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[The] "Stoics, who sought to exercise complete mastery over themselves, saw hope as involving both dependency and incompleteness, and so viewed it with suspicion".
Terry Eagleton
1
Besides deploring Trump's climate foolishness, I wish that the NYT and other newspapers would have articles on the likely consequences of his foolishness: for infrastructure, national security, etc.
6
How about an expansive wind power farm located off the eastern coast of Florida, due east of Trump's Mar-a-Lago? Perhaps such a proposal has already emerged from environmental groups in the Sunshine State. Let the Fake President get a routine view of one the world's necessary, future energy sources from some of the tees on his private golf course. Make America Green Again!
4
Meanwhile, college graduates are the number one purchasers of gigantic trucks and vans for commuting to office jobs and they continue to build larger and larger homes while making sure to take a flying vacation each year because they are “very” concerned about global warming...and outraged at our president. They actually believe saying is the same thing as doing.
2
The New York State Senate needs to bring to the floor and pass the Climate and Community Protection Act.
Nuclear energy is not carbon free.
2
I would suggest that the discussion of anthropogenic climate change consider its most significant driving force: the population explosion of the past century. There are currently about five times as many people as there were in 1900, each one quite understandably and legitimately wanting to lead a better life which, invariably, involves the utilization of more resources and the production of more pollution.
In the context of this editorial it is worth noting that many traditional conservatives were not so much deniers of anthropogenic climate change as they were simply opposed to very broad and deep power at the Federal level. There is a degree to which states and municipalities "filling in" the Federal gap validates those conservatives' belief that progress can be made, while maintaining more local accountability.
Unfortunately, the current iteration of what passes for conservative seems to be defined by Trump and Pruitt, no resemblance to traditional (especially Congressional) conservatives of the past half century. Sad !
4
Nuclear power is not carbon free, by any measure. It may be lower carbon than oil or coal, but it’s no where close to carbon free.
There is the added bonus that when a nuke explodes many of us will glow, maybe enough to not need room lights?
1
As regards climate change, Democratic candidates can do themselves and the country a favor in this election year by augmenting their leadership in preventive policy with leadership in plans for managing those consequences that are already inevitable and increasingly palpable.
I understand there’s a lag of about fifty years between human activities that cause global warming and the appearance of consequences from those activities. The very unfortunate fact, then, is that we and our children are already in for some consequences that will require ingenious, energetic management and the mobilization of vast resources. We need leaders who see the need to come to grips with that challenge now.
Today’s editorial contains nothing about this aspect of climate change. I hope the rising generation of politicians will recognize its importance and reframe the public discussion to include it.
2
Two revolutionary scientific breakthroughs open paths to rapidly retire fossil fuels.
The first is ambient heat, a huge untapped reservoir of solar energy which can power everything from cell phones to homes and every variety of vehicle including aircraft.
Ambient heat offers a 24/7 alternative to wind and solar pv farms. Fuel-free engines can be installed at utility sub-stations. See aesopinstitute.org
The second astonishing breakthrough involves easy and cheap replacement of gas, diesel and jet fuel by water to run combustion engines. Conventional science says water cannot be a fuel. However, Brilliant Light Power has demonstrated that it can, with a powerful yield, 200 times that of burning Hydrogen. H2 Global has developed a different, much more practical, way to use water as fuel. See MOVING BEYOND OIL at aesopinstitute.org for an introduction to this remarkable achievement.
Converting existing vehicles to run on water, which can be extracted from the air, eliminating any need to refuel, and equipping new cars, trucks, buses, boats, ships and aircraft to run without fuel, constitutes a pair of powerful weapons to combat climate chaos.
Trolls attack, as they believe this must be fraud. The result is a profound lack of needed support to rapidly bring these urgently needed breakthroughs to market.
These two developments by small firms hold hope on the horizon. Imagine the impact on the economy should these "impossible" breakthroughs be accelerated without delay.
3
After a year-plus of unspeakable anxiety about the direction set by DT and his anti-life enablers, much of my rage has turned to numbness. How else can I deal with my desire to do more for humanity in the face of such evil disregard for it? If these men and women - the people we call leaders - define survival of the fittest, then I, along with thinking individuals everywhere, will surely perish.
11
Republicans were instrumental enacting environmental standards originally and still support such things. Democrats have hijacked the cause and are using environmentalism as a political weapon while creating a heavy unacountable bureaucracy...who are mostly democrats.
1
Any concrete evidence to back up such claims?
5
Thank god for California leading the way. LA is no longer filled with smog. The number of spare the air days is in check.
The lives of millions of residents is protected with CA environmental regulations and forward thinking views.
11
Trump and the GOP have shown again and again that short-term corporate profits are more important to them than: clean air, safe drinking water, a livable planet, and the survival of the human race.
I find it incredibly unfortunate that so many of those who currently deny climate change won't be around to breath the poison air, drink the polluted water, and drown in the salt water of the polices they so vehemently promoted, because it would be justice well served. Too bad their children will end up paying for their willful ignorance and complete lack of accountability.
9
Loving my plug-in hybrid that's getting 57.3 mpg right now...
7
The sentiment behind your editorial is appreciated, and the coverage of climate change in your paper consistently superior. Sadly, it is wishful thinking to perceive any silver lining, even if it is heroic what many states and mayors are doing. But it will not avert catastrophe; at most delay it a bit.
The Paris Agreement is both a necessary, yet also an insufficient first step. All countries of the world solemly committed to holding the increase in global average temperature below 2°C (3.6F) or even 1.5°C (2.7F) above pre-industrial levels. As of today, 176 (of 197 parties) have ratified the agreement, which in itself is a remarkable success. Yet, mapping the journey is not the same as actually moving forward.
As matters stand, there is a colossal gap between promises and delivery, and not only because of a willfully obstructionist federal US government. If all the undertakings currently on the table will be delivered – which is a brave assumption to begin with – planetary warming of 2.9–3.4°C (5.2-6.1F) by 2100 will result. Among scientists, warming over 1.5°C (2.7F) is dangerous, over 3°C (5.4F) is catastrophic and over 5°C (9F) is unknown, implying beyond catastrophic. With unchecked emissions, the dangerous level will be reached within years, the catastrophic within decades, and the unknown before the end of this century.
Humanity is playing Russian roulette with the stability of the Earth and with its own survival. There is no silver lining in that.
17
Agreed Franz. Every aspect of our environment is screaming in pain. The lights are all flashing red, yet we're incapable of addressing either of the two main drivers of climate change - population and consumption - even if we were willing to do so.
Holding atmospheric CO2 below 350 ppm is a now-quaint, missed target in our rear view mirror. Credible climatological models forecast global temperature rise of more than 4 degrees centigrade, while the "world powers" dither about how to stay below the clearly unattainable goal of 2 degrees.
Our beloved children and grandchildren face an ugly future.
"Could be the human race is run." Pink Floyd, The Final Cut (Two Suns in The Sunset).
13
Franz Baumann,
Well said, especially about the insufficiency of the Paris Agreement, with or without US participation.
In Peter Brannen's 2017 book about the 5 mass life extinctions on earth so far, concerning the Paris Agreement, he writes on p. 257: "Though the signatory countries announced their intent to aim for 1.5 degrees of warming, the agreement itself sheepishly acknowledges that if every country met their optimistic pledges, the planet would still easily sail past 2 degrees." In short, with or without the Paris Agreement, we are in climate change trouble.
What's aggravating is that plenty of people want to pretend that all we have to do is live up to that agreement and we'll be fine. They want to comfort themselves with the supposed great achievement Paris supposedly is. And, by the way, they want to blame Trump for a failed climate change policy. While Trump isn't helping, neither are half way measures by politicians endorsing tepid agreements.
But, hey, such half way, ineffective measures do make some people feel better, maybe even allow them to hide out from and avoid real solutions.
2
As Saul Alinsky has shown, all real, lasting progress is step by step progress.
The Paris agreement was never meant to be the final one. If it's such a huge victory, it's precisely because it's the first, real and realistic step forward.
But it's only covering the next decade, so it has always been merely laying the foundation for the next rounds of negotiations.
What the world now needs is another Paris agreement for every single next decade, until 2100.
Unfortunately, in the US too many people knowing this have stayed home during the 2016 elections, and now a minority of ignorant voters is letting itself being fooled by the corrupt GOPe, led by its reality tv star able to sell no matter what lies to its base. So now, the next step is to first convince that minority of the difference between politics and science, all while convincing the others that not voting is no longer an option, once you take the state of our planet into account.
3
While Gov. Cuomo has banned fracking in NY, that doesn't far enough. He should ban the transportation, sale, and use of fossil fuels anywhere in the state. That would send a strong message!
4
that's ridiculous -- you want the economy to crash?
2
I applaud all states upholding the Obama era emission standards.
However, I denounce the use of nuclear power. Don't forget the devastation of Fukushima. And don't get fooled - everyone in Japan lives with fear of radioactive contamination - daily. Because we know that it takes 240 thousand years for plutonium to weaken to a biologically safe level.
What kind of environment are we wishing for when our solution includes such intolerable risk?
3
So you’d prefer to choke on nice clean COAL...and how many are killed mining it annually?
2
This editorial goes against common sense, is unfair to the US which would have required us to reduce carbon emissions, and pay billions of dollars to world's most egregious, shameless polluters, China and India, with no constraints placed on either.TRUMP backed out of a bad deal,saved the taxpayers a tremendous amount of money. There has never been a consensus among scientists on the causes of global warming, and even if we did ban all the private jets and gas guzzling s.u.v.'s from the market, the net effect on the global environment would be negligible. If Pelosi took her own advice,she would no longer be commuting weekly in a private jet at our expense to her constituency in SF, Al Gore would sell off or destroy his fleet of cars, and Leonardo de Caprio would cease traveling by jet to awards ceremonies, where he is thanked for his efforts to reduce global warming. How about it, Messieurs Staples, Semple, Bennett:Will you follow the advice you are giving to others and begin traveling from place to place by bicycle or horse and buggy? Don't do as I do!Do as I say!
3
Except that you're completely wrong. Start doing some fact-checking and you'll see.
First of all, the US has the highest carbon footprint per capita in the entire world.
Secondly, with only 6% of the world's population, we're responsible for 25% of current annual CO2 emissions. China has 24% of the world's population, and yet is responsible for only 25% of the world's CO2 emissions too.
Third, the Paris agreement puts constrains on ALL countries, including China and India.
Fourth, we did NOT engage to pay "billions" to help poor countries transition from a rural, non polluting economy directly to a developed and clean energy economy, without going through a century of dirty energy as we did.
This year, Michael Bloomberg decided to pay what the US owes the international community out of his own pockets. And that's $4.5 million.
If you know that the GOP today just created a $1,5 TRILLION dollar deficit, only to give huge tax cuts to its wealthiest donors, you know that they're LYING when they tell you that we, as the wealthiest and most polluting nation on earth, somehow nevertheless wouldn't be able to afford $5 million a year.
Fifth, there is a global scientific consensus about global warming for DECADES already. That's precisely why ALL countries, whether they have liberal or conservative governments, have signed the Paris agreement.
Time to stop blindly believing politicians and to start fact-checking yourself ... !!
9
reading this article about the Pruit's actions in further ruining the environment( not to mention the long list of other destructive acts generated by trump), I'm reminded of the residents of khelem, the small town somewhere in central Europe in the 1800's, the literary creation of Shalom Aleichem. the " wise people of khelem", were known for always doing the wrong thing, especially when reality ( let alone common sense) dictated otherwise. a close example is the person sitting on a high branch, sawing it off... but what is most astonishing is that ours is a country bursting with talents in all fields, including managing environmental science and economics !? but in a system which is built on ignorants making the policies in areas they don't have the slightest idea about ( such as in global warming- senator inhoff, and Secretary Pruit, or trump for that matter)- we shouldn't be surprised to witness how so many accomplishments and progress has been systematically eliminated. ruined. a cure ? vote correctly in Nov. but VOTE !
4
Why is Trump rolling back auto emmisions? Are those goals possible with the publics demand for larger vehicles? Direct injection engines help but they are having problems. Personally I would love a Plug in hybrid that gets 55 mpg but how many people are trading in their pick up trucks for a sub compact. Gasoline prices are going up to pushing three dollars a gallon so people might start buying ccars again.
I have a v-8 that 20 mpg at 70 mph, 25 mpg at 50 mph and 37 mpg at 35 mph. It runs on 4 Cyl depending. Ever think of slowing down? Most people are doing 80 on the highway now.
1
I own a large SUV that emits 0 pollutants. In fact, it doesn’t emit any greenhouse gases, doesn’t even have an exhaust pipe. It’s muscle car fast and gets the equivalent of 100+ miles per gallon except it doesn’t require gasoline, diesel, any fossil fuel, to run. Gas prices going up? I don’t think about it because I no longer need the smelly stuff. Don’t need oil changes because there isn’t any oil in the vehicle. Don’t need antifreeze because there’s no water coolant system. The only fluids required to operate the vehicle is coolant in a sealed tank that requires replacement every couple of years and a lubricant in another sealed box that doesn’t require replacement at all. Oh, when I take trips fuel is free at thousands of sites located around the country. For driving around town, I refuel at home and that is no more involved than plugging in a smartphone before going to bed.
Other options are available.
1
Several commenters have rightly said that, contrary to the statements in this otherwise fine editorial, nuclear power is by no means “carbon free.” The arguments of these commenters are correct, but they are much too weak.
No one has attempted a complete account of the carbon emissions caused by nuclear accidents, which are inevitable. It must include the carbon cost of responding to accidents to stop them and prevent further damage. That cost alone is huge, as is apparent at Chernobyl and Fukushima. There are many other such costs which I do not have room to list here.
No one has managed to produce a complete account of the carbon cost of achieving safe transport and storage of nuclear waste. That waste must be rendered completely safe under all possible conditions for at least 100,000 years. The pyramids have lasted for 4,000 years. Only 96,000 years to go.
If such studies are ever completed, they would show that nuclear power is by far the greatest emitter of carbon pollution that has ever existed. Those who claim that nuclear power is “carbon free” are simply denying the evidence we already have. We must uncover the rest of it if we are serious about fighting global warming.
1
The big one is the the fuel standards for automobiles that President Obama enacted which effectively doubled the standard from 25 to 50 mpg.
So far, automobile companies are not only keeping up with the standard, but going full tilt by promoting electric vehicles.
This will be required by all private companies, states and individuals to lead the way to our salvation via green technologies.
The government at the moment is clearly regressive.
4
It is worth noting that many traditional conservatives were not so much deniers of anthropogenic climate change as they were simply opposed to very broad and deep power at the Federal level. There is a degree to which states and municipalities "filling in" the Federal gap validates those conservatives' belief that progress can be made, while maintaining more local accountability.
Unfortunately, the current iteration of what passes for conservative seems to be defined by Trump and Pruitt, no resemblance to traditional (especially Congressional) conservatives of the past half century. Sad !
