A Year of Climate Extremes, In Photos
Yale E360
DECEMBER 31, 2024
From floods in Brazil to Hurricane Helene in North Carolina, extreme weather exacted a devastating toll in 2024.
2024
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Five Things the “Nuclear Bros” Don’t Want You to Know About Small Modular Reactors
Union of Concerned Scientists
APRIL 30, 2024
Even casual followers of energy and climate issues have probably heard about the alleged wonders of small modular nuclear reactors (SMRs). This is due in no small part to the “ nuclear bros ”: an active and seemingly tireless group of nuclear power advocates who dominate social media discussions on energy by promoting SMRs and other “advanced” nuclear technologies as the only real solution for the climate crisis.
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New study suggests the Atlantic overturning circulation AMOC “is on tipping course”
Real Climate
FEBRUARY 9, 2024
A new paper was published in Science Advances today. Its title says what it is about: “Physics-based early warning signal shows that AMOC is on tipping course.” The study follows one by Danish colleagues which made headlines last July, likewise looking for early warning signals for approaching an AMOC tipping point (we discussed it here ), but using rather different data and methods.
New Environmental Laws Focus on Public Health
Legal Planet
OCTOBER 23, 2024
The California State Legislature is now finally in its off-season. Governor Newsom had until Monday, September 30 th to sign or veto bills that the legislature passed and sent to his desk. In a final tally of bills, according to CalMatters , Governor Newsom vetoed approximately 18% of the nearly 1,000 bills that landed on his desk in the final days of session, or close to 1 in 5 bills.
How to Drive Cost Savings, Efficiency Gains, and Sustainability Wins with MES
Speaker: Nikhil Joshi, Founder & President of Snic Solutions
Is your manufacturing operation reaching its efficiency potential? A Manufacturing Execution System (MES) could be the game-changer, helping you reduce waste, cut costs, and lower your carbon footprint. Join Nikhil Joshi, Founder & President of Snic Solutions, in this value-packed webinar as he breaks down how MES can drive operational excellence and sustainability.
Ask a Scientist: How Close Are We to a Clean Energy Transition?
Union of Concerned Scientists
OCTOBER 15, 2024
After the hottest summer on record, the world continues to witness extreme weather fueled by the burning of fossil fuels. In the United States alone, we’re in the midst of a record-setting hurricane season, with back-to-back destructive hurricanes, Helene and Milton, causing immense destruction in Florida and neighboring states. Both hurricanes were exacerbated by warmer ocean surface temperatures, and are examples of “what hurricanes will look more like in the future,” according to Dr.
No More ‘House of Horrors’ Thanks to These New Laws
Legal Planet
OCTOBER 31, 2024
Halloween is the one time when we welcome ghouls, ghosts, and goblins coming to our homes (and, if your neighborhood is anything like mine, a variety of tiny superheroes). This season, however, the Legislature is dealing with a different kind house of horrors: dangerous chemicals in everyday products that affect millions of Californians’ health. From cancer-causing food dyes to lung-damaging fiberglass in our furniture, California’s State Legislature and the Governor have enacted legislation thi
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Hurricanes Helene and Milton Further Proof We’re Not Ready for Fossil Fuel-Caused Climate Change
Union of Concerned Scientists
OCTOBER 16, 2024
In August, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) issued its updated forecast for the 2024 hurricane season. It was to be above normal in every regard: more named storms and stronger hurricanes than usual. One of the main reasons for this forecast? Significantly warmer than usual surface temperatures in the Atlantic Ocean, which come largely as a result of human-caused climate change.
How to Make Trees Worth More Standing Than Cut Down
Legal Planet
OCTOBER 14, 2024
West of Sydney, Australia, lies the Blue Mountains, a range of plateaus and panoramic canyons forested with eucalyptus trees. Oil in the leaves produces a bluish haze, hence the name of the area. Twenty-five years ago, in 1999, a new NGO called Forest Trends brought together a small international group to the town of Katoomba to brainstorm over increasing capital flows to protect nature, how to “make trees worth more standing than cut down.
