North America – Page 3 – Desdemona Despair

Stormwater flows into Biscayne Bay, 1 June 2024 - 18 June 2024. The flows from the Little River exceeded rates of 2000 cubic feet per second, causing very low salinity in the bay, resulting in large-scale fish kills. Graphic: Miami Waterkeeper

July 27, 2024

Record flooding yields massive fish kill in miles-long stretch of Biscayne Bay – “These events are anything but normal”

By Margaret Wong 23 July 2024 (The Cool Down) – Biscayne Bay is reeling from its fourth major fish kill in as many years, triggered by recent record flooding in South Florida. What’s happening? Torrential rains have inundated the region, causing a significant influx of freshwater into the bay, which has led to low salinity […]

The Utility Disconnections Dashboard shows the number and rate of disconnections by utility in each U.S. state. Indiana has the highest disconnection rate. Places with particularly high disconnection rates include Alabama, where the city of Dothan’s municipal utility has disconnected an average of 5 percent of its customers, and Florida, where the city of Tallahassee has a disconnection rate of more than 4 percent. Large investor-owned utilities in Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, and Indiana also top the charts in disconnections, with average rates near 1 percent. Graphic: Energy Justice Lab / CC BY-ND

July 27, 2024

America faces a power disconnection crisis amid rising heat: In 31 states, utilities can shut off electricity for nonpayment in a heat wave –

By Sanya Carley and David Konisky 5 July 2024 (The Conversation) – Millions of Americans have been sweltering through heat waves in recent weeks, and U.S. forecasters warn of a hot summer ahead. Globally, 2023 saw the warmest June on record, according to the European Union’s climate change service. That heat continued into July, with some of […]

Neighbors look at a car crushed by a large tree in the wake of Hurricane Irene on 28 August 2011 in Baltimore, Maryland. Photo: Patrick Smith / Getty Images

July 27, 2024

Baltimore judge tosses climate case, hands win to Big Oil – “This decision is the oil companies’ dream. This is what they would love to happen to all those cases.”

By Aman Azhar 13 July 2024 (Inside Climate News) – In a first of its kind decision, a Maryland judge on Wednesday tossed Baltimore City’s climate suit against major oil giants on the grounds that it is not the role of the state courts to address a global issue like climate change. Originally filed in […]

Wildfires that threatened Jasper for days reached the Alberta mountainside town Wednesday evening, 24 July 2024. Shown here are properties are engulfed in flames at the corner of Cabin Creek Drive and Patricia Street. Photo: CBC

July 27, 2024

Canada mourns as Jasper, jewel of the Rockies, burns – Much of town incinerated by 100 meter-high walls of flame driven by tropical storm-force winds – “There are no tools we have in our tool box to deal with it”

By Max Matza and Eloise Alanna 26 July 2024 MONTREAL (BBC News) – Tears welled in Tasha Porttin’s eyes as she reminisced on the sheer beauty of the place she’s called home for 10 years. Jasper’s mountain peaks and the picture-perfect pine trees that frame its vivid baby-blue lakes make it a popular tourist destination […]

Trump walks onstage to deliver the keynote address at the Faith & Freedom Coalition’s Road to Majority Policy Conference at the Washington Hilton on 22 June 2024 in Washington, D.C. Photo: Samuel Corum / Getty Images

July 15, 2024

What Trump allies’ Project 2025 would mean for the fight against climate change – “Trump would frack the National Mall if he thought it would make a couple of bucks for donors and Big Oil”

By Zack Budryk and Rachel Frazin 13 July 2025 (The Hill) – Project 2025, a controversial conservative roadmap that aims to guide the next Republican administration, calls for the elimination of multiple energy- and environment-related offices and rules — moves that would restrict the government’s ability to combat climate change and pollution. Policies promoted under the plan […]

Staff at Lakewood Church hand out water and operate a cooling station in Houston, Tuesday, 9 July 2024. The effects of Hurricane Beryl left most in the area without power. Photo: Eric Gay / AP Photo

July 15, 2024

Houston is on a path to an all-out power crisis – “I’ve seen tweets from even the most committed Houstonians deliberating whether it’s time to move”

By Andrea Valdez 12 July 2024 (The Atlantic) – For the 2.2 million people in Houston who lost power Monday after Hurricane Beryl swept through the city, the first question they had was When will the electricity be back on? The city’s utility, CenterPoint Energy, didn’t yet have an online outage map to monitor. There was, however, […]

A drone view shows flood waters surrounding homes in the aftermath of Hurricane Beryl in Surfside Beach, Texas, U.S., 8 July 2024. Photo: Adrees Latif / REUTERS

July 14, 2024

Texas insurance crisis gets bad news – “With insurers withdrawing from climate-risk-prone markets or not renewing policies, securing essential coverage is becoming increasingly challenging”

By Suzanne Blake 10 July 2024 (Newsweek) – Texans have been facing a home insurance crisis that is only likely to escalate in the days after Hurricane Beryl, experts told Newsweek. Hurricane Beryl first entered Texas in Matagorda on Monday morning as a Category 1 hurricane after moving throughout the Caribbean. The hurricane persisted throughout Texas with strong winds and rain, […]

NASA’s ECOSTRESS instrument on 19 June 2024 recorded scorching roads and sidewalks across Phoenix, where contact with skin could cause serious burns in minutes to seconds, as indicated in the legend. Graphic: NASA / JPL-Caltech

July 14, 2024

NASA captures 160°F (71°C) roads and sidewalks across Phoenix – “It looks like we’re at a record pace, which is a record we really don’t want to set”

By Jessica Boehm 10 July 2024 (Axios) – Many Phoenix streets and sidewalks can reach 160° during the hottest parts of the day, according to a new NASA analysis. Why it matters: Surfaces that hot can cause contact burns in seconds, and Valley hospitals are seeing an uptick in patients with serious burn injuries. The big picture: Human-caused climate […]

Plaintiffs Mica, 14; Badge 15, Lander 18, and Taleah, 19, listen to arguments during a status hearing on 12 May 2023, in Helena, Montana, for a case that they and other Montana youth filed against the state arguing Montana officials are not meeting their constitutional obligations to protect residents from climate change. The first-of-its-kind trial began Monday, 12 June 2023, before District Court Judge Kathy Seeley in Helena. Photo: Thom Bridge /Independent Record / AP

July 14, 2024

Montana Republicans appeal to state supreme court to overturn landmark climate ruling – Ruling in Montana case could impact climate change lawsuits across country – “It’s an evasion of your constitutional obligation to protect our rights and our state. Why would you not try?”

By Josh Marcus 11 July 2024 SAN FRANCISCO (The Independent) – Republican officials in Montana urged the state supreme court on Wednesday to overturn a landmark 2023 climate ruling, which sided with a group of young plaintiffs who argued the state was violating their constitutional rights by allowing fossil fuel projects to move forward without […]

Fallen power lines littered the roads in Galveston after Hurricane Beryl hit the Texas coast on Monday, 8 July 2024. Photo: Meridith Kohut / The New York Times

July 10, 2024

Rising frustration in Houston after millions lost power in storm – “For a Category 1 hurricane to result in over a million customer outages in its immediate aftermath demonstrates that there is plenty of need for the resiliency hardening investments”

By J. David Goodman and Ivan Penn 10 July 2024 (The New York Times) – The sun felt hotter than usual in Houston this week, as millions of sweltering residents emerged from the rapid thrashing of Hurricane Beryl to face a prolonged power outage — the largest ever seen by the city’s utility, according to […]