3
Better technology will come with or without government regulation. In the big picture it does not matter if some companies have high MPG's and other companies have low (or no) MPG's as long as the industry average is moving in the right direction. The conservative approach is that the government should get out of the way and do as little as possible - lest it inadvertently hold back the progress we all want to achieve.
An individual state may set some standards for vehicles it registers but may not impose average standards on manufactures without interfering with interstate commerce. California should become its own country before imposing its will on the rest of us.
3
I agree that we should address climate change without increasing the size of government and by using the free market -- and the good news is that we can! We have to put a price (fee) on carbon, as there is currently no financial penalty for adding to the carbon pollution that drives climate change and puts our health and economic prosperity at risk. As long as carbon pollution remains free, the true costs of fossil may appear cheaper than they are. If all fees collected are returned to the citizens as a dividend, the size of government is not increased. This is a solution both conservatives and liberals can embrace.
4
Has any government, including our own, ever refunded a tax as a dividend?
1
A carbon tax is a simplistic solution with unintended consequences for the poor. Many countries that have tried it are sorry they did.
There are much better ways to reduce carbon with fewer bad consequences. Let's try those first.
I would suggest that the discussion of anthropogenic climate change consider its most significant driving force: the population explosion of the past century. There are currently about five times as many people as there were in 1900, each one quite understandably and legitimately wanting to lead a better life which, invariably, involves the utilization of more resources and the production of more pollution.
In the context of this editorial it is worth noting that many traditional conservatives were not so much deniers of anthropogenic climate change as they were simply opposed to very broad and deep power at the Federal level. There is a degree to which states and municipalities "filling in" the Federal gap validates those conservatives' belief that progress can be made, while maintaining more local accountability.
Unfortunately, the current iteration of what passes for conservative seems to be defined by Trump and Pruitt, no resemblance to traditional (especially Congressional) conservatives of the past half century. Sad !
6
The whole anti-contraception anti-abortion thing is overt denial of the fact that population growth threatens the stability of the climate everyone depends on.
Increasing the electric charging infrastructure would be the biggest boost the Electric Vehicle (EV) could benefit from. If the above states really committed to this technology's weak spot, I'd say that the EV units would be on their way to becoming common place. I bet that would be a commitment that would convince automakers.
3
Sorry, I can't get excited about this news when looming over us are Trump's plan to roll back auto emissions standards, to interfere in energy markets by forcing utilities to save struggling coal plants, by Ford's malfeasance in building up its SUV line, by Trudeau's pandering to Alberta shale interests, and so on.
2
Global warming is just one symptom of an already unsustainably high population of human resource consumers and polluters on earth. And the politically correct, allowed by the rich and powerful virtue signaling of concern about climate change is nothing more but a coopted delusion and distraction that suggests that the status quo of adding 1 billion more people every 15 years without further deterioration is possible via technological magic. Paid off by the 1% economists, and the corporate criminals that rule our world will keep increasing the size of the whole human enterprise to get ever more profits until regional or global biosphere crashes unless the common people find some way to sabotage and obstruct our leader's manipulations that gain them ever more "bodies" to exploit every year via mass immigration of 1-2 million who have larger than replacement numbers of children into the USA, valorizing and tax payer subsidizing teen pregnancy as a "valid alternate life style choice" and restricting access to sex education and contraception both here and abroad.
3
The editors state that Trump's stand withdrawing from the Paris Climate Treaty was ill-timed, since "as a result of rapid economic growth in Asia and lower fuel prices worldwide, global energy-related emissions increased in 2017 after holding steady for three years."
Noting that this treaty was not submitted for Congressional ratification, the U.S. was never bound to the plan, which most Democrats vowed was not binding anyway. And, even if the U.S. were 'all in', we would not have been able to persuade our co-signers to fulfill their requirements under the treaty.
Hence, the U.S. is less hypocritical than the other major co-signees of the treaty. We withdrew and have not ratified. Other major countries have ratified and then not acted in accordance with their commitments.
The CO2 emissions parade continues.
5
I keep waiting for the trend in electric-assist bikes to be noticed. Here in Seattle, I've had one for about 8 months, and I've already put over 2K miles on it. In addition to being my commute-to-work option, it has also replaced my car for making short trips around town. Not only is it fun, and conquers our gruesome hills, but it's also a money and time saver when it comes to parking. And it's zero emission. And I still get *some* exercise! I think electric-assist bikes are going to be a game changer in green transportation. I was talking to a guy yesterday who had one and he was claiming they now account for 50% of new bikes sold in Seattle. Don't know about that, but I've certainly been seeing a lot more of them around.
10
The bikes sound great. I have lived in Seattle and saw roses blooming in December. Not so much in Michigan or other northern states. Still, we could use them for maybe 7 months out of the year.
4
And not a mention of the UN Green Climate Fund? Which wants money from Western nations to disburse to poor little third word countries to combat climate change? Such as poor little China, which is still opening a coal fired operating plant each and every week? With none going back to Western nations that are actually meeting green house reducing limits, such as, as you just pointed out, America? Let's look at the world as it actually is, not as we wish it was, and give up on the old policies of pretending that paying third world nations to cut back on their destruction of their environment (and, in the case of the rain forests, ours too) while ignoring their total failure to keep their end of the bargain, was a working policy. If you really want to reduce the rate of climate change, it's time to be realistic, not fanciful.
Let's take the money that we are not, thankfully, any longer giving to the UN Green Fund under the Trump administration, and rebuild American highways and drainage systems. As the Chinese continue to spew out pollutants from coal fired plants, we can count on our waters rising right here.
9
Every coal plant built today is intended to operate for 50 years at a minimum average 50% load factor to meet financial projections.
1
Please let's not forget houses of worship that are hoisting solar panels on their roofs, conducting energy audits, switching out conventional light bulbs for LEDs, insulating attics and implementing a myriad of other energy reduction measures to reduce their carbon footprints. As a Catholic biologist, I wrote an Action Plan with my University of Georgia Colleagues for Pope Francis environmental encyclical Laudato Si. After a very successful pilot project in Atlanta, we are ready to fund a Sustainability Coordinator for the Atlanta Archdiocese. We are engaging other faiths. The "power of the pulpit" can be a very important way to engage the people in mitigating climate change.
13
But still nothing about cutting back the primary input to climate change: more people.
1
The effects in climate that we are seeing now are from aggregate causes made decades ago.
The effects of today will be manifest decades from now.
It will take a very long time to pull ourselves back from the brink
We are not a patient species.
And we ain't seen nothing yet
12
What is still unclear to many, if not most people, is that the increasing extremes in weather, be it average global temperatures, rising sea levels, more fierce storms, and the resultant flooding, unusually strong earthquake and volcanic activity, etc., will NOT abate, or subside, even if we suddenly go to a zero fossil fuel emissions civilization. Indeed, the changes we have set in motion may not have reached their peak. There is a hysteresis in the climate's (read planet's) response. We don't know at all, how long it will take for the planet to "reset" after we control our fossil fuel emissions. It may be that there will be no returning to a milder climate, as logical as it may seem to us, as that's, at best, just speculation.
6
It is worth noting that many traditional conservatives were not so much deniers of anthropogenic climate change as they were simply opposed to very broad and deep power at the Federal level. There is a degree to which states and municipalities "filling in" the Federal gap validates those conservatives' belief that progress can be made, while maintaining more local accountability.
Unfortunately, the current iteration of what passes for conservative seems to be defined by Trump and Pruitt, no resemblance to traditional (especially Congressional) conservatives of the past half century. Sad !
6
Not a one of these reactionaries who mislabel themselves conservatives will invest in clean power research.
2
One percent of the world's population, give or take, is currently forcibly displaced. Climate makes up one of the underlying causes of violence in some cases, and an overt factor in disastrous weather occurrences. Funding for the world's response to displacement, most of which is usually provided donor nation states, is so bad right now that what some people think is an inevitable migration crisis is actually fueled by people in refugee camps with no hope for education of their children, very little medical, and one meal a day.
It's wonderful that cities and states are doing something. But it is most certainly not enough, and it is not a reason for hope, because not enough in this game is a precursor to epic fail.
2
Let China invest in new technologies that are moving into the 21st Century. The US will invest in coal mines (clean coal) and subsidies for the coal power plants that pollute the air and cost too much to run.
2
Might want to consider high-altitude pollution coming out of LAX et al. Thousands of tons of carbon deposited every day world-wide by the airlines.
Ground them and save the world? Don't think Boeing or American, for example, would appreciate that or the bourgeoisie that loves flying so dearly.
Yeah, coal is the problem.
7
To those who believe in the Climate Apocalypse Prophecies and also claim to believe in science consider that believing in science is quite different from understanding science. One who understands science understands that to fully comprehend a problem one must look at all sides of the problem and associated data. Not just the sides of the problem or data that support one's preconceived conclusions. In an attempt to assist aspiring "scientists" commenting here I recommend the following, but note in order to improve your understanding you might have to suspend your beliefs:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/01/opinion/trump-paris-climate-withdrawa...
3
The Times' coverage of energy issues remains irresponsibly ill-informed. Organized moral efforts and benchmarks aren't what's driving this, and insofar as there is "hope", these factors aren't why. What's shifting is simple: our energy economy is the most wasteful machine ever built. Today the expertise it takes to detect and end waste, building by building, car by car, is more pervasive and practicable than ever, and it's only getting moreso. One crucial argument for waste is being destroyed as we watch: conservation isn't sacrifice. In fact, it's elegant selfishness, and in a time when selfishness characterizes the Right's political thinking, they cannot reconcile their spectacularly pro-wasteful energy policies with the pure capitalistic arguments for applied conservation.
Companies such as Walmart aren't going solar because the United States Climate Alliance is for it. They're doing it because it's irrefutably good for their bottom line, and it they want to compete in capitalism today they have to squeeze every wasted microwatt, gram, penny, and minute out of the way they work. Expertise that useful is is now on the laptop of a typical homeowner, and only a fool wouldn't pay attention.
As long as this is depicted as a moral issue, The Times will remain oblivious to the facts, arguments, and case studies on the ground. The moral argument is peripheral. The crux is money, and there lie the victories.
8
Next -- there is so much virtue in believing in climate change and that evil humans and particularly evil energy companies and evil white people are at fault. Except -- of course -- if the globe isn't headed toward an apocalypse of fire and devastation because we burned a little fossil fuel.
I support emissionless cars as one method of combating climate change. However, the infrastructure really isn't there yet for most of America. The challenge isn't really about how many emissionless cars you put on the street. You're not going to get the nation to invest the capital needed to overhaul the entire system within ten or even fifty years. Not without a massive infrastructure project equivalent to the creation of the interstate. Even then, you'll still need redundancy. Some people are not going to give up their combustion engines willingly.
On top of that, there's still no viable alternative in the commercial sector. By pushing consumer electric, you might end up giving business a pass to pollute more. The burden of clean automobile emissions falls to the individual while businesses take the profit margin. Emissions will remain constant or decrease but the heavy lifting falls disproportionately on only one side the social equation.
I also have to ask: If we're considering massively restructuring current transportation infrastructure, why does it have to be cars at all? More creative solutions exist for overhauling local and regional area maps. Cars and trucks are a massively inefficient use of urban and semi-urban space. We're talking about a localized solution anyway. Why not rail? You could diversify the energy grid supplying the rail line. That way you don't have to worry about all the environmental damage electric car batteries cause.
Just a thought.
8
I'm not going to forget a blog video I saw months ago of a F-150 engineered by its owner to belch thick black soot from an upright, meticulously chromed exhaust pipe -- a metaphorical display of hatred for air quality laws. The country has been viewing too many avenge/revenge video games. Trump has devolved into a break-everything Mad King at the same time; he recently ordered used and outmoded diesel tractors back on the interstates so they can defy sensible preservation laws and his EPA appointment Pruitt thinks whatever happened before his reign should be undone. Thoughtless idiocy.
10
You must have seen a video of the same truck that buzzed a climate march on South Padre Island, Texas, a few years ago---it revved up and blasted the participants with a cloud of dense diesel smoke.
There is hope knowing that the science of climate change is objectively true predictable and repeatable no matter any economics, historical, journalist, legal, political and theological myths, opinions and "theories" to the contrary.
When it comes to the science of climate change whether or not Trump is ignorant, stupid or a liar does not really matter. Ignorance is not knowing that 2 + 2 = 4. Stupid is knowing that 2+2=5. Lying is not caring either way.
7
The only "hope" we have is that the man-worshipping, Earth-worshipping Climate Change lunatics would stop their madness before all aspects of our lives are controlled and regulated and restricted. The science they use is as inaccurate as predicting the weather. They make wild unproven correlations and then the rest is all politics to promote their agendas. Its the ultimate goal of liberals to regulate us to death. They even want to restrict methane by taxing cow farts. Enough said.
6
Well ... that's what you've been told by politicians.
Just read some books about climate science written by scientists, and you'll see how much these politicians are lying to you, NOT to try to prevent a situation where "all aspects of our lives are controlled and regulated and restricted", but just to prevent that private sector clean energy companies receive as much subsidies as dirty fossil fuel companies, as it's those fossil fuel industries that are their main campaign donors.
And no, climate and weather aren't the same thing at all, from a scientific point of view. The climate doesn't change each and every day, so it can be studied, contrary to most weather patterns, for instance ... and that's only ONE huge difference.
Finally, don't forget that ALL countries except the GOPe's US have signed the Paris climate agreement. That means ALL conservative governments on earth too ... . In that case, it becomes absurd to refuse to look at the proven science just because you fear that this might be politicized by "liberals" ...
19
Weather forecasts are becoming more accurate. On a daily basis there can be atmospheric variations that make forecasts at times seem a little off, but well over 90% of the time forecasts are very accurate.
Trump wants to support coal and nuclear power generation, even when it is uneconomic to do so. So much for supporting the free market which is going for more renewable energy.
You'd do well to ask the suppliers of your stores there in Spokane how and where they're hiding waste in their systems, because in the end, you're paying for it. If you're eating that, Cartridge World needs a new manager. If you're calling it cost of doing business and passing it along to your customers, then do your competition a favor and hold a Going Out of Business Sale yourself before they do it for you. If that's what it takes to make you understand what climate change really is, then so be it.
1
June 2, 2018
If we are to add the extraordinary deposits of tears and death as a consequence of Trump inability to live and act up to his oath of office to protect and defend America then beyond foolishness is to take action and throw him out of office. Let him go back to Queens New York at a tyrant apartment owner and of course mismanagement and civil rights abuses of course.
JJA Manhattan, N.Y.
4
It is up to all of us to do this. And guess what? It pays!
Being eco-freaks, we invested in a solar system for the house, then added an electric car. The system provided sufficient power for both, so we added central A/C, and another electric car.
We now have no power bill, but have the benefits of grid connection, and the system pays off in less than three years. With electric transportation, we have no oil changes, no filters, no transmission work, no belts or chains, no injectors, no emissions systems, no mufflers, no engine maintenance at all. We do not spend our personal tome getting it tuned up or gassed up, as it is done at home at night.
