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<p><i><font size="+1"><b>December 10, 2020</b></font></i></p>
[And in this case, 'Lessons not learned, will be repeated']<br>
<b>You Should Have Listened, new York Tells Big Oil</b><br>
The comptroller's threat to pull billions from fossil fuel
investments is a big victory for climate activists.<br>
<br>
By Bill McKibben<br>
Mr. McKibben is a founder of the climate advocacy group 350.org and
a leader of fossil fuel divestment efforts.<br>
<br>
Dec. 9, 2020<br>
new York State's comptroller, Thomas Dinapoli, announced on
Wednesday that the state would begin divesting its $226 billion
employee pension fund from gas and oil companies if they can't come
up with a legitimate business plan within four years that is aligned
with the goals of the Paris climate accord. Those investments have
historically added up to roughly $12 billion.<br>
<br>
The entire portfolio will be decarbonized over the next two decades.
"Achieving net-zero carbon emissions by 2040 will put the fund in a
strong position for the future mapped out in the Paris Agreement,"
he said in a statement.<br>
<br>
It's a huge win, obviously, for the activists who have fought for
eight years to get Albany to divest from fossil fuel companies and
for the global divestment campaign. Endowments and portfolios worth
more than than $14 trillion have joined the fight. This new move is
the largest by a pension fund in the United States, edging the new
York City pension funds under Comptroller Scott Stringer, who
announced in 2018 that the fund would seek to divest $5 billion in
fossil fuel investments from its nearly $200 billion pension fund
over five years.<br>
<br>
But it also represents something else: capitulations that taken
together suggest that the once-dominant fossil fuel industry has
reached a low in financial and political power.<br>
The first capitulation, by investors, is to the understanding that
most of Big Oil simply won't be a serious partner for change. Mr.
Dinapoli had long been an advocate of engagement with the fossil
fuel companies, arguing that if big shareholders expressed their
concerns, those companies would change course. This, of course,
should be how the world works: He was correctly warning the
companies that their strategy endangered not only the planet but
also their businesses, and they should have listened.<br>
<br>
But time and again, they let him down. In December of 2017, for
instance, after prodding from Mr. Dinapoli, Exxon Mobil agreed to
"analyze how worldwide efforts to adopt the Paris Agreement goals
for reducing global warming might impact its business," he said in a
statement at the time. That could have been a turning point. But two
months later Exxon published the absurd results of that analysis:
The Paris Agreement would have no effect on its business, and it
could pump all its reserves of oil and gas. (As it happens, leaked
documents have since made it clear that Exxon was planning to
significantly increase its emissions by ramping up production.)<br>
<br>
Divestment remains a "last resort," Mr. Dinapoli said in his
statement. But he made clear that it was "an investment tool we can
apply to companies that consistently put our investment's long-term
value at risk."<br>
<br>
The oil industry has long wanted to cast itself as a responsible
partner for progress on climate change, as opposed to "unrealistic"
divestment activists. The Independent Petroleum Association of
America even set up an anti-divestment website to pressure decision
makers like Mr. Dinapoli not to pull the money they oversee out of
fossil fuel companies.<br>
<br>
Mr. Dinapoli deserves credit for standing up to the industry's
still-considerable power, even if it comes late in the game. And he
is now positioned to join Mr. Stringer as one of the strongest
voices for climate action in the financial sector. He can speak with
the unquestioned credibility of someone who tried to work
collaboratively.<br>
It's an argument that other investors are ready to hear, not just
because of the climate threat, but also because the fossil fuel
industry has been the worst-performing sector of the American
economy for many years now.<br>
<br>
Its problems are twofold: It faces a sprawling resistance movement,
rooted in the undeniable fact that its products are wrecking the
planet's climate system. And in wind and sun, it faces formidable
technological competitors who can provide the same service, just
cleaner and cheaper.<br>
<br>
These realities will destroy the coal, gas and oil barons; the only
question is, how fast. Big Oil's strategy at this point is delay,
but that course gets harder and harder, especially as the Trump
administration exits and with it the shield of protection the
industry has enjoyed.<br>
<br>
There are signs that this second capitulation -- the surrender of
the oil companies to the reality of their situation -- has begun.<br>
<br>
One of the so-called supermajors, BP PLC, announced this summer that
it would cut its oil and gas production by 40 percent over the
decade and significantly increase its investments in renewable
energy. Divestment campaigners can be excused for casting a
jaundiced eye on the news -- BP announced in 2000 that it was going
"Beyond Petroleum," a crusade it soon abandoned. But this time at
least they have the rhetoric right:<br>
<br>
"This coming decade," the company's C.E.O. said in a statement, "is
critical for the world in the fight against climate change, and to
drive the necessary change in global energy systems will require
action from everyone."<br>
<br>
Even Exxon has been humbled to the point where a kind of silent
capitulation seems to be starting. As recently as 2013 it was the
biggest company on the planet; by this autumn it wasn't even the
biggest energy company, having been briefly surpassed in market
capitalization by nextEra Energy, a Florida-based renewables
provider.<br>
<br>
Last week Exxon made clear its new status, disclosing it would slash
its exploration and capital expenditure budget from a planned $30
billion to $35 billion next year to barely half that and write off
up to $20 billion in natural gas assets that it now acknowledges it
will never pump.<br>
This fall from grace for oil and gas companies can't come fast
enough -- it recalls the collapsing fortunes of the coal industry
over the past decade, a slide that Mr. Dinapoli helped to exacerbate
by divesting the new York State pension fund from coal this past
summer.<br>
<br>
not only does the decline of Big Oil mean less carbon in the long
run; it also means less political influence in the short run and
hence less power to slow down the steps necessary for a transition
to carbon-free energy. Big Oil's influence on the Republican Party
remains large, but President-elect Joe Biden doesn't face the same
hulking beast his predecessors have had to work around. If Mr.
