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<p><i><font size="+1"><b>May 18, 2021</b></font></i></p>
[IEA is the International Energy Agency]<br>
<b>IEA’s first 1.5°C-aligned scenario bolsters call for no new
fossil fuel extraction</b><br>
MAY 18, 2021 - BY DAVID TURNBULLBLOG POST<br>
Contact:<br>
Kelly Trout, <a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:kelly@priceofoil.org">kelly@priceofoil.org</a> (EDT)<br>
David Tong, <a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:david.tong@priceofoil.org">david.tong@priceofoil.org</a> (NZST)<br>
David Turnbull, <a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:david@priceofoil.org">david@priceofoil.org</a> (PDT)<br>
IEA’s first 1.5°C-aligned scenario bolsters call for no new fossil
fuel extraction<br>
IEA must now make it central to its flagship WEO and fix remaining
model flaws<br>
<br>
Today, the International Energy Agency (IEA) released a special
report, “Net Zero in 2050: A roadmap for the global energy system,”
that represents the agency’s first ever effort to model a
comprehensive energy pathway towards limiting global warming to 1.5
degrees Celsius (°C). While concerns remain over some of the IEA’s
modelling choices, campaigners are welcoming the report as a
milestone towards IEA reform.<br>
<br>
Through the #FixTheWEO campaign, climate advocates, investors,
businesses, and diplomats have been urging the IEA for years to
align its influential annual World Energy Outlook (WEO) with the
full ambition of the Paris Agreement goals. In a key win, IEA
director Dr. Fatih Birol committed for the first time last week that
the new 1.5°C-aligned scenario will be “integral” to WEO 2021 and
made a permanent fixture of future WEOs.<br>
<br>
Critically, the 1.5°C-aligned scenario finds “no need for investment
in new fossil fuel supply.” This represents a break from past IEA
reports that boosted new oil and gas development by focusing on
scenarios that steered the world towards catastrophic levels of
warming...<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://priceofoil.org/2021/05/18/iea-bolsters-call-no-new-fossil-fuel/">https://priceofoil.org/2021/05/18/iea-bolsters-call-no-new-fossil-fuel/</a><br>
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[News release US Dept of Defense]<br>
<b>DOD Exercise Highlights Need to Address Climate Change, Its
Impacts</b><br>
MAY 17, 2021 | BY DAVID VERGUN, DOD NEWS<br>
The Defense Department's first climate and environmental security
"tabletop" exercise, dubbed Elliptic Thunder, highlighted the
growing security threats posed by climate and environmental change,
while illustrating that prevention activities today are essential to
avoiding dire consequences in the future, Annalise Blum, an American
Association for the Advancement of Science policy fellow in Office
of the Secretary of Defense for Policy's Office of Stability and
Humanitarian Affairs said. <br>
<br>
Elliptic Thunder, which was co-sponsored by the Office of Stability
and Humanitarian Affairs and the Joint Staff J5, took place March
25. Based upon future climate, economic and population forecasts,
the exercise was set in East Africa in a notional future in which
climate change had gradually disrupted natural systems, weakening
several states in the region and increasing the risk of
climate-driven extreme events. A combination of floods, droughts,
and cyclones led to shortages of food, water, and energy — causing
large-scale instability and migration. This instability expanded
opportunities for extremist groups and strategic rivals to gain
influence with consequences for U.S. national security and defense
objectives. <br>
<br>
Adam Mausner, senior policy advisor in SHA, noted that the exercise
made clear that climate change is a national security issue, and
should be tackled with the same urgency and resourcing as other
major threats to our country. "Additionally, high-end conventional
combat capabilities were of little use in the scenario, as our
adversaries instead engaged in irregular warfare to gain advantage,"
he said.<br>
<br>
Participants in the exercise included representatives from the
Office of the Secretary of Defense, the Joint Staff and the U.S.
Africa Command; Joe Bryan, special assistant to the Secretary of
Defense for climate; and representatives from the National Security
Council, the State Department, the U.S. Agency for International
Development, the Intelligence Community and the National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration. <br>
<br>
<b>The main takeaways of the Elliptic Thunder exercise included:</b><br>
<blockquote>-- Climate and environmental change will exacerbate
existing threats and security challenges via increased frequency
and severity of environmental stressors and extreme events.