That brings up our New Dilemma. When people see how trouble-free the EV is, they will abandon their internal combustion cars for them. That will cause a serious and significant upheaval in this society based on internal combustion engines and their needs. No more mechanics, muffler shops, tune-up places, oil filter salesman, transmission shops. We will see layoffs in the paper plants which made the filter elements, closed grocery stores where the parts guys used to shop, all through the economy.
We must plan now to avert this
9
The same thing happened to the horse breeders, harness makers, blacksmiths, farriers, wheelwrights,saddlers, livery stable operators, and grooms when the age of the auto began.
1
It’s time to accept that the earth is warming and start planning for the consequences. The attempt to stave off the inevitable with curbs on greenhouse gasses is a fool’s errand. There are too many actors that we (the US) can’t control or trust enough to curb emissions on their own.
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Fortunately, and ironically, market forces are coming to the rescue. Renewable energy and natural gas are driving fossil fuels, particularly coal, out of the picture, taking up the slack of political cowardice for the short term. If we have the sense to elect enlightened leaders, we may yet see such a surge in solar and wind that global temperatures will not reach a critical level.
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Pulitzer! and thanks for the link to "We Are Still In". In an ideal world, the federal government would be taking the lead role in providing the investment in new technologies, and R&D in solutions to ending our global dependence on greenhouse gas and health harming emissions from fossil fuel combustion.
The federal government has the resources to develop solutions to solve this global threat to our species but under the leadership of the GOP, it has declined to mobilize our resources as we did when we thought that Germany would develop the atomic bomb before we did and FDR launched the successful Manhattan Project and the other threat when the beeps of Sputnik launched the Apollo program. Both of these federal programs created technologies which sustain US global leadership.
Alas, since the GOP decided officially 11 years ago to deny both global warming and the finiteness of fossil fuels resources, the US has turned away from this market opportunity, and the financial security, jobs, better standard of living and health that the US and the World could enjoy.
In my 5 decades of research in this economically crucial field, I have advised the President and others in leadership to seize the issue, mobilize the economy and lead the World to a better place.
I subscribe to an energy path that include Drs. James Powell and Gordon Danby's superconducting Maglev for launching space solar satellites and moving freight and passengers on Maglev network. www.magneticglide.com
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You know all those people losing their jobs at coal mines?!! Let's take a chunk of the bloated Pentagon budget and retrain them to build and install solar panels all over the U.S.! We, the United States should be leading the world in developing, building and implementing solar AND wind energy!
Donald and his Trumpsters are not visionaries, they are fear mongers!
Please vote on November 6th, our children's and grandchildren's future depends on YOUR vote!
17
Glad that Trump and his many, many offspring have to breathe the same polluted air as the rest of us. I just wish he would spend some quality air time in a coal mine.
8
Meanwhile Trump is trying his best to unwind the small gains made by requiring power distributors to purchase from coal plants (as well as nuclear plants--a different question) in order to brace up these dying producers of green-house gas. Until we get a different Congress, a different set of legislators, the best that can be hoped for is holding the line which is not enough in view of the catastrophic wave approaching us.
7
It is good to learn that some States and cities have more sense than the current tenant of the White House.
15
What do the Disciples of the Church of Global Warming have against plants? Over the last several decades plant mass has increased dramatically by between 25% and 50%. That is huge! Plants like CO2 - a molecule necessary for life on earth, not a life killing molecule as so many of the anti-science crowd here believe.
2
1. A church cultivates beliefs that cannot scientifically be proven or refuted. Climate science is science. Those are two completely different things.
2. Scientists have indeed proven that certain plants tend to grow faster when atmospheric CO2 levels increase and other factors (water, ... ) remain available.
But if you want to distinguish yourself from "anti-science" people/behavior, you can't afford to just stop there.
CO2 also warms up the planet, which makes lots of places drier - too dry for plants to grow. For people who like plants so much that they depend on local crops for their survival, that's absolutely dramatic, as I'm sure you'll understand.
At the same time, global warming also increases extreme weather events, including storms and inundations. Plants tend to dislike inundations, as they wash away crucial minerals (and often plants themselves too). The result is, at best, plants (and as a consequence crops) that are much poorer, from the point of view of their mineral composition, which makes them much more vulnerable to certain diseases, all while making them quite useless for people (and other animals) to eat.
Conclusion: overall, global warming is bad, not good for plants.
More info:
https://www.skepticalscience.com/co2-plant-food.htm
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By the way, CO2 isn't by definition good for life on earth, just like O2 isn't by definition good for life on earth.
Most living beings depend on VERY specific atmospheric (or ocean, for marine life) concentration of both.
Human beings vitally need oxygen, for instance, but when concentration levels become too low OR too high, we die.
The exact same thing goes for CO2.
At the current atmospheric 440PPM levels, it's already too high in our oceans for lots of marine species to be able to adapt and survive.
And then there's the fact that in order to adapt, we need SLOW changes in concentrations, not the current, unprecedentedly rapid change from 280 to 440PM in less than 3 centuries.
14
What do the Disciples of the Church of Ignorance have to say about science? That the world was created 4000 years ago? That humans walked with the dinosaurs? That vaccinations cause autism? One could read up on the science of climate change and understand the argument claiming that massive CO2 emissions is beneficial is actually bogus, but far easier to believe the pseudo-science espoused by the Book of Ignorance.
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I'm not sure why the Times continues to mislead on climate. First -- total and per capita US emissions have been falling since 2007 -- per capita emissions for longer than that. The biggest drivers of future global emissions are emerging nations. We account for only 5% of the world's population and while there is no question each individual in the US could reduce their energy consumption almost all efforts in the US to reduce consumption will be swamped by the increasing demand for energy in emerging nations.
The factual errors, omissions and hyperbole in the Times re global warming is astonishing.
A quick example. Recently the Times published an article on how climate change might affect Black Bear hibernation and leads (3rd para) with the statement that American Black Bears could shorten hibernation from between 15 and 39 days -- decreasing by 6 days for every increase of 1 degree Celsius. However, the study didn't say that -- the author of the cited study that made that projection clearly said it referred to the area (Durango, CO) in which the study was conducted. Moreover, that projection doesn't stand up as any sort of rule -- or else black bears in Northern Alaska should hibernate roughly 3 months longer than Co bears. They don't, however, as a quick check of various sources would have revealed to the Time's climate team.
And of course the hyperbole re extreme weather and climate is simply ridiculous.
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"Misleading" is only appropriate, as an adjective, when the Times would write things that go against proven evidence.
Today, however, Republicans use that word no longer in its proper sense, but mainly to refer to no matter what "news" or opinion that goes against their own personal, subjective beliefs. That is what I would call quite "ridiculous" - and frankly outright dangerous, when it comes to taking policy decisions.
Let's take your idea that emerging nations contribute more to CO2 emissions than the US today, for instance.
All you had to do to fact-check your opinion before criticizing the Times, was to google it.
If you would have done so, you would have observed that you're wrong.
Yes, the US only makes up 6% of the world's population. But we're producing 25% of the world's CO2 - comparable to what China is emitting, even though they have four times as many habitants as the US has.
So emerging economies are emitting MUCH less CO2 than current, already developed economies, per capita, and overall.
In fact, it's the US today that has the world's highest carbon footprint per capita.
If you add to that the fact that we're not only the world's worst polluter but also the world's wealthiest country, it becomes clear why it's the US that has to take the lead here, if we really want to reduce global CO2.
In the meanwhile, the global green climate fund helps emerging economies to not even START polluting as much as we do, all while developing their economies.
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Anna Luisa -- I said of nothing of the sort. What I said was that emerging nations will be the drivers of FUTURE emissions. If you check you will see that India and China are growing emissions while we are declining -- and the US only accounts for about 14.3% of global emissions while China accounts for almost 29.5%. Get your facts straight please. And yes, the US leads in per capita emissions but that is declining while the emerging nations are going up. As you might know, people living in tropical areas want air conditioning -- many do not now but they will. And refrigerators and tvs etc.
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Trump's rationale was that the deal was bad for America.
Unfortunately, while he doesn't seem to have the ability to articulate his reasons himself, some of them appear to be around the impact on the American coal industry as well as the Green Climate Fund and the overall structure of the accord.
While most agree that human activity is a contributing factor to climate change, no one seems to be able to demonstrate how transferring trillions of dollars from US taxpayers to corrupt politicians in Africa, oligarchs in eastern Europe and despots in Asia and Latin America will fix the problem of global warming.
To many on the right Obama was an apologist. For example, he began his presidency with a Muslim apology tour. He justified the Iran nuclear deal because he wanted to help the Iranian people. He normalized relations with Cuba because after fifty years the Cuban people weren't any better off. DACA was done because he wanted to help foreign kids illegally in the US. These were not necessarily bad policies. He isn't morally corrupt no matter what people on the right say.
Trump and his people put America first. In every treaty, transaction and policy move they first and foremost look at the impact on American citizens and our economy. This, in itself, is not necessarily a bad policy. It's just different from Obama's. He (and his supporters) are not morally corrupt for these policies.
Elections have consequences.
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"no one seems to be able to demonstrate how transferring trillions of dollars from US taxpayers to corrupt politicians in Africa, oligarchs in eastern Europe and despots in Asia and Latin America will fix the problem of global warming."
My Tesla is made here in California by the sons and daughters of hippies.
Who made your car?
My car is powered by the Sun. Does yours still pollute? Really?
Who is paying the Arabs for gas, you or me?
Oh, . . .
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Putting America first is a nonsensical policy when the issue and the consequences are global.
We will not escape the economic consequences of climate change.
Let's not forget that this is really about Trump being spiteful, because Obama.
Putting more money in the fossil fuel billionaires' pockets now at the expense of the well-being of the generations to come, is the epitome of cut-your-nose-to-spite-your-face selfishness.
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Johannes
You seem to be a thoughtful person. I would agree that no one person in leadership has enough wisdom and knowledge to get all policy decisions right. But you got two major things wrong in your comments.
1. Trump does not understand that the world is interconnected and interdependent. Obama does. Trump doesn't care about the highest good of all people. Obama does. Putting America first at the expense of the rest of the world, natural and human, is a fatal error. Trump's perspective is selfishness, ignorance, and greed at its worst.
2. Trump's slogan "America First" is a sham. His real agenda is "Me and Mine First".
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Readers may want to keep in mind that there is one significant thing each of us can do to reduce harm to the environment, reduce greenhouse gasses, and save natural resources: stop eating meat. Animal agriculture is a major contributor to the degradation of the environment and use of resources. It's easy for people to blame businesses and governments, and to look to them for answers, but making this one decision on an individual level would have far more impact than driving a Prius, taking the bus, or even riding a bike to work. Stop eating animals.
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Water allowed to get where it’s going under the laws of Nature will flow like that for eternities. Water pushed madly by a pump to the same spot will only for the life of the pump. Stop being so impatient and always critical.
Thank goodness Trump is helping to de-regulate environmental protections.
I really am getting tired of breathing clean air.
13
Nyts and liberals. You seem to be sincerely concerned about global warming, co2 emissions etc. in my lifetime, the population of the u.s. has doubled. This increase has been driven almost exclusively over the last 40 years by immigrants and their offspring. As the greatest co2 producers per capita on earth, and without immigration, we would have a falling population, it seems extremely dishonest to talk about climate change when you are willfully blind to the one thing that would have a longterm permanent positive effect on climate change. No technology or signing any agreement is going to have a longterm effect if we don't control our numbers, worldwide of coarse, but especially here at home and the best way to do that is to limit immigration. At 5% of the worlds population using 25% of its resources, we really can't ignore this anymore.
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This.
From the crowd that refuses to promote sex education and contraception; is anti-choice, even in cases of rape and incest; and applauds reality shows with their 35 kids and counting.
But no. Let’s scapegoat immigrants and their 2.5 kids as the problem.
How do I get out of this Republican-controlled fun house?
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@Al,
"limit immigration"
No, the best way to do that is to make sex education and contraception and reproductive health services a priority, and that includes allowing easy access to safe and legal abortions.
All of which "liberals" have supported over the years and "conservatives" have vehemently opposed.
Most immigrants will assimilate over a generation or two (if they achieve some level of prosperity) and will have lower birthrates.
The main source of high birthrates in the US are "conservatives" and some specific religious groups like Mormons.
Also, as in less developed countries, poverty promotes having children-- the more educated and economically secure women are, the more likely they will reproduce above replacement rate.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/05/12/charted-the-relig...
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AI, that's a poor rationale for your dislike of "immigrants and their offspring." (Can you say "children" - the standard term for human "offspring"?)
Without immigrants, the US population would be tilting steadily and alarmingly older, meaning a declining work force to meet our needs for goods and services, technological advancement, income tax revenue, and payments into Medicare and Social Security for retirees who now live well into old age.
Been to a hospital lately? Noticed how many of the doctors have accents from the country they emigrated here from? We'd be in tough shape without them.
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It is not only climate change that requires a strict reduction in the emission of green house gases, as their production also releases a harmful array of toxins, from ozone, carbon monoxide, sulfuric acids, heavy elements like mercury and cadmium, CFC's and nitrogen oxides, to name a few, that result in smog, acidification of rain and the oceans, which in turn have disastrous health consequences. These health issues alone suffice to enforce strict regulation on emission from vehicle, power plants and industrial processing. Yet the US is going the opposite way, thanks to the willful subversion of facts and policies by the Trump administration, all for the purpose of financial rewards to their cronies under the banner of dishonest campaign promises made to Trump's ignorant and gullible devotees.
Reversing Obama's gas mileage standards appeases the automobile manufacturers, not because they found them technically challenging, but for the lower profitability of building small, efficient cars. Big SUV's and light trucks are much more profitable and, moreover, they are the preferred vehicles of most Americans. This is the reason of Ford's announcement to manufacture only SUVs and trucks in the US, delegating passenger car manufacturing to their Mexican subsidiary. I pray that California and the 17 dwarfs prevail in their quest to maintain the Obama mileage standards. The alternative is to hope that gas prices rise to force the US public to buy smaller and more efficient cars.
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To the surprise of almost everyone, ambient heat, a huge untapped reservoir of solar energy, larger than earth's fossil fuel reserves, can generate electricity 24/7,
Presently neglected, as the new science bends long accepted textbook physics which has become dogma, rapid development can replace fossil fuels very much faster than intermittent wind and pv solar farms.
Prototypes of a thin laminate have run clocks and a table fan for more than a decade. This invention has the potential to power cell phones and laptops 24/7. Large panels can supplement or replace pv solar cells.
A Ford engine has been successfully converted to run without fuel. The inventor is finishing conversion of a Kia engine which will be certified by a State laboratory.
Piston engines and turbines designed to run fuel-free will power everything from homes to vehicles, ships & aircraft.
Trolls attack as the science is hard-to-believe and the field has been said to move forward funeral by funeral. We no longer have that luxury.
Revolutionary invention of this nature is by individual inventors and small companies, poorly supported at present. Should that rapidly change, it can create new hope to quickly combat climate chaos.