Dinapoli can stand up to these forces, it augurs well for what the
new administration may accomplish.<br>
<br>
Last month set the global mark for the hottest November ever
recorded, and it seems increasingly certain that despite a growing
La nina cooling in the Pacific, 2020 will tie or break the record
for the hottest year.<br>
<br>
The planet is heating rapidly, but -- as the news from Albany makes
clear -- so is the movement to do something about it.<br>
<br>
Bill McKibben, a founder of the climate advocacy group 350.org,
teaches environmental studies at Middlebury College and is the
author of "Falter: Has the Human Game Begun to Play Itself Out?"<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/09/opinion/new-york-climate-change-divestment.html">https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/09/opinion/new-york-climate-change-divestment.html</a><br>
<p><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
[positivism]<br>
<b>Earth Is Still Sailing Into Climate Chaos, Report Says, but Its
Course Could Shift</b><br>
The biggest polluters are continuing to pollute, raising the risks
of global warming. There are, however, new signs of a pivot to a
green economy.<br>
Somini Sengupta - Dec. 9, 2020<br>
The world as a whole is dangerously behind schedule in slowing
catastrophic climate change, and its richest people will have to
make big changes in their everyday lives in order to shift course, a
major United nations report warned Wednesday.<br>
<br>
But nearly five years after a landmark international climate
agreement in Paris, there are signs of a sea change, including from
some of the biggest polluters in the world.<br>
<br>
The "undercurrent" of the global economy has shifted, said
Christiana Figueres, a former United nations diplomat who led the
negotiations that yielded the Paris Agreement in 2015. "We are
moving faster than we ever were," she said in a call with reporters
Wednesday.<br>
<br>
Most of the world's biggest emitters of planet-warming gases,
including China, have promised to draw down their emissions to
net-zero by midcentury, meaning that they would eliminate as much of
the greenhouse gases as they emit. If those promises are kept (a big
if) the world would come very close to the Paris agreement's goal of
limiting temperature rise to the levels required to avert the worst
climate disasters...<br>
- -<br>
Much more of the world's electricity, which used to come almost
entirely from burning toxic fossil fuels like coal, is now coming
from renewable sources, with the price of solar power having fallen
far faster than expected. Lawmakers -- including in big car markets
like China, Britain and California -- have announced an end to the
sale of gas-powered cars in the next 10 to 15 years, spurring
carmakers to roll out more electric vehicles. Some of the world's
biggest investors are beginning to move their money out of fossil
fuel industries, while the International Monetary Fund, hardly known
for its environmental activism, said this year that green measures
would help the recovery of the global economy.<br>
<br>
All is not well, though. Far from it.<br>
<br>
The assessment published Wednesday by the United nations Environment
Program, the 11th annual Emissions Gap Report, found that greenhouse
gas emissions continued to grow between 2010 and 2019, by an average
of 1.4 percent a year, with a far sharper rise in 2019, in part
because of emissions generated by wildfires, which are themselves
exacerbated by a warming climate...<br>
- -<br>
How effectively the United States and China can pivot their
economies away from fossil fuels is crucial to stemming global
warming, shaping global markets for clean technologies and nudging
other major emitters -- like India, Indonesia, Russia, and Brazil --
to do their part.<br>
<br>
Inger Andersen, the head of the United nations Environment Program,
which published the annual Emissions Gap Report, urged world leaders
to invest their post-Covid recovery funds, saying that "a green
pandemic recovery can take a huge slice out of greenhouse gas
emissions and help slow climate change."<br>
<br>
The report recommends, among other things, reducing, though not
eliminating, fossil fuel subsidies, stopping the construction of new
coal plants and restoring degraded forests.<br>
<br>
Andrew Steer, the president of the World Resources Institute, a
research and advocacy group, described the trillions of dollars
going into post-pandemic economic recovery as "the biggest
opportunity in history."<br>
<br>
"If we invest that in yesterday's economy," he told reporters on a
call Wednesday, "we are basically committing a mortal sin for our
grandchildren, quite frankly."<br>
<br>
But as the latest United nations report makes clear, we are not all
the same, nor do we all need to do the same thing to protect future
generations.<br>
<br>
The richest 1 percent of the global population produces more than
twice the greenhouse gas emissions than the combined share of the
poorest 50 percent of the global population. The polluting rich, the
report concludes, will have to reduce their emissions footprint by a
