Hope and Fellowship - by David Roberts

Limiting global temperature rise to 2 degrees Celsius, the widely agreed-upon threshold beyond which climate impacts are expected to become severe and irreversible, is likely off the table.  Widespread adaptive measures are slow in coming, far more expensive than mitigation would have been, and subject to enormous inequality of impact based on wealth and class. —  So, in this grim situation, do I have hope?  It’s complicated.

Hope and Fellowship - by David Roberts

Shrinking Water Supply Under Threat in U.S. Farm Breadbasket

A critical water source for U.S. farmers and ranchers is being depleted at a rapid rate, and nearly 70 percent of it will disappear within the next 50 years if the current trend does not change, according to a report issued this week.

The High Plains aquifer system, including a portion known as the Ogallala aquifer, is one of the world's largest.  It covers an area of approximately 174,000 square miles under portions of South Dakota, Nebraska, Wyoming, Colorado, Kansas, Oklahoma, New Mexico and Texas.

Shrinking Water Supply Under Threat in U.S. Farm Breadbasket: Report

Solar and Electric Vehicles Will Kill Industry Dinosaurs

Tony Seba, an energy expert from Stanford University, predicts that by 2030 solar will make the fossil fuel industry more or less redundant.  Even more striking is his forecast that electric vehicles will do the same thing to the oil industry by around the same date.

Solar and Electric Vehicles Will Kill Industry Dinosaurs

Friday, Aug 30, 2013

Nissan Says It Will Have First Commercially-Viable Autonomous Drive Vehicles by 2020

Nissan Motor Co., Ltd., announced that the company will be ready with multiple, commercially-viable autonomous drive (AD) vehicles by 2020.  Nissan said that its engineers have been carrying out intensive research on the technology for years, alongside teams from universities including MIT, Stanford, Oxford, Carnegie Mellon, and the University of Tokyo.

Nissan Says It Will Have First Commercially-Viable Autonomous Drive Vehicles by 2020; Across the Range in 2 Vehicle Generations

Green Groups: Keystone XL to Increase Tar Sands Production by 36 Per Cent

The Keystone XL pipeline would boost oil production from Canadian tar sands by at least 36 per cent, leading to an inevitable increase in greenhouse gas emissions, according to a major new report from a coalition of US green NGOs.

The group of more than a dozen organisations, including the Sierra Club, 350.org, and Oil Change International, released the report Thursday in response to President Obama's recent pledge that he would only approve the project if it "does not significantly exacerbate the problem of carbon pollution".

Green Groups: Keystone XL to Increase Tar Sands Production by 36 Per Cent

Thursday, Aug 29, 2013

A Cooler Pacific Linked to Recent Global Warming Pause -- Study

Average global temperatures haven't increased much in the past 15 years, and scientists have been working to determine why.

A number of recent studies have fingered the ocean as the cause.  Researchers believe heat that might otherwise warm the planet is being stored -- hidden, in a way -- in the sea.

A paper released Wednesday in the journal Nature adds to that body of evidence by linking the recent global warming hiatus to cooling in the equatorial Pacific Ocean.

A Cooler Pacific Linked to Recent Global Warming Pause -- Study

Wildfires Will Worsen with Climate Change, Harvard Environmental Scientists Project

Research at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) predicts wildfire seasons by 2050 will be three weeks longer, up to twice as smoky, and will burn a wider area in the western United States.

Wildfires Will Worsen with Climate Change, Harvard Environmental Scientists Project

Vicious Cycle: Extreme Climate Events Release 11 Billion Tons of CO2 into the Air Every Year

A major new study in Nature, Climate extremes and the carbon cycle, points to yet another significant carbon cycle feedback ignored by climate models.  Researchers “have discovered that terrestrial ecosystems absorb approximately 11 billion tons less carbon dioxide every year as the result of the extreme climate events than they could if the events did not occur.  That is equivalent to approximately a third of global CO2 emissions per year.”