Compounding and cascading events are likely to be particularly
disruptive.<br>
<br>
-- Environmental changes have implications across the department
with respect to great power competition, counterterrorism, our
alliances and partners, basing, access to ports and landing sites,
infrastructure investments and more. <br>
<br>
-- DOD will need to develop and/or refine policies, authorities
and organizations — as well as processes, budget and funding to
best prepare for and respond to climate threats.<br>
<br>
-- Improved understanding of emerging threats will help prevent
and prepare for future environmental and climate security
challenges. Enabling a shift to prevention activities will help
avoid simply responding to crises.<br>
<br>
-- Building partner capacity and resiliency will be critical to
manage climate risks. Effective diplomacy and strategic messaging
will be essential to countering adversaries who will seek to
exploit climate-related insecurity for strategic advantage. <br>
<br>
-- A whole-of-government approach is needed to address climate and
environmental security threats across the federal government.
Partnerships with industry, academia and non-profit organizations
can improve sharing and coordination of data-collection, modeling,
disaster response initiatives and early warning best practices. <br>
</blockquote>
Blum noted that participants expressed interest in future tabletop
exercises to address the impacts of climate change and environmental
security challenges. Future exercises, she said, might include
greater participation from allies and partners to include experts
from NATO, the United Nations, the scientific community, the
humanitarian and disaster recovery community and other relevant
experts.<br>
<br>
Bryan emphasized the value of the exercise and the need for future
exercises, assessments and other events to help the department
better understand the links between climate change and global
security.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.defense.gov/Explore/News/Article/Article/2596591/dod-exercise-highlights-need-to-address-climate-change-its-impacts/">https://www.defense.gov/Explore/News/Article/Article/2596591/dod-exercise-highlights-need-to-address-climate-change-its-impacts/</a><br>
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[clips from Guardian Opinion]<br>
<b>How we talk about the climate crisis is increasingly crucial to
tackling it</b><br>
Susanna Rustin - 17 May 2021 <br>
Our emotional register – how ‘doomy’ or ‘hopeful’ we are – will
inevitably shape the policies we put forward<br>
<br>
As the climate emergency creeps closer to the top of the political
agenda, where it belongs, an argument is raging over communication.
Exactly what to say about the environmental crisis, and how, is an
important question for all sorts of people and organisations,
including governments. It is particularly pressing for journalists,
authors and broadcasters. For us, communication is not an adjunct to
other activities such as policymaking or campaigning. It is our main
job...<br>
- -<br>
This phase of climate communication led to enormously harmful
delays. But the disagreements did not end when the global warming
deniers were forced to retreat. Instead, new divisions have either
appeared or become more obvious: while those on the left back strong
action by governments, those on the right put more emphasis on
markets and individuals.<br>
- -<br>
A more recent spat illustrates similar tensions from a different
angle. Michael E Mann is a US climate scientist whose latest book,
The New Climate War: The Fight to Take Back Our Planet, takes aim at
the shape-shifting efforts of climate deniers. He describes the new,
“softer” tactics adopted by the fossil fuel lobby and its
techno-utopian enablers. These include downplaying the dangers of
global heating and trying to delay regulatory action. But along with
them, Mann attacks a number of writers for engaging in what he calls
“doomism” or “despair-mongering”.<br>
<br>
One of his targets is the journalist David Wallace-Wells, author of
an influential book called The Uninhabitable Earth. Another is the
British academic Jem Bendell, who advocates an approach he describes
as “deep adaptation” to an anticipated “societal collapse”. While
Mann praises Greta Thunberg, who famously told world leaders “I want
you to panic”, in general he thinks the word “panic” should be
avoided.<br>
<br>
While this debate could be seen as a distraction from the more
important story of what is actually going on and what needs to be
done, I think the argument about how to talk and think about the
climate crisis is increasingly central.<br>
Divisions shouldn’t be exaggerated. Mann said in a recent interview
that he falls victim to “doomism” himself at times. On an emotional
level, he recognises that fear is a natural reaction to what is
going on. And, in an important sense, he, Bendell, Wallace-Wells and
Thunberg are on the same side: they all recognise global heating as
an existential threat. But the point is, major differences of
philosophy and strategy also have to be reckoned with, even among
those who see themselves as on the same side (against heating).<br>
<br>
The deals struck by governments at the Cop26 talks in November will
determine what progress on climate the world is able to make over
the next decade. Compared with this, the question of how cheerful or
miserable you or I or anyone else feels about the situation, and how
we encourage others to feel about it, might seem trivial. But I
think this emotional register is important, particularly for
progressives with their ideological commitment to the idea that
things should improve. The socialist critic Raymond Williams used
the term “structure of feeling” to describe the way that the
cultural life of a democracy could be shaped, from the bottom up.<br>
<br>
So what is the “structure of feeling” about the climate at the
moment? A recent poll of 1.2 million people by the UN found that
two-thirds believe global heating is an “emergency”; in the UK the
figure was 81%. What lies beneath such headlines is hard to know. Do
most people think things will work out in the end; that the warnings
