This must-have slide (click to enlarge) comes from a 2005 study, “Regional vegetation die-off in response to global-change-type drought.” I first saw it in a powerful 2005 presentation by climatologist Jonathan Overpeck, “Warm climate abrupt change–paleo-perspectives,” that concluded “climate change seldom occurs gradually.”

Overpeck noted that the 2005 study, together with the recent evidence that temperature [in red] and annual precipitation [in blue] are headed in opposite directions in the U.S. Southwest, raises the question of whether we are at the “dawn of the super-interglacial drought.”

Before explaining why I like this slide and how it shows the future of extreme weather, I need to review the conclusion of the study, which was led by the University of Arizona, with Los Alamos National Laboratory and the U.S. Geological Survey:

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[For those who have the time, I'd certainly be interested in feedback on my remarks.]

The folks at the NPR show “On Point,” read Friedman’s column in which he quoted Gilding and me (see “Is the global economy a Ponzi scheme, are we all Bernie Madoffs, and what comes next? Part 1“).

So if you click here, you can listen to an hour interview starting with

Paul Gilding, former executive director of Greenpeace International and founder of the environmental consulting firm ECOS. He’s now an independent writer, advisor and advocate for issues of sustainability and climate change. He first wrote about the idea of a “Great Disruption” in 2005.

I come on about halfway through, but this is really the first time I have ever elaborated on the Ponzi scheme notion in a talk or interview — so I’d be interested in any feedback.

But Gilding has been explaining his perspective for a number of years, so he is well worth listening to, I think.

Update: The chat is occurring in the comments section.

The Wonk Room welcomes Rep. Donna Edwards (D-MD) for a live chat on climate change, energy, and the environment. Edwards has represented the Maryland suburbs of Washington D.C. in the fourth district since 2008. An advocate for mass transportation and a “leader on the environment,” she sits on the transit and environment subcommittees of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee. She also serves on energy and environment subcommittee of the Science and Technology Committee, where today she questioned panelists about the costs of investing in the uncertain technology of carbon capture and sequestration from coal-fired power plants.

We’ll get to as many questions as possible that are submitted in the comments below (and here) in the time that we have when the interview begins at 2 PM, so ask away.

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In a stunning new report, two House Committees demonstrate that the Bush administration was never serious about Futuregen Nevergen, the “centerpiece” of its effort to develop “clean coal” technology. Turns out centerpieces are largely decorative.

Climate Progress has previously documented that the coal industry itself has never taken seriously the development of the one technology that could save the industry from extinction in the face of humanity’s urgent need slash CO2 emissions sharply and avoid its own self-destruction [see "Like Detroit, the coal industry chooses (assisted) suicide"].

Now we learn the same was true of the Bush Administration. We learn that they killed Futuregen even after Department of Energy staff explained the implications: “affordable coal fueled CCS plants would be delayed at least 10 years” deferring “widespread deployment of CCS” until after 2030.

That means the whole “clean coal” or carbon capture and storage (CCS) effort of the past decade was an intentional fraud by all parties concerned — and nobody should be allowed to use the absence of demonstrated CCS technology today as an excuse for weakening near-term CO2 targets or for giving the coal industry another decade to (fatally) delay serious climate action.

As the shocking House press release reveals:

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RealClimate has an excellent post for aspiring climate bloggers, “Advice for a young climate blogger.” It has some incredibly useful advice and warnings, including “Bad things can happen to good bloggers.”

But there is one bullet point that I think is misleading:

Don’t use any WWII metaphors. Ever. This just makes it too easy for people to ratchet up the rhetoric and faux outrage. However strongly you hold your views, the appropriateness of these images is always a hard sell, and you will not be given any time in which to make your pitch. This is therefore almost always counter-productive. This can be extended to any kind of Manichean language.

Silly. You should probably avoid Nazi metaphors, but in fact WWII is the only plausibly-close metaphor for the scale of effort needed to stabilize at or below 450 ppm and preserve a livable climate [see "Is 450 ppm (or less) politically possible? Part 2: The Solution" or my book].

Indeed, at the press conference I participated in with Greenpeace and Sen. Sanders today (details to come), Sanders himself said that we have the technology to do this today (or will very soon) — which is of course a central point of this blog, but what we most need to do is deploy, deply, deploy:

I think there is an enormous amount of technology out there…. Go back to December 1941. America had to completely retool its economy in two years. So don’t tell me it can’t be done.

And one of the most important scientific studies published last year (see “Stabilize at 350 ppm or risk ice-free planet, warn NASA, Yale, Sheffield, Versailles, Boston et al“) concludes with this key paragraph:

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The ChiPs are down for the hydrogen highway cul de sac — literally. The future Ponches and Jons of the California Highway Patrol won’t be policing the hydrogen highway.

The false hope of a hydrogen economy is on its death bed. This dream was embraced and elevated by President Bush, who said in his January 2003 State of the Union address:

With a new national commitment, our scientists and engineers will overcome obstacles to taking these cars from laboratory to showroom so that the first car driven by a child born today could be powered by hydrogen and pollution-free.

I have explained at length many times why the first car of child born in 2003 — or the last car, for that matter — will not be a hydrogen fuel cell car, most notably in my best selling book, The Hype About Hydrogen [Note to a picky semantic people: The book was not a best seller, but it was the best-selling of all of my books]. Maybe my best (and certainly my most widely read) paper available online is “The car and fuel of the future,” published by Energy Policy back in 2005. It is still worth reading if you want to understand why plug in hybrids, not hydrogen fuel cell cars, are the car of the (near) future.

The last vestiges of a hydrogen economy are collapsing. First, we had Honda’s new FCX Clarity, which the company optimistically billed as “the world’s first hydrogen-powered fuel-cell vehicle intended for mass production.” If so, the Clarity has demonstrated to the world how distant the whole enterprise is (see L.A. Times: “Hydrogen fuel-cell technology won’t work in cars.” Duh. and “The car of the perpetual future” — The Economist agrees with Climate Progress on hydrogen and “The Last Car You Would Ever Buy — Literally“).

Now Greenwire (subs. req’d) has a long story on the collapse of another one of the few remaining pieces of the dream, “Has Schwarzenegger’s hydrogen highway gone bust?” excerpted below:

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The president signs an Executive Order on stem cells and a Presidential Memorandum on scientific integrity. Guest blogger Chris Mooney opines in a post first published by Science Progress.

Monday, President Obama overturned his predecessor’s very unpopular embryonic stem cell research restrictions, a move drawing widespread media attention. But it wasn’t the only action on the science policy front. In a step that demonstrated just how closely the stem cell issue now fits into the broader “war on science” argument, the president simultaneously issued a memorandum aimed to set in motion the restoration of scientific integrity across the breadth of the federal government. The document calls upon the director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy–which should be John Holdren, except that as far as we know, his nomination is still mysteriously held up-to head a sweeping effort to this end. In other words, Holdren is to clean house, and set up structures to ensure there’s no more monkey business involving the role of science in government.

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