Measurements indicate, for instance, that the brutal 2003 European heat wave “had a much greater impact on the carbon balance than had previously been assumed.”  We’re already seeing a rise in extreme weather in North America.  Last year, Munich Re, a top reinsurer, found a “climate-change footprint” in the rapid rise of North American extreme weather catastrophes: “Climate­-driven changes are already evident over the last few decades for severe thunderstorms, for heavy precipitation and flash flood­ing, for hurricane activity, and for heatwave, drought and wild­-fire dynamics in parts of North America.”

Vicious Cycle: Extreme Climate Events Release 11 Billion Tons of CO2 into the Air Every Year - by Joe Romm

Wednesday, Aug 28, 2013

Nearly Half of All Western Wildfire Costs Go to California

With one of California’s largest-recorded wildfires still burning largely uncontained and threatening water and electricity for millions, the total bill for fighting U.S. wildfires in 2013 is now likely to soar well past $1 billion.  By the time the blaze is put out, which could be weeks from now, California’s Rim Fire will likely be among the most expensive wildfires of the year. In fact, during the past 10 years, $4 billion has been spent fighting wildfires in California, more than in any other state.

The high cost of fighting wildfires in California is just an indicator of what the entire West can expect in the coming decades.  The combination of more wildfires, fueled by warming temperatures, more people living and building infrastructure near and within forests across the West, and changes in forest management practices, will drive the costs of fighting wildfires even higher.

Nearly Half of All Western Wildfire Costs Go to California

Vanishing Ocean Smell Could Also Mean Fewer Clouds, which May Amplify Global Warming this Century Up to 0.9°F

It’s a smell that’s endangered by climate change. Experiments have linked the rising acidity of the world’s oceans to falling levels of DMS.  A paper published online Sunday in the journal Nature Climate Change warns that ocean acidification could reduce DMS emissions by about one-sixth in 2100 compared with pre-industrial levels.

Clouds do more for us than just dispense  quenching rain and snow: They also reflect light and heat away from the earth, helping to keep temperatures down.

Vanishing Ocean Smell Could Also Mean Fewer Clouds

Tuesday, Aug 27, 2013

World Petroleum Use Sets Record High in 2012 Despite Declines in North America and Europe

The world’s consumption of gasoline, diesel fuel, jet fuel, heating oil, and other petroleum products reached a record high of 88.9 million barrels per day (bbl/d) in 2012, as declining consumption in North America and Europe was more than outpaced by growth in Asia and other regions, according to the US Energy Information Administration (EIA).

World Petroleum Use Sets Record High in 2012 Despite Declines in North America and Europe

Official Price of the Enbridge Kalamazoo Spill, a Whopping $1,039,000,000

The spill, which went unaddressed for over 17 hours, was exacerbated by Enbridge's failed response according to the US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB).  At a hearing last year the NTSB's chair Deborah Hersman likened the company to a band of Keystone Kops for their bungled response, which included twice pumping additional crude into the line - accounting for 81 percent of the total release - before initiating emergency shut down.  The disaster revealed numerous internal problems within Enbridge that were further described by the NTSB as "pervasive organizational failures."

Official Price of the Enbridge Kalamazoo Spill, a Whopping $1,039,000,000

Marine Problems Could Cost World up to $2 Trillion

Pollution, overfishing, and climate change are just some of the environmental pressures that are amplifying each other more than previously assumed, according to a new study of the world's oceans by the Stockholm Environment Institute.

Marine Problems Could Cost World up to $2 Trillion, Study Says

Yosemite Fire Example of How Droughts Amplify Wildfires

The massive Rim Fire near Yosemite National Park in California is an example of how drought can amplify wildfires in a warming, drying West.

The fire, which now ranks as the 14th-largest wildfire in state history, has been racing through parched stands of oak and pine trees, and threatening some of the region’s iconic giant sequoia trees.  The vegetation in the area, and indeed across much of central and southern California, is extremely dry, as the state has experienced its driest year-to-date.

Parts of the West have been warming faster than the rest of the lower 48 states since the 1970s, a trend tied to climate change as well as natural climate variability.

Yosemite Fire Example of How Droughts Amplify Wildfires

Monday, Aug 26, 2013

NREL Study Says Western Renewables Could Be Cost-Competitive Without Federal Subsidies by 2025

A new Energy Department study conducted by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) indicates that by 2025 wind and solar power electricity generation could become cost-competitive without federal subsidies, if new renewable energy development occurs in the most productive locations. The cost of generation includes any needed transmission and integration costs.

