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<i><font size="+1"><b>May 19, 2020</b></font></i><br>
<br>
[Pipeline news]<br>
<b>New York Rejects Keystone-Like Pipeline in Fierce Battle Over the
State's Energy Future</b><br>
Regulators denied an application for a $1 billion natural gas
pipeline that environmentalists said would set back the fight
against climate change...<br>
- - <br>
"The state has made it clear that dangerous gas pipelines have no
place in New York," Kimberly Ong, a senior attorney at the Natural
Resources Defense Council, said. "We will continue to ensure this
reckless project is shelved forever."<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/15/nyregion/williams-pipeline-gas-energy.html">https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/15/nyregion/williams-pipeline-gas-energy.html</a><br>
<br>
<p><br>
</p>
[NYTimes says]<br>
<b>Climate Change Is Making Hurricanes Stronger, Researchers Find</b><br>
An analysis of satellite imagery from the past four decades suggests
that global warming has increased the chances of storms reaching
Category 3 or higher...<br>
- -<br>
"From a short time scale, these trends are not going to change the
risk landscape," Dr. Kossin said. But over the long term, he said,
"the risk landscape could change, and in a bad way, not in a good
way."<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/18/climate/climate-changes-hurricane-intensity.html">https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/18/climate/climate-changes-hurricane-intensity.html</a><br>
<p><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
[Australia in crisis - video overview]<br>
<b>Climate Wars: How brutal politics derailed climate policy in
Australia | Four Corners</b><br>
ABC News In-depth - May 18, 2020<br>
For more than 30 years, Australian politics has been grappling with
climate change and the nation's most senior public servants have
been there through it all. <br>
<br>
In Canberra's corridors of power, the nation's most senior public
servants have been there through it all. Usually, they keep their
thoughts private, rarely making a foray into public debate, even in
retirement. <br>
<br>
Now, after the devastating "black summer" fire season, the former
heads of the Office of Prime Minister and Cabinet and the Department
of the Treasury, along with former chief scientists, have decided
they can no longer stay silent.<br>
<br>
They believe there has been a colossal failure by politicians of all
stripes to comprehensively tackle climate change.<br>
Read more: <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://ab.co/36aFVi0">https://ab.co/36aFVi0</a> <br>
Play video <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTkRFK46UT0">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTkRFK46UT0</a><br>
<p>- - -<br>
</p>
[Aussie anger]<br>
<b>Australia's most senior former public servants and scientists
reveal their anger about climate policy failure</b><br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-05-18/four-corners-climate-change-public-servants-reveal-anger/12235180">https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-05-18/four-corners-climate-change-public-servants-reveal-anger/12235180</a><br>
<p>- - -<br>
</p>
[Radio Ecoshock]<br>
<b>Burning At The End Of The World--Australia catastrophic
fires--Greg Mullins--Radio Ecoshock 2019-10-02</b><br>
May 18, 2020<br>
Stop Fossil Fuels<br>
Massive wild fires have appeared on every Continent except
Antarctica. Now it is hitting Australia even at the end of winter
there. With temperatures about 10C--over 20 degrees Fahrenheit above
normal--over 130 bush fires were crackling over Australia in early
September. A veteran Australian fire expert warns climate change
makes the risk much worse, and it may break down the country's fire
defense system. And now strangely, a change high above Antarctica
makes this year's fire season even more ominous.<br>
<br>
We have reached Greg Mullins, former commissioner of Fire and Rescue
for New South Wales for 13 years until his retirement in 2017. Greg
has represented Australia for groups of Asian Fire Chiefs and the
United Nations. He currently sits on the Climate Council, the
publicly-funded climate watchdog.<br>
<br>
Australia has a history of fires going back to aboriginal times. I'm
thinking of the Ash Wednesday fires in February 1983 that killed 47,
and the Black Saturday Bushfires that killed 173 people in Victoria
in 2008. What is changing now? Every year has become super dangerous
for wildfires. Climate has changed the game.<br>
<br>
Show by Radio Ecoshock, reposted under CC License. Episode details
at <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.ecoshock.org/2019/10/burn">https://www.ecoshock.org/2019/10/burn</a>...<br>
<br>
Stop Fossil Fuels researches and disseminates effective strategies
and tactics to halt fossil fuel combustion as fast as possible.
