Hot Air

Something to keep in mind…


This Friday, UK students are planning a coordinated mass walkout
with 100,000 students expected to participate

It's a prelude to a week of even bigger protests planned for London
in April by Extinction Rebellion (XR)

Former Archbishop of Canterbury
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CLIMATE CHANGE IS NOT A BUSINESS PROPOSAL
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The risk posed by Climate Breakdown will not be resolved by ensuring profits are maintained. Profit must be decoupled from “Climate Change”.

Extractive businesses are fighting for their very existence, rushing to make revenue now, fearing future limits or a complete shut down of their industries. At the same time they are hedging their bets and diversifying into renewable climate technologies.

There is simply no time left for incrementalism. There is no time left to coddle multinational extraction industries. The risk posed by Climate Breakdown is immediate and is global.

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Resource extraction responsible for half world’s carbon emissions
The Guardian 3-12-19

Resources are being extracted from the planet three times faster than in 1970, even though the population has only doubled in that time, according to the Global Resources Outlook, which was released in Nairobi on Tuesday. … Each year, the world consumes more than 92b tonnes of materials – biomass (mostly food), metals, fossil fuels and minerals – and this figure is growing at the rate of 3.2% per year.

BP lobbied Trump administration to roll back key US climate rules
Unearthed 3-12-19

British oil major BP successfully lobbied the Trump administration to roll back key climate regulations preventing the release of methane into the atmosphere, despite claiming to support the Paris agreement to limit global warming to well below 2C.

Given the need to reduce CO2, the information in this article is timely. Worth checking out…

Oil majors strut into Houston for annual energy conference
Reuters 3-10-19

U.S. crude output has rocketed to more than 12 million barrels a day, surpassing former leaders Russia and Saudi Arabia, but that success comes as independent U.S. shale companies are reducing drilling under pressure from investors demanding improved returns. … “This is the first CERAWeek ever where the world’s largest producer is the country where we are holding the conference, which is the United States.”

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HOT AIR NEWS ROUNDUP

Airlines Were Supposed to Fix Their Pollution Problem. It’s Just Getting Worse
Bloomberg 3-10-19

“We are all going to have to reduce the extent to which we fly” … Airplane pollution, which has risen by about two-thirds since 2005, is forecast to jump as much as sevenfold by 2050 as incomes in developing economies advance, making flying more affordable for hundreds of millions if not billions of people, according to the Montreal-based ICAO. The International Air Transport Association, or IATA, the industry’s biggest trade group, expects the number of airline passengers to double by 2037, to more than 8 billion a year.

CO2 mineralization in geologically common rocks for carbon storage
Science Daily 3-8-19

An international research team modeled CO2 mineralization on a quartz (SiO2) surface to study the dynamics of geological trapping. In molecular dynamics simulations, CO2 interacted with SiO2 to form CO3 units, which were hydrolyzed into carbonate ions by water. Carbonate ions react with dissolved metals (e.g. Mg2+, Ca2+, Fe2+), locking CO2 emissions into underground minerals posing no environmental threat. The study confirms this process is favorable but requires cleaved SiO2 surfaces.

This article discusses the impact on fish and those that depend on them to survive…

Ice in the Bering Sea drops to lowest level since 1850
Axios 3-5-19

For the second straight year, the Bering Sea — a turbulent and bountiful stretch of the northern Pacific Ocean — is virtually ice free at a time of year when it should be gaining ice.

French government working on 'more ambitious' energy and climate bill
Reuters 3-10-19

A draft energy and climate law due to be presented to French cabinet ministers on Monday has been postponed so that it can be reworked with more ambitious environmental goals, … The proposals had been criticized by climate change campaigners and a high-level state-backed economic affairs committee for being too vague on some targets, including an aim for France to be “carbon neutral” by 2050.

Interesting book review, full article will be published 3-25…

The Criminal Dimension of Climate Change
Monthly Review 3-1-19

Unprecedented Crime: Climate Science Denial and Game Changers for Survival outlines the criminality of those who actively promote the continuing emission of carbon gases into the atmosphere despite having full knowledge of the consequences.

