[✔️] December 17, 2021 - Daily Global Warming News Digest

[👀 Richard Pauli]

/*December 17, 2021*/

/[ We knew and it will appear sooner than thought ]/
*World's Widest Glacier Facing Catastrophic Collapse Earlier Than Expected*
by Elizabeth Love
Share this story
Dec 16, 2021
An ice shelf in Antarctica -- currently preventing the Thwaites Glacier 
(aka the "Doomsday Glacier") from falling into the ocean -- could 
collapse within 3-5 years, according to new research presented by 
glaciologist, Erin Pettit, to the American Geophysical Union (AGU). If 
the shelf does collapse, it's projected to torrents of ice and increase 
global sea level rise by up to 25%.
https://worldwarzero.com/magazine/2021/12/world-s-widest-glacier-facing-catastrophic-collapse-earlier-than-expected/

- -

/[  Thwaits glacier is one of the largest in Antarctica.  97 min video 
from AGU  ]/
*Press Conference: The Threat from Thwaites: The retreat of Antarctica’s 
riskiest glacier*
Dec 13, 2021
AGU
Antarctica’s Thwaites Glacier is the largest fast-changing glacier in 
the world. It is thinning rapidly, has already retreated over eight 
miles, and has doubled in speed, in the last five decades. The 
vulnerable glacier is the size of Florida, and if it melts, global sea 
levels could rise by nearly 10 feet—putting millions of people living in 
coastal cities in danger zones for extreme flooding. Join experts from 
the International Thwaites Glacier Collaboration as they explore 
questions such as: Why is the glacier weakening? How soon before it 
begins its rapid collapse and accelerates sea level rise? And what can 
be done to slow its collapse?
https://youtu.be/uBbgWsR4-aw?t=294

/- -/

/[  so rolls the poles ]
/*See How the Antarctic Is Signaling Major Climate Disruption*
We’ve visualized recent data from the Southern Ocean that has scientists 
increasingly worried./
/https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/15/climate/nyt-climate-newsletter-antarctic.html/
/

/- -/

/[  44 min video report from the Arctic ]/
*Is Climate Change Really Raising Sea Levels? | Mutant Weather | Earth 
Stories*
Dec 15, 2021
Earth Stories - Climate Change Documentaries
Disappearing glaciers, shrinking sea ice, and thawing permafrost is 
increasing from year to year. This is threatening the planet with loss 
of drinking water and rising sea levels.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BHw9A9wfK0/
/

/
/

/
/

/[  Madison Avenue is paved by fossil fuels -- the asphalt driveway for 
this big house ] /
*Edelman’s dirty PR*
The PR giant is breaking its climate promise by creating glowing 
campaigns for an anti-climate lobbying group.
Emily Atkin and Connor Gibson
Dec 15
Public relations is in the midst of a climate reckoning. In the last few 
months, more than 210 advertising agencies and 600 independent creatives 
have signed the Clean Creatives pledge, promising to never create 
marketing for the fossil fuel industry.

But the world’s largest PR agency, Edelman, has refused to sign. In an 
internal meeting revealed by the New York Times last week, CEO Richard 
Edelman told the firm’s thousands of employees that the fossil fuel 
industry was “in transition and needed Edelman’s services..”

Edelman insisted, however, that climate change is “the greatest threat 
facing humanity.” He said the firm would still uphold climate-friendly 
values. In addition to his 2014 promise to never work on climate denial 
campaigns, Edelman said the company will also “reject projects that 
delay progress toward a future with net-zero greenhouse gas emissions.”

But Edelman is currently creating projects that delay progress toward a 
net-zero future. For example, it is taking millions every year to 
improve the public image of one of the most anti-climate policy lobbying 
groups in America: The American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers.

What is AFPM? How much is it paying Edelman for marketing? What work is 
Edelman creating for AFPM? How does that work delay climate progress? 
Independent climate researcher Connor Gibson has all the answers. Here’s 
his inaugural investigation for HEATED.

How Edelman promotes climate destruction 
https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F554e7ac2-17e6-43ef-b1cc-b225cea06bbb_1734x826.png

Marketing material made by Edelman for the American Fuel and 
Petrochemical Manufacturers, one of the most aggressive anti-climate 
lobbying groups in America. Source: Advertising Research Foundation.
Since its 2014 promise to stop working on climate denial campaigns, 
Edelman has taken $20.2 million to promote one of the most resoundingly 
anti-climate lobbying groups in America.