Learn more at <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://stopfossilfuels.org">https://stopfossilfuels.org</a><br>
<br>
<b>SHOW NOTES</b><br>
Greg warns that Australia's method of sharing fire-fighters and
equipment could break down. There used to be a succession of fire
seasons across that large continent, so each state could share
equipment and fire fighters. Now there can be concurrent fires,
meaning there is less to share.<br>
<br>
I see that danger becoming international. We had firefighters from
Australia and New Zealand come here to British Columbia to help
fight our massive wildfires. It was out of season for Australian men
and women who battle these beasts. But now places like California
say "fire season" is all year long. Maybe as the season extends even
in Australia, the international sharing will end too and everybody
will be on their own?<br>
<br>
Greg says that is already happening. Australia has very few large
fire fighting aircraft, like 737 size planes. They were always able
to get more from California during winter in the Northern
Hemisphere. But now fire season can last all year in California,
those planes are no longer always available. Australia just bought a
737 to fight fires, but still doesn't have enough if a super fire
season erupts in several parts of the country.<br>
<br>
<b>THE "BIG DRY" IN AUSTRALIA</b><br>
Australia is in yet another drought. Some dams in new South Wales
have almost run dry this year. Winter rainfall was dismally low.
Towns may run out of water. Water is in such short supply, in some
areas fire fighters have to let a home burn because that town cannot
spare that much water.<br>
<br>
When the Murray Darling river system was hit with low water, it
became a question of water for the City of Adelaide or for farmers
upstream. The change in rainfall is likely due to the Polar Vortex
winds tightening around Antarctica, meaning less rain for Australia.<br>
<br>
<b>SUDDEN STRATOSPHERIC WARMING OVER ANTARCTICA HEATS UP FIRE SEASON
IN AUSTRALIA</b><br>
A "sudden stratospheric warming" just popped up over Antarctica. My
basic understanding is this means the very cold stratosphere rapidly
warms up a few degrees. That happens now and then over the North
Pole, but rarely over the South Pole. The only other instance
scientists can confirm happened over Antarctica in 2002. The
Australian Bureau of Meteorology is predicting this will be the
strongest warming of Antarctica on record. Greg discusses the impact
on Australian weather.<br>
<br>
A "triple-whammy" is hurting Australia right now. Added to changes
in Polar winds, and the stratosphere, there is another cycle over
the Indian Ocean that is also in a phase which tends to reduce
rain-bearing winds over Australia.<br>
<br>
<b>IGNITION</b><br>
But even ideal burning conditions don't necessarily add up to a
catastrophic fire year. An ignition source is needed. Yes there are
cases of arson in Australia torching the bush, as there are in
Canada and most countries. But farmers are also to blame, being slow
to adapt to a changed climate. Where it was fine for their
forefathers to burn off fields or scrub bush at certain times of
year, that is no longer safe because the fire season has extended.
Some agricultural fires get away into the bush with terrible
results.<br>
<br>
Greg Mullins also tells us that the amount of lightning has
increased as well. That is what set ancient rainforests in the
Australian island of Tasmania ablaze in recent years. Those forests
had not burned for more than thousand years. Those trees are not
adapted to fire as some forests are in other parts of Australia.
When they burn they are gone for a long time. Even fire-adapted tree
species can be wiped out if the fires keep coming back too soon--as
they are!<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DJAON1Gen6Q">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DJAON1Gen6Q</a><br>
<p>- - -</p>
[Classic data display from Australia]<br>
<b>See how global warming has changed the world since your childhood</b><br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-12-06/how-climate-change-has-impacted-your-life/11766018?nw=0">https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-12-06/how-climate-change-has-impacted-your-life/11766018?nw=0</a><br>
<p><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
[US Military thinking]<br>
<b>Climate Change Didn't Pause for COVID-19: Implications for
Military Readiness</b><br>
As COVID-19 continues to hammer the nation, approximately 61,900
Department of Defense (DoD) personnel (45,600 of which are made up
of National Guard) have been called on to support the national
response.<br>
<br>
"With COVID-19, it's like we have 54 different hurricanes hitting
every state, every territory, and the District of Columbia -- some
are Category 5, some are Category 3, and some are Category 1," Gen.