Climate Change Will Expose Half of World’s Population to Disease-Spreading Mosquitoes By 2050
Yale Environment 3-5-19

“If no action is taken to reduce the current rate at which the climate is warming, pockets of habitat will open up across many urban areas with vast amounts of individuals susceptible to infection,”

Avalanches Terrorize Colorado as Climate Change Raises the Risk
Climate Change News 3-11-19

March took even seasoned Colorado veterans by surprise, with large avalanches unexpectedly hitting roads while they were open.  On March 8 the Colorado Avalanche Information Center said 346 avalanches had been reported in the previous seven days.

Excellent video...

A Climate Sociologist Explains the Green New Deal
The Real News 3-1-19 h/t lo

the fossil fuel industry is the number one barrier to climate change. politically, they have bought off most of the republican part, they have bought off many member of the democratic party. They are a huge industry that stands to loose absolutely everything and they are going to fight to the death. I you don't take them on and if you think you can cut a deal with them, while wiping them out kinda slowly. I think that's a naive view of how politics works in this country.

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[video:https://youtu.be/nccC6fQiI7k]
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B.C. left holding massive bill for hundreds of orphan gas wells as frack companies go belly-up
The Narwhal 3-13-19

On the cusp of a major fracking boom, B.C.’s Oil and Gas Commission is already struggling to keep up with the ballooning cost of cleaning up inactive and, at times, contaminated sites that have grown by 48 per cent in the last two years

US and Canadian Oil Production Push the Planet’s Climate Goals Out of Reach
Mother Jones 3-10-19

A surge in US and Canadian oil production over the last decade has added the equivalent of “one Russia or one Saudi Arabia” to the markets—pushing the planet farther away from ever getting a grip on the pollution that is driving climate change.

Really…

Spray sun-blocking chemicals into atmosphere to cut global temperature rise in half, scientists say
Independent 3-11-19

Scientists compare solar geoengineering to blood pressure medication: ‘An overdose would be harmful, but a well-chosen dose could reduce your risks’ … Spraying chemicals into the atmosphere to block sunlight could cut global temperature increases in half without any dangerous repercussions, Harvard scientists have suggested.

Air pollution deaths are double previous estimates, finds research
The Guardian 3-12-19

The scientists used new data to estimate that nearly 800,000 people die prematurely each year in Europe because of dirty air, and that each life is cut short by an average of more than two years. … its impact via the bloodstream on heart disease and strokes is responsible for twice as many deaths as respiratory diseases.

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ADAPTION AND RESILIENCE

How to Keep Food Cool Without Electricity
Green Optimist 3-11-19

Evaporative cooling was used as early as the Old Kingdom of Egypt, around 2500 B.C. As you can imagine, a clay pot cooler does not use electricity. It uses a porous clay pot (filled with wet sand) containing another smaller inner pot (which can be treated to prevent penetration by the liquid) within which the food is placed. The evaporation of the outer water draws heat from the inner pot.

[video:https://youtu.be/LfKgOpJc7Ps?list=PL4353B8F64687BAA1]
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Volkswagen Launches $50B EV Race to Challenge Tesla
Climate Change News 3-7-19

“The ID. BUGGY demonstrates the broad spectrum of emission-free mobility that can be achieved with the MEB [electric drive matrix] within the Volkswagen brand.  But we want to open up the platform for third-party suppliers”

Citing 'Permanent Oil Price Decline,' Norwegian Fund's Fossil Fuel Divestment Could Spark Global 'Shockwave'
Common Dreams 2-8-19

the Norwegian Sovereign Wealth Fund—the largest of its kind in the world—has recommended the Norway government divest the entirety of the fund's $40 billion holdings from the fossil fuel industry. … Institutional investors that manage sovereign wealth funds and pensions funds, she added,  "are withdrawing their capital from oil and gas companies on the grounds that quicker-than-expected growth in clean energy and associated regulation is making oil and gas business models highly vulnerable.

Green Optimist 3-7-19

This procedure is already applied in scuba rebreathers, … allowing the air to be recycled for re-breathing. The application of a similar procedure for capturing atmospheric CO2 is particularly attractive because the organic sorbent can be regenerated at much lower temperatures compared to existing commercial inorganic scrubbers, leading to a 24% reduction in energy requirements and a significant decrease in the costs of carbon capture.