RFK Jr. Joins the War on Climate Scientists
Legal Planet
FEBRUARY 27, 2024
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. made headlines when a Super PAC supporting his presidential bid ran a pricey Super Bowl ad, stealing the look of a famous 1960 spot for his uncle John F. Kennedy. But he got far less attention for another move that says a lot about his campaign: He has tapped Del Bigtree to run his communications team. Bigtree, like RFK Jr., is a well-known anti-vaccine activist.
The Key to Sustainable Energy Optimization: A Data-Driven Approach for Manufacturing
Speaker: Kevin Kai Wong, President of Emergent Energy Solutions
In today's industrial landscape, the pursuit of sustainable energy optimization and decarbonization has become paramount. ♻️ Manufacturing corporations across the U.S. are facing the urgent need to align with decarbonization goals while enhancing efficiency and productivity. Unfortunately, the lack of comprehensive energy data poses a significant challenge for manufacturing managers striving to meet their targets. 📊 Join us for a practical webinar hosted by Kevin Kai Wong of Emergent Ene
More solar shenanigans*
Real Climate
MARCH 7, 2024
Going back a few months, I spent a bit of time pointing out the strategy and nonsense in the various Willie Soon and company’s efforts to blame current warming on solar activity. I specifically pointed out their cultish devotion to a single solar activity reconstruction (Hoyt and Schatten, 1993) (HS93); with an update from Scaffeta (2023) , and their increasingly elaborate efforts to create temperature series that correlate to it.
Spencer’s Shenanigans
Real Climate
JANUARY 28, 2024
A recent sensible-sounding piece by Roy Spencer for the Heritage foundation is full of misrepresentations. Let’s play spot the fallacy. Comparing climate models to observations is usually a great idea, but there are some obvious pitfalls to avoid if you want to be taken seriously. The most obvious one is to neglect the impacts of internal variability – which is not synchronized across the models or with the observations.
Rain Comes to the Arctic, With a Cascade of Troubling Changes
Yale E360
FEBRUARY 20, 2024
Rain used to be rare in the Arctic, but as the region warms, so-called “rain-on-snow events” are becoming more common. The rains accelerate ice loss, trigger flooding, landslides, and avalanches, and create problems for wildlife and the Indigenous people who depend on them.
EVs Are at a Turning Point, It May Not Be What You Think
Union of Concerned Scientists
MARCH 7, 2024
There’s been a lot of nay-saying around EVs lately, including, amongst other things, worries that EV sales are stalling out now that all the early adopters have already made the switch and mainstream buyers aren’t ready to dive in. I wouldn’t blame you if you thought nobody was buying EVs or that sales were about to plummet. While there are some near term headwinds, I’ve never had as much confidence in the ability to zero out tailpipe emissions from our cars and trucks.
Implementing D.E.J.I. Strategies in Energy, Environment, and Transportation
Speaker: Antoine M. Thompson, Executive Director of the Greater Washington Region Clean Cities Coalition
Diversity, Equity, Justice, and Inclusion (DEJI) policies, programs, and initiatives are critically important as we move forward with public and private sector climate and sustainability goals and plans. Underserved and socially, economically, and racially disadvantaged communities bear the burden of pollution, higher energy costs, limited resources, and limited investments in the clean energy and transportation sectors.
Not just another dot on the graph?
Real Climate
JANUARY 12, 2024
As the climate monitoring groups add an additional dot to their graphs this week, there is some disquiet among people paying attention about just how extraordinary 2023 really was. First, it’s been obvious for months that 2023 would be a record year – in temperatures (at the surface, troposphere and in the ocean), in Antarctic sea ice, in the number of big climate disasters etc.