NREL Study Says Western Renewables Could Be Cost-Competitive Without Federal Subsidies by 2025

Climate Change: Ocean Acidification Amplifies Global Warming

Scientists have demonstrated that ocean acidification may amplify global warming through the biogenic production of the marine sulfur component dimethylsulphide (DMS).  Ocean acidification has the potential to speed up global warming considerably, according to new research.

Marine emissions of DMS are the largest natural source of atmospheric sulfur, and those sulfur aerosols play an important role in reflecting the sun’s energy back into space and cooling the planet.  Reporting in the journal Nature Climate Change, the scientists found that when they created acidic conditions in the seawater enclosures that match pH levels expected in 2100, emissions of DMS fell by roughly 18 percent.  The scientists said that their study was the first to prove the link between rising ocean acidification and the potential decrease in planet-cooling sulfur dioxide aerosols.

Climate Change: Ocean Acidification Amplifies Global Warming

Canadian Documents Suggest Shift on Keystone XL Pipeline

Canadian government officials have argued that because the pipeline would not have any major effect on rate of development of Canada’s oil sands, as a State Department environmental review concluded in March, it would not significantly raise the amount of carbon emitted.

But documents obtained by a Canadian environmental group suggest that the staff at Natural Resources Canada viewed Keystone XL as an important tool for expanding oil sands production.

Canadian Documents Suggest Shift on Pipeline

Sunday, Aug 25, 2013

Does Your iPhone Use As Much Electricity as a New Refrigerator? Not Even Close.

For 14 years, the coal industry has been pushing the myth the Internet is an energy hog. For 14 years, I (and other scientists) have been debunking that myth.  Last week, I promised a detailed debunking of the iPhone=Refrigerator calculation from Dr. Jon Koomey, the world’s foremost authority on the electricity consumption of the Internet.  Here it is — Joe Romm.

Does Your iPhone Use As Much Electricity as a New Refrigerator?  Not Even Close. - by Jonathan Koomey

EPA Orders Air Pollution Controls for Fracked Gas Wells

It’s the first time the EPA has required air pollution controls at hydraulically fractured, or fracked, wells. The new rule targets smog-forming volatile organic compounds and air toxics that increase cancer risks. The same equipment also would trap methane, a potent heat-trapping gas in the atmosphere.

EPA Orders Air Pollution Controls for Fracked Gas Wells

Carbon Economics and the Cost of Inaction

What the science says:  The costs of inaction far outweigh the costs of mitigation.

Carbon Economics and the Cost of Inaction

The Id and the Eco

Thinking about climate change makes people feel helpless and anxious – but that’s why we must talk about it openly.

The Id and the Eco

Saturday, Aug 24, 2013

Supercomputing a Quieter Wind Turbine

Noise created by giant wind turbines is high on the list of barriers to renewable energy deployment, with NIMBY and health complaints threatening or at least delaying a number of projects around the world.  But noise also is related to efficiency, and now the research division for turbine manufacturing giant GE says it has figured out how to reduce noise and boost output.  Win all around, apparently.

Supercomputing a Quieter Wind Turbine

Can Cities Adjust to a Retreating Coastline?

Who could ever imagine a politician standing on a coastline proclaiming, "We will retreat!"
But somehow, that's what has to be done.  Finding a way to have a realistic discussion of where to hold firm and where to pull back, where to gird and where to let nature dominate, has to happen to limit costs and other regrets in thousands of coastal cities and smaller communities around the world.

Can Cities Adjust to a Retreating Coastline?

Is Al Jazeera America Going to Change the Way Networks Cover Climate Change?

On its first day of broadcasting, Al Jazeera America devoted 30 minutes to climate change — more time than top shows on CNN and Fox News have given to this issue in the past four-and-a-half months, combined.

Is Al Jazeera America Going to Change the Way Networks Cover Climate Change?