Great article about how this scientist lives her life to minimize her personal carbon expenditure…

On Carbon, Geophysicist Robin Bell Walks the Walk
State of the Planet 3-7-19

the world’s leading earth scientist is not allowing collective inaction to absolve her of personal responsibility. … Living life in a manner that comports with her field of study is essential for Bell: “I just want to set an example,” she said. “If I am telling people this is an issue, I should be acting like it’s an issue.”

Another inspiring story of local advocacy…

Coming Full Circle
Sierra Club 3-12-19

The Washington Chapter has linked its work on the basin’s rivers with the urgent effort to save the Salish Sea’s Southern Resident orcas from extinction. The orca and salmon efforts are inextricably linked because while numerous factors threaten the orcas, the most critical by far is the current lack of sufficient Chinook salmon—the biggest, most nutritious species in the basin.

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WILDLIFE & THE ENVIRONMENT

The Shells of Wild Sea Butterflies Are Already Dissolving
Hakai 3-1-19

The canaries foretelling ocean acidification fly through the water on winglike feet, lofting their tiny curl of a shell behind them. And those shells are dissolving.

Climate change could devastate painted turtles, according to new study
PHYS ORG 3-12-19

Fluctuations in temperature driven by climate change could devastate a range of species for which sex is determined by temperature during critical stages of development, according to recently published research led by Nicole Valenzuela, a professor of ecology, evolution and organismal biology. Rising temperatures, along with wider oscillations in temperature, could disrupt the ratio of males to females

Good article with good illustrations…

Can we tweak marine chemistry to help stave off climate change?
PHYS ORG 3-12-19

These foreboding trends have led to an increasing focus on ways to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Among the methods being explored is the use of the ocean to absorb and/or store carbon by adding crushed rocks or other sources of alkalinity to react with CO2 in seawater, ultimately consuming atmospheric CO2. … Perhaps the best-known – and at times, controversial – method for marine carbon dioxide removal is stimulating photosynthesis to increase CO2 absorption.

Excellent radio interview about a recent paper discussing how close we are to the heat ceiling and its consequences…

The Rules of Extinction
Radio Ecoshock 3-13-19

“In a simplified view, the idea of co-extinction reduces to the obvious conclusion that a consumer cannot survive without its resources. Because resource and consumer interactions in natural systems (e.g., food webs) are organized in various hierarchical levels of complexity (e.g., trophic levels), it follows that the removal of resources could result in the cascading (bottom-up) extinction of several higher-level consumers.”

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PROTESTS • EXTINCTION REBELLION • RESISTANCE

College Students Calling out Climate Denial Machine That’s Older Than They Are
Desmog 3-7-19

DeSmog published a story this week from the Climate Investigations Center that touches on an interesting angle that’s emerging in the climate world as kids lead the way. … The article describes a conference last month at Brown University that featured a 90-minute panel built around a recent study in Nature Climate Change showing how decades of concerted misinformation played a key role in the current climate of climate denial.

Good read…

This International Women’s Day, Meet the Girls Leading a Movement
Five climate activists talk about why they’re skipping school
Sierra Club 3-8-19

Nineteen-year-old Dayamis Torino Véliz has been striking on Fridays in Lima, Peru, and 22-year-old Luisa Neubauer is organizing strikes across Germany. In January, Vanessa Nakate, 22, started leading strikes in Kampala, Uganda, and in Ontario, Canada, 11-year-old Sophia Mathur has been leading climate demonstrations since November. Meanwhile, 14-year-old Kallan Benson launched #SchoolStrike4Climate at the Department of Energy in Washington, D.C., on Friday, December 7

Students will be striking for climate change on March 15 and May 3
The Star 2-8-19

For decades now, adult activists, environmentalists and scientists have been trying to move climate change to the top of the world agenda. But we have met with limited success. … But now school students around the world are saying enough is enough. “We have the right to live our dreams and hopes,”

The Hip New Teen Trend Is Leading the Climate Movement to Save the World
Vice 3-6-19

What’s most notable about YCSUS is its leadership—besides Villasenor, its cofounders are 16-year-old Isra Hirsi and 12-year-old Haven Coleman. … [Their] dreams seem less insane given the intense outpouring of press coverage the three strike leaders have gotten. So far, they have been covered by the Washington Post, The Nation, Teen Vogue, Gothamist, NBC News, Euronews, Spiegel Online, Greenpeace, Sierra Club Magazine, High Country News, …

