[✔️] Jan 14, 2024 Global Warming News | weather views from our new planet, Divestment victory, Kerry moves on, Behavioral blamed, Map Lapham, 2009 Inhoff

[Richard Pauli]

/*January*//*14, 2024*/
/
[  video clips of early greetings from our new planet  ]/
*Maine under WATER Again ! Huge waves and flooding hit maine , new 
hampshire , USA.*
EARTH - EV
Jan 13, 2024  #Maine #flooding #usa
Maine under WATER Again ! Huge waves and flooding hit maine , new 
hampshire , USA.
massive waves hit portland maine and new hampshire again Maine saw 
record-breaking water levels in the state on  Saturday.
  As high-tide came in, towns and cities on Maine's coastline began to 
see historic flooding Many areas including Wells Portland and the 
Midcoast saw waves over 16 feet.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2UnMvLbkXk0

- -

/[ TV News of our predicament in one region, today ]/
*Extreme cold grips much of U.S.*
CBS Evening News
Jan 13, 2024
More than 30 million people are under winter weather advisories, with 
freezing temperatures expanding across the country this weekend. Charlie 
De Mar has the latest.

"CBS Evening News with Norah O'Donnell" delivers the latest news and 
original reporting, and goes beyond the headlines with context and 
depth. Catch the CBS Evening News every weekday night at 6:30 p.m. ET on 
the CBS Television Network and at 12 a.m. ET on the CBS News app.
Subscribe to the "CBS Evening News" YouTube channel: 
https://youtube.com/CBSEveningNews
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-bredbcyzQw

- -

/[ video clips of the new uncommon ]/
*01-13-2024 Hampton Beach, NH - Major Flooding - 14+ Feet Flood 
Stage-Powerful Winter Storm-High Tide*
Live Storms Media
Jan 13, 2024
***NOT FOR BROADCAST***
Contact Brett Adair with Live Storms Media to license.
brett at livestormsmedia.com
*AERIAL & GROUND WEATHER VIDEO* Major Flooding - 14+ Feet Flood Stage- 
Powerful Winter Storm - Hampton Beach, New Hampshire- High Tide (12:19 
PM 01-13-24).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PDPPQXFM8Q

/- -/

/[ more - from weather reporter ]/
*Storm surge, flooding cause major home damage in North Shore town*
WCVB Channel 5 Boston
Jan 13, 2024
Residents say major erosion from an overnight rain storm, along with 
tidal flooding and powerful waves, are undermining the structural 
integrity of their beachside homes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KaxrEI4Miyk/
/


/[ NYT - Opinion - activists prevail - a great divestment victory ]/
*Harvard and Other Schools Make a Choice on Fossil Fuels*
Oct. 2, 2021
By Naomi Oreskes and Sofia Andrade

Dr. Oreskes is a professor of the history of science at Harvard. Ms. 
Andrade is a sophomore at Harvard and an organizer with Fossil Fuel 
Divest Harvard.
This month, the University of Minnesota, Boston University and Harvard, 
our institution, announced that they’ll divest from the fossil fuel 
industry.

These decisions are the latest wins for both the planet and for activism 
against the industry most responsible for the climate crisis. The three 
universities join over 1,300 schools and institutions — including 
foundations, pension funds, institutional investors and others — that 
have divested or announced plans to divest, at least in part, from 
fossil fuels. In doing so, they have affirmed that continued investment 
in fossil fuels is neither financially responsible nor morally defensible.

The corporations that make up the fossil fuel industry know that these 
divestment decisions are catalysts for further action against their 
increasingly dangerous and irresponsible business models. As such, they 
have used their financial resources and outsize influence to undermine 
grass-roots climate movements, having deployed consulting apparatuses to 
generate complex anti-divestment schemes run through obscure websites 
and corporate influence campaigns.

Though the greater community at Harvard, for example, had been in favor 
of divestment — a faculty resolution in February of 2020 proved 
overwhelming support for divestment, as did the alumni majority that has 
elected four pro-divestment candidates to Harvard’s Board of Overseers 
since last year — Harvard didn’t listen.