3
I've read that nuclear energy plants actually do have a carbon footprint because of mining and transportation needs for fuel. If I remember right, it's about 20% of natural gas.
There are so many sources of energy that are renewable and clean--we just need to exploit them--geo-thermal, wind, sun and water currents all are potential sources.
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I don't know the statistics, but then the same could be said about the production of renewable energy sources, from mining the basics to production and installing and maintaining them.
It is the net result that is significant.
3
Optimism is muted when you have others even at the NYT and population at large with opinions that mirror that of Bret Stephens' recent Op-Ed piece (link below). If you want to curb carbon emissions or foster re-tooling of an industry, sometimes government incentives do play an important role. If this were not the case, then why do we still have so many farm subsidies? A fundamental change in America's energy consumption will not magically happen through the mythical invisible hand of the market. Instead, we continue to need a specific strategy and concerted effort by industry and government alike. I applaud those that are doing what they can to do something different to help the environment.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/25/opinion/elon-musk-tesla.html
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To enhance our national security, we need to be energy independent, develop renewable and sustainable resources for living, and increase our conservation and recycling efforts. The days of waste are over. The future is ours, if we plan it. Plan it for the planet!
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Would be interested in the progress other countries still in the Paris agreement have made in reducing their emissions. I don't think they've done much and these heralded agreements seem more like feel good moments than effective strategies.
We shouldn't have left the agreement but have doubts about how effective it is now and will be in the future. It's all voluntary and all talk so far.
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Paris was not about climate change, it was about redistributing America's wealth.
3
With "Climate Change" such an important topic, as a service to its readers and the world, perhaps the NYT should institute regular weekly reporting about what's happening in the field.
What tangible steps, for instance, are being taken in various countries and states to reduce CO2 emissions?
What technologies are being introduced in the private sector?
What incentives are available to individuals and how can they be accessed?
What groups are negating progress -- and how are they being countered?
Where and when are there upcoming meetings about Climate Change? And, then, what happened in them.
If we hope to see progress, it is important as a minimum to build conscious -- and keep it front and center.
How about it, NYT? Can you make a commitment to leadership of your readership?
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Try this:
https://www.nytimes.com/section/climate
The rest of us need to contribute "clicks" (yes, ugh, I know) to bring the topic forward in the midst of all the Trump foolishness which thrives on kidnapping all the oxygen in the room.
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Despite the lack of evidence a climate summit - any climate summit - has actually reduced greenhouse-gas emissions, editors here voice their support for another.
Why? The reason has no basis in science. Ask a climatologist: Columbia's James Hansen has only condemnation for international climate accords, seeing them (accurately) as kum-ba-ya, feelgood excuses to kick the atmospheric-CO2 can down the road.
Meanwhile, for the wrong reasons, Trump may be doing more to address climate change than all of Paris's co-signers combined. On the basis of expert advice from the Department of Energy, the president yesterday "ordered his energy secretary to take immediate action to stem power plant closures, arguing that a decline in coal and nuclear electricity is putting the nation’s security at risk" (Bloomberg).
Coal is on its way out, for the right reasons. Nuclear is not, and it has everything to do with a determined effort by natural gas interests to replace it with fossil fuel gas. That nuclear generates twenty times the carbon-free electricity as all U.S. solar panels combined has been overlooked by the Times for too long: solar will never generate electricity at night; wind will never generate electricity when it's not blowing. To climate and energy experts, it's abundantly clear that "renewable" energy will forever be incapable of replacing, and will only perpetuate, the role of fossil fuels in generating electricity.
Ask a climatologist: we have no time to lose.
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Unlike real climatologists, you don’t cite a shred of credible, verifiable evidence to support your claims, or your speaking for them.
Such a tiresome approach for arguing against reducing greenhouse gasses.
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Our grid is fine. We should be investing in wind and solar! Coal is dirty, nuclear is dangerous. Donald is doing quite a bit of harm! He wants to buoy up nuclear and coal, typical ignorance.
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As a former engineer for a large power company, I can cheerily report you are wrong. Our renewable sources are developing at a rapid rate, and taking over for the closed coal and nuclear plants which cannot compete with new gas and even lower prices for PV and wind power.
And the new low costs are for 24-hour wind plus battery storage and PV plus battery storage. Now. All over, and cheaper than any other source.
But infrastructure takes time to replace, so unless you help, you may not see those benefits soon.
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California's clean air act predates that of the federal act. LA started its air pollution program in 1947. California receives special attention in the federal act because it had existing regulations in place when the federal system came about in 1970.
Pruitt can't just wave a wand and "make it so". EPA's sloppy legal work is evident. You can repeal regulations, but you have to follow the same process you do as when they were first promulgated. This administration clearly has no idea of how to run a government, and doesn't care, but courts do care, and this sloppiness will continue to trip up EPA.
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There is no limit to the amount of damage this president is capable of inflicting upon the U.S. & the world. From the dehumanization of immigrants looking for a better life, to continual race baiting comments legitimizing the alt right, to the reversal of leadership by the U.S. in the international coalition to combat climate change, to undermining the rule of law and our institutions responsible for enforcing them.....he is a boundless threat to everything good in America. The November midterms will determine if the U.S. is willing and capable of addressing this catastrophic leadership choice.
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It's difficult to accept that climate change is really the number one priority of environmentalists who oppose nuclear power. It is here and it is carbon free.
Of course, they have their objections to it. But despite their protestations, they are apparently not as alarmed about global warming as they are about other issues.
1
Nope. Most serious "environmentalists" realize nuclear power is part of the equation. Unfortunately, fear and prejudice has made grandfathering the more dangerous plants rather than bringing in the new safer cleaner versions. For example, the UK is having China (!) build them an old-tech nuclear plant (and a little UK birdie says that's so they can sneak in nuclear material for their military). The worst of all possible worlds.
Unfortunately, the combination of fear, prejudice, shot-term thinking, economics, etc. are putting us all at risk. You, for example, are only using this as a talking point to discredit "environmentalists". How stupid is that?!
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Nuclear is not carbon-free, ERP. All the cement, steel and copper that goes into construction has a large carbon footprint - from fossil fuels. Then there is a large carbon footprint for decommissioning the plants. Environmentalists have known this for 40 years. It is one of their reasons for opposing nuclear.
2
The big problem with nuclear is the same as it always has been. What to do with the nuclear waste that no one wants buried in their backyard. And nuclear power is a non-renewable energy source, which means eventually we will run out.
Other problems are with the amount of water a nuclear plant needs and how to dispose of the warm water, which should not be immediately released into rivers or streams. The water disrupts the life that is in the water, which kills fish and other life.
Esp. in the western states where water is at a premium already, the amount needed would take valuable water from crops and humans.
Please list in detail, your reasons for choosing to hate Domestic Resource Providers?
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The fact that they're destroying the planet's current climate, whereas human civilization (and tons of other species) need it to survive.
That seems to be enough, no?
That being said, knowing that we need to change our energy sources if we want to keep what we care for most on earth and here at home, doesn't mean that we have to "hate" fossil fuel energy sources and their producers.
Hate never solved any problem efficiently.
What we need is cultivating the courage to confront proven facts calmly and lucidly, and then change what has to be changed.
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By "domestic" I assume you mean heavily polluting? My list is too long for that.
Why don't you come up with a list of why you "hate" efforts to protect the atmosphere we all breathe?
Oh, and renewables are providing hugely more American jobs than polluting energy sources these days.
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We must invest and support our nation's sustainable energy providers! Wind and solar are clean and plentiful!
Coal is limited, dirty. Nuclear, only if we have no other choice, and solar and wind will take care of our needs!
Nobody hates "our energy" providers, we hate the POLLUTION!
3
The only 'climate foolishness' is not getting ready for the next Ice Age.
1
We ARE in an ice age right now.
Scientists define "ice age" by permanent ice on both the north and south pole.
For the moment, we're in the earth's sixth ice age (called "quaterny ice age"). Ice ages typically last hundreds of millions of years. Our current ice age is quite "young" still (it's only 2,6 million years old), and in its deepening phase.
Within each ice age, there are warmer and cooler periods. The cooler ones are called "Glacial Periods", the warmer ones "Interglacial Periods". They typically last tens of thousands of years.
Since 12,000 years now, we're in such an Interglacial Period (= since the beginning of human civilization on earth).
The alternation between those periods is supposed to be linked to the wobbling of the earth's axis, changing its distance to the sun.
So what is supposed to happen next, within a couple of thousands years, is another Glacial Period, within our current Ice Age.
Instead of cooling down, however, our planet is now warming up. Even worse, it's warming up unprecedentedly fast, so fast that we're already in the earth's Six Extinction (= number of species becoming extinct a year), as many species can't adapt so fast to changing temperatures and chemical environments.
If we don't stop CO2 emission increases right now, within 100 to 200 years so much life on earth will be destroyed that once the next Glacial Period arrives, most of it will have been wiped out, including human civilization.
So we have to act. And act NOW.
9
Trump exists because the Republican Party allows him to exist. So let's place the blame squarely where it lies: on the members of Congress who are towing the Republican Party line. If we, Americans, want real change we must vote these people out. Otherwise there will continue to make our lives, and the lives of others throughout the world, extremely unhealthy. These are bad people. Really bad people. They have no morals, no character, no sense of right and wrong. They are the worst of the worst. No other way to see them.
14
The climate change hoax was on the ballot. America voted. Trump and capitalism won. Get over it. These people would rather that a spotted owl live them a man feed his family.
1
Well ... all scientists all over the world, and all governments (leftist and conservative, socialist and capitalist, white and black, poor and rich) all over the world agree that it's not a hoax at all, and that we have to act now.
That America's GOPe managed to create and spread a climate change conspiracy theory and that 30% of the American people don't fact-check but blindly believe them, is a typically American problem.
America voted for capitalist Hillary, but the electoral college decided to give the White House to a demagogue who doesn't care about proven facts at all, and who's entire life is built on selling lies only in order to increase his own personal wealth. There's NOTHING "capitalist" about that, it's simply called corruption.
10
Per your last sentence: what ridiculous, false hyperbole.
Good grief. What’s the point of men (and women, don’t forget) feeding their families when their air and water are poisoned?
Besides, a true capitalist would be willing on a daily basis to step over the dead bodies of those who don’t make it by that system, including children and babies.
Not only that, red states would raise their own revenues rather than willfully feed from the blue-state-funded federal trough.
“...capitalism won.”
Hilarious.
5
We have solar panels on our roof. They generate 90% of our power usage. My wife and I both drive electric cars. All of my yard and power tools are electric. The only fossil fuels we burn are for hot water. Our decision to switch was aided by California subsidies. We are much happier with these decisions and have discovered it is actually less expensive to have a lower carbon footprint and much less smelly, dirty, and there are fewer repairs being electric.
Oddly, the only thing it took was making the decision to switch. It's all out there and available, folks.
32
Thank you! Great work.
7
I’m with you! I made the switch to solar & an electric car too & am helping save not only the planet but money too!
7
Your 90% usage is due to your living in sunny California. I live in Virginia and never realized how often it is cloudy until I bought an expensive solar system with 18 panels. It really doesn't provide anywhere near my needs, particularly in the winter when it is cold and the sun is low; and I live in an earth sheltered home.
2
Trump is clearly doing all he can to force renewed demand on fossil fuels that not only result in costly destruction to communities and public health, that require costly military and policy to protect foreign sources, but that force dependency on a fuel source that is inevitably more expensive to deliver. We’re already seeing rising gas prices thanks to Trump policies. On the one-year anniversary of pulling out of the Paris Climate Accord, despite the bold, visionary moves by the 16 states plus Puerto Rico in the United States Climate Alliance, Trump is doing everything possible to even obstruct those efforts. Just this week, when New York Governor Andrew Cuomo announced all coal-fired plants would be closed by 2020, Trump, in an abuse of power, signals an executive order to mandate purchase of electricity from coal plants that would otherwise be too uneconomical to operate – akin to forcing purchase of whale oil to block Edison’s electric lights. On top his climate-denying anti-environment, Big Oil-lackey EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt rolling back car standards, Trump’s move to tariffs on automobiles is a way to removing competition from countries mandating a shift to electric vehicles. Finally, on top of saving the planet from life-destroying impacts of climate change, shifting to clean, renewable energy decentralizes energy-production, giving localities more control and uprooting the tyrannical hold of fossil-fuel oligopolies.
3
The vicious cycle all of human civilization is trapped in rationalizes maintaining current self oriented behavior because there is no clear price to pay in the short run. There is no daily, in everyone's face, signal that individual behavior requires change lest the long term future be unbearable.
Each society exhibits this self defeating behavior in different ways. Ours has its own idiosyncrasies based upon the legacy of living the American dream circa the fifties.
The structural features that reinforced such behavior are
deeply embedded in legal/administrative code,
as well as the flexing of power within dysfunctional, ossified
political systems at all levels.
Significant change, needed to slow down our willful collective rush to suicide, can only come from the bottom up. Massive organizing is needed to create practical options that make it feasible to modify daily choices of local entities, be they government, private business, or individual. The editorial summarizes a few, but this is far from sufficient.
The private sector, from small to large enterprise, has to be included quickly, which obliges that a price signal be introduced that rewards shifting away from carbon energy use without penalizing the working classes currently struggling to get by.
This requires ingenuity, imagination, and determination to circumvent the true evil at work elsewhere.
And those fellow citizens who have turned off from civic engagement need to turn back on.
3
Those who support the vast co2-warming industry continue to ignore the fact that no one has been able to point to any clear definitive scientific evidence that co2 causes warming. Anyone who doubts this can/should do a literature search and report their findings.
In real life, it has been proven more than half a century ago already - and beyond ANY possible doubt.
Time to update your info ... ;-)
10
Nothing done in the US will have any significant effect on the climate of the planet. Carbon emissions are driven by population expansion and the US is a minor player. As the global population grows from some 7.5 to 10 billion carbon-generating human heaters during this century, incremental increases in per capita energy efficiency will have little impact on our ongoing environmental disaster. And rolling back Obama's mileage standards will save lives; further efficiency gains will come at the expense of smaller, lighter, and less-safe vehicles.
2
Wrong.
1. The US has the largest carbon footprint per capita of any country on earth.
2. The US is responsible for 25% of today's annual CO2 emissions, even though it only makes up 6% of the world's population.
It's our duty and responsibility to change our lifestyle immediately, especially knowing that ALL other countries have already signed the Paris agreement too.
And Obama's fuel efficiency standards are the first and absolutely necessary step to get us there. That's not a personal, subjective opinion, it's what has been scientifically proven to be true.
13
You are both right and wrong. We could have a falling population and less reliance on hydrocarbons, but immigration will prevent any real progress on this front as we continue to add millions more heavy co2 producers to our present numbers. Unless popultion is addressed we are all, the entire planet, wasting our time.
1
GREED is the root of all Evil. Period.
9
That old truism needs updating:
"National security is the last refuge of the scoundrel."