HEATED obtained the most recent tax filings from the American Fuel and 
Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM), an oil and gas trade association 
that even some oil majors have renounced over its intense lobbying 
efforts to stall climate policies.

We also discovered details of specific campaign work that Edelman did 
for the AFPM, the first time such work has been reported. It claims the 
anti-climate lobbying group is “making progress” by promoting fossil fuels.

Edelman did not return a question for comment.

*AFPM works to delay climate progress*
The AFPM is a well-known climate policy villain. It has spent tens of 
millions of dollars on lobbying at the federal level. Most recently, the 
group opposed the methane reduction provisions of the Build Back Better 
Act, which are widely accepted as an immediate climate mitigation 
priority. The AFPM also recently lobbied against carbon taxes, both in 
the state of Washington and at the federal level.

The AFPM has played a lead role this year in spreading state laws that 
criminalize protest against fossil fuel companies. It worked closely on 
this effort with the American Legislative Exchange Council—a group 
Edelman disavowed due to its anti-climate advocacy.

The AFPM also helped Koch Industries create a front group to attack 
electric vehicles; partnered with Koch to help the Trump administration 
weaken fuel economy standards; worked to repeal the Clean Power Plan; 
and opposed ozone regulations. In 2009, the AFPM opposed the U.S. 
Environmental Protection Agency’s decision to classify greenhouse gases 
as pollutant, saying it was “based on selective science.”

The AFPM funds climate denial groups like the Heartland Institute, which 
received $150,000 from AFPM from 2017 to 2018. The AFPM’s anti-climate 
work is so egregious that many oil companies have renounced their 
memberships because of it, including Shell, Total and BP.

But Edelman does not have a problem with this. It has made millions 
promoting the group’s public image over the last several years.

*Edelman makes millions to promote AFPM*
HEATED investigated how much Edelman was paid by the AFPM since 2015, 
the year after Edelman pledged not to assist climate change deniers.

By combining the freshly disclosed 2020 expense of $2.6 million with 
previously disclosed contract expenses in AFPM IRS filings, we 
calculated a total of $20.2 million in AFPM payments to Edelman from 
2015 to 2020.

Previously, it’s been unclear what AFPM campaigns Edelman has worked on. 
However, HEATED obtained a document published by the Advertising 
Research Foundation showing Edelman created an award-winning AFPM 
campaign called “We Make Progress” from 2017 to 2018.
The campaign showcased common consumer products made using 
petrochemicals, implying that people would not have the luxuries they 
love without fossil fuels. This is one of the classic discourses of 
climate delay, the scientifically-defined argumentation patterns used to 
slow climate action.
https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3cab4e82-4689-4458-a25b-b217d2893e47_1100x688.jpeg
The aim of the “We Make Progress” campaign was to boost the AFPM’s 
reputation with political “elites” in Washington, D.C. Goals included 
“enhancing its advocacy efforts,” “better positioning its products,” and 
ensuring “that policymakers consider the impact on the fuels and 
petrochemical industries in every decision they make and vote they take.”

Edelman was successful. According to the award document, “the fuel and 
petrochemical industries saw significant reputational gains among the 
Beltway Opinion Elite.” It went on to say “The campaign drove greater 
familiarity, favorability, and trust in both AFPM and the 
fuel/petrochemical industry and positioned the brand well for future 
activations.”
https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F2dc78c43-1a8c-4fad-88e6-e56e5bf18477_700x366..png
But that’s not all Edelman’s campaign did. It also made people more wary 
about a future without fossil fuels. That is the greater purpose of this 
kind of advertising, said Robert Brulle, a visiting professor at Brown 
University who co-authored a recent peer-reviewed study with student 
Cartie Werthman on the role of public relations in climate change politics.

“A major part of the effort to obstruct climate action involves … 
emphasizing the benefits of continued fossil fuel use,” Brulle said. And 
no one helps emphasize those benefits more than Edelman, the number one 
PR firm for pro-fossil fuel content that ignores the deadly climate 
consequences.

