U.S. energy-related carbon dioxide emissions increase in past two years

By Perry Lindstrom20 April 2015 (EIA) – For the second year in a row, energy-related carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in the United States have increased. However, unlike 2013, when emissions and gross domestic product (GDP) grew at similar rates (2.5% and 2.2%, respectively), 2014’s CO2 emissions growth rate of 0.7% was much smaller than the […]

How to misinterpret climate change research – Research into the cooling impact of aerosols sends climate contrarians into a tailspin

By Gayathri Vaidyanathan23 April 2015 (Scientific American) – Slivers of dust float in the upper atmosphere, scattering the sun’s rays back into space and cooling the planet in some places. In other places, the particles warm the planet. The equivocation has meant that the particles, known as aerosols, are a significant wild card in our […]

Places to visit before they’re ruined forever by climate change

By Tanya Lewis24 April 2015 (Business Insider) – Earth Day, which was on April 22 this year, is a time to celebrate and protect the pale blue dot we call home. But some of its crown jewels may be vanishing. Many parts of the globe face threats from warming temperatures, sea level rise, drought, and […]

Apple Inc. carbon footprint rises despite green measures

20 April 2015 (NBC News) – Apple is more energy efficient than it ever has been, according to a new report, with 100 percent of U.S. operations running completely on renewable energy. Still, the company was responsible for 34.2 million metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions in fiscal 2014 — the vast majority from manufacturing […]

Half of Vanuatu residents lack clean water, month after Cyclone Pam: UNICEF

By Magdalena Mis; Editing by Tim Pearce 22 April 2015 LONDON (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – More than 100,000 people in Vanuatu have no clean drinking water, a month after a monster cyclone struck the tiny Pacific nation, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said on Wednesday. Two thirds of the archipelago’s water and sanitation infrastructure […]

5 canards in Rep. Lamar Smith’s Earth Day editorial on global warming

25 April 2015 (Desdemona Despair) – The Wall Street Journal continues its long tradition of printing editorials that reject the findings of climate science. On Earth Day 2015, we were treated to Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX), chairman of the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology, rolling out some old denialist chestnuts, to criticize proposed […]

Nevada’s Lake Mead hits record low water level after 14 years of severe drought

By Victoria Cavaliere; Editing by Sandra Maler24 April 2015 (Reuters) – Nevada’s Lake Mead, the largest capacity reservoir in the United States, is on track to drop to its lowest water level in recorded history on Sunday as its source, the Colorado River, suffers from 14 years of severe drought, experts said on Friday. The […]

California drought drives an ‘explosive,’ longer wildfire season – ‘Since 2000 we’ve been seeing larger and more damaging fires’

By Linda Carroll25 April 2015 (NBC News) – There was a time when fire season in California started around May and went through September. Now, thanks to a drought that’s stretching into its fourth year, the state seems to have become a year-round tinderbox. The long running drought has “created explosive fire conditions,” said Mike […]

Graph of the Day: Trend in global average surface temperature, 1970-2014

By Tamino20 January 2015 (Open Mind) – Both NASA and NOAA report 2014 as the hottest year on record. Despite the new #1, neither the news itself nor the response to it has surprised me. The news that last year was so hot is certainly no surprise. The simple reason is that for the last […]

Not science fiction: Changing climate pushing migrants out of Africa and into tragedy

By Michael Werz and Max Hoffman 21 April 2015 (Reuters) – The migrant crisis in the Mediterranean is symptomatic of deep dislocation in the Sahel region and sub-Saharan Africa — dislocation exacerbated by climate change. Climate change is affecting such basic environmental conditions as rainfall patterns and temperatures and is contributing to more frequent natural […]

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