6
Boy, oh Boy...you folks tickle me. Market forces are the BEST way for things to change...not heavy-handed Government intervention.
That's not how the military developed most of its best technological inventions - including the internet.
We've had enough ideology here, we urgently need fact-based policies.
7
Yet the Trump administration is trying to override market forces to prop up a dying industry - coal based power - see the recent moves to force continuation of coal based plants, despite being unprofitable and on the chopping block to be replaced with gas and solar powered power supplies. Nuclear plants have a set lifespan, and most have not been replaced with new nuclear plants due to more profitable - and coincidentally cleaner - alternatives.
7
Markets don't exist without government "intervention", Garloin, they are a legal construct and don't have an independent existence. This applies even to private contracts between commercial parties: if things go sour, the government-established courts mediate according to government-established law of contracts. Markets require rules, currency, regulated financial institutions, weights and measures.... and, especially, the policy analysis necessary to determine what issues are to be regulated and what issues can remain outside markets.
2
A question that comes to mind, is what kind of an educational system produces the likes of a Scott Pruitt, a Rick Perry, or a Donald Trump? Climate change is a concept even a third grader can comprehend. It's not too tough. So once again, what does it say about the quality of education in some red states? Did their high school history or science instructors neglect to show Al Gore's documentary "An Inconvenient Truth?" One problem as an educator I have identified is most of the social sciences in the public schools is taught by coaches, long on braun, short on intellect. That might explain it. Coaches are the "bouncers in the night club." Most could care less about the environment. Your thoughts...........
7
Climate change has been going on for 4 billion years on our planet. And, skip Al Gore's documentary "An Inconvenient Dupe".
I have asked myself this question over and over. What kind of educational system produces people who are so willfully ignorant that they refuse to accept the scientific evidence of human impact on global warming?
5
It should suffice to read the current New Yorker article on the dismal state of public education in Oklahoma to
answer the question. When denialist commenters (see E. Martin's above as one of many) sneeringly point out the absence of "convincing evidence" that co2 "causes" warming, they exhibit a mentality (and proudly so, apparently) that has not the slightest understanding what inference and reasoning from scientific evidence means.
The conceptual tools needed for this were supposed to be one of the main goals of an education, even one confined to high school, or, gasp, some time spent in higher education.
That this is sorely absent is a generalized phenomenon
that has made it absurdly difficult to act collectively to insure that the next generation has a future that is anything more than a daily struggle to survive.
4
When the Kentucky Coal Mining Museum switched to solar power it acknowledged that coal is a fuel of the past, dirtier and more expensive than modern-day alternatives. Trump, Pruitt and other corrupt Republicans bought off by the coal barons may continue to ride that gravy train for as long as they can, but it will only hasten the demise of the GOP. A political party that denies science will, like coal, eventually find itself to be irrelevant everywhere except museums.
11
No doubt the subsidies to owners of obsolete power plants will flow back to the only political party in the world with a treasonous platform to undermine the central government.
9
It's so wonderful to see all these states step up on such a crucial issue for the US and the entire world - and knowing that the US has the highest per capita carbon footprint in the world, and is responsible for 25% of the world's CO2 emissions all while making up only 6% of the world's population.
America HAS to lead on this issue, if not the efforts of other countries simply won't make a serious dent in overall atmospheric CO2 levels.
Another great initiative, not mentioned here, is the fact that Michael Bloomberg, NY's former Mayor, has promised to pay $4,5 million out of his pockets in order to respect America's financial engagements as included in the Paris agreement for this year.
So yes, that's correct, while the GOP just added a whopping $1.5 trillion to the deficit in order to give people like Trump and Bloomberg a huge, unpaid for tax cut, all that was needed to respect the Paris agreement was a $4,5 million payment.
And yet, Trump claimed that we couldn't afford to do so, and instead preferred to put America's wealthiest citizens first.
In reality, America and the West have been exploiting the rest of the world's natural resources for more than a century already, taking away not only their natural wealth but also their climate, and it's those countries, not us, who today already are suffering most from climate change.
How ignorant do you have to be to then call $5 million a year in compensation "too much" ... ?
8
It is already baked in that the world will emit another 50% of the entire fossil fuel CO2 emissions released to the atmosphere since 1800 over just the next 25 years.
7
Thank you for the good news about the United States Climate Alliance- this effort by sixteen states gets lost in the muddle of distractions by the EPA and its notorious leader Scott Pruitt.It is unconscionable that anyone would take us back to the days when we could "see" the air we were breathing.Long ago in California we were advised to keep our children indoors because the smog was so bad.Anyone with lung problems also had to avoid being outside on certain days.This may not outrage Scott Pruitt but it is an outrage to the rest of us.Mr.Trump's pandering to his base should not punish the rest of us who want clean air and water!
11
Emissions data for the year Trump took office does not a trend make. Any collective states efforting won't show up in the data for a while. Greenhouse gas emissions reduction has been a slog starting with the 2005 energy plan under Bush and continuing with "all the above" under Obama. Our electricity sector emissions are being reduced due to efficiency, natural gas replacing mostly coal plants, and renewables deployment such as wind and solar. And that's great. On the other hand, transportation sector emissions are growing as SUVs and Trucks make a comeback - despite efforts by Tesla and Detroit to sell EVs. Industrial sector emissions are starting to rise given that Trump admin is reshoring manufacturing and the US has become an oil, oil products, natural gas(as LNG) and coal exporting juggernaut. That domestic fossil fuel just gets burned elsewhere.
Finally, environmentalists don't have to become nuclear power's flacks and publicists - despite efforts by fake green groups like Energy Progress and The Breakthrough Institute and fake environmental journalists who won't be named. There is nothing stopping nuclear power expansion in areas that would want nuclear power. What's stopping nuclear power is economics - and that's chiefly the result of the grid getting smarter and able to managed renewables. Let all those fake (third way) environmental groups coordinate with Trump's deplorables et al. Leave environmentalist out of this issue.
3
Three points: First, don't lump (sic) coal and nuclear plants together. Coal plants pollute worst of all while nuclear plants pollute not at all.
Second, it's time to give up on the Department of Energy. It was a mistake to make it a Cabinet department, thereby politicizing it. Perhaps it should be broken up according to its various missions and those components buried in other departments like Commerce, Defense and Transportation. Then the dedicated people there can quietly go about their important work without political interference.
And last, the States need to band together in twos and threes to take over the necessary research on advanced nuclear power (fission and fusion). We can no longer expect the Federal Government to do the job.
5
Bob--Nuclear plants, of course, have their own terrible dangers. And, many of them are not in good repair. Never say it can't happen here. Most nuclear plants are located near bodies of water. That is an inherent danger, for millions of people.
8
Nuclear plants are really only useful for base load generation. The cannot be made to throttle up and down tracking the variable outputs of renewable energy sources.
3
Eventually, neutrons destroy most materials. The problem is even worse in proposed fusion reactors.
The Trump administration argues that the market (meaning self interest) should drive energy policy. Regulation, they argue, undermines individual freedom by shifting the decision-making process out of the hands of producers and consumers and into those of bureaucrats, who scorn the needs and interests of average Americans in favor of a radical agenda. Aside from the fact that this fable ignores the impact of decades of federal and state tax breaks for fossil fuel companies, the notion that the market always ensures the most efficient means of production factors out the consequences of externalities.
The true cost of oil and coal would include the harmful economic effects of pollution, but in fact the market has no way of pricing this damage. Even from the narrow perspective of a market enthusiast, therefore, it makes no sense to compare the cost of fossil fuels to that of renewable sources of energy without factoring in the amount of pollution caused in each case.
These facts, while obvious to anyone who has taken a course in Economics 101, will not move Trump, into whose mind reality intrudes only when it confirms his fantasies. Nor will they influence his minions in Congress, for whom the welfare of the country must always take second place to the short-term interests of their corporate donors.
But unless this reality informs the debate over climate change, champions of the fossil fuel industry will continue to enjoy an artificial advantage in deciding policy.
6
What Trump is doing is not foolishness.
It’s stupidity.
Time to call it what it is.
9
I disagree with your analysis. While Trump is both foolish and stupid, he demonstrates on a daily basis that he is owned lock, stock, and barrel by the Russians.
First there is the destruction of our environmental protections, creating a wedge between the US and the rest of the world. Then there is the total destruction of the ACA, leading to God knows what for the American people. Now we have a trade war on our closest friends and allies while publically defending Chinese jobs at the expense of our foreign policy. Our friends and allies publically speak of not being able to trust the United States.
Lets hope Mueller can continue to follow the money and find out just what the Russians have on Trump.
1
Yes, it seems clear that Trump is acting to spite Obama's progressive policy legacy.
Building himself up, at least in hiw own eyes, by tearing someone else down, no matter what the cost to the general welfare.
I suggest we reward Trump's juvenile behavior by designating him SPOTUS, Spiteful President of the United States.
6
NYT, please put front and center on the front page everyday, a small blurb about climate change. Simple facts that happen everyday. High temps, ice caving, etc. these things happen daily, report them.
10
Trump's actions and attitudes are consistent with American attitudes. To whit: The vast majority of Americans prefer to drive either a Ford F250, a Chevrolet Yukon or a Toyota Tundra around town. One single person drives this to work every day, then home. These huge, truly massive vehicles represent mainstream America's concern about "global warming": That concern is -> Americans could not care less about Global warming, and, thumb their noses it at through resource intensive vehicles. Wait, that's not all. They drive their Chevy Yukon home to a 4300 square foot house where two kids and two adults live. Not quite enough disdain for global warming yet. Americans HEAT that monster house every winter. So, don't blame Trump for ignoring global warming with disdain. All Americans ignore global warming with great, dripping disdain. Probably the Editoral Board of the NY Times is ignoring Global Warming as well in their actual lives. Are you guys heating your spatious apartments in winter? Ah, I thought so.
3
On the one hand, many people are unaware of what the concrete alternatives are, in their daily life, and on the other hand, for many problems you're mentioning, the only solution is a cultural shift, which requires much more than just awareness of already available alternatives.
That being the case, it's absurd to imagine that all that is needed is for each of us to live our life in a bit more ecologically responsible way.
The problem is MUCH worse than that. That's why we need a federal and global response to climate change.
We URGENTLY need laws that force car makes to make cleaner cars, we need much better public transportation systems, we need to force power plants to go clean, we need to force our companies to transition to using clean energy, we need subsidies for poorer countries so that they don't start massively doing what we did a century ago, we need laws that mandate (and help) ordinary citizens to better isolate their homes, and probably most of all, we need LOTS AND LOTS of education about this issue, as for the moment, the next fight is about getting a government that at least acknowledges the problem rather than deliberately making things much worse, as the current one is doing.
And that's where the NYT's mission lies, and where it's doing a pretty good job, imho ...
3
@Micheal, I've also noticed that these huge, energy inefficient, trucks never seem to be hauling anything but the drivers' egos. I remember a 16th birthday I attended where the son received one of these behemoths as a birthday present and I thought "This is the wrong message to be sending to your son and his friends."
2
I agree, some people who drive big trucks fit the profiles you describe. But please don’t lump all of us “big truck drivers” in that profile! Some of us drive large trucks because we have to plow several miles of road in winter, or haul hay and feed for our animals, or navigate dirt roads during mud season. I for one drive a large truck due to all of the above, but I also live in a small solar-powered house.
2
That $$1.5 TRILLION tax cut for billionaires and flush corporations like Apple sure would have gone a long way toward investing in clean energy and our kids health and future prosperity. Trump's message to America's kids: "DROP DEAD!" I wonder if the real reason we haven't seen Melania lately is that she's suffered a nervous breakdown. She seems to care about kids. In addition to all the humiliating Playboy bunnies and porn stars, could it be she's also worried about Barron's future?
6
As someone old enough to remember Three Mile Island, I am uneasy about relying too heavily on nuclear power, but there is a new generation of nuclear reactors in the pipeline, such as the small modular reactors designed by NuScale in Oregon. (Full disclosure: my son-in-law works there.) Nuclear can be part of the solution, if it is redesigned to be safer than the current technology.
Nukes don't track rapid load fluctuations because there are always ongoing nuclear decays even when the control rods are fully inserted in an emergency shutdown.
Send Trumputin a message. We want more solar, wind, tide power. Clean nuclear is OK. Coal - leave it in the ground. Natural gas - expand. Match one mileage standard by following California goals. More electric cars.
Tax golf balls to pay for this. Send Pruitt to China to breathe their air - he may catch on to the problem - maybe not.
1
I am not clear what Melania meant by "Be Best," but it does not matter. What matters is how djt interprets those words. Whether it is used as a noun, a verb, or an adverb, we generally associate the word with positive persons, places, or things, or with positive actions.
djt, however, simply wants to be the best in his own mind. The best liar, the best at attacking other people's character, the best tax avoider, the best blowhard, the best at skipping out on his bills, the best at scamming, the best at cheating at golf, the best at cheating on one's wife, the best at grabbing women, the best at paying off his political friends, the best at playing to his supporters' worst inclinations. Now we get the picture.
Perhaps Melania needs to go back to the drawing board.
1
Anything that has Obama's imprimatur on it precipitates destruction by Trump. How could a black man, the lowest of the low, not even born here do so many positive things while, I, the best of the best, have arrived to save all of us from his inferior actions. Thru his inept cabinet choices, who reflect back to him his gloriousness, carry out his destructive desires. The EPA, education, immigration, etc. You name it, his fingerprints are all over it.
It is a tribute to those states that have moved forward on their own to take sensible action. Thank heavens there are a few sane people left. To all climate deniers: what if you are wrong?
6
The only good thing that can be said about Pruitt is that he is so blinded by ideology that he plays fast and loose with federal regulations regarding rule making. This move will be challenged in court and Pruitt will lose, no matter how many corrupt partisan GOP judges the case is heard by.
4
This may be off the mark, but has anyone asked Obama if he feels any regret about his Trump lines at the White House Correspondents Dinner? The blow back, which I am sure he could not foresee, has been something no one could have imagined. Just asking?!?!?
2
We can only hope that the United States of America have reached peak stupidity with Mr Trump; for if that is the case, necessarily, things can only get better.
7
Trump's fans enabled him on the theory that any change whatsoever would improve their own lives.
2
Bet not one Editorial Board member passed organic chemistry with a "gentleman's C" or better.
Astrobiology, not a chance. Get a clue--all the Obama solar panels and wind farms that can be made in the next decade won't change the earth's temperature .01 degree F or C. Ever heard of "snowball earth"?
Not one day on earth since day one not "climate change".
Can man have an effect in the next century--not a chance. Nice religion, though.
3
I take it you didn't pass high-school physics at all.
1
Religion has to do with what cannot be proven.
Most of what you're saying here has been proven to be wrong for decades already.
Time to update your info ... ;-)
In the meanwhile, just one example. Yes, the climate on this planet has changed before, and many times already. Analyzing how it changed and what the effect of life on earth has been is precisely what allows us to know what will happen during the next century if we continue to increase atmospheric CO2 levels at the current pace.