Go watch the video and be inspired by this young Belgian woman…

Anuna: the young Belgian who fights for the climate
Chron 3-8-19

Anuna is 17 years old and attends her last year of high school. What drives her is fear, she explains. "In Belgium, we had a lot of heat waves this summer and I am aware of the what the effects will be if we just keep going on this rate”. She was received by many politicians, included the French president Emmanuel Macron. But all the decision makers that she met gave her a bad impression. "They act like children, they don't see that the emergency is now

Great pictures…

Climate protesters climb Finnish Parliament House pillars
UUITISET 3-6-19

Members of several Finnish environmental groups demonstrated at the Finnish Parliament on 6 March. Eight protesters were detained after scaling the giant stone columns.

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Fridays For Future
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Hundreds of Irish children to join global climate-change protest
Irish Times 3-2-19

[The] schoolchildren are set to go on strike on Friday March 15th because of the failures of adults to address climate change. … The students are using social media to mobilise, while three separate teacher groups are helping to organise events around the country.

Councils give pupils Friday off to join climate change protests
The Times 3-11-19

Thousands of children will be handed a free pass out of school to attend climate change protests throughout Scotland on Friday. At least four councils have confirmed they will allow an “authorised absence” to attend if pupils have the permission of their parents. Nicola Sturgeon praised the passion of children who attended the first strike on February 15, but said that repeated absence from school was “not an option”.

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Greta Thunberg
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Greta Thunberg, schoolgirl climate change warrior: ‘Some people can let things go. I can’t’
The Guardian 3-11-19

“They just told me everything will be all right. That didn’t help, of course, but it was good to talk. And then I kept on going, talking about this all the time and showing my parents pictures, graphs and films, articles and reports. And, after a while, they started listening to what I actually said. That’s when I kind of realised I could make a difference. And how I got out of that depression was that I thought: it is just a waste of time feeling this way because I can do so much good with my life. I am trying to do that still now.”

Teen climate activist Greta Thunberg speaks at four school strikes in a week
National Observer 3-11-19

[video:https://youtu.be/VDBJMqZ6lWI]
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Extinction Rebellion
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JOIN EX USA: on their website
EX NEWSLETTERS & EVENTS: on their website

This is perhaps the most succinct Extinction Rebellion presentation to date…

CLIMATE CHANGE: Why we are heading for extinction and what to do about it
Our Gallent Ship 3-5-19

Marcus Carambola from Extinction Rebellion Ōtautahi Christchurch (NZ) talks about the latest climate science and where our planet is headed, and including a good introduction to Extinction Rebellion.

[video:https://youtu.be/LDWdH9YlfJY]
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Thirteen arrests after environmental protesters occupy National Museum of Scotland
The Scotsman 3-8-19

Extinction Rebellion Scotland occupied the National Museum of Scotland to disrupt the annual dinner of the Scottish Oil Club. … The museum was set to host 890 fossil fuel industry leaders for an event to celebrate the industry. Instead a group of 20 activists from Extinction Rebellion Scotland occupied the main hall

This is a list of all the international actions by XR over the last month. Very impressive…

International Highlights (xrebellion.org)
Ocupy SF 3-6-19

South Africa – February 7, March 15 and 23: Rebels used South Africa’s recent state-of-the-nation address to raise awareness of Extinction Rebellion’s demands, by holding a mock parliament and making their own address to the nation. There’s an ongoing, dynamic discussion about how XR can best tackle South Africa’s unique challenges, and help people affected by climate breakdown.

Climate change rebellion protesters pour fake blood on road outside Downing Street
Yahoo 3-9-19

Activists poured hundreds of litres of fake blood into the road outside Downing Street to demand action on climate change. Police stood by watching, without making any arrests, as protesters simultaneously tipped up buckets of the red liquid, which spread across the breadth of the road. An estimated 400 demonstrators from the groups Extinction Rebellion and Christian Climate Action staged the protest, simulating a “sea of blood”.

Hedges is unequivocal. This is an old article just republished by XR…

EXTINCTION REBELLION by Chris Hedges
Occupy San Francisco 3-9-19

There is one desperate chance left to thwart the impending ecocide and extinction of the human species. We must, in wave after wave, carry out nonviolent acts of civil disobedience to shut down the capitals of the major industrial countries, crippling commerce and transportation, until the ruling elites are forced to publicly state the truth about climate catastrophe, implement radical measures to halt carbon emissions by 2025 and empower an independent citizens committee to oversee the termination of our 150-year binge on fossil fuels. If we do not do this, we will face mass death.