Years of organizing went into persuading Harvard’s governing body to 
contend with its role in fueling climate change and the destruction of 
its students’ futures. That organizing included community rallies and 
demonstrations, a protest that led to arrests at the 2019 Harvard-Yale 
football game and a legal complaint challenging the school’s 
investments. Now Harvard, the oldest institution of higher learning in 
the United States and one of the world’s richest, will allow its current 
investments in the fossil fuel industry to expire. It will divest an 
estimated $838 million of its $42 billion endowment from fossil fuels 
and take the first step toward a just transition to a greener future.
Despite these recent victories, the fossil fuel industry shows no sign 
of relenting in its campaign against divestment. After Harvard’s 
announcement, the American Petroleum Institute stepped in to urge 
against divestment and to work with the industry on “tackling the 
climate challenge.” The Independent Petroleum Institute of America got 
to work making its own case against divestment. The industry seems 
unwilling — and perhaps unable — to change.

But the fact remains: Momentum is now against the fossil fuel 
disinformation and for divestment. Soon after Harvard’s announcement, 
the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis released a 
report that outlined how Harvard’s divestment can serve as a model for 
institutions globally.

Thirteen days after the Harvard announcement, the MacArthur Foundation 
announced that it would divest its $8 billion endowment. The next day, 
Boston University followed suit. The school had voted in 2016 to divest 
its holding of coal and tar sands; now it will divest from fossil fuels 
entirely, starting immediately. In making the announcement, Boston 
University’s president, Robert A. Brown, acknowledged the role of 
on-campus activism, saying, “Advocates here have been very influential” 
in talking with the school’s trustees “and swaying their opinion.” One 
of those trustees, Richard Reidy, said, “Divestment is one vehicle to 
hasten fossil fuel extractors to transition to renewable energy.”

The University of Minnesota said in a statement concerning its 
fossil-fuel-related investments, it “continues to work more closely to 
align its portfolios with mission-based objectives and priorities.”

Divestment isn’t a panacea for the climate crisis. But it is an 
important step in breaking the stranglehold that the fossil fuel 
industry has on politics, on economics and on the planet. The Harvard 
divestment decision reflects a broad recognition among students, 
faculty, alumni and other community members that the fossil fuel 
industry’s business model is incompatible with a just and stable future.

It is also incompatible with financial stability — a point Harvard’s 
president, Lawrence Bacow, acknowledged in a letter to the university 
community. “Given the need to decarbonize the economy and our 
responsibility as fiduciaries to make long-term investment decisions 
that support our teaching and research mission, we do not believe such 
investments are prudent,” he wrote. This, of course, was part of the 
argument that students and faculty had long been making.

Harvard’s divestment is a signal to other investors that as the planet 
burns, finance must not stand with the arsonists.

Some people will dismiss divestment as merely symbolic. Even if that 
were true, symbols matter. They signal our values and intentions. But 
divestment is more than that. Where investors put their money reflects 
their expectations of how the future will unfold, and those 
expectations, when acted upon, shape our future.

We are confident that Harvard’s example will inspire still more colleges 
and universities to invest in the future that their students — and all 
young people — deserve.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/02/opinion/divestment-fossil-fuels-harvard.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/02/opinion/divestment-fossil-fuels-harvard.html?unlocked_article_code=1.Nk0.X_FM.gAfBgoMU823w&smid=url-share



/[ Perhaps COP28 was not the best place for him ]/
*John Kerry Bows Out as U.S. Climate Envoy*
By Lisa Friedman
Jan. 13, 2024
John Kerry, President Biden’s special envoy for climate, plans to step 
down by spring, ending a three-year run in a major diplomatic role that 
was created especially for him and which will face an uncertain future 
with his departure.

Mr. Kerry, 80, has served as the president’s top diplomat on climate 
change since early 2021, working to cajole governments around the world 
to aggressively cut their planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions.

He led the U.S. negotiating team through three United Nations climate 
summits, reasserting American leadership after the country withdrew from 
the Paris climate agreement during the Trump administration. Mr. Kerry 
championed cooperation on global warming between the United States and 
China, the world’s two largest polluters, during times of tension.

