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<p><i><font size="+1"><b>July 30, 2020</b></font></i></p>
[video - fresh, new notion]<br>
<b>How energy storage will kill fossil fuel.</b><br>
Jul 26, 2020<br>
Just Have a Think<br>
Utility scale batteries have been dismissed by some as no more than
a useful bolt-on to our existing electricity grids to help with a
little bit of demand stabilisation here and there. But dramatic cost
reductions, improved efficiencies, and a plethora of new innovations
in how to store energy that can be delivered into the grid over long
durations have all contributed towards a rapidly changing market
that look <br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DFKxoD_a3k">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DFKxoD_a3k</a><br>
<p><br>
</p>
<br>
[learning how to push change]<br>
<b>Coronavirus shows how to get people to act on climate change -
here's the psychology</b><br>
July 29, 2020<br>
Climate change and COVID-19 are the two most significant crises
faced by the modern world - and widespread behaviour change is
essential to cope with both. This means that official messaging by
government and other authorities is critical. To succeed, leaders
need to communicate the severe threat effectively and elicit high
levels of public compliance, without causing undue panic.<br>
<br>
But the extent to which people comply depends on their psychological
filters when receiving the messages - as the coronavirus pandemic
has shown.<br>
<br>
With COVID-19, the early messaging attempted to circumscribe the
nature of the threat. In March, the WHO announced that: "COVID-19
impacts the elderly and those with pre-existing health conditions
most severely." Similar statements were made by the UK government.<br>
<br>
A reasonable interpretation of this would be that the virus does not
"affect" young people. But as new clinical data came in, this
message was changed to emphasise that the virus could affect people
of all ages and doesn't discriminate.<br>
<br>
But human beings are not necessarily entirely rational in terms of
processing information. Experimental psychology has uncovered many
situations where our reasoning is, in fact, limited or biased.<br>
<br>
For example, a mental process called the "affect heuristic" allows
us to make decisions and solve problems quickly and (often)
efficiently, but based on our feelings rather than logic. The bias
has been shown to influence both judgements of risk and behaviour.
For COVID-19, the official messaging would have established a less
negative reaction in young people compared to older people. This
would have made them more likely to take more risks - even when new
authoritative data about the actual risks came in. Researchers call
this "psychophysical numbing".<br>
<br>
Another mental obstacle is confirmation bias. This makes us blind to
data that disagrees with our beliefs, making us overly attentive to
messages that agree with them. It influences (among other things)
automatic visual attention to certain aspects of messages. In other
words, if you are young, you may, without any conscious awareness,
pay little visual attention to the news that the virus is serious
for people of all ages.<br>
<br>
The initial positive message for young people also created an
"optimism bias". This bias is very powerful - we know of various
brain mechanisms that can ensure that a positive mood persists. One
study found that people tend to have a reduced level of neural
coding of more negative than anticipated information (in comparison
with more positive than anticipated information) in a critical
region of the prefrontal cortex, which is involved in decision
making. This means that we tend to miss the incoming bad news and,
even if we don't, we hardly process it.<br>
<br>
All of these biases affect our behaviour, and there is clear
evidence that young people were more likely to fail to comply with
the government's directives about COVID-19. A survey conducted on
March 30 by polling firm Ipsos MORI found that nearly twice as many
16-24 year-olds had low or limited concern about COVID-19 compared
with adults who were 55 or older. The younger group was also four
times as likely as older adults to ignore government advice.<br>
<br>
Lessons for climate change<br>
Our own research has shown that significant cognitive biases also
operate with messaging about climate change. One is confirmation
bias - those who don't believe that climate change is a real threat
simply don't take in messages saying that it is.<br>
<br>
What's more, unlike coronavirus messages, most climate change
messages inadvertently accentuate what we call "temporal" and
"spatial" biases. The UK government campaign "Act on CO2" used
images of adults reading bedtime stories to children, which implied
that that the real threat of climate change will present itself in
the future - a temporal bias.<br>
<br>
Other campaigns have used the perennial polar bear in the associated
