trade practices, misrepresentation, failure to warn; seeks 
injunctive relief, restitution, and corrective public education campaign

Minnesota joins growing list of states and local governments holding 
fossil-fuel industry accountable for decades-long 'campaign of deception'

June 24, 2020 (SAINT PAUL)--Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison 
filed a lawsuit this morning in Ramsey County  on behalf of the State 
and its residents to stop deceptive practices related to climate change 
and to hold ExxonMobil Corp., the American Petroleum Institute, and 
three Koch Industries entities accountable for perpetuating fraud 
against Minnesotans.

The lawsuit includes claims for fraud, failure to warn, and multiple 
separate violations of Minnesota Statutes that prohibit consumer fraud, 
deceptive trade practices, and false statements in advertising. In 
addition to an injunction barring further violation of these laws, the 
complaint seeks restitution for the harms Minnesotans have suffered, and 
asks the Court to require defendants to fund a corrective public 
education campaign on the issue of climate change.

Minnesota joins a growing number of governments that are seeking to hold 
companies responsible for harms associated with climate change. While 
defendants and claims vary among jurisdictions, at least 15 other 
plaintiffs have brought similar lawsuits to date. Plaintiffs include the 
states of Massachusetts, New York, and Rhode Island, along with cities 
and counties throughout the country...
- - -
The complaint asks the court to require these companies to use 
wrongfully-obtained profits to help Minnesota pay for the devastating 
consequences of climate change. Attorney General Ellison is asking for 
these companies to disgorge profits and to "fund a corrective public 
education campaign in Minnesota relating to the issue of climate change, 
administered and controlled by an independent third party," and that 
defendants "disclose, disseminate, and publish all research previously 
conducted directly or indirectly . . . that relates to the issue of 
climate change."..
  - -
Two images released in the complaint today illustrate the campaign of 
deception. One is a document from Exxon Engineering, labeled 
"Proprietary Information," dated October 19, 1979. It clearly asserts 
the reality of climate change and acknowledges that the cause is "due to 
fossil fuel consumption." 
https://www.ag.state.mn.us/Office/Communications/2020/docs/ExxonKochAPI_ProprietaryInfo.pdf
The other image is of print advertisements from the Information Council 
for the Environment, an industry front group dedicated to denying the 
science of climate change. The ads compare predictions of climate change 
to "Chicken Little" and assert that "they may not be true" -- despite 
the defendants' knowledge that the predictions were true. 
https://www.ag.state.mn.us/Office/Communications/2020/docs/ExxonKochAPI_Ads.pdf 
...
  - - -
Juwaria Jama, the state lead for Minnesota Youth Climate Strike, 
explains how young people feel about this action: "As generation z, we 
have known about climate change ever since we were born. As children, we 
were told that we only had a few years to act until our future could be 
stolen from us. Now as teenagers, that reality is clearer. We are 
spending our time fighting a last-minute battle to preserve a livable 
world for ourselves and future generations because corporations like 
Exxon knew the impacts of climate change, but continued to deceive the 
public for decades. Exxon chose profit over people. It's time they're 
held accountable."...
- -
*Impacts and costs of climate change on Minnesota*
According to the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, from 1951 to 2012, 
Minnesota's climate warmed faster than both national and global rates of 
increase, with average annual temperature increasing by 3.2 degrees 
Fahrenheit in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul metro area. According to the 
Minnesota Department of Health, since 1960, the rate of climate warming 
in Minnesota has increased from 0.2 degrees Fahrenheit per decade from 
the 1890s to the 1950s to 0.5 degrees Fahrenheit per decade beginning 
with the 1960s. These and other studies lay out many of the impacts of 
climate change on Minnesotans' health and Minnesota's environment and 
economy.
https://www.ag.state.mn.us/Office/Communications/2020/docs/ExxonKochAPI_Complaint.pdf
more at https://www.ag.state.mn.us


[Massachusetts man with platform in tow]
*Retired Easthampton engineer builds 30-foot-tall 'Sea Level Rise 
Ruler,' plans to drive it across the east coast to raise awareness about 
climate change*
By Jackson Cote | jcote at masslive.com
Easthampton resident Vinney Valetutti's monstrous "Sea Level Rise Ruler" 
is far from 12 inches long.