Friday, Aug 23, 2013

FERC Chair Jon Wellinghoff: Solar 'Is Going to Overtake Everything'

If a single drop of water on the pitcher's mound at Dodger Stadium is doubled every minute, Wellinghoff said, a person chained to the highest seat would be in danger of drowning in an hour.

"That's what is happening in solar.  It could double every two years," Jon Wellinghoff, chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), said.

FERC Chair Jon Wellinghoff: Solar 'Is Going to Overtake Everything'

5 Terrifying Statements in the Leaked Climate Report

Climate Desk has obtained a leaked copy of the draft Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's 2013 Summary for Policymakers report, which other media outlets are also reporting on.  The document is dated June 7, 2013.  We recognize ... that this document is not final and is in fact certain to change.

Most media outlets are focusing on the document's conclusion that it is now "extremely likely"—or, 95 percent certain—that humans are behind much of the global warming seen over the last six decades.  But there is much more of note about the document—for instance, the way it doesn't hold back.  It says, very bluntly, just how bad global warming is going to be.

5 Terrifying Statements in the Leaked Climate Report

How IPCC Climate Reports Are Like the Surgeon General’s Cigarette Warnings - by Joe Romm

The gun-shy IPCC is still willing to say the equivalent of “quitting carbon over the next several decades greatly reduces serious risk to your climate,” but it continues to pull its punches on the specificity of its warning about what happens if we make no serious effort to quit carbon.

How IPCC Climate Reports Are Like the Surgeon General’s Cigarette Warnings - by Joe Romm

Thursday, Aug 22, 2013

Get Ready for Food Prices to Go Way Up, Thanks to Climate Change

Climate change will likely push food prices up 20 to 40 percent, regardless of cuts to future carbon emissions, new research in the journal Climatic Change concluded.  Staple crops like rice, wheat, and grains — which make up the vast majority of global diets, especially for the poor — could see the biggest hits, with big costs for global economic welfare.

Get Ready for Food Prices to Go Way Up, Thanks to Climate Change

Wednesday, Aug 21, 2013

Historic & Future Increase in Global Land Area Affected by Monthly Heat Extremes

Dim Coumou and Alexander Robinson from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research have published a paper in Environmental Research Letters (open access, free to download) examining the frequency of extreme heat events in a warming world. 

They compared a future in which humans continue to rely heavily on fossil fuels (IPCC scenario RCP8.5) to one in which we transition away from fossil fuels and rapidly reduce greenhouse gas emissions (RCP2.6).  In both cases, the global land area experiencing extreme summer heat will quadruple by 2040 due to the global warming that's already locked in from the greenhouse gases we've emitted thus far.  However, in the low emissions scenario, extreme heat frequency stabilizes after 2040 (left frames in Figure), while it becomes the new norm for most of the world in a high emissions scenario (right frames in Figure).

Historic and Future Increase in the Global Land Area Affected by Monthly Heat Extremes

Fracking Frenzy Slows as Oil and Gas Assets Plummet

Oil companies are hitting the brakes on a U.S. shale land grab that produced an abundance of cheap natural gas -- and troubles for the industry.

The spending slowdown by international companies comes amid a series of write-downs of oil and gas shale assets, caused by plunging prices and disappointing wells. The companies are turning instead to developing current projects, unable to justify buying more property while fields bought during the 2009-2012 flurry remain below their purchase price, according to analysts.

Fracking Frenzy Slows as Oil and Gas Assets Plummet

Japan to Raise Severity Rating for Fukushima Leaks to Level 3

Contaminated water with dangerously high levels of radiation is leaking from a storage tank at Japan's destroyed Fukushima nuclear plant, the most serious setback to the cleanup of the worst nuclear accident since Chernobyl.

Japan will raise the severity rating of the toxic water leak at the Fukushima nuclear plant to level 3, or "serious incident", on an international scale for radiological releases, underlining the deepening sense of crisis at the site.

Japan to Raise Severity Rating for Fukushima Leaks to Level 3

Tuesday, Aug 20, 2013

Federal Report Says Sandy Recovery Spending Must Account for Future Climate Change

The Hurricane Sandy Rebuilding Task Force, a presidentially appointed group in charge of coordinating rebuilding efforts in the states devastated by last year's storm, yesterday issued a report stressing the need to take climate change into account when investing federal funds in disaster recovery.