images, which strengthens spatial bias - polar bears are in a
different geographical location (to most of us). These messages
therefore allow for a high degree of optimism bias - with people
thinking that climate change won't affect them and their own lives.<br>
<br>
Research using eye-tracking to analyse how they process climate
change messages demonstrates the effects of such biases. For
example, optimistic people tend to fix their gaze on the more
"positive" aspects of climate change messages (especially any
mentions of disputes about the underlying science - there is less to
worry about if the science isn't definitive).<br>
<br>
These gaze fixations can also affect what you remember from such
messages and how vulnerable they make you feel. If you don't think
that climate change will affect you personally, the affect heuristic
will not be guiding you directly to appropriate remedial action.<br>
<br>
To make climate change messages more effective, we need to target
these cognitive biases. To prevent temporal and spatial biases, for
example, we need a clear message as to why climate change is bad for
individuals in their own lives in the here and now (establishing an
appropriate affect heuristic).<br>
<br>
And to prevent optimism bias, we also need to avoid presenting "both
sides of the argument" in the messaging - the science tells us that
there's only one side. There also needs to be a clear argument as to
why recommended, sustainable behaviours will work (establishing a
different sort of confirmation bias).<br>
<br>
We also need everyone to get the message, not just some groups -
that's an important lesson from COVID-19. There can be no (apparent)
exceptions when it comes to climate change.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="https://theconversation.com/coronavirus-shows-how-to-get-people-to-act-on-climate-change-heres-the-psychology-143300">https://theconversation.com/coronavirus-shows-how-to-get-people-to-act-on-climate-change-heres-the-psychology-143300</a><br>
<br>
<p><br>
</p>
[vote and climate - video]<br>
<b>Climate One TV: The 2020 Election and Will Climate Matter</b><br>
Jul 29, 2020<br>
Climate One<br>
Racism, police and the pandemic are dominating hearts and headlines,
but will they translate to votes in national and regional elections?
One study found wavering Trump voters rank immigration and climate
change as top reasons for a possible vote change, but it's unclear
if that will materialize. Other studies contend climate doesn't even
rank on the minds of swing voters. Young, liberal Americans are
leading the charge on climate, but Bernie Sanders learned they are
more likely to protest than vote. <br>
<br>
What issues are top of mind for Obama-Trump voters in swing states?
How will the Coronavirus and racial justice crises of 2020 impact
voters this cycle? A conversation about power in the elections with
Tiffany Cross, author of Say It Louder! Black Voters, White
Narratives, and Saving Our Democracy, Rick Wilson, Republican
political strategist, and Rich Thau, who is leading focus groups
with swing voters in key states.<br>
<br>
After a fleeting moment atop the national political agenda last
year, climate change has been eclipsed by the global pandemic. A
recent poll from Yale found that public engagement on climate change
is at or near historic levels. But will that matter when people
vote? The Environmental Voter Project asserts that many people who
say they care about climate and the environment don't actually cast
ballots. Further, when talking to pollsters they lie and say they
did vote.<br>
How will mainstream media cover climate in national and regional
elections? Will President Trump's stance on climate hurt Republicans
in down-ballot races? Do Joe Biden's policy positions on climate
really matter?<br>
<br>
Join us with Vannessa Hauc, journalist and senior correspondent at
Noticias Telemundo, Jeff Nesbit, executive director at Climate
Nexus, and Nathaniel Stinnett, founder and executive director of the
Environmental Voter Project, for a conversation on climate coverage
in the race for the presidency.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8PdZTxQrJi0">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8PdZTxQrJi0</a><br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="https://www.youtube.com/user/ClimateOne/videos">https://www.youtube.com/user/ClimateOne/videos</a><br>
#lets<b>talk</b>climate<br>
<p><br>
</p>
<br>
[video lectures on Methane]<br>
<b>Global Methane Budget: The Devil is Always in the Details</b><br>
Jul 28, 2020<br>
Paul Beckwith<br>
For the 2008-2017 decade global methane emissions are estimated from
the Top-Down method to be 576 Tg CH4 per year, 60% from
anthropogenic sources and the rest from natural sources. Bottom-Up
methods suggest numbers 30% higher. Two-thirds of the emissions are
from tropical regions (below latitude 30N), with about one-third
from low latitudes (30N to 60N) with only about 4% being from high