Intimidation Tactics Exposed in Oregon Climate Case vs. Fossil Fuel Industry
Union of Concerned Scientists
OCTOBER 30, 2024
In 2021, a record-breaking heat dome enveloped Oregon , tragically claiming the lives of 72 people. In response, Multnomah County, which includes Portland, filed a lawsuit for over $51 billion against major fossil fuel entities–one of the largest claims for a climate case to date. The case names ExxonMobil, the American Petroleum Institute, McKinsey & Co., and others, including the recently added NW Natural , a gas utility, alleging that their contributions to climate change—and their disinf
California Must Not Abandon its Climate Leadership
Legal Planet
NOVEMBER 4, 2024
On November 8, the California Air Resources Board, or CARB, is slated to consider approving amendments to California’s Low Carbon Fuel Standard. The program has been so successful in replacing high carbon petroleum-based fuels with lower emissions vehicle fuels that interest groups from all sides of the political spectrum have come forward to demand radical changes that they argue will fix problems.
Governor Newsom Should Veto These Four Bills
Legal Planet
SEPTEMBER 27, 2024
This post was co-authored by Ruben Aronin , Principal of the Better World Group. With just weeks to go before November 5, all eyes are on the election, including what it means for environmental policy. And yet, one of the largest threats to California’s clean transportation leadership in recent history has materialized right under our noses — and it’s coming from our own legislature.
Shaping a Resilient Future: Climate Impact on Vulnerable Populations
Speaker: Laurie Schoeman Director, Climate & Sustainability, Capital
As households and communities across the nation face challenges such as hurricanes, wildfires, drought, extreme heat and cold, and thawing permafrost and flooding, we are increasingly searching for ways to mitigate and prevent climate impacts. During this event, national climate and housing expert Laurie Schoeman will discuss topics including: The two paths for climate action: decarbonization and adaptation.
CPUC Should Set a Date for Closing Aliso Canyon
Legal Planet
NOVEMBER 26, 2024
The Aliso Canyon gas storage facility blowout in 2015-16 was the largest methane gas leak in the history of the United States. In addition to the climate effects from the methane leakage — 109,000 metric tons, the equivalent of burning over 1 billion gallons of gasoline — there were tremendous health impacts on neighboring communities and even throughout California.
How the Supreme Court’s Chevron Decision Benefits Big Oil and Gas
Union of Concerned Scientists
JULY 1, 2024
Last Friday, the Supreme Court overruled the 40-year-old Chevron doctrine , fundamentally changing the landscape of federal regulatory power. This decision , reached with a 6-3 majority led by Chief Justice John Roberts, marks a significant shift in administrative law and has profound implications for environmental regulations and climate accountability.
In Mongolia, a Killer Winter Is Ravaging Herds and a Way of Life
Yale E360
MARCH 6, 2024
Mongolia’s nomadic herders are facing a savage “dzud” winter, with more than 2 million livestock frozen to death so far. Scientists say this lethal phenomenon — extreme cold and heavy snow following summer drought — is occurring more frequently and is linked to climate change.
Hottest Summer on Record May Be Ending, but Fight to Protect Workers from Heat Is Far from Over
Union of Concerned Scientists
SEPTEMBER 12, 2024
Over the last three months, which have been declared the world’s hottest summer on record, outdoor workers across the US have endured dangerously hot conditions on the job. They’ve cut grass in 112°F heat in California’s Coachella Valley, handled baggage on the hot tarmac of airports across the country, harvested fruit , delivered packages , and performed countless other functions that go largely unnoticed by our society.
Sustainability at Retail
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Sustainability impacts every nation, company, and person around the world. So much so that, in 2015, the United Nations (UN) issued a call for action by all countries to work toward sustainable development. In response to this and as part of a global Sustainability at Retail initiative, Shop! worked collaboratively with its global affiliates to address these critical issues in this white paper.
A Brutal Supreme Court Session Puts a Generation of Public Protections at Risk
Union of Concerned Scientists
JULY 8, 2024
There’s no sugarcoating it: over the last two terms, but particularly in the last month, an ideologically-driven Supreme Court majority has issued ruling after ruling that collectively undermine how we protect public health and safety in this country. In a string of 6-3 and 5-4 rulings emerging from deliberately selected cases, this court has targeted decades of precedent and invited further attacks on the safeguards we all rely on.