*“Edelman’s work is indistinguishable from climate denial”*
Brulle and Werthman’s research shows Edelman to be the most-used PR firm 
of the entire fossil fuel industry. It says fossil fuels make up “a 
substantial percentage” of Edelman’s clients—though what percentage 
exactly is unclear. (Edelman did not respond to our request to clarify 
this point).

This makes Edelman particularly valuable to the fossil fuel industry, 
which spends far more on public relations than it does on conservative 
political think tanks. According to Brulle and Werthman’s research, the 
fossil fuel industry only spends about $36 million per year on political 
think tanks that downplay climate science, while $500 million annually 
is spent on public relations.

This shows the fossil fuel industry considers good PR to be a far more 
effective way to achieve its political goals than outright climate 
denial, Brulle said. “In my opinion, [public relations] is the major 
area of effort to obstruct climate action,” he said. “Instead of climate 
denial and misinformation, the vocabulary needs to shift to climate 
obstruction and propaganda.”

Still, Edelman has only officially banned blatant “climate denial” 
campaigns—showing the company either does not understand how its work 
for the fossil fuel industry is being used, or is choosing to ignore it.

Duncan Meisel, who is leading the Clean Creatives pledge, thinks that 
will soon change. “Edelman’s work for AFPM is indistinguishable from 
outright climate denial, and a threat to human health,” he said. “It’s 
an affront to Edelman’s stated values to continue working for the most 
extreme fossil fuel lobbying organization in America.”

Edelman did not respond to our request for comment. But in a Chicago 
Tribune interview, the CEO expressed his continued commitment to the oil 
and gas industry. “I’m proud of our clients, and I’m proud of our work 
for them,” he said. “I believe deeply in the oil and gas sector.”
https://heated.world/p/how-edelman-promotes-the-climate
- -
//[  Washington Post a few weeks ago  ]//
//*How Big Oil relies on some PR firms to block climate action*
"It's not okay anymore to be an outright climate denialist. No one's 
going to listen to you," Aronczyk said. “So instead, PR firms are 
changing the context in which climate communications take place. It's 
even more insidious."
- -
*All eyes on Edelman*
The paper saves some of its sharpest scrutiny for Edelman, the world's 
largest PR firm — and the firm most frequently used by the U.S. oil and 
gas industry.

Several fossil fuel industry trade groups have paid Edelman large sums 
to influence climate politics, including the American Fuel and 
Petrochemical Manufacturers ($21 million between 2012 and 2018) and the 
American Petroleum Institute ($439.7 million since 2008).
- -
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/11/30/how-big-oil-relies-some-pr-firms-block-climate-action/
//



/[ The NYT article is a superb multimedia overview of global climate 
destabilizations ]/
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/12/13/opinion/climate-change-effects-countries.html 




/[   Podcast on a series of topics   ] /
*Climate One*
We’re living through a climate emergency; addressing this crisis begins 
by talking about it. Host Greg Dalton brings you empowering 
conversations that connect all aspects of the challenge — the scary and 
the exciting, the individual and the systemic. Join us.
https://cms.megaphone.fm/channel/CCC9544803627?selected=CCC3909379568
- -
*1   Climate Miseducation*
What a student learns about climate science depends a lot on which state 
they live in and who’s teaching. This week, we unpack climate 
miseducation with investigative reporter Katie Worth and learn about the 
undue influence of industry on school curricula.
55 min

- -

/[  The recent book ]/
*Miseducation: How Climate Change Is Taught in America*
by Katie Worth
Why are so many American children learning so much misinformation about 
climate change?

Investigative reporter Katie Worth reviewed scores of textbooks, built a 
50-state database, and traveled to a dozen communities to talk to 
children and teachers about what is being taught, and found a red-blue 
divide in climate education. More than one-third of young adults believe 
that climate change is not man-made, and science instructors are being 
contradicted by history teachers who tell children not to worry about it.