On Wednesday, Mr. Kerry met with Mr. Biden in the White House to inform 
the president of his intention to resign, according to one person 
familiar with the meeting. On Saturday, his staff learned of his 
decision at a hastily arranged meeting, said the person, who asked to 
remain anonymous in order to discuss personnel matters...

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/13/climate/john-kerry-climate-envoy.html

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/13/climate/john-kerry-climate-envoy.html?unlocked_article_code=1.Nk0.vZGB.BEn4exero-h6&smid=url-share



/[  pay attention, discuss, retain, repeat, learn, devote and vote ]/
*Human ‘behavioural crisis’ at root of climate breakdown, say scientists*
New paper claims unless demand for resources is reduced, many other 
innovations are just a sticking plaster
Rachel Donald
Sat 13 Jan 2024
Record heat, record emissions, record fossil fuel consumption. One month 
out from Cop28, the world is further than ever from reaching its 
collective climate goals. At the root of all these problems, according 
to recent research, is the human “behavioural crisis”, a term coined by 
an interdisciplinary team of scientists.

“We’ve socially engineered ourselves the way we geoengineered the 
planet,” says Joseph Merz, lead author of a new paper which proposes 
that climate breakdown is a symptom of ecological overshoot, which in 
turn is caused by the deliberate exploitation of human behaviour.

“We need to become mindful of the way we’re being manipulated,” says 
Merz, who is co-founder of the Merz Institute, an organisation that 
researches the systemic causes of the climate crisis and how to tackle them.

Merz and colleagues believe that most climate “solutions” proposed so 
far only tackle symptoms rather than the root cause of the crisis. This, 
they say, leads to increasing levels of the three “levers” of overshoot: 
consumption, waste and population.

They claim that unless demand for resources is reduced, many other 
innovations are just a sticking plaster. “We can deal with climate 
change and worsen overshoot,” says Merz. “The material footprint of 
renewable energy is dangerously underdiscussed. These energy farms have 
to be rebuilt every few decades – they’re not going to solve the bigger 
problem unless we tackle demand.”

“Overshoot” refers to how many Earths human society is using up to 
sustain – or grow – itself. Humanity would currently need 1.7 Earths to 
maintain consumption of resources at a level the planet’s biocapacity 
can regenerate.

Where discussion of climate often centres on carbon emissions, a focus 
on overshoot highlights the materials usage, waste output and growth of 
human society, all of which affect the Earth’s biosphere.

“Essentially, overshoot is a crisis of human behaviour,” says Merz. “For 
decades we’ve been telling people to change their behaviour without 
saying: ‘Change your behaviour.’ We’ve been saying ‘be more green’ or 
‘fly less’, but meanwhile all of the things that drive behaviour have 
been pushing the other way. All of these subtle cues and not so subtle 
cues have literally been pushing the opposite direction – and we’ve been 
wondering why nothing’s changing.”
The paper explores how neuropsychology, social signalling and norms have 
been exploited to drive human behaviours which grow the economy, from 
consuming goods to having large families. The authors suggest that 
ancient drives to belong in a tribe or signal one’s status or attract a 
mate have been co-opted by marketing strategiesto create behaviours 
incompatible with a sustainable world.

“People are the victims – we have been exploited to the point we are in 
crisis. These tools are being used to drive us to extinction,” says the 
evolutionary behavioural ecologist and study co-author Phoebe Barnard. 
“Why not use them to build a genuinely sustainable world?”

Just one-quarter of the world population is responsible for nearly 
three-quarters of emissions. The authors suggest the best strategy to 
counter overshoot would be to use the tools of the marketing, media and 
entertainment industries in a campaign to redefine our 
material-intensive socially accepted norms.

“We’re talking about replacing what people are trying to signal, what 
they’re trying to say about themselves. Right now, our signals have a 
really high material footprint –our clothes are linked to status and 
wealth, their materials sourced from all over the world, shipped to 
south-east Asia most often and then shipped here, only to be replaced by 
next season’s trends. The things that humans can attach status to are so 
fluid, we could be replacing all of it with things that essentially have 
no material footprint – or even better, have an ecologically positive one.”
The Merz Institute runs an overshoot behaviour lab where they work on 
interventions to address overshoot. One of these identifies “behavioural 
influencers” such as screenwriters, web developers and algorithm 
engineers, all of whom are promoting certain social norms and could be 
working to rewire society relatively quickly and harmlessly by promoting 
a new set of behaviours.