of disaster will turn out to have been exaggerated? Or are millions,
even billions of us, living in terror that they won’t?<br>
<br>
Mann is far from alone in his hostility to gloominess. Others, too,
see it as a gateway to nihilism; and fear that those who anticipate
a grim spiral of chaos and scarcity will push reactionary policies
focused on controlling borders and resources.<br>
<br>
Others, including me, think that while it’s right to be hopeful
about the post-carbon future, to embrace the prospect of green jobs
and cleaner air, too much optimism also carries risks. The situation
is sad and very dangerous. Like a person with a serious illness, we
need first to admit this; and then do every single thing we can to
preserve life.<br>
<br>
Susanna Rustin is a Guardian columnist and leader writer<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/may/17/talk-about-climate-crisis-tackling">https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/may/17/talk-about-climate-crisis-tackling</a><br>
<br>
<br>
[everyone should know by now]<br>
<b>California Is Headed Toward Another Brutal Wildfire Season</b><br>
Last year’s blazes set state records. This year, the drought’s even
worse.<br>
Dan Spinelli - May 16-2021<br>
A wildfire in Southern California grew to 1,325 acres on Sunday as
roughly 1,000 Topanga Canyon residents had to be evacuated from
their homes. Just like that, fire season has started again in
California. As an extreme drought worsens across much of the state,
2021 is shaping up to be potentially another deadly year.<br>
<br>
The state’s warm climate and lack of rainfall makes it especially
prone to wildfires, but nature is not the only reason large parts of
California are regularly set ablaze every summer. As Jeffrey Ball
wrote for Mother Jones in 2019:<br>
<br>
Today’s monster fires result largely from three human forces:
taxpayer-funded fire suppression that has made the forest a
tinderbox; policies that encourage construction in places that are
clearly prone to burning; and climate change, which has worsened
everything. <br>
<br>
That last point has become especially crucial as scientists have
searched for ways to explain why the area covered by California’s
summer wildfires are eight times larger than they were in 1972.
“This climate-change connection is straightforward,” Park Williams,
a bioclimatologist at Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth
Observatory, told the New York Times last year. “Warmer temperatures
dry out fuels. In areas with abundant and very dry fuels, all you
need is a spark.”<br>
<br>
The problem is only getting more dire. After a record year last year
in which California fires burned an area “larger than the state of
Connecticut,” scientists are expecting an even worse season this
summer, continuing a trend of earlier starts to fire season. <br>
<br>
As Daniel Swain, a UCLA climate scientist, explained to CNN last
week: “A combination of factors—including short-term severe to
extreme drought and long-term climate change—are in alignment for
yet another year of exceptionally high risk across much of
California’s potentially flammable landscapes.”<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2021/05/california-is-headed-toward-another-brutal-wildfire-season/">https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2021/05/california-is-headed-toward-another-brutal-wildfire-season/</a><br>
<br>
<p><br>
</p>
[online game]<br>
<b>Survive Century</b><br>
You are the senior editor of the world’s most popular and trusted
news organization. You have the enviable power to set the news
agenda, and thereby shift the zeitgeist.<br>
<br>
Lead the world towards utopia, or unleash your inner sociopath to
see how bad things can get. Nobody’s judging. Your choices will
determine how well humanity will survive the 21st century.
<blockquote>Survive the Century is a branching narrative game about
the political, environmental and social choices humans will face
between 2021 and 2100 as we adapt to the ravages of climate
change.<br>
<br>
This game is a work of fiction, but it is informed by real
science.<br>
<br>
We hope that this game helps you to feel less hopeless and
nihilistic about the future. Our choices matter. It’s not over.
There are still a lot of decisions we can make that will lead to
dramatically different futures.<br>
</blockquote>
PLAY THE GAME<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://survivethecentury.net/">https://survivethecentury.net/</a><br>
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</p>
<p><br>
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[space is collapsing upon us]<br>
<b>Climate emissions shrinking the stratosphere, scientists reveal</b><br>
Exclusive: Thinning indicates profound impact of humans and could
affect satellites and GPS<br>
Damian Carrington Environment editor<br>
<br>
Wed 12 May 2021<br>
<br>
Humanity’s enormous emissions of greenhouse gases are shrinking the
stratosphere, a new study has revealed.<br>
<br>
The thickness of the atmospheric layer has contracted by 400 meters
since the 1980s, the researchers found and will thin by about
another kilometer by 2080 without major cuts in emissions. The
changes have the potential to affect satellite operations, the GPS
navigation system and radio communications.<br>
<br>
The discovery is the latest to show the profound impact of humans on
the planet. In April, scientists showed that the climate crisis had
shifted the Earth’s axis as the massive melting of glaciers
redistributes weight around the globe.<br>
The stratosphere extends from about 20 kilometers to 60 kilometers
above the Earth’s surface. Below is the troposphere, in which humans
live, and here carbon dioxide heats and expands the air. This pushes
up the lower boundary of the stratosphere. But, in addition, when
CO2 enters the stratosphere it actually cools the air, causing it to
contract.<br>
<br>
The shrinking stratosphere is a stark signal of the climate
emergency and the planetary-scale influence that humanity now
exerts, according to Juan Añel, at the University of Vigo, Ourense
in Spain and part of the research team. “It is shocking,” he said.
