The spotlight is a weekly, categorized compilation of links and excerpts from environmentally related posts at Daily Kos. Any posts included in the collection do not necessarily indicate my agreement with or endorsement of them. Because of the interconnectedness of the subject matter, some of these posts can be placed in more than one category.
CLIMATE EMERGENCY & EXTREME WEATHER
Scientists see evidence of 'vigorous melting' at grounding level of Antarctic 'Doomsday Glacier' by Meteor Blades. Using new satellite data, researchers in the other study—published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences—found that jets of warm saltwater are plunging as far as 6 kilometers (3.7 miles) beneath a floating ice shelf of the gigantic Thwaites outlet glacier in West Antarctica. That tongue of ice flexes and bends with the tide allowing the water intrusion and exposing what long ago was nicknamed the “doomsday glacier” to what the researchers call “vigorous melting.” It gets that name because if it melted entirely, that alone would add about 60 centimeters (2 feet) of global sea level rise. But if it did all melt, that would allow a speed-up in the melting of the whole West Antarctic Ice Sheet, a melt that is already inevitable. If the entire ice sheet were to melt, that would add another 3.3 meters (11 feet). But, as Jeff Goodell noted in his book last year, The Heat Will Kill You First. The Thwaites study’s lead author, Eric Rignot, a scientist with the University of California at Irvine, told Chris Mooney at The Washington Post: “The water is able to penetrate beneath the ice over much longer distances than we thought. It’s kind of sending a shock wave down our spine to see that water moving kilometers.” It’s just awesome what it does to my spine when a climate scientist says something revealed in their research gives their spine a jolt.
Trump's offer of a quid pro quo of ending climate fight in exchange for Oil cash has been accepted by Pakalolo. Over two-thirds of voters don't like Trump's offer to end environmental rules in exchange for one billion dollars from oil executives. It would be a shame if this financial news got on every newspaper front page and cable talk show in the country. It is just days after a brutal heat wave and record-breaking rainfall, leaving 800,000 people without power, crippled Houston. It is there that fossil fuel executives will fill Trump’s coffers. He promised that, as a dictator, he would “drill, drill, drill” on day one. Killing the biosphere would be his top priority; the fossil fuel industry has him wrapped around their little finger. The urgent task of preventing and eventually ending greenhouse gas emissions into the rapidly heating atmosphere will end any sliver of hope to prevent the worst impacts of the climate crisis if Trump is elected.
Straight-line windstorm damage in downtown Houston on May 17, 2024. The Houston area is getting hotter and more humid.
The media is absent on the N Atlantic's heat and how devastating and ugly this summer will likely be by Pakalolo. Scientists have been paying attention to the North Atlantic, which has been anomalously warm over the past thirteen months, the warmest since records began. Meteorologists and climate scientists have been flashing the red lights for decades now, and what they see is a hyperactive hurricane season similar to or worse than 2005, when a record 28 storms formed, including seven classified as major. Six direct hits to the US coast, including Cindy, Dennis (major), Katrina (major), Ophelia (the circulation center hugged the North Carolina coastline like a weed whacker), Rita (major), and Wilma (major). For the first time in history, all the names for the 2005 season were used up, and additional storms used the Greek alphabet. Four had their names retired, including Stan, who caused massive destruction by landslides and flooding in Mexico and Central America. People must be warned about the threats to the East Coast, Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean. It’s extremely worrisome. This is why I remain on Twitter; that is where some of the climate scientists are, and the media is nowhere to be seen writing about their work and warnings. Be careful and pay attention.
A relentless heatwave with no historical precedent pushes the limits of survivability in Mexico by Pakalolo. After reeling from three intense heat waves, Mexico and Central America will experience the highest recorded temperatures for the next few weeks. Mexico City residents are used to more temperate temperatures, so many homes and businesses lack air conditioning. The situation of our southern neighbors is quite grim. MEXICO CITY (Reuters)—Mexico, reeling from a heat wave that has already broken records, caused power outages and killed people and animals, could see "unprecedented" temperatures over the next two weeks, the country's largest university warned on Wednesday. The extreme heat, fueled partly by the most recent El Nino weather phenomenon, will arrive with 70% of Mexico in drought and a third in severe drought, according to data from the national water commission. "In the next 10 to 15 days, the country will experience the highest temperatures ever recorded," researchers from the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) said in a statement.
Denial, delusion and disaster: Ron DeSantis and Florida’s climate change by Silmedia2. In a state so subject to such obvious climatic changes, why does [Florida’s] elected leadership so resolutely refuse to acknowledge what is clearly underway? Some answers seem obvious to even the most casual observer and they’re rooted in basic human nature. There’s simple inertia, a refusal to acknowledge change in any form. There’s denial, the resistance to facing uncomfortable facts. There’s helplessness, a sense that no action will have any effect anyway. Added to those are some political reasons peculiar to Florida. There’s a fear of offending a constituency that’s older and resistant to change—which is also Republican. Every spring and fall, Florida Atlantic University conducts a Florida Climate Resilience Survey to assess public attitudes on climate. This year the survey, released on Tuesday, May 14, one day before the governor’s bill signing, found that belief in human-caused climate change had fallen among Florida Republicans from 45 percent to 40 percent—meaning that 60 percent of Republicans don’t believe human activity is a factor in climate change. That’s the 60 percent of Republican voters that Florida lawmakers need to win their primaries. It also found that older voters are less likely to believe that human activity causes climate change than younger ones (50 percent of Floridians over 50 years of age don’t believe in climate change compared to 66 percent of Floridians under 50).
A graphic presentation of the heat impact of climate change on Florida. The fully interactive version can be accessed here.