Who has tried to influence what children learn, and how successful have 
they been? Worth connects the dots on oil corporations, state 
legislatures, school boards, libertarian thinktanks, conservative 
lobbyists, and textbook publishers, all of whom have learned from the 
fight over evolution and tobacco, and are now sowing uncertainty, 
confusion, and distrust about climate science, with the result that four 
in five Americans today don’t think there is a scientific consensus on 
global warming. In the words of a top climate educator, “We are the only 
country in the world that has had a multi-decade, multi-billion dollar 
deny-delay-confuse campaign.” Miseducation is the alarming story of how 
climate denialism was implanted in millions of school children.
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/miseducation-katie-worth/1138942963



/[ - Canada and Radical First Nations Peoples speak out  - video start 4 
mins in  Noam speaks at 30 mins in  ] /
*Noam Chomsky & Eriel Tchekwie Deranger at Labour Confronts the Climate 
Crisis*
Nov 19, 2021
OFL Comms
When it comes to the climate crisis what’s at stake? What’s the science? 
Where do pensions fit in?
On Friday, October 15, and Saturday, October 16 the Ontario Federation 
of Labour hosted Labour Confronts the Climate Crisis, a free virtual 
conference that addressed the role of pensions in working towards 
environmental justice.
Watch the speakers from day one of this important event: Professor Noam 
Chomsky and Eriel Tchekwie Deranger from Indigenous Climate Action.
Check out day 2 here: https://youtu.be/1fLm50h0stI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_c4NLVuabI



/[ Climate Psychology Alliance ]/
*When the Tubbs Fire Changed My World and My Practice: Holding Space in 
the Era of Climate Crisis**
*Dec 16
By Jenni Silverstein, LCSW, Santa Rosa, California

Psychotherapists, regardless of our theoretical background or treatment 
modality, share a common critical capacity: the ability to hold space 
for difficult emotions and experiences. This capacity is hard to 
measure, define, or teach. It entails a moment-by-moment dance of 
empathy, compassion, presence, self-reflection, and self-regulation. It 
forms the basis of the healing relationships that underlie our work. And 
it is self-protective, insulating us from the vicarious trauma we risk 
experiencing, as we expose ourselves daily to our clients’ stories of 
suffering.
As with any skill, building our capacity to hold space takes time, 
practice, and mentorship. Ideally, our initial exposures to stories of 
suffering occur in the course of a fairly predictable work routine, in 
manageable doses that we can counter with an increasingly sophisticated 
set of self-regulatory actions. To aid in this ability, we are taught to 
cultivate an objective distance– a barrier between the client’s story 
and our own psyche–symbolized by the image of Freud, pad in hand, seated 
behind his couch.

My own journey as a trauma therapist has highlighted the value of 
professional distance. My first job in the field was at a group home for 
adolescent mothers here in Northern California. I had never heard 
stories like those told by the young moms I met there. Their lives were 
a litany of abandonments, losses, violations, and terrors. The 
experience was a crash course in the horrors humans can inflict upon 
each other, and an introduction to the extent of my own privilege. That 
their stories were so far removed from my own experience was a 
protective factor, enabling my developing capacity to hold space. I have 
since built a career out of caring for some of the most vulnerable in my 
community–very young children already burdened by histories of abuse and 
neglect. The extent of difference between their stories and mine has 
allowed me to bear witness to the horrific without being flooded by the 
effects.

On October 8th, 2017, I lost the protection of distance. Overnight, the 
Tubbs Fire ravaged my community in Santa Rosa. It was the first major 
urban wildfire, and briefly held the title of most destructive in 
California history. Tubbs forced rapid, mass evacuations in the middle 
of the night, including the complete evacuation of two major hospitals. 
By morning, over five thousand structures had burned, and twenty-two 
people had perished.
*
**I awoke to a changed world of smoke-filled skies, silent streets, 
missing landmarks, and collective shock. And I returned, after five days 
of evacuation, to a changed psychotherapy practice.* My clients’ stories 
mirrored my own. I shared the need to integrate, to come to terms with 
the frightening and disruptive events of that night. For a time, the 
boundaries that contain therapeutic relationships melted away, as we 
therapists faced the daunting task of healing ourselves along with our 
entire wounded community.

Healing has turned out to be an elusive process at best. The impact of 
Tubbs is still being felt in systems throughout Sonoma County: lack of 
housing, disrupted child welfare responses, disrupted schooling, and 
delayed court cases continue to haunt our community. And any hope of a 
full recovery was quashed as the subsequent years brought two more 
rounds of devastating and terrifying local wildfires. The rest of the 
West Coast has joined us, and Tubbs has been far surpassed in its 
destructiveness since.
*
**My therapy skills have not made me immune to the lingering effects of 
fire trauma.* I feel the unease of hyperarousal whenever the wind blows 
strong, and I have endured many a night of disrupted sleep, anticipating 
evacuation alerts. My ability to hold space for the fire-related stories 
of my clients is not protected by distance from their experience. I have 
had to learn on the fly how to show up: maintaining presence, calm, and 
awareness, even as their anxieties trigger and match my own.

