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<i><font size="+1"><b>April 1, 2020</b></font></i><br>
<br>
[PBS video explains]<br>
<b>Why Trump wants to relax automotive fuel efficiency standards now</b><br>
Mar 31, 2020<br>
PBS NewsHour<br>
The Trump administration wants to roll back another federal
regulation intended to reduce global warming. Obama-era automobile
fuel efficiency rules require U.S. vehicles to increase mileage
standards by an average of 5 percent per year from 2021 through
2026. Tuesday's move would reduce the improvement threshold to 1.5
percent. The Washington Post's Juliet Eilperin joins John Yang to
discuss.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPe7Y6HdkzQ">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPe7Y6HdkzQ</a><br>
<br>
<br>
[Yale says]<br>
<b>Aggressive action to address climate change could save the world
$145 trillion</b><br>
Climate solutions are expensive investments in the short run but
will yield huge long-term savings, according to new research by
Project Drawdown.<br>
<br>
A respected research group, Project Drawdown, finds that deploying
solutions consistent with meeting the Paris climate targets would
cost tens of trillions of dollars globally. But crucially, those
outlays would also yield long-term savings many times larger than
the up-front costs.<br>
<br>
The new 2020 Drawdown Review includes economic estimates of the
capital costs to deploy each solution, net lifetime operation costs,
and lifetime profits from the sale of products produced by the
agricultural solutions. The key conclusion is that while the upfront
costs are substantial - around $25 trillion globally - the resulting
savings and profits are five to six times larger.<br>
<br>
Project Drawdown is a nonprofit organization that evaluates climate
solutions nations could deploy to reach the point where greenhouse
gas levels in the atmosphere begin to decline (the threshold of
carbon "drawdown"). Achieving drawdown will require phasing out the
use of fossil fuels that add carbon and strengthening the natural
sinks that absorb carbon. In 2017, the group published the New York
Times bestselling book Drawdown, which described the 100 most
substantive solutions to global warming based on a comprehensive
scientific review by the project's research team.<br>
<br>
The new Drawdown Review considers two potential pathways. Scenario 1
envisions how climate solutions could be deployed to meet the Paris
target of staying below 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit)
hotter than pre-industrial temperatures, in which the point of
carbon drawdown is reached in the mid-2060s. Scenario 2 is more
ambitious, keeping global temperatures below the aspirational Paris
target of 1.5 degrees C (2.7 degrees F) by achieving carbon drawdown
in the mid-2040s. In the more aggressive Scenario 2, global economic
savings are $145 trillion, with an additional $29 trillion in
profits generated from the agricultural sector - the latter on its
own offsetting the initial $28 trillion capital costs. Both the
Scenario 1 and 2 savings estimates are calculated over the life
times of the solutions.<br>
<br>
Better public health savings not factored in<br>
Without even accounting for the many trillions of dollars saved by
improving public health and avoiding climate damages, the
researchers estimate that keeping global temperatures below the 1.5
degrees C target would result in a global net economic savings of
$145 trillion.<br>
<br>
In a few cases, the savings come almost immediately. For example,
LEDs may cost more than the less efficient light bulbs they replace,
but because they last so much longer, buying an LED is cheaper than
repeatedly replacing equivalent shorter-lived bulbs. The Drawdown
Review estimates that replacing older lighting technologies with LED
bulbs would save $2 trillion dollars globally in capital costs, plus
another $5 trillion in the long term as a result of improved energy
efficiency.<br>
<br>
Most of the other climate solutions in the Drawdown Review have
significant capital costs that are more than offset by lifetime use
savings and/or profits. Solar panels and wind turbines, for example,
have much lower operation and maintenance costs than the fossil fuel
power plants they replace. As a result, the Drawdown Review
estimates that over their lifetimes, the onshore wind turbines and
utility-scale solar panels deployed in Scenario 2 would save $8.5
trillion and $28 trillion globally, respectively, along with another
$13 trillion saved by distributed solar panels (e.g. installed on
building roofs). Some of the other most cost-effective solutions
include improving building insulation, which would save another $23
trillion by increasing energy efficiency, and electric cars, which
would save $16 trillion by replacing less efficient gasoline-powered
vehicles.<br>
<br>
Much of the difference between the two Drawdown Review scenarios
boils down to the speed at which wind and solar energy are deployed.