The construction spans a whopping 30 feet and currently sits on a wooden 
platform attached to the Western Massachusetts man's car.

With his structure, the former engineer is seeking to raise awareness 
about the dangers of rising sea levels due to climate change and ice 
caps melting.

"I simply hope to make people aware of the reality of sea level rise, as 
it is a unique part of the global warming discussion," Valetutti said in 
a statement. "People tend to not focus on sea level rise because, at 
first glance, the daily effect is insignificant, but ice melt has a 
cumulative effect."

Valetutti, a retired professional engineer who is passionate about 
energy conservation, stays up to date on the science of climate change. 
He was inspired in 2019 by Greta Thunberg, a 17-year-old Swedish girl 
who become internationally recognized for her environmental activism.

Using his background in engineering, Valetutti constructed a traveling 
flagpole that can hold a 30-foot-tall banner that replicates a ruler, 
with exact measurements in feet, according to the Easthampton resident.

"I marked the 11- and 22-foot levels in red, because those indicate 
where our sea level would rise if only 5% or 10% of Antarctica and 
Greenland were to melt," he said. "When people stand next to the 
flagpole and see how high that really is, it shows how legitimate and 
scary the reality of rising sea levels is."

The ruler has been sitting in Northampton, but Valetutti is hoping to 
drive his moveable education tool across the east coast, according to 
his statement.

"I wanted to take a stance on the side of climate change that is not 
always talked about - rising sea levels due to global warming," the 
statement said.

Valetutti stressed how rapidly sea levels could rise and how little the 
problem is discussed.

"Sea level rise is real. It is scary, and there is no way to time it," 
he said. "Mother Nature can work fast."
https://www.masslive.com/news/2020/06/retired-easthampton-engineer-builds-30-foot-tall-sea-level-rise-ruler-plans-to-drive-it-across-the-east-coast-to-raise-awareness-about-climate-change.html



[Radical action]
*Turning Delusion into Climate Action: Prof Kevin Anderson, an interview*
By Andrew Simms, Kevin Anderson, originally published by Scientists for 
Global Responsibility
June 18, 2020
In a conversation recorded before the Covid-19 crisis hit, which is 
raising many questions about the responsible use by policy makers of 
scientific advice, SGR's Andrew Simms interviews the leading voice on 
climate science, Prof Kevin Anderson of the Universities of Manchester 
and Uppsala, about the responsibilities of scientists in the climate 
emergency. He is outspoken in saying that the scientific community has 
much to do to change its ways.

This article first appeared in Responsible Science Issue No. 2, 2020

Andrew Simms: Would you like to hear more from your fellow climate 
scientists now about the speed and scale of action required?

*Prof Kevin Anderson:*  I'd like to hear much more of what many 
academics say in private being said in public. This is also true of many 
others I engage with across the climate change community - from those in 
NGOs to more informed policy makers, business types, journalists, and 
more. Over the past two or more decades I've witnessed an emerging 
preference for spinning an appealing but increasingly misleading yarn 
about what is needed to meet our various climate commitments. 
Disturbingly, many of those who should know better have even begun to 
believe their own delusionary tales. The enthusiastic and almost 
unquestioning support by many academics for the Climate Change 
Committee's (CCC UK) 'net zero' report, or 'not zero' as I prefer to 
call it, exemplifies how we're prepared to forgo analysis and integrity 
to maintain politically-palatable fairy-tales of delivering on Paris.

AS: And what are they saying in private?

*KA:* Not all, but many had been telling me for years that there's no 
hope of staying below 2 degrees centigrade, that we're heading to three 
or four degrees. I should add that I disagreed with this view, arguing 
that if we're lucky on climate sensitivity and are prepared to grasp the 
nettle and make very difficult but doable cuts in emissions, then a thin 
thread of hope remained for staying below two degrees. Today, the 
chances are much, much slimmer and with the cuts in emissions completely 
unprecedented and far beyond anything in the public and political 
debate. What I find most disturbing, is that many of those who 
previously had told me, away from any microphones, that 2C was not 
viable, are now coming out in support of meeting 1.5C. Worse still, they 
repeatedly point to idealised technical solutions, yet often with little 
understanding of either the technologies or their practical delivery, 
let alone the timelines for making wholesale shifts in technologies and 
associated infrastructures.

