A round-up of the top climate and energy news. Please post additional links below.
EU nations have yet to come up with a plan on how to fill a multi-billion euro fund to help tackle climate change, even as the region’s executive body hosts talks with countries likely to bear the brunt of extreme weather. [Reuters]
The effects of global warming are making it more difficult for reservoir managers to control floods and manage flows for irrigation, recreation and fisheries. [Idaho Statesman]
Disadvantaged kids not only breathe disproportionate amounts bad air, but they also can be more vulnerable to the ill effects of that bad air. [Huffington Post]
California Superior Court judge Elizabeth Allen White has dismissed most of Ben Stein’s lawsuit that claimed the Japanese company Kyocera Mita backed out of a $300,000 deal to hire him to act in commercials for a line of computer printers when it found out about his controversial beliefs on global warming. [Hollywood Reporter]
Crude oil prices slid Monday to the lowest level since February as weak economic data and high prices dampened expectations for consumption just three weeks ahead of the summer driving season. [Washington Post]
The next great hurdle for selling electric cars could be to attract new customers from among those who live in apartment complexes. [USA Today]
Smart meters eventually will be ubiquitous globally over the next few decades, but, interestingly enough, installations of smart meters in the U.S. will actually sharply decline over the next two years, before they pick back up, according to Pike Research. [Earth2Tech]
The Asian Development Bank urged countries in the Asia-Pacific region to take immediate action to reduce the negative impact of climate change. [UPI]
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Language Intelligence: Lessons on persuasion from Jesus, Shakespeare, Lincoln, and Lady Gaga
Where does 2C come from anyway? Can’t see any specific details on why/how it was selected as the threshold? 2C will mean multi-meter sea level rise.
Club of Rome sees 2 degree Celsius rise in 40 years
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/08/us-climate-clubofrome-idUSBRE8470JE20120508
even though global population should peak in 2042 at 8.1 billion and economic growth will be much slower than expected in mature economies, the Switzerland-based body said in a report on Tuesday.
Research last month by the University of Oxford and Princeton University said global warming was likely to be between 1.4 and 3 degrees by 2050, but that 3 degrees was at the upper end of what was likely.
It’s worse than that. 2C, like 350 are “bad” because:
1) They are arbitrary; (see #2 and #3)
2) They are too high; and yet
3) With current policies and politics, they are unachievable.
However, it is good to have targets, benchmarks, and common discussion points. And no one ever promised that being a climatehawk is easy.
Mark, maybe you were thinking of 450ppm instead of 350ppm. 350ppm is in our rear view mirror and was cited by Hansen among others a probable safe CO2 level. The 450ppm number was linked with the arbitrary 2.0C number.
Right.
Unlike 450 ppm, 350 is not too high. It more than makes up for that by being much, much less achievable (being past it and all.)
Mission: Lowest emission houses possible
Printable Houses Could Redefine Housing
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http://www.care2.com/greenliving/printable-houses-a-new-paradigm-in-eco-architecture.html
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NOAA/NCDC U.S. State of the Climate report for April is now out:
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/national/2012/4
Climate Highlights — April
• Warmer-than-average temperatures engulfed much of the contiguous United States during April, and the nationally-averaged temperature was 55.7 degrees F, 3.6 degrees F above average — the third warmest on record. The precipitation averaged across the nation was 2.23 inches, 0.20 inch below average.
• Warmer-than-average temperatures were present for a large portion of the nation during April — six states in the central U.S. and three states in the Northeast had April temperatures ranking among their ten warmest. Above-average temperatures were also present for the Southeast, Upper Midwest, and much of the West. No state in the contiguous United States had April temperatures that were below average.
• April 2012 came on the heels of the warmest March on record for the Lower-48, and eight states — Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Wisconsin,Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia — had April temperatures which were, despite being warmer than normal, were still not as warm as their March temperatures.
The January-April period was the nation’s warmest such period on record as this graph shows:
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/temp-and-precip/time-series/index.php?parameter=tmp&month=4&year=2012&filter=4&state=110&div=0
Here is the news release from NOAA on the U.S. April climate report:
U.S. temperatures for April third warmest on record
Past 12 months and first third of the year were warmest nation has experienced
Several warm periods across the contiguous U.S. during April brought the national average temperature to 55°F, 3.6°F above average, marking the third warmest April on record. These temperatures, when added with the first quarter and previous 11 months, calculate to the warmest year-to-date and 12-month periods since recordkeeping began in 1895.
The 12-month period of May 2011-April 2012 has a nationally-averaged temperature 2.8°F above the 1901-2000 long-term average, while the January-April 2012 months were 45.4°F, 5.4°F above the long-term average.
On the heels of the warmest March for the U.S., warmer and drier than average temperatures continued for much of the nation with some states in the Ohio Valley having a small, but still above average, dip in temperatures.
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/summary-info/national/2012/4
Stephen, I think you might be off by day on the date for the days news (its May 8th, not 9th I believe).
It should be noted that today another moderate Republican Senator – Senator Lugar of Indiana (noted for bipartisan work and befriending our current President when he was a new Senator) was knocked off by a Tea Party backed (Koch front group backed) “conservative” primary challenge.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/richard-lugar-loses-primary-nomination-to-conservative-challenger-richard-mourdock/2012/05/08/gIQANcJjBU_story.html
As we found out in 2009 when the Democrats had all three branches of government with a veto proof majority in the Senate (barely but it was there) – because of Democrat fossil fuel turncoats moderate Republican support was and will be needed to get climate change action enacted (when the time comes) and the Koch funded and directed campaign to knock off moderate Republicans via funded and directed primary challenges continues to work very well building an ever growing mass of radical GOP candidates amendable to Koch bidding on climate change as time goes on.