While the rebuilding strategy ensures that residents of New York and New Jersey have the federal aid they need to build more resilient communities, the report does not include a recommendation to provide additional federal revenue to invest in resilience efforts in other communities vulnerable to storms, floods, drought, heat waves, and wildfires.

Because of lack of funds, some states have not adequately invested in community resilience.  In the wake of the tornados in Moore, Oklahoma, the New York Times reported that, “only about 10 percent of homes in Moore” had storm-safe rooms or underground shelters.

Federal Report Says Sandy Recovery Spending Must Account for Future Climate Change

The Declining Value of Coal Just Killed Another Export Terminal

On Monday the Port of Corpus Christi announced it was scrapping plans to build a coal export terminal, scoring a major victory for environmentalists and offering further proof of the declining market value of coal.  According to a press release from the Sierra Club, New Elk Coal Company signed a lease with the port in 2011, and will pay a one-time fee to cancel it.

The Declining Value of Coal Just Killed Another Export Terminal

Monday, Aug 19, 2013

Memo to Media: The Coal Industry Wants You to Believe the Internet Is an Energy Hog. It Isn’t. - by Joe Romm

Now you’d think that a study designed to prove the Internet economy must be fed ever-growing amounts of coal to keep running — a study that just happens to be “sponsored by the National Mining Association and the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity ” (!) — would raise some red flags for journalists. Alas, no.

... Just 60 seconds on Google directs one to countless debunkings of Mills, mostly by Dr. Jon Koomey, who is a research fellow at Stanford and former staff scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, where he became the world’s foremost expert authority on the electricity consumption of the Internet.

There’s a regular trend on the electrical efficiency of computers that has persisted for two decades longer than Moore’s law, and applies to all electronic information technology, not just microprocessors.  The electrical efficiency of computation, defined as the number of computations we can do per kilowatt-hour consumed, has doubled roughly every year and a half since the mid 1940s."

Memo to Media:  The Coal Industry Wants You to Believe the Internet Is an Energy Hog.  It Isn’t.

Future Flood Losses in Major Coastal Cities: Costly Projections

Climate change combined with rapid population increases, economic growth, and land subsidence could lead to a more than nine-fold increase in the global risk of floods in large port cities between now and 2050.

Future Flood Losses in Major Coastal Cities: Costly Projections

3.1 GW of Fossil Fuel Power Plants to Be Shut Down in Germany — No Longer Competitive

RWE, a German electric utilities company, has announced in their report on their results for the first six months of 2013 that they plan to take 3.1 GW of fossil fuel generating capacity off the market.

The reason they give is that wholesale electricity prices are way down in Germany as a consequence of more renewable energy in the mix.  They would be losing money if they needed to sell at these low prices.  They aren't currently losing money because most of their business is fulfilling contracts from the past couple of years, which still have higher prices.  That effect will be gone soon.

3.1 GW of Fossil Fuel Power Plants to Be Shut Down in Germany — No Longer Competitive

Sunday, Aug 18, 2013

New IPCC Report: Climatologists More Certain Global Warming Is Caused by Humans, Impacts Are Speeding Up

The Fifth — and hopefully final — Assessment Report (AR5) from the UN Intergovernmental Panel On Climate Change (IPCC) is due next month.  The leaks are already here:

Drafts seen by Reuters of the study by the UN panel of experts, due to be published next month, say it is at least 95 percent likely that human activities – chiefly the burning of fossil fuels – are the main cause of warming since the 1950s.

New IPCC Report: Climatologists More Certain Global Warming Is Caused by Humans, Impacts Are Speeding Up

Andrew Dessler on Why It's Stupid Not to Act on Climate Change

Andrew Dessler on Why It's Stupid not to Act on Climate Change (via Skeptical Science)

Posted on 16 August 2013 by dessler

Andrew Emory Dessler is a climate scientist and Professor of Atmospheric Sciences at Texas A&M University.  His research subject areas are atmospheric chemistry, climate change, and climate change policy.