Typically it is more senior academics and others who hold these 
conflicting public and private positions. Whilst such deception is often 
very well meant, it nevertheless reflects a deep arrogance. They are 
basically saying, I'm a sufficiently clever person, that I can judge 
what is politically or not viable, and therefore by massaging my 
assumptions I can provide politically appropriate conclusions. Such 
arrogance is widespread. Just look at the CCC UK. I have a huge respect 
for the CCC's secretariat, and particularly the new CEO, Chris Stark, I 
think he's excellent. But since its inception, the academic 
Commissioners who, in many respects guide the framing of the 
secretariat's work, have failed to support the CCC in pursuing genuinely 
independent analysis.

As such the CCC have, in my view, misled parliament and the public - at 
least in terms of mitigation. Individually I respect the academic work 
of many of the commissioners, some of whom I know well and would call 
friends, but as soon as they don their CCC hat, academic rigour is 
weakened in favour of political expediency. Exacerbating all of this is 
repeated reference to the CCC as independent. It is not. It is basically 
a Quango with advisors and a secretariat more sensitive to the dominant 
political and economic dogma than to the implications of their science.

As I say, all this is done with good intention - and perhaps if the rest 
of the academic community held the CCC, and government ministers, to 
account, this would not be a problem. But by and large the academic 
community, including the funders, have abdicated this responsibility 
preferring to embrace the CCC as the climate oracle. I want to add here, 
that I have spoken to Chris Stark about this, and think it only fair to 
note that he strongly disagrees with my views on how the Commissioners 
have engaged with the secretariat - seeing their contribution in a much 
more constructive light.

AS: Does that mean that in effect, they've been self-editing, or 
self-censoring, in terms of not saying what is necessary to align the 
process of economic and political change to meet the Paris targets?

*KA: * I think that's true of the CCC, and I think it's true of a high 
proportion of academic work on mitigation, particularly at a senior 
level. Unfortunately, this invidious political expediency percolates 
down to some of the earlier career researchers. However, from 
experience, the Post Docs and the PhDs demonstrate much greater 
integrity with their research, and an honest recognition of the scale of 
the challenge we face.

I've only really become aware of the misleading and dangerous influence 
of some senior academics on their earlier career colleagues over the 
past two years. It was brought to my attention at one of the big climate 
negotiations, (COPs) I was attending. Chatting to those without grey 
hair, it became increasingly clear many of them were being reprimanded 
for asking difficult questions by their senior colleagues and 
supervisors. I really found this hard to believe. But the more I asked 
about this the more I realised I'd been living in a naïve bubble unaware 
of how vibrant academic debate driven by younger academic colleagues is 
being deliberately stifled. And this is not something that only others 
elsewhere are doing. I now hear that senior colleagues I've worked with 
& known for years - sharing many a vibrant exchange over coffee or a 
beer with some of them - have also actively constrained the 
contributions of 'their' earlier career colleagues.

I assumed most good academics thrived on open debate and courteous but 
robust disagreement - Ok, put on a CCC hat, do some consultancy work 
etc, and there's a risk of all too easily being co-opted. But this is 
much worse. It's a deep institutional systemic bias towards aligning our 
conclusions within the boundaries of the status quo - and this extends 
to the funders. We've chosen to forgo our academic independence for the 
appeal of being relevant within a debate our own analysis tells us is 
irrelevant.

It's only then when a Swedish child has the courage to call out our 
nakedness, echoed by a similar call from our own children, that we stir 
from our cosy consensus. Forced to look in the mirror - it's becoming 
bloody obvious that we're naked and have been for a long time, but no 
one has had the guts to tell us. The wonderful thing about children is 
that they're not yet locked into our political baggage - but if they go 
on to become post-docs, we'll do our best to bash them into conformity.

AS: Do you think it would have been easier to bring forward political 
and policy proposals that were in line with the scale of the problem if 
the scientific community had censored what they had said less?

*KA:* Well, first of all, I don't think the scientific community should 
censor what it says at all. If it does censor, then it isn't the 
scientific community. There's a serious risk that we've become little 
more than a group of elite privileged citizens. With no expertise in 
processes of change in emergencies, or political economy more generally, 
we pontificate on responding to climate change, hiding the ignorance 
underpinning our expedient suggestions behind a veil of academic 
objectivity.