factor of 30 to avert the worst damages of a warming planet. That
can be done, the report adds, by reducing food waste, making
buildings more energy-efficient and taking public transit rather
than cars, and trains rather than planes, for short distances.<br>
<br>
"The wealthy bear greatest responsibility," the report said.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/09/climate/paris-agreement-anniversary-united-nations.html">https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/09/climate/paris-agreement-anniversary-united-nations.html</a><br>
<p><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
[Better would be by 2024]<br>
<b>Microsoft and 12 others join Amazon's climate change initiative</b><br>
Unilever also pledged to hit net zero carbon emissions by 2040.<br>
Kris Holt - 12-9-2020<br>
Microsoft and 12 other companies have joined Amazon's Climate
Pledge, which is a commitment to hit net zero carbon emissions by
2040. The project aims to meet the climate goals of the United
nations Paris Agreement a decade early. Signatories also agree to
regularly report their greenhouse gas emissions.<br>
<br>
Back in January, Microsoft committed to becoming carbon negative by
2030. Over the next 30 years, it also plans to remove more carbon
from the atmosphere than it has emitted since the company was
founded in 1975. The company has been carbon neutral since 2012. <br>
<br>
"no one company or organization can meaningfully address the climate
crisis on their own. It will take aggressive approaches, new
innovative technologies and strong commitment to collaboration
across industries and economic sectors," Lucas Joppa, Microsoft's
chief environmental officer, said in a statement. "By joining The
Climate Pledge community and working together, we will be able to
collectively rise to the challenge and curb our emissions so that we
can make progress toward a net zero future."<br>
<br>
Among the other companies who just joined the Climate Pledge are
Unilever, UK broadcaster ITV and Coca-Cola European Partners.
Previous signatories include Uber, Best Buy, Siemens and Engadget's
parent company Verizon...<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.engadget.com/microsoft-amazon-climate-pledge-unilever-181555273.html">https://www.engadget.com/microsoft-amazon-climate-pledge-unilever-181555273.html</a>
<p><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
[Apple media say Variety]<br>
<b>Climate Change Anthology Series From Scott Z. Burns Lands Apple
Series Order (EXCLUSIVE)</b><br>
Apple has given a series order to "Extrapolations," an anthology
series about climate change from Scott Z. Burns, Variety has learned
exclusively.<br>
<br>
Burns will write, direct, and executive produce the series, which
hails from Media Res. It is said to tell intimate, unanticipated
stories of how the upcoming changes to our planet will affect love,
faith, work and family on a personal and human scale. Told over a
season of 10 interconnected episodes, each story in the scripted
series will track the worldwide battle for our mutual survival
spanning the 21st century.<br>
<br>
Variety exclusively reported that the series was in the works at
Apple earlier this year. Along with Burns, Michael Ellenberg will
executive produce via Media Res, with Greg Jacobs and Dorothy
Fortenberry also executive producing.<br>
- -<br>
"Most of the storytelling around climate change has focused on the
science and getting people to accept it," said Burns. "Our aim with
'Extrapolations' is to move beyond science and use drama, comedy,
mystery and every other genre to allow us to consider how every
aspect of our world is going to be changing in the years ahead. We
know the climate is going to change – 'Extrapolations' asks, can we
change, too?"<br>
- -<br>
Burns previously produced the Oscar-winning climate change
documentary "An Inconvenient Truth" in 2006 and executive produced
the followup "An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power" in 2017. His
other credits include several films that deal with major world
issues, such as "The Report," "The Informant!," "Contagion," "Side
Effects," and "The Laundromat."<br>
<br>
He is repped by UTA and Jackoway Austen Tyerman.<br>
<br>
The series marks the latest collaboration between Apple and Media
Res.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://variety.com/2020/tv/news/climate-change-anthology-series-apple-scott-z-burns-1234849794/">https://variety.com/2020/tv/news/climate-change-anthology-series-apple-scott-z-burns-1234849794/</a><br>
<br>
<p><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
<br>
[Washington Post]<br>
<b>The world's rich need to cut their carbon footprint by a factor
of 30 to slow climate change, U.n. warns</b><br>
Despite sharp drop in greenhouse gas emissions during the pandemic,
the world remains on pace for catastrophic warming in coming decades<br>
By Brady Dennis, Chris Mooney and Sarah Kaplan<br>
Dec. 9, 2020 <br>
<br>
The world's wealthy will need to reduce their carbon footprints by a
factor of 30 to help put the planet on a path to curb the
ever-worsening impacts of climate change, according to new findings