Joseph Lengyel, Chief of the National Guard Bureau, said in a recent
statement.<br>
<br>
But its more than that – not only is DoD supporting the response to
the "54 different hurricanes," but they are fighting the pandemic
internally as it begins to degrade readiness from impacts on the
pipeline for new recruits to delays in deployments, pauses in
training, and cancelation of major exercises.<br>
<br>
And so the perfect storm begins to brew as COVID 19 collides with
the existing readiness impacts on the Department of Defense (DoD)
from the bruising impact of severe weather events, sea level rise,
flooding, and wildfires fueled by climate change...<br>
- -<br>
The entrance of COVID 19 onto the stage has compounded and
accelerated the existing impacts on readiness from climate change.
In and of itself, COVID-19 has brought challenges to deployments and
training throughout DoD. The Marines have been especially hard hit
from the cascading disasters brought about by this collision that is
accelerating existing and future readiness vulnerabilities. Already
forced to make difficult funding decisions between "near-term
readiness and long-term modernization efforts" of their
installations, which serve as their warfighting platforms for combat
readiness, Hurricane Florence plummeted Marine Corps Base Camp
Lejeune in 2018, which houses a third of the Corps' combat operating
power, which caused $3.6 billion in damages from massive flooding
and beach erosion damaging 913 military structures to include
training facilities and significantly impacting training and
deployments. "When you are not able to train as hard and as long…to
maintain a substantial training level …that's a risk" said General
Robert Neller, former Commandant of the Marine Corps in his
testimony before Congress in December 2018. Only $400 million was
received from Congress in 2019 and the Marines are still trying to
recover while staring into the face of a severe 2020 hurricane
season by the predicted the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration similar to that which gave rise to Superstorm Sandy.<br>
<br>
At the same time, the Marines, along with their sister Services,
have experiencing readiness challenges from COVID-19 as the
pandemic impacts the new recruit pipeline and large scale exercises
in Europe, the Artic, and the Pacific while the Chinese are using
this as an opportunity for more aggressive behavior in the South
China Sea...<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://climateandsecurity.org/2020/05/18/climate-change-didnt-pause-for-covid-19-implications-for-military-readiness/">https://climateandsecurity.org/2020/05/18/climate-change-didnt-pause-for-covid-19-implications-for-military-readiness/</a><br>
<p><br>
</p>
<br>
[Just have a think - video]<br>
<b>Is Germany sustainable?</b><br>
May 17, 2020<br>
Just Have a Think<br>
Wind power now dominates Germany's electricity sector, but the
country also still burns millions of tonnes of coal every year. So
what is Chancellor Merkel's plan for a genuinely sustainable future
at the heart of Europe?<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XhPSSjI9jJU">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XhPSSjI9jJU</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 -
May 19, 2008 </b></font><br>
The Guardian reports:<br>
<blockquote> "A shareholder revolt at ExxonMobil led by the
billionaire Rockefeller family has won the support of four
significant British institutional investors who will call on
Monday for a shakeup in the governance of the world's biggest oil
company.<br>
<br>
"Guardian.co.uk has learned that F&C Asset Management, Morley
Fund Management, the Co-Operative Insurance Society and the West
Midlands Pension Fund are throwing their weight behind a
resolution demanding that ExxonMobil appoints an independent
chairman to stimulate debate on the company's board.<br>
<br>
"Exxon is facing a rebellion from its investors over its hardline
approach to global warming. The firm has refused to follow rival
oil companies in committing large-scale capital investment to
environmentally friendly technology such as wind and solar power.<br>
<br>
"The Rockefeller dynasty, whose ancestor John D. Rockefeller
founded the original oil business at the core of ExxonMobil, have
sponsored four shareholder resolutions demanding changes at Exxon.
One of these calls on Exxon's chief executive Rex Tillerson, to
relinquish his role as chairman in favour of an outsider to bring
in an alternative point of view."<br>
</blockquote>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="http://www.theguardian.com/business/2008/may/19/exxonmobil.oil">http://www.theguardian.com/business/2008/may/19/exxonmobil.oil</a>
<br>
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