Annual GMSAT predictions and ENSO
Real Climate
JANUARY 5, 2024
For the last few years ( since at least 2016 ), I’ve shared predictions for the next annual global mean surface air temperature (GMSAT) anomaly based on the long term trend and the state of ENSO at the start of the year. Generally speaking, this has been quite skillful compared to persistence or just the long term trend alone – the eventual anomaly was consistently within the predicted bounds.
Driving on Electricity Is Now Much Cleaner than Using a Gasoline Car
Union of Concerned Scientists
MAY 30, 2024
Replacing gasoline with electricity greatly reduces the carbon emissions from driving. Based on where electric vehicles (EVs) have been sold, driving the average EV in the US produces global warming emissions equal to a hypothetical 94 mile per gallon gasoline car, or less than a third of the emissions of the average new gasoline car. Transportation is the largest sector for emissions , and passenger cars, trucks, and SUVs are the majority of transportation emissions, so there is no way to slow
On Navajo Lands, Ancient Ways Are Restoring the Parched Earth
Yale E360
OCTOBER 1, 2024
Farming once thrived in the Black Mesa region, before overgrazing and climate change wreaked havoc with the land. Today, the Navajo are restoring their watersheds — and boosting their food sovereignty — with earthen berms and small dams made of woven brush, sticks, and rocks.
A New Energy Project at UCLA Law
Legal Planet
SEPTEMBER 17, 2024
You don’t have to look beyond the front pages of newspapers , or beyond rooftops in your neighborhood to know that we are in the midst of a clean energy revolution, with renewable energy technologies dramatically decreasing in price and increasing in availability. These technologies promise to reduce energy cost burdens for households, as well as reduce climate- and health-harming pollution.
Twenty years of blogging in hindsight
Real Climate
NOVEMBER 23, 2024
It’s 20 years since we started blogging on climate here on RealClimate (December 10, 2004). We wanted to counter disinformation about climate change that was spreading through various campaigns. In those days it was an unusual move that prompted a welcome from Nature. One thing that I didn’t anticipate then was the vast global scale that fake news and conspiracy theories later would attain.
Sea Level Rise is Already Threatening Communities
Union of Concerned Scientists
JUNE 20, 2024
In an era when massive heat domes blanket large swaths of continents for days, wildfires burn through areas the size of small countries, and hurricanes regularly push the limits of what we once thought possible, sea level rise can seem like extreme weather’s low-key cousin. But with estimates suggesting that sea level rise will affect more than one billion people around the world in the next 25 years, this is one member of the dysfunctional climate change family that shouldn’t be ignored.
NEPA in the Supreme Court (Part I)
Legal Planet
NOVEMBER 11, 2024
In what could turn out to be another loss for environmental protection in the Supreme Court, the Court is about to decide a major case about the scope of the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA). The case, Seven County Infrastructure Coalition v. Eagle County , has important implications for issues such as whether NEPA covers climate change impacts.
Plastics Reckoning: PVC Is Ubiquitous, But Maybe Not for Long
Yale E360
FEBRUARY 15, 2024
Used in everything from water pipes to car seats, PVC has long attracted criticism: a key ingredient is carcinogenic, and its additives include known endocrine disruptors. Now, the EPA is evaluating PVC’s safety, and an emerging global plastics treaty may limit its use.
Gas Plants Have a Real Climate Problem. So Do Some Proposed Approaches for Addressing It.
Union of Concerned Scientists
OCTOBER 15, 2024
Power plants fueled by methane gas have a serious climate problem. The fuel, commonly known as natural gas, now powers the biggest portion of US electricity generation—more than 40 percent. It has also grown to be the largest source of carbon pollution from the US power sector, even as zero-carbon renewable energy has been growing by leaps and bounds.
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