Before the industrialization, those levels were at about 280 parts per million (PPM). Today, they're at 441 PPM. You have to go back at least 4 million years to find concentrations that high, in other words, long before humans even existed (let alone human civilization, which is only 11,000 years old). What's even more, those levels have never gone up as fast as they're doing today, and neither have global temperatures. We already know that that is causing changes that are too rapid for many species on earth to be able to adapt. So it's why we're already in the "Sixth Extinction" period.
And just like what happened before, if we continue to put so much carbon into the air, oceans will change irreversibly, so we won't have any fish to eat anymore, and once that happens, it will have a snowball effect on many other aspects of our current way of living.
Once you know all this, the question becomes: why would we NOT stop this madness ... ?
1
These climate denial arguments are really getting old. Believe it or not, humans do indeed have an impact on global climate. It's basic physics. And scientists are becoming more adept at linking human activity to specific climate extremes.
1
It seems like it is us against them. Them being us; we the people. As Pogo said " I have seen the enemy and he is us" B
"Climate foolishness"? More like climate madness, I'd say. States' actions are all well and good. But they will have only limited effect in the face of a president who is systematically dismantling Federal programs to address climate change. There will be no hope until voters wake up, realize how serious is our dilemma, elect reform-minded Democrats in 2018 and, ultimately, remove the current president from office in the 2020. For good measure, they should resolve never to vote Republican ever again. By enabling Trump, the Republican party has lost all moral standing to govern the country. They are complicit in his madness. Climate change is real, and must be addressed now, by all nations in concert.
3
I think while it is admirable for Mr. Obama like Mr Bush to fade into a quiet private life I beseech them to say one thing - That they think Paris is a bad deal and climate change is hoax. Almost immediately Trump would change in the opposite direction. For him everything that the previous administration did is bad and he is here to undo it. Mr Obama should also say that his foundation money is going to be sent to build the wall .
1
Important article, a reminder of the willful stupidity of Trump and Pruitt, among other closed minds, in denying the obvious,that man-made climate change is getting worse, evidenced by an increase in frequency and severity of floods, droughts and fires. This phenomenon is universal even when the main culprits (polluters) are the Unites States and China...while causing the most harm in poor countries, unable to defend themselves as well as we do. And Trump has the gall, and arrogance, to withdraw from the Paris accords? What an insult to sanity, what a trampling of empiric evidence. Hats off to the brave states with the will to assist mother Earth in the healing.
A few omissions in this piece and a few misleading statements need to be clarified. The US has put more CO2 into the atmosphere than any other nation so our responsibility for the world reducing PPM of CO2 is greatest. And despite all of the renewables (wind and solar) CO2 is still increasing. Even if we stayed at the present level of 411 PPM we need to reduce the level to 350 to stop the present changes to our climate. (Pre-industrial levels were 280). The author states the increase is due to rapid economic growth and lower fuel prices. The omission here is the increase in human population and "rapid economic growth" is misleading. Rather, it is increased consumption and CO2 production as the poorer nations want the lifestyle of the wealthy nations. And large families from poor nations are the ones consuming more.
Renewables would have to increase 6 times faster than they currently are to be effective. They are the future but now we need a world-wide carbon tax, one large enough to reduce CO2 production significantly. The drop in CO2 would be immediate and the revenue could be used to support renewables, free public transportation and tax rebates for low income. And yes, this means we will have to sacrifice--no matter how ugly that word is. Rising seas and more extreme weather are much more ugly.
1
So you propose that America, which has the largest carbon footprint per capita on earth, goes talking to the rest of the world and tell them that instead of developing their economies, we, wealthiest nation on earth, would like to see them tax those large and poor families ... ?
If yes: that's never going to happen. And it's why the Paris climate agreement is such a huge victory. One of the main obstacles to stabilizing the increasing atmospheric CO2 levels is precisely the fact that developing and poor nations don't accept the idea that first the West colonized them and took their natural resources in order to build the dirtiest economy on earth, to then ask them to not imitate us and if they would want to do so, pay a tax.
What is needed is indeed a global plan, but that plan has to take the desire of poor nations to finally get out of poverty into account.
And that inevitably means accepting to pay them, so that they can afford to directly go from subsistence, rural economies to developed economies using clean energy as main energy source, rather than first going through a century of dirty energy, as we did.
It's what the global Climate Green fund is for. America, under the Paris agreement, only pays a VERY small amount into that fund, but it's what allowed us to get poor and developing nations on board too.
2
In as little as 7 months, I hope we have a Congress willing to take on this madness. This is the issue that literally drowns all others.
I admit to being a climate-change radical. Those deniers who do so for monetary or political gain while knowing the truth should be tried before the World Court for crimes against Humanity.
5
Cape Cod has a Fukushima twin at sea level with a rising tides. The plant regularly shuts down for "failures" several times a month including cooling failures. When/if it goes, it will wipe out Boston and all of Cape Cod. It is due to close but will it? And what to do with the spent fuel, nearly a 1,000 in a pool designed for 300, also at sea level. It it there as Fukushima was for easy access to cooling waters. Oh, and then there is Indian Head on the Hudson that would pollute all of NYC. Seriously, nuclear is not even to be considered based on cost and proximity to water plus no plan for storing spent fuel.
1
One of the best tactics the "Never Trump" and "Resistance" people of the USA could adopt is to buy only cars that help to meet or even exceed the reduced emissions standards set by the Obama administration. Since Trump's only interest is to do the opposite of Obama, out of some churlishness or pathological hatred, this would hit him where it hurts most: his ego. The planet would be the winner.
2
THAT Enlightened governors would part ways with the federal government is a moot point. The Feds abandoned the states (in the name of "states' rights, of course) during the era of Ronnie Ray Gun. The states had to do something to counteract the federal effort to shift wealth from the 99% to the 1%. During the time that the tax rip-off of the 99% is implemented, the 99% will see the transfer of between $1.8 and $2.2 trillion to the 1%. Meanwhile, Walmart employees are so poorly paid, intentionally, that they constitute the largest single group of people in the US who have to depend upon welfare, food stamps and medicaid. That looks like a scam and a rip-off by the Waltons to me. What makes them so "special" (specially greedy that is) that they're entitled to rip off government social programs to increase their profits and, hence, their quarterly stock earnings.
3
This editorial does not mention Russia where pollution continues to be so bad is that the country has never devoted adequate resources to addressing it.
President Vladimir Putin has said publicly that manmade climate change is a lie that Western countries have perpetrated to try to hold back development in Russia and other countries.
1
Good Editorial! Humans are imperfect, but it surely is perverse that the country that put men on the moon nearly fifty years ago should be run by people who deliberately choose to be wrong on so many issues. Forward thinkers paid a high price for their pioneering work: Galileo was under house-arrest for years; Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake; countless others were burned as heretics, witches, or Jews. Irish priests had a price on their heads, literally; same price as on the head of a wolf. No Torquemada now--just Trump and Pruitt.
2
The Paris agreements should have been the first step, on a global level, to recognize and act on our mutual obligation to ensure the future for next generations. I
nstead, our reality star toddler president pulled us out - because Obama put us in. How pathetic.
But,his choice to deconstruct the EPA, the odious Scott Pruitt, will be a star poster boy and foil for Dem candidates in November.
Even if low-information, easily fooled voters stay convinced by high school grad Hannity, that science is a special interest and clean air and water is a partisan issue, Pruitt's indulging of his champagne taste on other people's hard earned tax dollars will become increasingly impossible to explain away or justify.
The fact that he won't step down, and that he is not ordered to step down, will only make his final and inevitable fall all the more precipitous.
3
The name of the country is the UNITED STATES, but it is becoming more obvious that we are not united.
Economically and culturally we are not united on many if any issues.
Is it time to discuss secession? Why can i not have a say in who is the speaker of the house or the majority leader who both control the legislative bodies of this country. Lets face it McConnell and Ryan do not represent me or the vast majority of the folks in the Country.
Think about it McConnell is senator from Kentucky, a state with very many nice people but a state with less people than
horses or cows and yet he is control of the country of 350 million people. DOES THAT MAKE SENSE?
4
The active attempts to pervert climate science are nothing short of crimes against humanity.
The Kochs, and in fact the majority of the Republican party are active participates in this crime.
Exxon profits came from steeling our grand-kids' future.
3
"an administration that is preparing to force power companies to keep dirty and inefficient coal-burning power plants operating on the pretext that they are needed to protect national security." National security? Pruitt's machinations will make the US less secure. How do we fight this kind of perversion?
Hope is not a plan, though it can be a source of inspiration.
Trump is going out of his way to make things worse. He's claiming national security as justification for trying to block the closure of coal burning power plants and nuclear reactors.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-planning-to-jolt-sagging-c...
He's rolling back mileage goals for car makers and trying to kill programs that provide incentives for greenhouse gas reductions.
Don't give Governor Cuomo a pass either. While he needs help on transportation (a quarter of US greenhouse gas emissions come from transport), Cuomo has been pursuing car-centric policies at the expense of rail. It's not just New York City and Long Island that need help with their rail systems - it's upstate as well.
One of the elements missing from the new bridge that replaced the old Tappan Zee bridge is a cross-Hudson rail link. Supposedly it would have added too much to the cost of the bridge, but the costs to the environment and the loss of future rail expansion on the West Shore will be even more expensive in the long run.
The Empire Service locomotives Amtrak uses in New York State are wearing out; food service is being cut back. Where is Cuomo on this? There are heritage rail lines he wants turned into bike trails, when they could become a means of sustainable redevelopment in an economically hurting region. Cuomo can and should do more.
2
The west, and Japan, although being large CO2 emitters, have done at least one thing right - the west and Japan have stabilized natural population growth, and in several western countries, natural population growth is below replacement levels.
If it were not for mass immigration to the west, the CO2 emissions in western countries would be stabilized naturally, through natural reduction through reduced demand.
It is great to push for environmentally sustainable energy options, but any gains will be lost by the population increases in the western worlds, not be natural growth but by mass migration, both legal and illegal. (Because once immigrants arrive in the west, they produce much more CO2 emissions than they did back home in their less developed countries.)
The soring population growth rate will also offset any conservation gains that the west will make. The world population doubles every 61 years, and will be responsible for enormous increases in CO2 emissions. Any serious discussion about reducing CO2 emissions must consider also controlling the world's runaway population explosion, but this topic is not broached at all.
4
Philly,
Global population growth won't offset conservation gains 'the west' will make, because the causes of global warming are economic. Individual voluntary efforts can reduce emissions marginally, but the warming won't be capped without collective intervention in the 'free' market for energy, to internalize the marginal warming costs of everyone's CO2 emissions in the price of fossil fuels. The USA, in particular, still has the economic power to lead the crucial transition to a carbon-neutral global economy.
'Alternative', i.e. carbon-neutral, energy sources have been known since early in the industrial age, and so has the fact that fossil fuels cause global warming. But the marginal warming cost was kept out of the price of fossil fuels, so alternatives couldn't compete with them in the market, thus there was no incentive to develop them and bring their price down.
As long as we're not paying for the marginal cost of the climate change we're causing in the price of every gallon of gas we buy to run our crosstown errands, the bill will accumulate in arrears. It's already being paid by people around the world in money and tragedy, far out of proportion to their fossil carbon emissions. Recent headlines make it clear US residents are paying too. The sooner we enact a national carbon tax, e.g. revenue-neutral Carbon Fee and Dividend with Border Adjustment Tariff (citizensclimatelobby.org), the lower the total bill for anthropogenic climate change will be.
Trumps order to keep outmoded coal plants on line is a foolish effort to placate the miners he lied to in 2016. No matter what he does, economics mechanization will continue job losses in coal mining.
In W.Va. it would be smarter to invest in pipelines that would carry its vast natural gas reserves to the close by Eastern states. The natural beauty of W.Va. should also be opened up with a new road system that would bring tourists. Country roads is a beautiful song but won't do much for travel.
1
If we wish to survive, we must notice, not deny, what is going on all around us. We must face the real threat of the sixth extinction. Increases in extremes are just getting started, sea level rise is observable and obvious in low-lying areas, oceans are acidifying, etc. etc., and all this is expensive as well. Ignorance is not bliss, and the planet does not believe in phony arguments. People advocating against climate reality are not skeptics, but they will use any argument to pretend their bias is honest seeking. Real science is skeptical; special pleading is not.
Here's a good short easy resource: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldLBoErAhz4
About coal: "the increase in atmospheric carbon levels is due entirely to humans burning fossil fuels. There are an increasing number of dead zones in the oceans. Burning coal was causing acid rain"
"carbon dioxide pollution ... continues to rise. As a result, the oceans are becoming increasingly acidic, and temperatures increasingly hot. Scientists today also worry about potentially large releases of methane from the ocean floor and Arctic."
"climate change that nearly wiped out life on Earth 252 million years ago ... Both appear to have largely been caused by burning coal. ... species are now going extinct at least as fast as they did during the five previous mass extinction events."
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/20...
8
Let's do the math, as everyone seems to believe in perpetual growth. New Jersey wants to switch to 50 % renewables by 2030, they also want 3% growth. 3% growth is over 40% compounded between now and 2030. So, renewables need to be 70% of current usage, and fossil fuels will be 70% of current usage- a reduction of only 30%. And this is only electricity, not looking at transportation, which uses more energy.
This also does not factor in all the fossil fuel energy required to built that 70% renewable energy infrastructure- solar panels and wind turbines cannot be made by renewable energy. .
Energy use world wide correlates to economic growth. While it does not perfectly correlate in the US, that is because we have off-shored all the energy needed to make the imported products we buy at Walmart or from Amazon.
Converting to renewables is very difficult if you still want perpetual growth on a finite planet.
2
By the way, energy use may indeed increase when economic growth increases too, in certain of today's economies.
But today economies growing at 7-8% have nevertheless a much lower carbon footprint per capita than the US, even though the US economy has been growing by about 2%.
So there's no direct link between economic growth and carbon footprint, and that's because developed countries tend to use MUCH more energy per capita than developing countries.
So here too, you have to look at concrete numbers and studies, you can't just put your finger in the air and then presume that a 3% economic growth in the US inevitably means much more energy use - let alone dirty energy use.
4
It isn't.
Just read HOW New Jersey will do this, concretely, and what the exact math is, rather than brainstorming on your own, and you'll see how they'll do it.
3
With a small solar array on my roof and one hybrid vehicle in my garage, I am in, too.
8
An hybrid? How disgusting! You know that thing has a gasoline-burning engine, right? You need a 100% electric car. BMW's i3 is coming off leases in large numbers; previously-enjoyed Nissan LEAFs are very, very inexpensive; and Soul EV, Hyundai Ioniq EV, and e-Golf, are also very affordable.Presumably the other vehicle in your garage is an ICE too, so you could retain that for longer trips. If you can afford them Chevy Bolt and Tesla Model 3 long-range EVs are available. Charging is easy if you have a garage (like us), just plug in every evening for a full charge in the morning; if not, then public charging is becoming more accessible by the week. Put that solar array to good use and power your primary car with it.