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CLIMATE STUDIES

Rain Is Triggering More Melting on the Greenland Ice Sheet — in Winter, Too
Inside Climate News 3-8-19

A new analysis of satellite and weather data shows that melting associated with rain in Greenland doubled in the summers and tripled in the winters from 1988 to 2012 as temperatures rose … The findings could help explain some of the increase in Greenland's meltwater runoff and show how global warming feedback loops can intensify the impact.

Migrating snowline plays outsized role in setting pace of Greenland ice melt
Science Daily 3-6-19

Meltwater from Greenland's ice sheet is a leading contributor to global sea level rise, and a new study shows that an underappreciated factor -- the position of the snowline on the ice sheet -- plays a key role in setting the pace of melting.

This is something we should all be talking about…

Shifting away from coal is key to cutting greenhouse gas emissions

Science Daily 3-7-19

The United States could fulfill its greenhouse gas emission pledge under the Paris Climate Agreement by virtually eliminating coal as an energy source by 2024, according to new research. … As a result, the U.S. would need shift to an energy portfolio based on natural gas, efficiency, wind, solar power and biofuels, with oil used predominately for transportation fuel.

Researchers Capture Carbon Dioxide and Turn it Back to Coal
Green Optimist 3-7-19

According to the authors of the study, until now, similar techniques have been quite expensive. This is due to the special temperature conditions, required for the gas to turn into solid. However, the team showed that if you add a liquid metal [cerium, tin, gallium and indium] as a catalyst, the process can take place at room temperature. This makes it viable and easily scalable.

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Equivalencies:
• 1 gigatonne = 1 billion tons
• 1 gigatonne Carbon = 3.67 gigatonnes CO2
• 1 part per million (ppm) of atmospheric CO2 = 7.81 gigatonnes CO2
• 1 part per million of atmospheric carbon = 2.13 gigatonnes of carbon

Global Warnings

QMS: Time to disconnect greed from the welfare of earth, if survival means anything. I like trees.

Paul Beckwith: "I declare a global climate change emergency to claw back up the rock face to attempt to regain system stability, or face an untenable calamity of biblical proportions."

Kevin Hester: "There is no past analogue for the rapidity of what we are baring witness to. There has been a flood of articles ... 2C is no longer attainable and that we are heading for dangerous climate change"

Guy McPherson: "The recent and near-future rises in temperature are occurring and will occur at least an order of magnitude faster than the worst of all prior Mass Extinctions. Habitat for human animals is disappearing throughout the world, and abrupt climate change has barely begun."

Magi Amma: We need to turn on a dime at mach nine!

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magiamma's picture

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magiamma's picture

@QMS @QMS
music sooths the soul, smooths the fretted brow, this one furrowed with grief for the planet... waxing poetic this morn... heh... that is to say it helps... a bunch

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janis b's picture

for climate change is critical.

Lying only 4.6 metres above sea level, Tuvalu could be one of the first communities to be truly impacted by rising sea levels. Not only will land become uninhabitable, but salt water will infiltrate water supplies and destroy staple food supplies such as coconut and taro. This is the harsh reality for many of our Pacific neighbours.

Tuvalu is where the lead musician (Moana composer Opetaia Foa’i) of Te Vaka is from. He and his musical family have been fighting for climate awareness for at least two decades in NZ.

[video:https://youtu.be/cGrPDNxGUt4]

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magiamma's picture

@janis b beautiful music and beautiful faces. lots of places at sea level. most people live near iirc. we here are absolutely in the line of fire, if you will. and so much more at risk.

the young ones are my hope, we must act now...

thanks for stopping by and for the lovely music. have a good one

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we could stop using our lakes and rivers as sewers but we can't we stop using the oceans and air as a sewer?

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janis b's picture

@Snode

My first thought was that it had something to do with the immediacy of lakes and rivers, as opposed to the vastness of the ocean and air. People can be limited in their understanding of the bigger picture of things. But from my understanding, even many of the lakes and rivers are still subject to sewage of one kind or another, which makes the overall effort more than challenging.