I take a straightforward view of our role as academics. We need to 
develop a culture of being  disinterested in whether people like or 
dislike our work, our only interest should be in whether people agree or 
disagree with our analysis and conclusions - and why. Academia should 
not be a fashion contest, or a desperate clamour for funding, committee 
memberships, gongs, awards and prestige.

As for whether honesty, integrity and robust bluntness would have 
significantly changed where we are now, - well in my judgement, yes and 
significantly so. I can understand the levels of measured optimism of 
the early 1990s; that substantial but nonetheless incremental changes to 
business as usual could have led to a timely decarbonised future. But by 
2000 it was becoming obvious that such optimism was now misplaced. 
Rising emissions & more locked-in fossil fuel infrastructure and 
associated expectations, had kicked the potential of incrementalism into 
the long grass. During the subsequent two decades, the academic and 
climate change community has not played a straight bat when it comes to 
mitigation. As the years have passed, through 2005, 2010, and onto 2015 
and Paris, we've adopted increasingly exotic technologies, technocratic 
fraud, dodgy accounting and eloquent nonsense as a salve for ever-rising 
emissions. There is no group that can be singled out for this abject 
failure. Certainly the academic community learnt credibility to the 
fluff and nonsense that has filled the void left by failing to mitigate. 
But the journalists have played their role - more spin and glossy 
stories than investigative reporting. The policy makers, the business 
community, the unions, civil service and the electorate, at least in 
democracies, don't come out of this any better. And nor do the climate 
great and good - from Gore to DiCaprio, Attenborough to Goodall, Musk to 
Branson - all have been party to a greening of business as usual. On 
mitigation and particularly cutting emissions in line with Paris, we're 
all players in a grand unifying delusion - we've become mitigation-deniers.

If, on mitigation (as distinct from the science), academics had 
collectively favoured meticulous analysis, system thinking and blunt 
communication over spin & well-intentioned sycophancy, then I think we 
could have catalysed a different and more honest debate. Whether this 
would have led to the profound changes to contemporary society now 
required by Paris cannot be known. But rigorous academic input was and 
still is a prerequisite of transforming the thinking, expectations, 
policies, and societal norms inline with 2C carbon budgets. Of course, 
such input is not sufficient, but without it we will continue to fail.
https://www.resilience.org/stories/2020-06-18/turning-delusion-into-climate-action-prof-kevin-anderson-an-interview/


[two old guys grumbling about the economy - Chris Martenson interview 
James Howard Kunstler]
*Riots, Injustice & Living In 'The Long Emergency'*
Jun 17, 2020
Peak Prosperity
Unsustainable systems, by definition, eventually break down.

That's been a key warning we at Peak Prosperity have been delivering for 
over a decade regarding the over-indebted global economy, society's 
addiction to depleting fossil fuels, and accelerating ecological 
destruction.

The coronavirus pandemic has placed such intense and unexpected strain 
on this unstable house of cards that its odds of toppling sooner have 
increased substantially. Few people understand this better -- from the 
historic job destruction impacting tens of millions to the social anger 
starting to boil over -- than James Howard Kunstler.

His new book Living In The Long Emergency (which builds on its classic 
predecessor) not only predicted what's happening now, but lays out what 
life in the aftermath will be like and how to best position for it today.

And yet, while the status quo still reigns as things worsen, those in 
power refuse to recognize the risks. In fact, they're doubling down on 
the same strategies that have undermined the system -- ignorant that 
when it breaks, it will be to their peril, too.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Q5zUuQSMgc


[UK is 1% of global emissions]
*Net Zero Home School Day 2: Pathways To Net Zero*
[Second] event of the University of Oxford's Net-Zero Home School in 
partnership with The Guardian, Oxford Climate Society, the Oxford 
Climate Research Network, Net Zero.org and Climateworks Foundation.
This series consists of five webinars on climate science and policy for 
Generation Net Zero, to mark the first anniversary of the passage of the 
UK's Net Zero Emissions law. All events are hosted by Fiona Harvey, 
Environment correspondent, The Guardian. Running Monday 22nd to Friday 
26th June daily from 5:00 - 6:30pm.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JxSKDKphghw
- - -
*Oxford Climate Society*
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCOoksFYBCHqZWwVBU9qewZg


[Digging back into the internet news archive]
*On this day in the history of global warming - June 25, 2008
*June 25, 2008: The New York Times reports: "The [George W. Bush] White 
House in December refused to accept the Environmental Protection 
Agency's conclusion that greenhouse gases are pollutants that must be 
controlled, telling agency officials that an e-mail message containing 
the document would not be opened, senior E.P.A. officials said last week.":

    *White House Refused to Open Pollutants E-Mail*
    By Felicity Barringer
    June 25, 2008

    The White House in December refused to accept the Environmental
    Protection Agency's conclusion that greenhouse gases are pollutants
    that must be controlled, telling agency officials that an e-mail
    message containing the document would not be opened, senior E.P.A.
    officials said last week.