TransCanada Acknowledges Oil Sands Crude Could Sink If Spilled

In comments released Thursday by the State Department, TransCanada Corp. acknowledged a possibility that opponents of Keystone XL have long used against the project:  The heavy oil sands crude that would run through the controversial pipeline, if spilled in water, could sink below the surface.

TransCanada Acknowledges Oil Sands Crude Could Sink If Spilled

Saturday, Aug 17, 2013

Drought Forces First-Ever Cutbacks in Lake Mead Water Deliveries

The Bureau of Reclamation announced Friday that it will reduce for the first time ever Colorado River water deliveries from the Lake Powell reservoir downstream to Lake Mead, which provides nearly all of Las Vegas' water.

Drought Forces First-Ever Cutbacks in Lake Mead Water Deliveries

The Myth of Baseload Power

The mix of renewable energy technologies in our computer model, which has no base-load power stations, easily supplies base-load demand.  Our optimal mix comprises wind 50-60%; solar PV 15-20%; concentrated solar thermal with 15 hours of thermal storage 15-20%; and the small remainder supplied by existing hydro and gas turbines burning renewable gases or liquids.  (Contrary to some claims, concentrated solar with thermal storage does not behave as base-load in winter; however, that doesn’t matter.)

The Myth of Baseload Power

Friday, Aug 16, 2013

New Hydropower Laws Could Add 60 GW of Clean Energy to US Grid

The one thing everyone working on energy issues in America can agree upon is non-existent energy policy action at the national level.  But late last week, President Obama signed two bipartisan bills that could create a major boost for US renewables generation from an unlikely source – small hydropower.


New Hydropower Laws Could Add 60 GW of Clean Energy to US Grid

New Rechargeable Flow Battery Enables Cheaper, Large-Scale Energy Storage

MIT researchers have engineered a new rechargeable flow battery that doesn’t rely on expensive membranes to generate and store electricity.  The device, they say, may one day enable cheaper, large-scale energy storage that would support widespread use of solar and wind energy.

New Rechargeable Flow Battery Enables Cheaper, Large-Scale Energy Storage - MIT

Fox News: ‘There's No Question that the Polar Bear Is Thriving’

On Friday, Fox News broadcast a segment where President of the Pacific Legal Foundation Rob Rivett claimed polar bears’ only ‘threatened’ status is that they are a ‘threat’ to the fossil fuel industry.

Fox has said the polar bear proves global warming doesn’t exist when it’s tackled the issue in the past. Eight polar bear populations are in decline, but what will decimate their population by mid-21 century is rapidly shrinking Arctic sea ice.  Based on the extensive study of climate change’s threat to the bear, including 13 out of 14 peer reviewers, the D.C. Circuit upheld the Fish and Wildlife Service “threatened” classification in a case this spring.

Fox News: ‘There's No Question that the Polar Bear Is Thriving’

Ecuador to Open Amazon's Yasuni Basin to Oil Drilling

Ecuador will open up part of the Amazon rainforest to oil drilling after rich nations failed to back a conservation plan that would have paid the country not to explore in the area, President Rafael Correa said on Thursday.

Ecuador to Open Amazon's Yasuni Basin to Oil Drilling

Thursday, Aug 15, 2013

New Report Highlights Increasing Risks to Coastal Homes from Sea Level Rise and Storm

 The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) issued a report Tuesday highlighting that sea level rise and worsening storm surge are increasing both the risks of flooding in coastal communities and the potential for large costs borne by U.S. taxpayers.  Coastal state-subsidized wind insurance programs are also at financial risk.

The report calls for reforms to the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) and state-backed wind insurance programs to discourage risky development.

According to the NFIP, although repetitive-loss properties account for just 1.3 percent of overall policies, they have been responsible for 25 percent of all NFIP payments (almost $9 billion) since 1978, and are expected to account for 15 to 20 percent of future NFIP losses.