We only have the one vehicle, a Toyota Avalon Hybrid. The best answer is driving less overall. Now 5 years old, as the original owners, we have about 18,500 miles on the vehicle which is far below average for a US driver.
Tighter fuel economy standards are fine, but more powerful tools for reducing transportation emissions are being avoided by many state political leaders, including our own Governor Cuomo. Fewer vehicle miles traveled (VMT) are the best way to reduce energy use and carbon emissions from transportation. Proven measures to reduce VMT include: 1) policies and investments favoring public transit and transit-friendly development (suburbs included) and 2) raising gas prices through gas or carbon taxes. Governor Cuomo does not need federal approval to pursue both strategies.
His track record on #1 -- which would also advance equity and economic mobility -- is poor. As far as I know, he has not come out in support of #2. Meanwhile, the NY State Climate Action Council's 2010 "Vision for a Low-Carbon Future" keeps receding beyond the election cycle time horizon: "Because so many attractive mass transportation options will be available, per-capita personal vehicle miles of travel will be low." And "New York communities will be compact, mixed-use and interconnected keeping per capita VMT low."
2
That’s all well and good for a state with mass transportation available. We don’t have that in California.
1
Sometimes I wonder whether Walt Disney didn't do more harm than good. In his theme parks he advanced the proliferation of a pretend world, where we could completely escape our everyday realities. Where everything was clean, pretty colorful and pleasant, and we didn't have to make hard choices and could live in a fantasy place, at least for a while. It seems several decades later Americans are firmly entrenched in imaginary thinking than I could ever have believed possible. What a change from several decades beforehand where Americans went to bat to save a warring world. Or did the actions of our government leaders and corporations make us collectively so hopeless and depressed for our future that we now willingly close our eyes to the consequences of our actions and engage in rigorous denial as we collectively hurtle toward the cliff edge?
13
Put aside the climate debate: What is wrong with policies that reduce the amount of pollutants in the air , take advantage of cheaper fuel sources, and provide more jobs? What am I missing?
45
What is wrong?!! Do you want to take billions of dollars of profits from the fossil fuel companies' pockets merely to keep the planet liveable for humanity??
With their wealth, they can cocoon their family and friends in a bubble of alternative reality, and buy off politicians to keep their wealth stream intact.
2
It is interesting that many of the countries that are in the climate pact are not reducing emissions, but the U.S. is marginally reducing emissions. Remember, much of this is up to us. We can drive smaller cars, do energy audits, use leds, etc. In the long run, more nuclear power will likely be necessary.
3
Duke Power and PG&E CEOs have both said their business goals include decarbonization of their companies. Coal is now too expensive and won’t be a solution. The Navaho power station in Page, AZ is shutting down in 2019 decades ahead of its obsolescence because coal is too expensive for the 2.25GW plant. But there is a huge thermal gradient under the Rockies, enough to power the US for centuries according to a report from 2006 done by MIT and paid for by DOE. We don’t need nukes and the problems of radioactive waste and potential meltdown. What we do need and badly is to take the initiative. Solutions are out there.
64
I don't own energy stocks. I'm not a member of the energy lobby. If renewables will destroy OPEC which is a malicious cartel I'm on board. But renewables won't solve this problem. We've been here before with the unrealistic predictions. Every few years someone will publish a road map for running the world on 100 percent renewable energy by some date, say 2050. The resulting headlines look great, & people walk away with the impression that, if we wanted to, we could easily drop fossil fuels & nuclear power. But delve into these road maps, and you’ll often find jaw-dropping numbers of solar panels & wind turbines, radical changes to existing infrastructure, & amazing assumptions about our ability to cut energy use that make switching to renewable energy seem daunting. Germany is a cautionary tale. Despite the investment Germany has made in wind & solar, when they shut down their nuclear power plants, they increased by three times the carbon output that they had saved though renewable efforts. Turns out Germany isn’t an ideal place for solar and wind power. So to cover any shortfalls in energy production, they had to rely on energy imports from neighboring countries. German consumers, pay one of the highest electricity rates in the developed world. There is only one practical solution to this coming global crisis and that is nuclear energy from fission. There are far safer ways to get nuclear energy without the large amounts of waste than what we are presently producing.
5
As far as I know, there are no and have never been "a road map for running the world on 100 percent renewable energy by some date, say 2050".
So any evidence to back up that claim?
1
In general I see nothing wrong with states wishing to have stricter regulations on energy issues. The problem is energy products don't reside exclusively within state or city borders, meaning that such local regulation can disrupt energy choices in other states that follow federal guidelines. This seems to be a perversion of federalism - Utah or AZ should not be at the mercy of CA disrupting their energy, automobile or industrial sectors.
1
You are mistaken Chris. Federalist theory encourages States to experiment with hihger standards. These experiments may lead to information that others may wish to emulate. Your one standard only set by the National government is against federalist principals. What you really seem to object to is the influence California has with businesses because California has such a big economy. One in every eight americans live in California. That does influence business. You really want Utah and Arizona to dictate standards for California. Be honest with yourself!
2
I am encouraged by the recent decisions to add significant wind power generation by Mass. and RI. CT and NY are also looking to add offshore wind. But on the demand side, we need states and private organizations encouraging consumers to switch their electric suppliers to 100% renewable where that is allowed. In Connecticut consumers can choose their electric supplier. However, not enough have chosen the renewable source option. While it is positive to see change to renewable power generation coming, more needs to be done to educate and entice consumers on the demand side to move it faster. The same holds true for electric vehicles and mass transportation. Incentives and promotion work, so let's use more of them.
9
This is an editorial in favor of nuclear power, cloaked in concern about carbon.
Emblematic is that New Jersey initiative, which would add 10% renewables to the existing 40% of power from nuclear.
So let's talk about nuclear.
It has been safe in the US Navy.
It has not been safe in the Russian Navy.
It has not been safe in worldwide power generation, from Fukushima to Chernobyl by way of 3 Mile Island. Many of those plants, including Fukushima and 3 Mile Island, were done by the same people who did the USN, with the same tech.
The difference? Operators. The USN has put men and money into safety, compulsively, to extremes. The Russian Navy and commercial power have cut corners and saved money on safety.
If we are going to run this nuclear tech, we have to run it like the USN runs it, and we are not. Do it right, or suffer disasters.
We really need much better nuclear tech, that can be safe at less expense, with less intense operator supervision.
Bill Gates among others has been putting a lot of money into developing such safe tech. His idea is small, sealed power blocs. Germany worked on something similar, before giving it up. If he can make it work, Bill Gates will get much richer, all over again.
There is money to be made, with considerable risk of course. That is a traditional place for government to help lead the way. Ours is not. None have, except Germany which has quit.
If we need nuclear, we need a new nuclear, a safe nuclear.
56
Two fatal issues with nuclear power....generating facilities last 20 years then they themselves are nuclear waste; and most importantly, there are no permanent nuclear storage facilities.
Expensive, complicated to operate, and a pile of poison waste after 20 years. A nuclear future, lets hope not.
37
"0.5 percent drop in emissions... driven partly by... the switch from coal to natural gas." For the last 800,000 years, atmospheric methane averaged about 550ppb. It is now five times that value and rising. Methane is 35 times more potent a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide. For this reason, if more than 3% of natural gas escapes to the atmosphere and isn't burned in the power plant, then that gas-fueled power plant is no better, as far as preventing climate change, than if the plant was burning coal. In 2013, both the Bakken (N Dakota) and Eagle Ford fields were found to have fugitive emissions in excess of 10% (measured from space).
America's progress in reducing its CO2 emissions may have come at the expense of increasing its methane output, in which case very little improvement actually occurred. This is why natural gas companies don't want the government measuring their fugitive emissions.
94
Also, we've outsourced a bunch of CO2 generation to other countries to make the stuff we buy. I'm not sure the numbers include shipping and aviation either.
The idea that we can pat ourselves on our back with the outsourcing of CO2 generation and the methane leakage is ludicrous.
6
Natural gas is far cheaper than coal, oil or coal and far cheaper and efficient. We should demand by law that flaring natural gas be outlawed in all leases, both private and public. Flaring is a wanton waste of energy.
This is will never happen under Trump and his timid and complicit Congress subject to the thumb and power of the oil industry.
An old Texas petroleum geologist's view.
10
System leakage over 3% makes natural gas worse than coal for global warming. The EPA is blocking the measurements. Tests done before indicate it is running at over 6%.
The problem is fossil fuel burning -- period.
If the press would have front page coverage of climate change on a daily basis and make the dire predictions known, people may not have voted for a gov't full of climate change deniers linked to fossil fuel corps. The press has never devoted much time to climate science. I had to do my own research outside of the newspapers to get the actual sad stats of what we are dealing with. Most people don't have the time to do that. People get the general idea of climate change but have no idea how the dire predictions for devastation have now accelerated to a point where it is not the end of this century when the worst begins, it's within the next 20 years.
169
"Most people don't have the time to do that [research]" No--the Bachelorette is very time-consuming. Really, what's missing is not time but willingness. Science brings new ideas and challenges comfortable childhood certainties.
26
Why would you be so insulting towards someone you don't know? Perhaps she works two jobs or is a single mother. Without knowing anything about her you demean her for no reason.
Most people, not all, but most, find the time to do the things they really want to do. For some that means watching the Bachelorette.
I know single parents and people who work two jobs. Some are knowledgeable. Some revel in their own ignorance. Have worked two jobs myself. I still found the time to stay informed on critical issues.
It is heartening to hear that local and state governments are pursuing reducing greenhouse gas emissions and improving climate resilience. By reducing GHG emissions and adapting to a changing climate we can alleviate the risks that come with unavoidable changes in our climate.
Having local action plans communities can educate their town councils, staff, and citizens on energy conservation by reducing utility bills for municipal facilities, promote energy efficiency and conservation in building and local services including water treatment and street lighting, making government transportation more efficient, demonstrating renewable energy resources in each community, and smart waste management which all can increase local resilience in the face of climate change.
Local governments are playing an important role in mitigating causes of climate change through local level policy and citizen engagement in local climate change plans.
10
“[W]e are saddled with an administration that is preparing to force power companies to keep dirty and inefficient coal-burning power plants....”
Republicans don't need to worry about being held accountable at the ballot box when they’ve been pulling out all the stops: voter suppression, gerrymandering, and manipulation of the electronic voting machines. That's why extreme rightwing Republicans hold large majorities at the state and national level.
It’s outrageous that in a country that calls itself a democracy our vote-counting system has been outsourced to a handful of rightwing companies that count our votes on proprietary software. Is it a coincidence that statistical and pattern evidence from exit polls indicate that vote counts are being shifted to the right?
Mark Crispin Miller: Can US Elections Really Be Stolen? Yes https://tinyurl.com/y96scqlt
“There are some very realistic and feasible solutions to this horrific problem, solutions that other countries have used. We need hand-counted paper ballots, counted out in the open. We need to get rid of computerized voting. We need to get rid of the private interests involved in the system. We need people to be registered automatically on their birthdays. And we need to make Election Day a national holiday. These are certain basic reforms that we can do and that will actually return this country to its people.”
"The people who cast the votes decide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything."—Joseph Stalin
80
Why would election officials destroy the ballots during pending litigation and before 22 months as required by federal law?
Politico: Experts [Say] Broward’s Election Chief Broke Law Destroying Ballots https://tinyurl.com/ybkktvf9
Steven Rosenfeld: In Violation of Federal Law, Ohio's 2004 Presidential Election Records [and Ballots] Are Destroyed or Missing https://tinyurl.com/y9eo4ovp
Jonathan Simon: “The amount of evidence that has been produced says we’re not sure who’s committing this crime but there is a dead body. We do have a corpus delicti. We have all these elections where you’re getting these results whether you look at the exit polls, cumulative vote share analysis, individual anecdotes that we see votes flipping on touch screen machines, poll watcher reports. All these things are very strongly probative that something significant, targeted, and directional is taking place and there is no interest in taking any further steps in reporting it or investigating it.”
Follow Simon’s interviews at http://codered2014.com/. You will learn new information from each one.
He is the author of "Code Red: Computerized Elections and the War on American Democracy” (2018 edition).
We don't conduct banking without a transparent and verifiable process, we should not be putting blind faith in secret vote counts.
41
Nuclear energy plants run on fuel that requires a lot of carbon dioxide emissions to purify. First one has to mine uranium, and I bet the mining machines don't run on solar or wind power. Then one has to purify the uranium, which for one thing requires a lot of gas centrifuges. Then you have to build the power plant and that requires a lot of concrete and diesel powered machines, both of which emit a lot of carbon dioxide and heat. Then there is maintenance, and all the workers drive carbon emitting vehicles so they can work at the power plant, and guard the powerplant once it is "retired".
26
Indeed, Alex. Further, there is going to be an enormous expenditure of energy, primarily in the form of cement and petroleum fuels, in decommissioning these reactors. We don't know how much fossil fuel energy is required because there have been so few cases where successful decommissioning back to safe ground has been completed.
Shame on NYT for describing nuclear as carbon-free.
6
Some people don't accept what the scientists say about Global Warming / Climate Change. But no matter how the public “debate” about it goes, we should in any case transition to renewable energy as soon as possible.
Look at it this way: If GW/CC does not happen, but we make the transition anyway, we would still benefit from the wonderful economic, societal, and environmental advantages that renewable energy offers. However if the science turns out to be right and human-caused GW/CC is happening, transitioning to renewable energy as soon as possible may be the only thing that saves us from an environmental catastrophe.
Read more about the benefits of renewable energy here. ( https://wp.me/p72ZfM-4Z )
25
National security? If their looking for a real national security threat, look no further than the Russian government hacking our elections with misinformation, outright lies and trolls who seem to know more about the American psyche than the DNC. The denial of scientific evidence goes hand in hand with the denial of evidence confirmed by 13 of our security agencies that our elections are vulnerable to foreign interference. The idea that we would ignore easily predictable future, environmental and espionage related, threats because of a few ignorant, greedy, nihilistic men in high places means that Russia chose well when they chose who to back for our presidency. I understand that this particular kind of pollution is not the topic of this editorial but it still makes me uncomfortable that nothing will be done before the 2018 midterms and I just imagine Putin and his hackers sharing a glass of champagne and toasting themselves by declaring "We are still in.".
18
@Rick Gage- It is as much denial as it is that people are resigned to the fact that we had merely gotten a taste of our own medicine. What goes around comes around. Put in context one should not be so surprised considering US influence on Russia's government and economy through out the 1990s, which proved most devastating and humiliating to the Russians. Self-righteous indignation over Russia's purported influence on our elections is hypocritical and laughable on it's face, when seen in this light. If we have allowed the system to be so degraded and open to foreign influence it is our own responsibility, as it would be for any country, and even more so for the "most powerful nation on Earth." Though you wouldn't know it by our media, Russia is not alone as far as foreign powers that influence US politics- Israel and Saudi Arabia come immediately to mind. The self-righteous will take this opinion as a defense of Russia, but it isn't. It's a realistic view and aims to put the concern where it belongs- on ourselves. We threaten our own national security as much as anyone else- what with military over-reach(and the blowback created from it), austerity imposed on over half the populace, a culture of ignorance,greed and apathy, divisive politics, and a parasitic banking/financial sector. Why on Earth are these self-destructive problems not as relevant as the Russian boogeyman? After all, it is we who are surrounding them with our armed forces, not the other way around.