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@janis b I dunno. One other thing, In the US once the rivers and lakes got cleaned up, the shore front became prime real estate and the well off came flocking for 2nd homes. They also didn't want the riff raff on "their" lakes and fought to limit the public's access.

So, once again the responsibility for clean up was socialized, and the benefits privatized.

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magiamma's picture

@Snode
stuff gets dumped into the ocean from all over the world. and then there are all the container ships that get wrecked and dump more stuff. an average of 1,679 containers were lost each year over the six years (from 2014). https://gcaptain.com/how-many-shipping-containers-lost-at-sea/

Chris Ebbenmeyer, a phd oceanographer wrote a whole book on flotsam. "Ebbesmeyer tracked the oceanic movement of all kinds of flotsam including 34,000 ice hockey gloves washed off the Hyundai Seattle in 1994. Prior to this, he had specialized in forecasting the movement of oil spills and sewage."

He wrote a book about it with Eric Scigliano: Flotsametrics and the Floating World: How One Man’s Obsession with Runaway Sneakers and Rubber Ducks Revolutionized Ocean Science.

He mapped the Pacific (iirc) gyeres and more importantly their orbital periods by recording rubber duckies.

http://beachcombersalert.org/RubberDuckies.html

Dean and Tyler beachcombed an important contribution to oceanographic science. The toys provide 40% of the orbital period estimates and the MIBs the remaining 60%. How many more trips around the Gyre will the toys make in future years? After four circuits, by mid-July 2004 Dean and Tyler found four toys; Kim Elliot located a faded blue turtle. The Orbison data show numbers decreasing six-fold in a decade from 25 in 1994 to four in 2004.

and one more link
http://oceanmotion.org/html/research/ebbesmeyer.htm

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@magiamma and I bet this is the kind of research that gets cut year after year.

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Centaurea's picture

Greta Thunberg, the founder of the Youth Strike for Climate movement, has been nominated for the Nobel peace prize, just before the biggest day yet of global action.
[...]

“We have proposed Greta Thunberg because if we do nothing to halt climate change it will be the cause of wars, conflict and refugees,” said Norwegian Socialist MP Freddy André Øvstegård. "Greta Thunberg has launched a mass movement which I see as a major contribution to peace.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/14/greta-thunberg-nominated-n...

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"Don't go back to sleep ... Don't go back to sleep ... Don't go back to sleep."
~Rumi

"If you want revolution, be it."
~Caitlin Johnstone

magiamma's picture

@Centaurea that is a great start to the day. Thanks. Yay.

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@magiamma and that fierce determination in her expression, I think "there's hope yet that we're going to find our way out of this mess."

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"Don't go back to sleep ... Don't go back to sleep ... Don't go back to sleep."
~Rumi

"If you want revolution, be it."
~Caitlin Johnstone

@Centaurea This site has good information about the march 15 strike for those not on facebook

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magiamma's picture

@jbob

thanks so much for that link. I will add it to the post later. and to the rest of the missives that go out this week. have a good one...

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Lookout's picture

Sunrise is asking for volunteers...

Sunrise_GND_launch-SM_graphics-03.png

This morning we announced the biggest project Sunrise has ever undertaken, the Road to a Green New Deal Tour. It will:

  • Give every single American an opportunity to hear from their neighbors about how the Green New Deal will improve their lives.
  • Counter the lies coming from the Koch Brothers and their allies.
  • Grow our movement to transform the 2020 election into a referendum on climate action.

In April and May, Sunrise leaders will host over 100 Green New Deal Town Halls to share how the Green New Deal will improve the lives of people across the country. We'll meet in churches, classrooms, and union halls to talk about how this policy will improve our communities, and lay out our path to victory through 2020.

On top of that, thousands will gather for nine massive events with national Sunrise leaders and some of the rising stars in progressive politics. Planning is already in full swing for stops in Boston, Detroit, Des Moines, Paradise, CA, Los Angeles, San Antonio, New Orleans, Richmond, KY, and Washington, DC.

If we pull this off, we’ll build the public support needed to ensure that the Green New Deal is at the top of the agenda as we head the 2020 election. But to do that we need your help.

https://actionnetwork.org/forms/sign-up-to-host-a-green-new-deal-town-hall

The newest XR newsleter from yesterday is so full of global actions that it makes me think they might awaken the slumbering population to actually pay attention and do something.