northern latitudes (60-90N). Global emissions have increased by
about 10% in the last two decades, with present levels 2.6x their
preindustrial level. It is thought that the main OH sink has not
changed much.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8zXDUY5EvI">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8zXDUY5EvI</a><br>
<br>
<br>
- - <br>
[Methane continued]<br>
<b>Everything you Wanted to Know About Atmospheric Methane Sources
and Sinks and Forcings</b><br>
Jul 28, 2020<br>
Paul Beckwith<br>
The "chemical lifetime" of methane in the atmosphere is 9 years; due
to reaction with hydroxide molecules (OH) producing CO2 and water
vapour. OH radicals have a very short atmospheric lifetime (about
one second), so the methane destruction varies with the spatial and
altitude distribution of the OH and methane. Methane is also broken
down by chlorine atoms and oxygen atoms (latter often derived from
ozone breakdown). While 90% of atmospheric methane removal is by
these chemical reactions, about 10% of atmospheric methane is
removed by soils, and subsequent methanotrophic breakdown.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8_NTflddjU">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8_NTflddjU</a><br>
<p><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
[e-mailing]<br>
<b>The New Yorker - The Climate Crisis</b><br>
Amy Davidson Sorkin s Newsletter<br>
"The pandemic shows us above all, I think, that twenty-first-century
survival depends on an ability to handle chaos: that our political
leaders, and our other institutions, have to devote themselves as
never before to humane competence. And, as this summer's racial
reckoning should remind us, the pain that's coming needs to be
distributed far more fairly. We're fast running out of margin. The
ability of political systems to respond to extreme stress can't be
predicted as numerically as the response of physical systems to
extra carbon, but it will be measured, as with COVID-19, in deaths.
Just on a much larger scale."<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="https://link.newyorker.com/view/5e4f6ed6954fcf61233b06c1cj6eg.c8g/7a425626">https://link.newyorker.com/view/5e4f6ed6954fcf61233b06c1cj6eg.c8g/7a425626</a><br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="https://www.newyorker.com/newsletter/sorkin">https://www.newyorker.com/newsletter/sorkin</a><br>
<p><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
[actions today affect tomorrow]<br>
<b>How hot will it get? Earth's Climate Sensitivity</b><br>
Jul 24, 2020<br>
ClimateAdam<br>
How much will global warming warm the globe? And why is this such a
fiddly question to answer? In a new study, a team of 25 researchers
have managed to home in on a temperature. But ultimately Earth's
future depends on our decisions today.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7tMAkhQCJ48">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7tMAkhQCJ48</a><br>
<p><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
[Two years ago made history]<br>
<b>The First Undeniable Climate Change Deaths</b><br>
In 2018 in Japan, more than 1,000 people died during an
unprecedented heat wave. In 2019, scientists proved it would have
been impossible without global warming.<br>
By DANIEL MERINO - July 23, 2020<br>
July 23, 2018, was a day unlike any seen before in Japan. It was the
peak of a weekslong heat wave that smashed previous temperature
records across the historically temperate nation. The heat started
on July 9, on farms and in cities that only days earlier were
fighting deadly rains, mudslides, and floods. As the waters receded,
temperatures climbed. By July 15, 200 of the 927 weather stations in
Japan recorded temperatures of 35 degrees Celsius, about 95 degrees
Fahrenheit, or higher. Food and electricity prices hit multiyear
highs as the power grid and water resources were pushed to their
limits. Tens of thousands of people were hospitalized due to heat
exhaustion and heatstroke. On Monday, July 23, the heat wave reached
its zenith. The large Tokyo suburb of Kumagaya was the epicenter,
and around 3 p.m., the Kumagaya Meteorological Observatory measured
a temperature of 41.1 degrees Celsius, or 106 F. It was the hottest
temperature ever recorded in Japan, but the record was more than a
statistic. It was a tragedy: Over the course of those few weeks,
more than a thousand people died from heat-related illnesses.<br>
On July 24, the day after the peak of the heat wave, the Japan
Meteorological Agency declared it a natural disaster. A disaster it
was. But a natural one? Not so much.<br>
<br>
In early 2019, researchers at the Japan Meteorological Agency
started looking into the circumstances that had caused the
unprecedented, deadly heat wave. They wanted to consider it through
a relatively new lens—through the young branch of meteorology called
attribution science, which allows researchers to directly measure
the impact of climate change on individual extreme weather events.
