[✔️] May 24, 2022 - Daily Global Warming News Digest

[Richard Pauli]

/*May 24, 2022*/

/[ food stresses on the horizon ]/
*With food prices continuing to climb, the UN is warning of crippling 
global shortages*
May 23, 2022
Fears of a global food crisis are growing due to the shock of the war in 
Ukraine, climate change and rising inflation.
https://www.npr.org/2022/05/23/1100592132/united-nations-food-shortages

- -

/[ top wx news]/
*Ontario racing to restore electricity for thousands after deadly, 
powerful storm*
May 23, 2022  Crews in southern Ontario are working to restore power for 
thousands of people, after Saturday's sudden and severe thunderstorm 
that killed at least 10 people.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iD3vDq7YY4U



/[ the poor cannot afford air conditioning ]/
*India’s heatwave exposes divide in access to cooling equipment*
Almost 323 million Indians at high risk from extreme heat amid lack of 
access to fans and refrigerators, report released last week finds.
- -
Almost 323 million people across the country are at high risk from 
extreme heat and a lack of cooling equipment such as fans and 
refrigerators, found a report released last week by Sustainable Energy 
for All (SE4ALL), a UN-backed organisation...
- -
 From building heat-resistant homes to creating more green spaces, 
Mavalankar said prompt action is needed to help the poor and vulnerable 
survive a hotter world.

“Temperatures may increase by three to five degrees in coming summers,” 
he warned. “We have to prepare right now.”
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/5/23/indias-heatwave-exposes-divide-in-access-to-cooling-equipment



/[  no longer willing to follow  ] /
*Shell consultant quits, says company causes ‘extreme harm’ to planet*
Oil giant’s expansion plan prompted resignation email accusing firm of 
dismissing climate risks.
BY ZIA WEISE - May 23, 2022

A Shell consultant resigned Monday with a searing email accusing the oil 
giant of “failing on a massive planetary scale” to limit climate risks.

Caroline Dennett, who has been a U.K.-based safety consultant for Shell 
for 11 years, said she could no longer work for the company given its 
plans to expand fossil fuel extraction.

In an email sent to the executive committee and more than 1,000 
employees, she wrote that as “continued oil & gas extraction is causing 
extreme harm” to the planet, Shell was “failing on a massive planetary 
scale” to deliver on its pledge to cause “no harm” with its operations.
“Shell is operating beyond the design limits of our planetary systems. 
Shell is not implementing steps to mitigate the known risks. Shell is 
not putting environmental safety before production,” Dennett wrote in 
her email, seen by POLITICO.

She cited the International Energy Agency’s findings that no new gas or 
oil fields should be developed to reach net-zero emissions by the middle 
of the century and stay within relatively safe levels of global warming.

Shell last year put forward a net-zero strategy but still plans to 
explore new fossil fuel projects until 2025, and recently started 
campaigning for the U.K. government to let the company develop a new 
North Sea gas field.

“It pains me to end this working relationship which I have greatly 
valued, but I can no longer work for a company that ignores all the 
alarms and dismisses the risks of climate change and ecological 
collapse,” Dennett wrote.

She called on the company’s management “to look in the mirror and ask 
themselves if they really believe their vision for more oil & gas 
extraction secures a safe future for humanity” and asked employees who 
can do so to “please walk away and towards a more sustainable career.”

Asked for comment, a Shell spokesperson said that the company was 
"determined to deliver on our global strategy to be a net-zero company 
by 2050" and that it had "every intention of hitting" its targets.

They added: "We're already investing billions of dollars in low-carbon 
energy, although the world will still need oil and gas for decades to 
come in sectors that can't be easily decarbonized."

https://www.politico.eu/article/shell-consultant-caroline-dennett-quits-extreme-harm-planet-climate-change-fossil-fuels-extraction/
- -
[ hear her video plaint ]
https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6934409781495431168/
https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6934409781495431168/#
https://www.linkedin.com/in/caroline-dennett-6161a814/
- -
/[ her text ]/
*Caroline Dennett*
Director: CLOUT LTD
Today I’ve ended my 11 year relationship as a safety consultant with Shell.

I've surveyed thousands of Shell employees and contractors around the 
world to help keep the 'oil in the pipe' and prevent harm to people. I 
hope through this work I've helped avoid accidents and spills.

But Shell’s disregard for climate change risks means they are completely 
failing on their Goal Zero safety ambition to “do no harm”.

Shell is fully aware that their continued oil & gas extraction and 
expansion projects are causing extreme harms, to our climate, 
environment, nature and to people.

I can no longer work for a company that ignores all the alarms and 
dismisses the risks of climate change and ecological collapse.

Because, contrary to Shell’s public expressions around Net Zero, they 
are not winding down on oil and gas, but planning to explore and extract 
much more.