Thanks for the practical advice of Robin Bell. I've been trying to live with a light footstep as well. My next car will be electric. Finally been dry and warm enough to bike some.

Thanks for the OT and climate news!

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

magiamma's picture

@Lookout
thanks for the heads up re: the town halls. I will pass it on to our local bernie group. could happen here.

pics from when bernie came to town.. intro by one of our leaders, pic of guy that had traveled around the country helping locals (we put a bunch of the up here and the man himself. the energy is not the same this time. new people will have to step up. have a good one...

bernie 3.jpg

bernie 2.jpg

bernie 1.jpg

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I had no idea there were salmon this big in the river. whoa Some got trapped when the flood receded, fresh. carry on

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The fisheries are waiting to be reborn, they are not dead yet. not quite

Support Students
Strike March 15!
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peace & love

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magiamma's picture

@eyo
great pic. also the ones from yesterday's walk that you posted. yes indeed

carry on... heh

have a good one, please Lol

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and potentially fruitful strategy the Brown University students took of calling out the self-serving, corrupt, and greedy climate denier machine. According to the article you cited above in Desmog, the students have learned "how decades of concerted misinformation played a key role in the current climate of climate denial". I think when people fully understand "the fact that there’s a well-funded, widespread propaganda effort to protect polluters at the public expense" it ought to change the dynamic of this debate.

The term "at the public expense" encompasses a whole range of horrors, from unnecessary illness and cancers to unnecessary destruction of bodies of water etc. Calling out... pointing fingers... laying blame... has to be done. All of this destruction was not an accident, it was deliberate and done for profit.

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magiamma's picture

@randtntx
yes, thanks for pointing this out. yes, people, and particularly the young ones. they will be on fire. no pun intended whatsoever. okay then. breath. have a good one...

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mhagle's picture

Won't have a chance to follow links until later. The climate strikes are certainly inspiring! In Texas most of the students are out on spring break this week. Haven't checked to see if anything is happening here.

Wanted to post before I go out to the garden. On Tuesday, our 17 year old son came to us and said, "The air quality in Corsicana (neighboring small city pop 25000) is dangerously high today. He said he checks air quality every day. So I downloaded an app and sure enough, the evening of March 11 through the next morning, USAQI levels were about at 170, and the PM2.5 levels were about 80 . . . according to the history graph. Safe levels are less than 20 and less than 5 respectively.

Does anyone here know how to interpret this data? In my mind, it sounds like either it is an error or there was some sort of industrial accident.

Have a great day everyone!

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Marilyn

"Make dirt, not war." eyo

@mhagle I don't know anything about Texas, but those numbers are a bummer. I wonder if you are downwind from some kind of industrial release "event", or what. Hopefully you are far away from all that. Windy.com shows the directions, and I found this from a 2016 news release:
Texas breakdown: 68 million pounds of pollution released during industrial malfunctions and maintenance last year - New Report Ranks Worst Polluters and Regions

The plant locations are listed there, and a link at the bottom goes to Neighborhood witness: http://www.neighborhoodwitness.org/database

I think that says there have been 117 releases for March already? I didn't have the heart to dig deeper. sheesh If it's not gas and oil, it's some other chemical pollution. That's the system.

peace

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mhagle's picture

@eyo @eyo

That's the kind of info I was looking for. I will study it tonight.

Only 12 miles from Corsicana, so . . . bummer.

We are 50 miles from West where the fertilizer plant blew up. We heard and felt that explosion. A friend told me there are 5 of those plants in Corsicana. Ugh.

Thanks again!!!!

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Marilyn

"Make dirt, not war." eyo

Deja's picture

@mhagle
If you go to the additional resources link on the 2nd link eyo provided, there's a map link (Google doc/map, so you have to view it while logged into a Google account, at least I did), it shows a location at/near Waxahachie. There's another at/near Marshall, but that's way east of you.

Jeez! All the spots in the Permian Basin are insane! Compare that area to the ones around Houston/Beaumont. Woah! I knew there were lots of oil and fracking fields out there, but I seriously thought refineries were more nasty. Are there refineries out there too? I thought the main pollutants involved in fracking had to do with the waste water. Never imagined air pollution at such levels.