Attribution science, at its most basic, calculates how likely an
extreme weather event is in today's climate-changed world and
compares that with how likely a similar event would be in a world
without anthropogenic warming. Any difference between those two
probabilities can be attributed to climate change.<br>
<br>
Attribution science was first conceived in the early 2000s, and
since then, researchers have used it as a lens to understand the
influence of climate change on everything from droughts to rainfall
to coral bleaching. As scientists have long predicted, the vast
majority of extreme weather events studied to date have been made
more likely because of climate change. But the 2018 Japan heat wave
is different. As people who lived in Japan knew at the time, the
oppressive temperatures were more than unusual. They were
unprecedented. In fact, without climate change, they would have been
impossible.<br>
<br>
"We would never have experienced such an event without global
warming," says Yukiko Imada of the Japan Meteorological Agency...<br>
- - <br>
In many small ways, Japan is shifting to accommodate a warming
future. But if these changes don't seem like huge strides in the
fight for a greener future, it's because they aren't. These are
adaptations to a warmer world. They are not actions to reduce
greenhouse gas emissions and prevent an even hotter one.<br>
The Japanese government has a less-than-stellar plan to meet the
challenges of climate change. There are, of course, some people
doing what they can to fight climate change. Groups of young
activists are hosting workshops and talks, organizations like
Climate Action 100+ are trying to convince businesses to adopt more
sustainable practices, and there are individuals, in modest ways,
making changes to their personal lives in an attempt to help. But
there isn't a sustained, centralized, government-endorsed move to
take the necessary amount of action. More than once I was told that
change would happen if the government asked for it, but the
government hasn't asked. In the wake of the Fukushima disaster,
there has been a switch away from nuclear energy in Japan. The
government created a subsidy program for solar energy but is
simultaneously investing in coal power plants. Regardless of where
the blame falls, the end result is the same as in so many places:
Japan is not prioritizing actions to counter the underlying cause of
climate change.<br>
<br>
Attribution science is giving us the ability to watch, in real time,
the consequences of our actions. The future that the heat wave of
2018 represents is one we knew was coming. It is here, today, and
attribution science gives scientists and the world the ability to
say so with conviction.<br>
<br>
There's another way in which the new field might prove useful. At
the end of our conversation, Watanabe paused to reflect on the work
he has done. Attribution science compares the world of today with a
world without climate change. In some ways, he's started to see his
work as a signpost in history, reminding us of a world that used to
exist, but no longer does. Someday, it's the other simulation, the
world without climate change, that will be the curiosity, he thinks.
That computer simulation will be the one that tells people something
they never got to experience—an image of what the world once was,
but will never be again.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="https://slate.com/technology/2020/07/climate-change-deaths-japan-2018-heat-wave.html">https://slate.com/technology/2020/07/climate-change-deaths-japan-2018-heat-wave.html</a><br>
<p><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
[Digging back into the internet news archive]<br>
<font size="+1"><b>On this day in the history of global warming -
July 30, 2010 </b></font><br>
<p>On MSNBC's "The Rachel Maddow Show," fill-in host Chris Hayes and
Mother Jones reporter Kate Sheppard discuss the coal industry's
role in killing climate-change legislation.<br>
<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="http://youtu.be/sWlwmzgLzVc">http://youtu.be/sWlwmzgLzVc</a><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
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