Here we show that human-induced increases in greenhouse gases have contributed to the observed intensification of heavy precipitation events found over approximately two-thirds of data-covered parts of Northern Hemisphere land areas. These results are based on a comparison of observed and multi-model simulated changes in extreme precipitation over the latter half of the twentieth century analysed with an optimal fingerprinting technique.

Changes in extreme precipitation projected by models, and thus the impacts of future changes in extreme precipitation, may be underestimated because models seem to underestimate the observed increase in heavy precipitation with warming

That’s from the first of two seminal studies in Nature, “Human contribution to more-intense precipitation extremes” (subs. req’d).  The second looked at “Anthropogenic greenhouse gas contribution to flood risk in England and Wales in autumn 2000” (subs. req’d):

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Trillions At Stake From Climate Change Over The Next 20 years

When the giant investment firms understand that global warming is a real problem, the rest of us should really stop thinking global warming is some sort of communist plot. The capitalists are worried about global warming too. In fact they think they can make a lot of money by dealing with the problem. They also think they can save a lot of money by dealing with the problem before it becomes too big.

It would seem that the only people who think global warming is a scam are the industries that are set to lose the most, coal, oil and gas companies.

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Exxon Mobil Corp., the world’s largest publicly traded oil company, is struggling to find more oil.

In its closely watched annual financial report released Tuesday, the company said that for every 100 barrels it has pumped out of the earth over the past decade, it has replaced only 95.

This news is not in the least bit surprising to those who follow oil (see Science/IEA: World oil crunch looming? Not if we can find six Saudi Arabias!).

Ironically, the news comes from the Wall Street Journal, whose editorial page remains an opponent of all strategies to end our addiction to oil before the brutal dislocations of peak oil force us to.  Here’s more of the story:

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Of the over 400 amendments offered on the House government-funding measure, the 2011 Continuing Resolution (H.R. 1), dozens are focused on climate change, energy policy, and environmental protection. The existing language in the budget bill is already designed to deny global warming, slash and burn public health and green jobs, but the amendments would take even more radical steps to reward polluters who are killing our children’s future.

Brad Johnson explains that Republican amendments, if fully enacted, would:

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Resumes are coming in, but I wanted this at the top of the daily 1 pm email!

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The “Jevons paradox,” asserts that increasing “the efficiency with which a resource is used tends to increase (rather than decrease) the rate of consumption of that resource.”  It is mostly if not entirely bunk, as the scientific literature and leading experts have demonstrated many times (see “Efficiency lives “” the rebound effect, not so much“).

But it lingers on in part because it is one of those quirky, ill-defined contrarian notions that the media can’t get enough of and in part because those who oppose clean energy, often for bizarre ideological reasons, keep pushing it.

So I’m reposting two debunkings written by Real Climate Economics expert Dr. Jim Barrett.  As noted in the second post (whose Yogi Berra quote I repeated for my headline), “Though he discovered it nearly 100 years after Stanley Jevons, I believe [Berra's] exploration of the Jevons effect is more complete and accurate than Jevons’ own, as well as being vastly shorter. The notion that we could get so efficient at using energy that we’d end up using more is about as valid as the idea that a restaurant could get so crowded that it was empty.

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Last week, I reposted Dr. Jeff Masters’ piece, “Extremely dangerous Tropical Cyclone Yasi bears down on flooded Queensland, Australia.”  Now comes Carlos.  While it isn’t as “strong” as Yasi, it has dumped a stunning amount of water on this most water-soaked country:

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In a groundbreaking article to be released this month in the Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, Dr. Paul Epstein, associate director of the Center for Health and the Global Environment at Harvard Medical School, details the economic, health and environmental costs associated with each stage in the life cycle of coal – extraction, transportation, processing, and combustion.  These costs, between a third to over half a trillion dollars annually, are directly passed on to the public.

In terms of human health, the report estimates $74.6 billion a year in public health burdens in Appalachian communities, with a majority of the impact resulting from increased healthcare costs, injury and death. Emissions of air pollutants account for $187.5 billion, mercury impacts as high as $29.3 billion, and climate contributions from combustion between $61.7 and $205.8 billion. Heavy metal toxins and carcinogens released during processing pollute water and food sources and are linked to long-term health problems. Mining, transportation, and combustion of coal contribute to poor air quality and respiratory disease, while the risky nature of mining coal results in death and injury for workers.

That’s from a news release for the important new study, “Full cost accounting for the life cycle of coal.”  Dr. Epstein is the lead author, and there are 10 coauthors, public health and environment experts.

We’ve known for a long time that coal is a costly and deadly energy source.  In “The Toll from Coal,” The American Lung Association found that coal-powered electricity alone caused “over 13,000 premature deaths in 2010, as well as almost 10,000 hospitalizations and more than 20,000 heart attacks per year.”

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You can watch him present Obama’s fiscal 2012 DOE budget request in front of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee here.

Politico’s Morning Energy says, “The hearing is slated to start directly following completion of the panel’s 9:30 a.m. subcommittee assignments markup.”  Hence ‘anon’, a word I’ve always wanted to use in a blog post!

By William Becker

Like a family that has no homeowner’s insurance, no fire detectors, a gas leak in the basement and a bad case of denial, the global community remains unprepared for irreversible and potentially catastrophic changes to the Earth’ climate.

What’s needed – quickly – is an international risk management effort, a process that’s more familiar in military and national security circles than it is in environmental and scientific circles.

That process is described in “Degrees of Risk: Defining a Risk Management Framework for Climate Security” — a report just released by the London-based think tank Third Generation Environmentalism (E3G). The report’s recommendations are the result of consultations E3G held over the past two years with military and intelligence leaders in Europe, the United States and several developing countries. The bottom line:

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Of the over 400 amendments offered on the House government-funding measure, the 2011 Continuing Resolution (H.R. 1), dozens are focused on climate change, energy policy, and environmental protection. The existing language in the budget bill is already designed to deny global warming, slash and burn public health and green jobs, but the amendments would take even more radical steps to reward polluters who are killing our children’s future. Republican amendments, if fully enacted, would:

– Eliminate the White House Council on Environmental Quality, the Special Envoy for Climate Change, the Assistant to the President for Energy and Climate Change, the NOAA Climate Service, the Department of Energy’s ARPA-E, National Science Foundation K-12 funding

– Block US funding for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and the Global Environment Facility

– Suspend enforcement of fisheries laws and construction and conservation acquisition programs of the National Parks and Department of the Interior

– Block rules for cement plant pollution, coal ash, industrial boiler pollution, water quality, climate change pollution, climate change adaptation, energy-efficient lighting, mountaintop removal, atrazine, and water conservation

Most of these amendments are budget neutral, not lowering the deficit one cent. Several defund extremely effective jobs programs that cost only a few million dollars. The goal of these amendments is not fiscal responsibility or jobs creation, but polluter protection, even though the pollution is poisoning babies, causing the elderly to suffer, and destroying America’s natural bounty.

Meanwhile Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA) has proposed amendments to eliminate billions in dollars in Big Oil subsidies, reduce the deficit, and restore LIHEAP and NIH funding, Rep. Jared Polis (D-CO) offered amendments to defend America from the threat of global warming pollution, and Rep. Jay Inslee (D-WA) proposed amendments to take $66 million from fossil energy research and development and put it into green energy programs.

Some of these amendments were first compiled and summarized by E&E News PM.