Very cool link. The numbers of incidents just for March, 2019 are crazy too. Over 30,000 for basically each company that they have data for? Holy hell! Hopefully I am misunderstanding the numbers.

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mhagle's picture

@Deja

I won't have time to look until this evening. Any close to you Deja?

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Marilyn

"Make dirt, not war." eyo

Deja's picture

@mhagle
Except, I'm closer to a natural gas company that spews shit, according to the database.

I don't know where it is, but it's somewhere in Wharton county (I'm 1/2 mile from the W county line), and work in that county.

They don't have the smelly plastics plant, that's right on the Colorado River, in that database, though. And it's in Wharton (county seat), where I work.

Please let us know what you find.

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magiamma's picture

@mhagle
thanks and thanks for popping in. and for all your recent posts. hope your garden is surviving, thriving even.

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enhydra lutris's picture

to ye. I absolutely love:

CLIMATE CHANGE IS NOT A BUSINESS PROPOSAL

. That's where all of the corporatists fail, and where they expose themselves for what they are. It is akin to one of my favs that I keep thinking about bumper stickering:

Market Based Solutions Aren't. Because corporations are, by definition, sociopathic if not psychopathic, building them into the equation must invariably cause socio-economic and ecological derangement.

Have a great one.

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

magiamma's picture

@enhydra lutris
at another-sunny-day day. heh. yeah!

I am getting fucking tired of the meme. gotta change it. kids will... I think. and I intend to help. Lol have a great one...

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ggersh's picture

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I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish

"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"

Heard from Margaret Kimberley

magiamma's picture

@ggersh Bringing-Widespread-Extreme-Weather?

Category Six
https://www.wunderground.com/cat6/Midwest-Bomb-Cyclone-Set-Low-Pressure-...

A “bomb” cyclone that set all-time low-pressure records over portions of the central U.S. on Wednesday has brought a damaging smorgasbord of extreme weather to a huge section of the nation.

The storm rapidly deepened by over 24 mb in a 24-hour period on Wednesday, qualifying it as a “bomb” cyclone. The low bottomed out at 969 mb over western Kansas on Wednesday afternoon--one of the lowest pressures ever recorded in that portion of the country. Pueblo, Colorado, set its preliminary, unofficial all-time record-low pressure early Wednesday morning (975.1 mb), according to the National Weather Service (NWS). Colorado state climatologist Russ Schumacher tweeted it was the lowest pressure on record there since at least 1950. Six stations on the Oklahoma Mesonet set all-time low-pressure records on Wednesday. Dodge City, KS, had pressure of 974.7 mb, its lowest since 971.6 mb was measured way back on April 8, 1878.

Historic flooding in Nebraska, Iowa, and South Dakota

The bomb cyclone brought heavy rains of 1 – 3” over a large swath of northeast Nebraska, northwest Iowa, and southeast South Dakota. These heavy rains fell on a snowpack with a high liquid water content, and the resulting runoff has brought major river flooding to at least 23 river gauges in Iowa, Nebraska and South Dakota. Seven of these gauges have already set all-time high-water marks, with at least four more likely to do so later on Thursday

.

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Deja's picture

@magiamma
I've never heard of a bomb cyclone. That's a lot of destruction too. Wow!

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magiamma's picture

@Deja
I think your right. damn. the new normal.

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mhagle's picture

@Deja

High wind thunderstorms the past couple of days. DFW airport recorded wind gusts of 78 mph.

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Marilyn

"Make dirt, not war." eyo

Deja's picture

@mhagle
It was glorious down here, though. Humidity so low I shocked myself touching my truck door. And finally, after a month's worth of cloudy and rainy days, the sun! High only in the 70s. Next week is supposed to be even cooler. Not the norm for this time of year, to say the least.

Like mm says, we're there.

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magiamma's picture

I think this is the same storm

Mercurynews.com

Major damage” was reported from a tornado near Paducah, Kentucky, Thursday morning. The twister narrowly missed the Weather Service office in Paducah, requiring meteorologists to seek shelter while the Weather Service office in Louisville briefly took over operation.

In the transition zone between the warm and cold sectors of the storm, the combination of downpours and melting snow poses flooding concerns in eastern Nebraska and Minnesota, southeast South Dakota, Iowa, Wisconsin and northern Michigan. Ice jams are a major concern along rivers in this region.

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