published Wednesday by the United nations Environment Program.<br>
<br>
Currently, the emissions attributable to the richest 1 percent of
the global population account for more than double those of the
poorest 50 percent. Shifting that balance, researchers found, will
require swift and substantial lifestyle changes, including decreases
in air travel, a rapid embrace of renewable energy and electric
vehicles, and better public planning to encourage walking, bicycle
riding and public transit.<br>
<br>
But individual choices are hardly the only key to mitigating the
intensifying consequences of climate change.<br>
<br>
Wednesday's annual "emissions gap" report, which assesses the
difference between the world's current path and measures needed to
manage climate change, details how the world remains woefully off
target in its quest to slow the Earth's warming. The drop in
greenhouse gas emissions during this year's pandemic, while notable,
will have almost no impact on slowing the warming that lies ahead
unless humankind drastically alters its policies and behavior, the
report finds...<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2020/12/09/carbon-footprints-climate-change-rich-one-percent/">https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2020/12/09/carbon-footprints-climate-change-rich-one-percent/</a><br>
<br>
<p><br>
</p>
<br>
[Politico - Opinion]<br>
<b>Biden needs to Go Big on the Climate</b><br>
To motivate the country around the changes we need, Biden needs a
unifying theme. The right one is climate change.<br>
By REP. RAUL GRIJALVA<br>
12/08/2020<br>
President-elect Joe Biden cited the new Deal as a major American
inflection point in his victory address to the nation, indicating
that we will need an equally massive policy response now to battle
the Covid-19 pandemic and heal our damaged economy. And as he no
doubt learned from Franklin Roosevelt, the window of opportunity for
a president to achieve that kind of sweeping impact starts to close
the moment he takes office...<br>
- -<br>
Our country's best hope for the future is a decarbonized economy
built around sustainable jobs and powered by clean energy. Rather
than trying to explain each individual project or set of projects in
isolation, fighting repeated hand-to-hand battles against the usual
demagoguery and anti-government rhetoric, the Biden-Harris
administration should continue what it started during the campaign.
It should unite the country around a common theme and a set of
important and achievable policy goals, an ambitious effort to retool
our economy and our institutions to meet the challenge of climate
change that we all know is very real.<br>
<br>
As vice president, Biden led the "cancer moonshot" effort to break
through longstanding barriers and deliver a major win not just for
his fellow countrymen, but for all humanity. That same spirit can
now animate his entire presidency. Addressing climate change is
necessary to make America stronger and safer, but it's also part of
our leadership role in protecting the entire planet. That's the kind
of president Biden promises to be, and it's the kind of president he
can be if he uses the right strategy to mobilize and unite the
country in a way that truly meets the moment.<br>
<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/12/08/biden-climate-unity-grijalva-443650">https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/12/08/biden-climate-unity-grijalva-443650</a><br>
<p><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
[15 min video]<br>
<b>How Living at the South Pole Works</b><br>
nov 19, 2020<br>
Wendover Productions<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZAEydOjNWyQ">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZAEydOjnWyQ</a><br>
<p>- -</p>
[Personal tour of an environmentally controlled dwelling]<br>
<b>Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station Tour!!</b><br>
Jan 19, 2020<br>
Gone Venturing<br>
The Amundsen-Scott South Pole Elevated Station Tour! Come with me
and take a tour of the entire Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station! In
this video I show you pretty much all of the public and social
areas, the dorm areas, and even some work centers! If you've ever
wondered what the South Pole Station looks like, well, here ya go! <br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext"
href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bNRNqaKxZ8">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bnRnqaKxZ8</a><br>
<br>
<p><br>
</p>
[Digging back into the internet news archive]<br>
<font size="+1"><b>On this day in the history of global warming -
December 10, 2008 </b></font><br>
<p>On MSNBC's "The Rachel Maddow Show," Brian Hardwick of the
Alliance for Climate Protection denounces a borderline-blasphemous
holiday marketing campaign by the coal industry.<br>
<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TaGun1X8E2s">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TaGun1X8E2s</a><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
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