  When Tubbs roared through, many tried to claim it was a fluke, and 
that its devastation was unique to the faults of Sonoma County’s 
landscape and urban planning. Four more years of lengthy and destructive 
western wildfire seasons have proven this wrong. *Catastrophic wildfires 
are the result of poor forest management combined with climate change. 
They are the new normal.**
*
Like many of us finding our way now to the Climate Psychology Alliance 
of North America, I carry a lifetime of awareness about the climate and 
biodiversity crises we face. I cannot recall ever believing that our way 
of life was sustainable; I anticipated living through the collapse of 
Industrial Growth Society. Still, I maintained the myth that we had some 
time. When I was pregnant eight years ago, it did not rain once in the 
first three months of our wet season. Anxiety about mega-drought was a 
defining aspect of my pregnancy. Yet I still believed my baby would get 
though childhood, at least, before the real consequences of the climate 
crisis began to be felt.

The last few years have proven to so many of us that we are out of time. 
We are living this now.*As clinicians, we have a vital role to play in 
supporting emotional resiliency and strengthening communities, so we can 
adapt to the repetitive collective trauma we will continue to face.* 
Like so many, I vacillate between hope and despair, anxiety and action. 
I know that living systems and human ingenuity can weave together in 
amazing and unexpected ways—and our profession holds an understanding of 
what it takes to access our full human potential, which will be critical 
in navigating this process. So I will keep on showing up, participating 
in the co-creation of the best possible outcome for all living beings.

*How do I bring my clinical skills to the climate movement when the 
protective distance that enables my compassionate presence has 
completely fallen away? *We are all in this together, and it is time to 
put aside the image of Freud and his couch, in exchange for a more 
inclusive and participatory psychotherapy that holds us all in this 
human experience. I cannot claim to know what this will look like. But 
like all other aspects of this collective moment, it begins with 
acceptance of the unknown. With allowing what no longer serves to begin 
falling away, so it can make way for the new that we cannot yet see clearly.

I am grateful for the blossoming of CPA-NA, and the opportunity we will 
have to support each other on this journey to a new way of holding 
space, a way that allows for the depth of our own emotions and 
experiences. I invite you all into collaboration and consultation as we 
redefine what mental health support looks like in the world in which we 
now find ourselves living.
https://www.climatepsychology.us/blog/the-tubbs-fire-changed-my-world-and-my-practice



/[The news archive - looking back]/
*On this day in the history of global warming December  17, 2018*

On MSNBC’s “Velshi & Ruhle,” Dr. Katharine Hayhoe discusses America’s 
partisan divide on climate.

https://youtu.be/OEAhNLo_ZG4


/-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------/ 

/Archive of Daily Global Warming News 
<https://pairlist10.pair.net/pipermail/theclimate.vote/2017-October/date.html> 
/
https://pairlist10.pair.net/pipermail/theclimate.vote

/To receive daily mailings - click to Subscribe 
<mailto:subscribe at theClimate.Vote?subject=Click%20SEND%20to%20process%20your%20request> 
to news digest./

   Privacy and Security:*This mailing is text-only.  It does not carry 
images or attachments which may originate from remote servers.  A 
text-only message can provide greater privacy to the receiver and 
sender. This is a hobby production curated by Richard Pauli
By regulation, the .VOTE top-level domain cannot be used for commercial 
purposes. Messages have no tracking software.
To subscribe, email: contact at theclimate.vote 
<mailto:contact at theclimate.vote> with subject subscribe, To Unsubscribe, 
subject: unsubscribe
Also you may subscribe/unsubscribe at 
https://pairlist10.pair.net/mailman/listinfo/theclimate.vote
Links and headlines assembled and curated by Richard Pauli for 
http://TheClimate.Vote <http://TheClimate.Vote/> delivering succinct 
information for citizens and responsible governments of all levels. List 
membership is confidential and records are scrupulously restricted to 
this mailing list.

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://pairlist10.pair.net/pipermail/theclimate.vote/attachments/20211217/ab6bf049/attachment.htm>