“This proves we are messing with the atmosphere up to 60
kilometers.”<br>
<br>
“It makes me wonder what other changes our emissions are inflicting
on the atmosphere that we haven’t discovered yet.”<br>
Scientists already knew the troposphere was growing in height as
carbon emissions rose and had hypothesized that the stratosphere was
shrinking. But the new study is the first to demonstrate this and
shows it has been contracting around the globe since at least the
1980s, when satellite data was first gathered.<br>
<br>
The ozone layer that absorbs UV rays from the sun is in the
stratosphere and researchers had thought ozone losses in recent
decades could be to blame for the shrinking. Less ozone means less
heating in the stratosphere. But the new research shows it is the
rise of CO2 that is behind the steady contraction of the
stratosphere, not ozone levels, which started to rebound after the
1989 Montreal treaty banned CFCs.<br>
<br>
The study, published in the journal Environmental Research Letters,
reached its conclusions using the small set of satellite
observations taken since the 1980s in combination with multiple
climate models, which included the complex chemical interactions
that occur in the atmosphere.<br>
<br>
Prof Paul Williams, at the University of Reading in the UK, who was
not involved in the new research, said: “This study finds the first
observational evidence of stratosphere contraction and shows that
the cause is in fact our greenhouse gas emissions rather than
ozone.”<br>
<br>
“Some scientists have started calling the upper atmosphere the
‘ignorosphere’ because it is so poorly studied,” he said. “This new
paper will strengthen the case for better observations of this
distant but critically important part of the atmosphere.”<br>
<br>
“It is remarkable that we are still discovering new aspects of
climate change after decades of research,” said Williams, whose own
research has shown that the climate crisis could triple the amount
of severe turbulence experienced by air travellers. “It makes me
wonder what other changes our emissions are inflicting on the
atmosphere that we haven’t discovered yet.”<br>
<br>
The dominance of humanity activities on the planet has led
scientists to recommend the declaration of a new geological epoch:
the Anthropocene.<br>
<br>
Among the suggested markers of the Anthropocene are the radioactive
elements scattered by nuclear weapons tests in the 1950s and
domestic chicken bones, thanks to the surge in poultry production
after the second world war. Other scientists have suggested
widespread plastic pollution as a marker of a plastic age, to follow
the bronze and iron ages.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/may/12/emissions-shrinking-the-stratosphere-scientists-find">https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/may/12/emissions-shrinking-the-stratosphere-scientists-find</a><br>
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[lost to a compromised database -- a recovered classic talk from 6
years ago.]<br>
<b>Renee Lertzman: The Myth of Climate Change Apathy</b><br>
Sep 25, 2015<br>
Ed Mays<br>
Do personal anxieties and emotional responses to ecological problems
hinder our ability to act effectively? According to Royal Roads
University’s Renee Lertzman, tackling climate change takes more than
behavioral changes–it also requires an underlying shift in human
emotions.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://youtu.be/XFOxk95QV-4">https://youtu.be/XFOxk95QV-4</a><br>
<br>
<p><br>
</p>
<br>
[Digging back into the internet news archive]<br>
<font size="+1"><b>On this day in the history of global warming May
18, 2013 </b></font><br>
<p> Brad Plumer of the Washington Post points to the cultural
factors that fuel climate-change denial: <br>
<br>
"[P]eople tend to arrive at these debates with their own
pre-existing cultural values. If you're not already inclined to
accept the values that typically accompany belief in climate
change -- and if you're not predisposed to agree with all the
people who like to talk about climate change -- then you're
probably not going to change your mind just because the media says
there's an expert consensus."<br>
<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/05/18/scientists-agree-on-climate-change-so-why-doesnt-everyone-else/">http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/05/18/scientists-agree-on-climate-change-so-why-doesnt-everyone-else/</a><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
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