I want Shell Execs and Management to look in the mirror and ask 
themselves if they really believe their vision for more oil & gas 
extraction secures a safe future for humanity.

We must end all new extraction projects immediately and rapidly 
transition away from fossil fuels, and towards clean renewable energy 
sources.

Shell should be using all its capital, technical and human power to lead 
this transition, but they have no plan to do this.

Shell have ben a major client of my business, and I’ve worked with some 
really great people.

I don't know what impact this action will have on my business and 
career, and it's possible my reputation may be damaged in the eyes of 
people I have worked with. However, I feel like there is no other choice 
I can make.

Join me, and exit the industry if you can.
#jumpship #truthteller @Shell
https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6934409781495431168/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/caroline-dennett-6161a814/



/[  Podcast of deeper discussion  ]/
*Volts podcast: Lauren Melodia and Kristina Karlsson on energy inflation 
and how to tame it*
Fossil fuels make inflation worse; renewables help solve it./
/May 23, 2022
David Roberts

Americans are struggling with two related problems: one, there’s general 
inflation, which means pretty much everything is expensive; two, there’s 
energy price inflation, which means that energy in particular 
(specifically, oil and gas) is expensive.

This has led some politicians, mainly Republicans-and-Joe-Manchin, to 
propose a dual solution: cut back on government spending (to tame 
inflation) and increase domestic oil and gas production (to tame energy 
prices).

This approach is wrong-headed and counter-productive on both counts. The 
reasons why are laid out in a new issue brief from the Roosevelt 
Institute, the first in a series called “All Economic Policy Is Climate 
Policy” (which, hell yes).

Lauren Melodia, deputy director of macroeconomic analysis at the 
Roosevelt Institute, and Kristina Karlsson, the institute’s program 
manager for climate and economic transformation, argue that fossil fuel 
prices are inherently volatile, and that volatility has serious 
macroeconomic effects; on the flip side, electricity prices — 
specifically renewable electricity prices — tend to be far more stable 
and manageable.

It follows that government spending to build out clean-energy 
infrastructure is itself anti-inflationary; it removes a source of price 
instability and replaces it with stability.

This argument is my favorite kind — it put words to something that’s 
been rattling around in my head for years — so I was excited to talk to 
Melodia and Karlsson about the volatility of fossil fuels, why we’ve 
come to accept it as an inevitable fact of life, and why it is, in fact, 
a choice that we could make differently.
https://www.volts.wtf/p/volts-podcast-lauren-melodia-and?r=10305&s=r&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email/
/


/[ common sense news ] /
*Neighbourhood green space is in rapid decline, deepening both the 
climate and mental health crises*
Published: May 18, 2022
There is now substantial evidence that points to the importance of green 
space for human health and wellbeing. Psychological studies suggest that 
if we spend time in nature regularly, we are more likely to report 
positive mood and cognition, lower anxiety, higher creativity, 
mindfulness and social connectedness. These benefits are greater if we 
have a strong sense of our connection to nature and take the time to 
notice our surroundings.
https://theconversation.com/neighbourhood-green-space-is-in-rapid-decline-deepening-both-the-climate-and-mental-health-crises-183389



/[  BBC is greatly concerned about doom ]/
*Why is climate 'doomism' going viral – and who's fighting it?*
By Marco Silva
BBC climate disinformation specialist

Published May 22. 2022

Climate "doomers" believe the world has already lost the battle against 
global warming. That's wrong - and while that view is spreading online, 
there are others who are fighting the viral tide.

As he walked down the street wearing a Jurassic Park cap, Charles 
McBryde raised his smartphone, stared at the camera, and hit the record 
button.

"Ok, TikTok, I need your help."

Charles is 27 and lives in California. His quirky TikTok videos about 
news, history, and politics have earned him more than 150,000 followers.

In the video in question, recorded in October 2021, he decided it was 
time for a confession.

"I am a climate doomer," he said. "Since about 2019, I have believed 
that there's little to nothing that we can do to actually reverse 
climate change on a global scale."

Climate doomism is the idea that we are past the point of being able to 
do anything at all about global warming - and that mankind is highly 
likely to become extinct.

That's wrong, scientists say, but the argument is picking up steam online.

"I am a climate doomer," Charles McBryde told his TikTok followers last 
October
'Give me hope'
Charles admitted to feeling overwhelmed, anxious and depressed about 
global warming, but he followed up with a plea.

"I'm calling on the activists and the scientists of TikTok to give me 
hope," he said. "Convince me that there's something out there that's 
worth fighting for, that in the end we can achieve victory over this, 
even if it's only temporary."

And it wasn't long before someone answered.

*Facing up to the 'doomers'*
Alaina Wood is a sustainability scientist based in Tennessee. On TikTok 
she's known as thegarbagequeen.

After watching Charles' video, she posted a reply, explaining in simple 
terms why he was wrong.