The paper discusses the enormous success of the work of the Population 
Media Center, an initiative that creates mainstream entertainment to 
drive behaviour change on population growth and even gender violence. 
Fertility rates have declined in the countries in which the centre’s 
telenovelas and radionovelas have aired.

Population growth is a difficult topic to broach given the 
not-too-distant history of eugenics and ethnic cleansing practised in 
many nations around the world. However, Merz and colleagues insist it is 
important to confront the issue as population growth has cancelled out 
most climate gains from renewables and efficiency over the past three 
decades.

“It’s a question of women’s liberation, frankly,” says Barnard. “Higher 
levels of education lead to lower fertility rates. Who could possibly 
claim to be against educating girls – and if they are, why?”

The team calls for more interdisciplinary research into what they have 
dubbed the “human behavioural crisis” and concerted efforts to redefine 
our social norms and desires that are driving overconsumption. When 
asked about the ethics of such a campaign, Merz and Barnard point out 
that corporations fight for consumers’ attention every second of every day.

“Is it ethical to exploit our psychology to benefit an economic system 
destroying the planet?” asks Barnard. “Creativity and innovation are 
driving overconsumption. The system is driving us to suicide. It’s 
conquest, entitlement, misogyny, arrogance and it comes in a fetid 
package driving us to the abyss.”

The team is adamant that solutions that do not tackle the underlying 
drivers of our growth-based economies will only exacerbate the overshoot 
crisis.

“Everything we know and love is at stake,” says Barnard. “A habitable 
planet and a peaceful civilisation both have value, and we need to be 
conscious about using tools in ethical and justice-based ways. This is 
not just about humanity. This is about every other species on this 
planet. This is about the future generations.”

“I do get frustrated that people sit in paralysis thinking, what do I 
do? Or what must we do? There are moral hazards everywhere. We have to 
choose how to intervene to keep us working on a path forward as 
humanity, because everything right now is set up to strip us of our 
humanity.”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/jan/13/human-behavioural-crisis-at-root-of-climate-breakdown-say-scientists



/[ Simpler times - a magazine draws a MAP ]/
*Power Before Petroleum*
Wind, bones, and other historical energy sources
https://www.laphamsquarterly.org/energy/maps/power-petroleum
see also https://www.laphamsquarterly.org/energy



/[The news archive - resetting history by Keith Olberman ]/
/*January 14, 2009 */
January 14, 2009: MSNBC host Keith Olbermann denounces Senator James 
Inhofe (R-OK) for his rhetorical assault on former EPA Administrator 
Carol Browner:

"But our winner, climate change denier Senator James Inhofe of Oklahoma, 
desperate to capsize the incoming energy and climate adviser, Carol 
Browner, branding her a secret socialist.  Sounds like a Christmas 
thing, secret socialist.  And saying, 'There is another organization 
that a lot of people don‘t realize.  It‘s called the Center for American 
Progress.  This report that came out, this is the group that is trying 
for the Fairness Doctrine, trying to, I think, dramatically upend the 
First Amendment.  She, Carol Browner, was a member of that group.'

"As he fulminated, Senator Inhofe even held up a copy of a Center for 
American Progress report called 'The Structural Imbalance of Political 
Talk Radio.'  There's only one problem: in that report, the Center for 
American Progress specifically concludes, quote, 'There is no need to 
return to the fairness doctrine.  Increasing ownership diversity will 
lead to more diverse programming.'

"So Senator, thanks for pointing out that Carol Browner belongs to a 
group that specifically opposes reinstating the Fairness Doctrine you‘re 
so scared of.  Senator James 'Maybe next time I‘ll remember to read the 
damn thing first' Inhofe, today‘s worst person in the world!"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k0tbsps_KOA#t=73


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