3
Hadn't seen the sanity by the incoming NJ governor on nuclear power - kudos...
Longer-term sanity (not just NJ) would have been to incrementally replace the monolithic reactors with same-site more modern and modular - and inherently safer - ones...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B%26W_mPower
(revive - and build in NJ???)
Good luck getting to even cost-effective 50% renewable in the face of the dynamic efficiency of current natural-gas plants and the baseline economics of current nuclear plants...
Keep the objectives statutory rather than contractual...Decades-long take-pay agreements being signed in some places may become as onerous as the costs of half/never-finished nuclear plants being passed through to customers in other states...
At one time, renewables themselves were the magic - that didn't turn out so well...
https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-11-14/germany-is-burning-to...
Now, new storage technology is the magic...
Simpler just to make the nuclear component free for residential customers at night - something like up to 2 Kw for up to 8 hours – specifically for recharging of EVs or residential-scale storage...
More efficient and accessible to have 2 GW of storage in the form of 1M EV batteries drawing 2 KW...
Somewhere in between EVs and trains - fit in (given massive NJT bus ridership) electrified buses for shorter-hauls...Could build in spot-recharging at some stops...
I think that if auto makers can meet the Obama goal, the resulting product would be presumably more efficient, and thus less costly to drive. And then people would buy them, realizing a major cost savings. I.e., the market forces would step in.
7
Pruitt’s/Trump’s solution may be extreme, but balance also is necessary. This editorial suggests by its focus solely on the U.S. that the Earth’s challenges with regard to human habitability can only be addressed by actions taken by us, or at least by developed countries. Yet one of the biggest reasons why Trump exited the Paris Accords was the lopsided demands placed on developed countries, and us in particular, with only promises from developing countries, where almost all the global increase in population over the next fifty years is projected to be generated – additional billions of human billions consuming at levels beyond anything they’ve ever experienced before in their histories; and polluting at levels beyond anything they’ve ever polluted in their histories. The economic challenges facing THEM to pull their populations out of general poverty have caused many to conclude that their promises aren’t worth the parchment the treaties are inscribed on.
Every regulation affects our competitiveness by increasing production costs to comply with it; and that affects jobs in mature industries that pay mature wages and benefits. California’s mandates about emission-free vehicles are puzzling, given that an effective electrical-charging infrastructure to support millions and millions (and millions) of cars doesn’t exist in California, and won’t for many years; and certainly doesn’t and won’t nationally for many MORE years.
2
If individual cities and states believe they can do better, in large part by doubling-down on nuclear capabilities that remain the bane of the left, then that’s great – but I know the sentiments in these blue states on nuclear, and it will take more than New Jersey’s new governor’s support of nuclear to change them. Their residents risk becoming economically uncompetitive with states that approach global climate change in a more balanced manner; and other factors, such as very high taxes and excessive regulation of ALL sorts, already are damaging their competitiveness. It should be noted as well that New Jersey is almost as bankrupt as Illinois, so depending on us to lead America on this issue along with California is … precarious indeed.
Finally, Trump, when exiting the Paris Accords, invited the world to come together with us to craft a more balanced set of accords that didn’t SO disadvantage developed countries. What has been done so far by the world to even attempt this? Nothing.
The threats to humanity represented by global climate change are real and pressing. But so is the need for dramatic global economic expansion, to perpetuate and extend the gains secured in reducing global poverty over the last few decades, as is the need for strengthening the economic underpinnings of yet another American century. Facile, one-sided solutions largely based on ideological totems will not save us from finding ourselves between an ecological rock and an economic hard place.
4
To say that addressing the ecological challenges presented by global warming or climate change is an alternative (in any way) to economic growth misses a couple of key points.
First, in general macroeconomic sense, the cost of carbon based fuels is subsided by allowing some of the costs of using carbon based fuels to be spread around the economy. Matching costs to revenues is a time honored and basic accounting principle which, when ignored, like when pricing carbon based fuels, leads to poor decision making.
Second, replacing the energy infrastructure does have a cost. Put another way, it creates jobs. After all, in an economy, one person's job is another's income. These jobs actually increase the size and robustness of the economy.
Global warming aside, I never understood why conservatives don't buy into what will be one of the great, worldwide, distributed growth industries for the next 50+ years.
"Yet one of the biggest reasons why Trump exited the Paris Accords..." There can be only one "biggest." And the biggest reason was because the accord was negotiated, in part, by Obama.
5
As long as fossil fuels remain artificially cheap, there's zero chance of beating climate change. We've built our civilization with with their abundant, dense energy, but now nature's bill has come due. So now we must redirect the economy to our survival goals.
Without effective global carbon pricing, one nation's virtuous efforts will be negated by other energy-hungry nations' consumption because the laws of supply and demand apply in the global marketplace. The atmosphere doesn't care where the CO2 comes from.
The only entity on earth capable of creating a global carbon price is the global economy itself, not the UN. If even one of the big emitters like the US and China were to initiate a carbon tax with border carbon tariffs on trading partners lacking their own carbon pricing, the world economy would swiftly respond to the trade pressure. Industry would move toward lower carbon fuels, processes and products, not because of social responsibility, but because they'd be cheaper in the long run.
Both CEO's and investors would then have sound fiduciary arguments for investment and divestment, and consumers would naturally go for less expensive.
It can start here with the proposal from Citizens' Climate Lobby for a revenue neutral, fully refunded carbon fee, dividend and border carbon duty.
Were Congress to pass it, Trump would have the opportunity to become Savior of the World. Want to bet he'd sign it?
8
Time is short. The atmospheric concentration of CO2 not only grows annually, it continues to accelerate. Humankind needs to get its act together very soon if a difficult future is not to become a truly catastrophic one.
A glimmer of hope is provided by states, businesses and universities that are developing their own approaches to carbon emission reduction. Not because they alone will make a significant difference, but because their continued innovation will provide options for others and for the nation as a whole if we can somehow break through the culture of denial in the near future.
27
A reminder that moving to electric cars solves nothing unless the electricity is produced responsibly by low-carbon methods. What would likely be more helpful in the short term is increased sales/use of hybrid cars.
13
This is a dumb trope, Pajama Sam. Almost all states, not just the 16 in the Climate Alliance plus NJ (17 in all) who are aggressively going green - all of the states have increasing amounts of solar and wind in their grid, because (a) their grid connects to neighboring states which DO generate energy more cleanly, and their own residents want solar because it slashes their electric bills. Also - hopefully no one is dumb enough to think that we should FIRST make all electricity green, and THEN BEGIN to change over transportation to electricity. Obviously these are things you start simultaneously, and those projects converge.
4
Changing California's (the biggest auto market in the US) emission control standards would require a massive retooling of automobile manufacturing practices and after market fuel and exhaust systems. Emission standards in large cities have been on the books for years and are not likely to be rescended whatever Sessions and Trump may think or do. They might as well be trying to tell the manufactures and public that air bags are no longer necessary.
3
Wrong. I just bought an electric car in Sept; my next door neighbor bought one two months ago; the cop up the street bought one this month. Electrics are EVERYWHERE out here. California is at the tipping point already.
39
My next door neighbor has one (in mass)
We the people if we care about our climate need to do everything we can as individuals and business owners take responsibility for our actions and choices we make. Why do we have to depend on Trump or the government to make regulations that are often not enforceable. It is fine that a coalition of 16 states have a Climate alliance pledging to reduce US greenhouse gas emissions. The rest of the states and individuals can make their own effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. How many are driving small fuel efficient cars in this century? A lot less every year of this century. How many are firing up their BBQ grills with charcoal instead of electricity? Not any less than the last century. How many are boycotting products made from industries that emit green house gases? Not many. How many major polluters are shut down since the Paris accord and after the pulling out of the Paris accord.? We need mass education, awareness and self responsibility to care for our climate. Depending on politicians to keep are air, water and land free from pollution will never get us to change what needs to be done. Accords and alliances cannot get us the desired outcome when everyone only cares about their own convenience and life style. In this decade alone I see more drivers driving SUVs, large trucks and mini vans than all the years before combined. What difference will it make if as individuals we do not do our part to keep our environment safe. 2025 projections practically mean little
15
Yes. It's as if we Americans are waiting for the government to tell us what to do. Nevertheless, it would help if more politicians behaved like Sheldon Whitehouse and Bernie Sanders and treated climate change as the most important and urgent of our problems. When people repeatedly hear Republicans call climate change "controversial," it's easier for them to doubt (or convince themselves that they doubt) the urgency of the crisis. It's an example of the effectiveness of the "big lie."
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Yes, especially when states like, I believe, S. Carolina don't allow the words climate change in its assessment of future erosion along its coast and when Florida, much of which is below sea level, does nothing to help itself. Right now, Miami finds itself underwater during high tides and storms.
Where I live, I don't see or hear people doing much of anything to curb their own fossil fuel use. If it crimps their lifestyle, their comfort level, their freedom, it's not worth the effort. Americans are spoiled rotten.
4
Climate change may prove to be such a serious problem that as much many of us, myself included, want to push hard for renewables, we may have to more fully utilize atomic power for the next 50 years. We can and will ramp up renewable sources, including the necessary battery storage systems required, but if we don't curtail our carbon emissions immediately, future generations will pay a severe price.
The damages that humanity will experience in 50 to 100 years are being set in place now. This is what is so infuriating abut Scott Pruitt's idiotic policies. This years quarterly profits are the loss of crops and oceanfront property 50 years from now.
Atomic power plants are terribly expensive to build in their current configurations. I am convinced that a simpler, cheaper more reliable way to harness the atom can be developed. But we are starving universities of research funds. Austerity is more important.
We also need to address the long term waste storage problem. Most of it is currently being stored on site in ponds. Not good. The Yucca Mountain project was supposed to fix that problem but Harry Reid killed it. Yucca must be built.
Trump and Pruitt are doing tremendous damage to our nation, our world. High altitude glaciers are disappearing all over the world and they supply fresh water to over one billion people. We are experiencing climate change now. After these two leave, the damage cannot be undone.
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We're still not ready to move to 100% clean energy...that's a scientific fact. We can't & won't stop burning coal...at least for the foreseeable future. Of all the fossil-fuel sources, coal is the least expensive. It's a major factor in the low cost of electricity in the U.S. In 2015, 33% of our electricity came from coal. Renewables can't fill that gap at the present time. Coal & other fossil fuels are currently the only way we can meet the high demand for power now. The electricity demand on the power grid must be generated as its needed, in real time. There's no other option. When the demand for electricity suddenly spikes, we need to have the means available to generate that power immediately. Fossil fuels provide this capability, as we know that we can use an X amount of it to generate a Y amount of energy in a reliable manner at anytime, day or night. Solar, wind & hydro power is limited as we cannot generate hundreds or thousands of mega watts of power upon request if the Sun isn't shining or if the wind isn't blowing sufficiently. If we were simply forced to generate power through only clean methods at this point, there would be rolling brown-outs and power curfews like there are in 3rd world countries. The American public won't stand for this under any circumstances. While many people are in favor of alternatives, they also want those alternatives to not compromise their lifestyle. So whether we like it or not coal is here to stay for decades to come.
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Lets not live in the 1950's mindset - It is simply not true that coal is the least expensive fossil fuel for power generation. And that is before the fair market price of carbon pollution (>$30/ton CO2) is attached to coal's atmospheric pollution. Natural gas is significantly less expensive for power generation, and wind / solar / hydro are rapidly approaching the cost of natural gas.
Bill Brown, take a look. Stop looking backwards and realize that this is a threat to you and the future of humanity on an unimaginable scale. It's not what you can get away with, it is what we all must do.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/20...
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Of all the degradation of the Obama Administration initiatives by this President, and there are dozens, I can think of none worse than his exiting from the Paris Climate Agreement. It more than any other agreement, rule, regulation, or law has done more damage to the future generations safety and security.
It's good to read about the States and Cities that continue to abide by the climate accord, but it's not enough. Hopefully the electric utilities and automotive industry will see that the backward thinking by this administration is just temporary. In a few short years climate protection and initiatives will return with a vengeance.
And thank you for reminding us there are States and Communities out there continuing to do their part to save our planet. It's the only one we have.
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I see your point but utilities and manufactures plan long term. Much of the equipment to retool the auto and electrical requirments is already on order or sitting in warehouses ready to be installed. That expense is on the books. Would they depreciate equipment they are not useing? And may well have to install with the next administration? NO big NO. They are smarter than that. 10 years, 20 years are their horizons.
1
You're right, Trump is still a climate hoax proponent when most other prominent politicos have steered away from that obvious road to ruin. But it may be too late to avoid the elimination of all life on earth.
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Don't let them off the hook. The real issue is that the Republicans are the guilty ones. Trump can propose and work to undermine all that is good about the Federal government, but it is the Republicans in Congress who hold the power. As these Republicans go along with Trump, they are showing they are the real problem
26
On so many matters that have been critical throughout history, leadership is above all else of profound importance. As it is state and municipal officials who are showing through their smart decisions on urban infrastructure and energy management what real leadership is, it should be no surprise that it would be from them that national leadership will emerge. Rather than look to Washington's swamp to spare from mass stupidity, we should tkae heart that bold and imaginative doers are seizing the day at the local level in communities across the land. That should give us all hope and those of us who see this should be sure to support these visionaries.
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Trump and his henchmen can roll back Obama's automobile efficiency mandate all they want, but they cannot stop us from buying the most fuel efficient vehicles on offer. If enough of us do so manufacturers will have no choice but to continue to improve fuel efficiency. Further, the irony is that with his every move on the foreign policy front Trump provides the necessary incentive at the gas pump. November is crucial to the nation's future, but in the meantime there are steps we can take as consumers to move things in a more sane direction.
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"Trump and his henchmen can roll back Obama's automobile efficiency mandate all they want, but they cannot stop us from buying the most fuel efficient vehicles on offer."
Except we don't. The best selling vehicle in the USA for an astonishing 37 straight years is the Ford F150 truck. We do not have that many construction workers, farmers, and ranchers.
1
There is some hope for reducing vehicle emissions - the electric car. The technology is improving all the time! My husband and I have driven hybrids for years but, this year, we decided that one of our cars would be all electric. Our new car has a 200+ mile range. Most of our driving is within a 15 mile radius of our home, so it is perfect for "every day" driving and it is "fun" to drive - quick off the mark and very responsive. You don't have to rewire your garage for the more powerful charging cable and quicker charge unless you want to. We plug it in our regular outlet in the garage - it charges overnight - we do that a couple of times a week. For longer trips, or larger cargo loads, we use our hybrid SUV. Hopefully, these new cars will be part of the solution.
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