New Report Highlights Increasing Risks to Coastal Homes from Sea Level Rise and Storm

As Northeast Asia Bakes, Climate Scientists Predict More Extreme Heat Waves on the Horizon

Northeast Asia is on fire.  Yesterday temperatures in Shanghai hit an all-time high of 105.4ºF (40.8ºC), the hottest day in the coastal megacity since Chinese officials began keeping records some 140 years ago — during the Qing dynasty.  On Aug. 12 the heat reached 105.8ºF (41ºC) in the southern Japanese city of Shimanto, the hottest temperature ever recorded in the country.  Hundreds of people throughout South Korea have been hospitalized because of heatstroke, even as the government was forced to cut off air-conditioning in public buildings because of fears of a power shortage.

As heat waves go, it’s similar to the brutally hot weather that singed Europe 10 years ago and contributed to the deaths of over 30,000 people.  It’s also a glimpse of a blazingly hot future.  As a new study published in Environmental Research Letters shows, the sort of scorching heat waves currently baking Northeast Asia are likely to become more frequent and more severe around the world in the decades to come — and that’s going to happen no matter what we do about carbon emissions in the near future.

As Northeast Asia Bakes, Climate Scientists Predict More Extreme Heat Waves on the Horizon

Plants in U.S. Southwest Moving Higher as the Climate Warms

Numerous plant species on a mountain in the southwestern U.S. are migrating to higher elevations as the climate gets warmer and drier, according to a new study.

After comparing the results of a recent survey of 27 plants found on Mount Lemmon, a 9,157-foot peak near Tucson, Ariz., with a similar survey conducted in 1963, researchers at the University of Arizona found that three-quarters of the plants have shifted their range "significantly" upslope in the last five decades.

Writing in the journal Ecology and Evolution, the researchers note that the lowermost boundary for 15 of the species has shifted upslope. "If climate continues to warm, as the climate models predict, the subalpine mixed conifer forests on the tops of the mountains -- and the animals dependent upon them -- could be pushed right off the top and disappear," said Richard C. Brusca, a research scientist who led the study.

Plants in U.S. Southwest Moving Higher as the Climate Warms

Wednesday, Aug 14, 2013

Wet, Wetter, Wettest Makes July No. 5 in Record Books

Extremes in precipitation was the weather highlight of July, with last month ranking as the fifth-wettest July on record nationwide, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's monthly weather summary report released Tuesday.

Wet, Wetter, Wettest Makes July No. 5 in Record Books

With Florida Project, the Smart Grid Has Finally Arrived

Many utilities are installing smart meters—Pacific Gas & Electric in California has installed twice as many as FPL, for example. But while these are important, the flexibility and resilience that the smart grid promises depends on networking those together with thousands of sensors at key points in the grid— substations, transformers, local distribution lines, and high voltage transmission lines. (A project in Houston is similar in scope, but involves half as many customers, and covers somewhat less of the grid.)

In FPL’s system, devices at all of these places are networked—data jumps from device to device until it reaches a router that sends it back to the utility—and that makes it possible to sense problems before they cause an outage, and to limit the extent and duration of outages that still occur ..... The project involved 4.5 million smart meters and over 10,000 other devices on the grid.

With Florida Project, the Smart Grid Has Finally Arrived

Blackout Threat Unmitigated a Decade After the Northeast Went Dark

Power system experts who study blackouts say that they see a similar pattern in most cascading outages. They cite recent notables, such as  Arizona, California and Mexico’s Baja California in 2011, Western Europe in 2006, Brazil in 2009, and twice in India last year.  The commonality is evidence to the experts that cascading failures are a dangerous facet of modern power grids that remains all but impossible to predict or prevent. “Large blackouts are likely to recur at regular intervals,” says Ian Dobson, a cascading failures expert and electrical and computer engineering professor at the University of Wisconsin.

Blackout Threat Unmitigated a Decade After the Northeast Went Dark

Tuesday, Aug 13, 2013

Media Slammed for ‘Surprisingly Limited Analysis’ of Major Report on Climate Change’s ‘New Normal’

The Columbia Journalism Review has criticized the NY Times and other major media outlets for inadequate coverage of NOAA’s annual State of the Climate report. In its critique, CJR points out “Considering the importance of the information, the mainstream press provided surprisingly limited analysis.”

Media Slammed for ‘Surprisingly Limited Analysis’ of Major Report on Climate Change’s ‘New Normal’