    The document, which ended up in e-mail limbo, without official
    status, was the E.P.A.'s answer to a 2007 Supreme Court ruling that
    required it to determine whether greenhouse gases represent a danger
    to health or the environment, the officials said.

    This week, more than six months later, the E.P.A. is set to respond
    to that order by releasing a watered-down version of the original
    proposal that offers no conclusion. Instead, the document reviews
    the legal and economic issues presented by declaring greenhouse
    gases a pollutant.

    Over the past five days, the officials said, the White House
    successfully put pressure on the E.P.A. to eliminate large sections
    of the original analysis that supported regulation, including a
    finding that tough regulation of motor vehicle emissions could
    produce $500 billion to $2 trillion in economic benefits over the
    next 32 years. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because
    they were not authorized to discuss the matter.
    Both documents, as prepared by the E.P.A., "showed that the Clean
    Air Act can work for certain sectors of the economy, to reduce
    greenhouse gases," one of the senior E.P.A. officials said. "That's
    not what the administration wants to show. They want to show that
    the Clean Air Act can't work."

    The Bush administration's climate-change policies have been evolving
    over the past two years. It now accepts the work of government
    scientists studying global warming, such as last week's review
    forecasting more drenching rains, parching droughts and intense
    hurricanes as global temperatures warm (www.climatescience.gov).

    But no administration decisions have supported the regulation of
    greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act or other environmental laws.

    Tony Fratto, a White House spokesman, refused to comment on
    discussions between the White House and the Environmental Protection
    Agency. Asked about changes in the original report, Mr. Fratto said,
    "It's the E.P.A. that determines what analysis it wants to make
    available" in its documents.
    The new document, a road map laying out the issues involved in
    regulation, is to be signed by Stephen L. Johnson, the agency's
    administrator, and published as early as Wednesday.
    The derailment of the original E.P.A. report was first made known in
    March by Representative Henry A. Waxman, Democrat of California,
    chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. The
    refusal to open the e-mail has not been made public.

    In early December, the E.P.A.'s draft finding that greenhouse gases
    endanger the environment used Energy Department data from 2007 to
    conclude that it would be cost effective to require the nation's
    motor vehicle fleet to average 37.7 miles per gallon in 2018,
    according to government officials familiar with the document.

    About 10 days after the finding was left unopened by officials at
    the Office of Management and Budget, Congress passed and President
    Bush signed a new energy bill mandating an increase in average
    fuel-economy standards to 35 miles per gallon by 2020. The day the
    law was signed, the E.P.A. administrator rejected the unanimous
    recommendation of his staff and denied California a waiver needed to
    regulate vehicle emissions of greenhouse gases in the state, saying
    the new law's approach was preferable and climate change required
    global, not regional, solutions.

    California's regulations would have imposed tougher standards.

    The Transportation Department made its own fuel-economy proposals
    public almost two months ago; they were based on the assumption that
    gasoline would range from $2.26 per gallon in 2016 to $2.51 per
    gallon in 2030, and set a maximum average standard of 35 miles per
    gallon in 2020.

    The White House, which did not oppose the Transportation Department
    proposals, has become more outspoken on the need for a comprehensive
    approach to greenhouse gases, specifically rejecting possible
    controls deriving from older environmental laws.

    In a speech in April, Mr. Bush called for an end to the growth of
    greenhouse gases by 2025 — a timetable slower than many scientists
    say is required. His chairman of the Council of Environmental
    Quality, James Connaughton, said a "train wreck" would result if
    regulations to control greenhouse gases were authorized piecemeal
    under laws like the Clean Air Act and the Endangered Species Act.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/25/washington/25epa.html
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2008/06/26/174068/epa-email-denial/

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