Alaina makes a habit of challenging climate doomism - a mission she has 
embraced with a sense of urgency.

"People are giving up on activism because they're like, 'I can't handle 
it any more... This is too much...' and 'If it really is too late, why 
am I even trying?'" she says. "Doomism ultimately leads to climate 
inaction, which is the opposite of what we want."

Sustainability scientist and TikToker Alaina Wood is on a mission to 
reassure people it is not too late for the climate
*Why it's not too late*
Climate scientist Dr Friederike Otto, who has been working with the UN's 
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, says: "I don't think it's 
helpful to pretend that climate change will lead to humanity's extinction."

In its most recent report, the IPCC laid out a detailed plan that it 
believes could help the world avoid the worst impacts of rising 
temperatures.

It involves "rapid, deep and immediate" cuts in emissions of greenhouse 
gases - which trap the sun's heat and make the planet hotter.

"There is no denying that there are large changes across the globe, and 
that some of them are irreversible," says Dr Otto, a senior lecturer in 
climate science at the Grantham Institute for Climate Change and the 
Environment.

"It doesn't mean the world is going to end - but we have to adapt, and 
we have to stop emitting."

*Fertile ground*
Last year, the Pew Research Center in the US ran a poll covering 17 
countries, focusing on attitudes towards climate change.

An overwhelming majority of the respondents said they were willing to 
change the way they lived to tackle the problem.

But when asked how confident they were that climate action would 
significantly reduce the effects of global warming, more than half said 
they had little to no confidence.

Doomism taps into, and exaggerates, that sense of hopelessness. In 
Charles's case, it all began with a community on Reddit devoted to the 
potential collapse of civilisation.

"The most apocalyptic language that I would find was actually coming 
from former climate scientists," Charles says.
*
**Hear more*
Listen to 'The online boom in climate doom' from BBC Trending

It's impossible to know whether the people posting the messages Charles 
read were genuine scientists.

But the posts had a profound effect on him. He admits: "I do think I 
fell down the rabbit hole."

Alaina Wood, the sustainability scientist, says Charles's story is not 
unusual.

"I rarely at this point encounter climate denial or any other form of 
misinformation [on social media]," she says. "It's not people saying, 
'Fossil fuels don't cause climate change' ... It's people saying, 'It's 
too late'."

TikTok's rules forbid misinformation that causes harm. We sent the 
company some videos that Alaina has debunked in the past. None was found 
to have violated the rules.

TikTok says it works with accredited fact-checkers to "limit the spread 
of false or misleading climate information".

*Young and pessimistic*
Although it can take many forms (and is thus difficult to accurately 
measure), Alaina says doomism is particularly popular among young people.

"There's people who are climate activists and they're so scared. They 
want to make change, but they feel they need to spread fear-based 
content to do so," she says.

"Then there are people who know that fear in general goes viral, and 
they're just following trends, even if they don't necessarily understand 
the science."

I've watched several of the videos that she debunked. Invariably, they 
feature young users voicing despair about the future.

"Let me tell you why I don't know what I want to do with my life and why 
I'm not planning," says one young woman. "By the year 2050, most of us 
should be underwater from global warming." But that's a gross 
exaggeration of what climate scientists are actually telling us.

"A lot of that is often fatalistic humour, but people on TikTok are 
interpreting that as fact," Alaina says.

But is Charles still among them, after watching Alaina's debunks? Is he 
still a climate doomer?

"I would say no," he tells me. "I have convinced myself that we can get 
out of this."
https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-61495035



/[The news archive - looking back]/
/*May 24, 2006*/
May 24, 2006: "An Inconvenient Truth" is released in the United States. 
BoxOfficeGuru.com's Gitesh Pandya notes:

    "Setting the limited release box office on fire was the global
    warming documentary 'An Inconvenient Truth' which opened in only
    four theaters but grossed a hefty $367,311. That gave the Al Gore
    pic a stunning average of $91,827 per location over four days.
    Distributed by Paramount Vantage, the new incarnation of Paramount
    Classics, Truth collected $281,330 over the Friday-to-Sunday portion
    averaging a scorching $70,332. Total since Wednesday stands at
    $490,860. Opening this weekend on multiple screens at a pair of
    theaters in both New York and Los Angeles, Truth will add about 60
    more playdates on Friday and expand throughout June hoping to become
    the dominant doc of the summer."

(Al Gore and director Davis Guggenheim would appear on the June 2, 2006 
edition of "EcoTalk" on Air America to discuss the film.)

http://youtu.be/8ZUoYGAI5i0

http://www.boxofficeguru.com/052906.htm

http://blogsofbainbridge.typepad.com/ecotalkblog/2006/06/al_gore_about_a.html

http://blogsofbainbridge.typepad.com/ecotalkblog/2006/06/davis_guggenhei.html


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