In the more aggressive Scenario 2, onshore wind turbines and
utility-scale photovoltaic panels are the two largest sources of
reduced carbon emissions. This scenario envisions the share of
global electricity from wind increasing sixfold, from 4.4% today to
27% by 2050, and solar farms exploding from just over 1% today to
25% in 2050. In Scenario 1, each would supply about 20% of global
electricity by 2050.<br>
<br>
No single 'silver bullet' solution to climate change<br>
Some of the other top climate solutions in the Drawdown Review may
come as a surprise to some. They include reducing food waste,
improving health and education, eating plant-rich diets, refrigerant
management, and tropical forest restoration...<br>
- - <br>
The diversity of the Project Drawdown solutions makes clear that
there is no "silver bullet" to solve the climate crisis - only
silver buckshot. Even the biggest individual solutions like onshore
wind turbines contribute less than 10% to the overall carbon
reductions in the Drawdown scenarios. That's why Drawdown evaluates
100 different solutions.<br>
<br>
The good news is that these studies show that climate solutions are
investments with a high rate of return. And if the world makes those
investments, the Paris targets could still be within reach.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.yaleclimateconnections.org/2020/03/aggressive-action-to-address-climate-change-could-save-the-world-145-trillion/">https://www.yaleclimateconnections.org/2020/03/aggressive-action-to-address-climate-change-could-save-the-world-145-trillion/</a><br>
<br>
<br>
[Human caused CO2 nicely explained in a brief video]<br>
<b>"It's Us"</b><br>
Apr 9, 2012<br>
Earth: The Operators' Manual<br>
The chemistry of the added CO2 reveals its source: it's humans
burning fossil fuels, and not volcanoes or the ocean.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://youtu.be/-PrrTk6DqzE">https://youtu.be/-PrrTk6DqzE</a><br>
<br>
<br>
[Opinion]<br>
<b>This Land of Denial and Death</b><br>
Covid-19 and the dark side of American exceptionalism.<br>
By Paul Krugman<br>
- - -<br>
About denial: Epidemiologists trying to get a handle on the
coronavirus threat appear to have been caught off guard by the
immediate politicization of their work, the claims that they were
perpetrating a hoax designed to hurt Trump, or promote socialism, or
something. But they should have expected that reaction, since
climate scientists have faced the same accusations for years.<br>
<br>
And while climate-change denial is a worldwide phenomenon, its
epicenter is clearly here in America: Republicans are the world's
only major climate-denialist party.<br>
Nor is climate science the only thing they reject; not one of the
candidates contending for the G.O.P.'s 2016 nomination was willing
to endorse the theory of evolution.<br>
<br>
What lies behind Republican science denial? The answer seems to be a
combination of fealty to special interests and fealty to evangelical
Christian leaders like Jerry Falwell Jr., who dismissed the
coronavirus as a plot against Trump, then reopened his university
despite health officials' warnings, and seems to have created his
own personal viral hot spot.<br>
<br>
The point, in any case, is that decades of science denial on
multiple fronts set the stage for the virus denial that paralyzed
U.S. policy during the crucial early weeks of the current pandemic.<br>
<br>
About death: I still sometimes encounter people convinced that
America has the world's highest life expectancy. After all, aren't
we the world's greatest nation? In fact, we have the lowest life
expectancy among advanced countries, and the gap has been steadily
widening for decades.<br>
<br>
This widening gap, in turn, surely reflects both America's unique
lack of universal health insurance and its equally unique surge in
"deaths of despair" -- deaths from drugs, alcohol and suicide --
among working-class whites who have seen economic opportunities
disappear.<br>
<br>
Is there a link between the hundreds of thousands of excess deaths
we suffer every year compared with other rich countries and the tens
of thousands of additional excess deaths we're about to suffer from
the coronavirus? The answer is surely yes.<br>
<br>
In particular, when we conduct a post-mortem on this pandemic -- a
stock phrase that, in this case, isn't a metaphor -- we'll probably
find that the same hostility to government that routinely undermines
efforts to help Americans in need played a crucial role in slowing
an effective response to the current crisis.<br>
What about the larger picture? Is there a link between the uniquely
American prevalence of science denial and America's uniquely high
mortality? To be honest, I'm still trying to figure this out.<br>
<br>
One possible story is that the U.S. political landscape gives
special power to the anti-science religious right, which has lent
its support to anti-government politicians. But I'm not sure whether
this is the whole story, and the power of people like Falwell is
itself a phenomenon that demands explanation.<br>
<br>
In any case, the point is that while America is a great nation with
a glorious history and much to be proud of -- I consider myself very
much a patriot -- the rise of the hard right has, as I said, also
turned it into a land of denial and death. This transformation has
been taking place gradually over the past few decades; it's just
that now we're watching the consequences on fast forward.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/30/opinion/republicans-science-coronavirus.html">https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/30/opinion/republicans-science-coronavirus.html</a><br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
[Digging back into the internet news archive]<br>
<font size="+1"><b>On this day in the history of global warming -
April 1, 2009 </b></font><br>
<br>
MSNBC's Keith Olbermann takes it to House Minority Leader John
Boehner (R-OH):<br>
<br>
"But our winner, House Minority Leader John Boehner of Ohio. We
assume that when it comes to politicians and math there is going to
be some lying. But lying to the tune of 140 times the truth?
Boehner's criticism of the Obama's proposals on cap and trade,
making energy in this country as green as possible, includes this
statement: 'anyone who has the audacity to flip on a light switch
will be forced to pay higher energy bills thanks to this new tax
increase, which will cost every American family up to $3,100 per
year in higher energy prices.'<br>
<br>
"That is true if your family is a large one, say 101 people.
Boehner has taken a research study done two years ago at MIT on the
affect of cap and trade on energy prices and he has lied about it.
The number in the study was not up to $3,100 per family. It was up
to $31 per person. And even that would not kick in until 2015. <br>
<br>
"So the average additional cost per family six years from now would
be 79 bucks, minus however much foreign gas prices would drop based
on decreased demand, and minus the lowered health care, because of
the cleaner atmosphere. Thirty one bucks, 3,100 bucks, it's all the
same to Congressman John "The Mathlete" Boehner, today's worst
person in the world."<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.nbcnews.com/id/30012135/#.Uoq1MSeHPs0">http://www.nbcnews.com/id/30012135/#.Uoq1MSeHPs0</a><br>
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