Florida residents and business owners are paying a ruinous price for climate change denial by TheCriticalMind. Zealots, cultists, and corporate apologists claim that tackling climate change is “too expensive.” Bullshit. Not tackling global warming is becoming punitively ruinous. Just ask people trying to operate assisted living facilities in Florida. In an unambiguously titled piece, Florida’s 125% Surge in Property-Insurance Bills Sows Havoc, Bloomberg reports on a Florida business owner who gave up when faced with the rising cost of ignoring global warming. For Filicia Porter, the insurance bills were the final straw. They’d been climbing steeply for her assisted-living business as Florida was battered with ever more-powerful storms, and eventually, the numbers stopped adding up. So in March, she finally decided to call it quits, shutting the facility near Palm Beach that she opened just two years ago. That came four months after she closed an older location in Port St. Lucie, opened in 2017. Together, they left a dozen residents scrambling to find another place to live. “Each year you see a rise. Why pay more?” said Porter.
The Noise and Disarray of Trying to Wrap Your Head Around Climate Change by Benumbra. I will be 24 this July. Almost weekly I confront myself with the idea of if I have even a glimpse of a future that’s worth living for or if it’ll be better for everyone if I take myself out of the equation before I’m 30, after it’s clear whether or not any positive change has occurred. Since I was 16, I have been gripped by nothing but fear. Donald Trump’s election made me believe that the future state of the world was a sure apocalypse and the next four years only solidified that idea. However, 2020 (despite it feeling like an apocalypse in real time) was a brief respite as we saw a glimpse of a world where the artifices of car dependency and a presidential candidate who seemed to be promising a real acceptance of the truth and not a purely commercial MO. By 2022 I was fully suicidal. I had done what I had thought to be useful; I joined the Sierra Club, I signed petitions when I could, I limited my driving substantially (much easier in college), but on the cusp of my graduation and a desire to fully understand the world I was heading into, I was brought in by a particular online community. Their name was r/collapse. I do not stand by their perspectives, not fully, but when I was first having all of my understandings of the global issues not just validated but enhanced by their extrapolations (where I learned buzz words like “Blue Ocean Event”), the brief cultural phenomenon of “Don’t Look Up”, endless articles from places like The Guardian and op-ed pieces from people like Jonathan Franzen, I was drawn endlessly into their worldview. I found myself hating myself for being American, wishing some poor Bangladeshi kid would get the chance to strangle me with his bare hands as some kind of retribution. I only was rescued by friends and family who cared enough to speak to me, although by that point I had grown to view their optimism as toxic and had to tune that out as much as the suicidal ideation.
Zero day arriving soon for Mexico City and Bogotá? by Robpos. Back in 2018, Cape Town, SA, came within months of running out of water and coined the term Zero Day to illustrate the crisis and spur action. This year, officials in Mexico City and Bogotá are facing a possible Zero Day next month. Already, water service in Mexico City is becoming more and more unreliable for more and more residents, especially for the poorer residents, who, in the best of circumstances, had little by way of stable access. When the water does flow from the taps, it comes out brown with a noxious odor. In Bogotà, reservoir levels have fallen so fast that the city government has instituted rationing by employing rotating water shutoffs. The mayor of Bogotá has also asked residents to shower together and leave the city on weekends to reduce water usage. In Cape Town, the city implemented a massive public awareness campaign and rolled out a system of strict fines to curtail water usage. Their response is seen today as a success story in municipal crisis management. They enacted a tariff system that targeted the highest water users with higher prices per gallon and a door knocking campaign to shame the biggest water hogs. But, the most effective aspect of the campaign was rhetorical. When city officials informed the citizenry that they would be able to get buckets of water from centralized collection points, managed by the military, consumption plummeted and residents began sharing conservation tips, such as recovering water used for showering for flushing the toilet, also.The situation in Mexico City and Bogotá is very different, however.
How to stop climate change by Dooey. Q: How can we stop climate change. A: We can’t. A: We never wanted to. That’s reality. We are in the process of going extinct — actively — right now. The wishful thinking, push-back, propaganda, and and noble indignation is nothing more than hot air on an overheating planet. WELCOME to the soon to be short lived “Carbon Capture” to the rescue media blitz. The ads are popping up everywhere — “ CARBON CAPTURE.” Lots of People of Color as the actors — great graphics — big smiles — lot’s of hope. When one goes online to find out how much carbon we are capturing at present or how much we will be capturing,,,,,,,, the bullshit gets thick fast. Look for the tell tale words “ due to,” “online to,” “set to,” ”in development,” “in the works” ….. If the headline says 35,000 metric tons per year — the actual is probably 1,000 at present BUT they are scaling up for more.
Former Sen. James Inhofe on the Senate floor in 2015 explaining how climate change is a hoax.
Can Carbon Capture Help Climate Change? Or What we Should Fund Instead of AI by angryea.No one with an ounce of honesty questions that climate change is really and will have real deleterious effects across human society. There are debates about how to best deal with those changes and how to best limit the damage (it does seem pretty clear that some level of heating and thus damage is baked into the system at this point). Carbon capture is one possible route to mitigation. The plant in question is a Direct Air Capture plant. It sucks in air, passes that air through filters that grab the C02 and then heats the filters to extract the C02 and store it, either as rocks (in the case of the Iceland plant in the article) or commercial products (as in the case of some other pilot programs). These programs are not without controversy. First, it is unclear that they can be scaled to the required level to help keep climate warming to under 2 degrees Celsius. Second, they do require a lot of energy and not every proposed plant is well positioned to use entirely carbon free energy. Third, commercializing the operations requires the use of pipelines to shape the product to its end goal and/or final processing destination. New pipelines are not popular in many communities. Finally, they may be relatively inefficient compared to forcing plants and power plants to capture carbon at the release point (the carbon at release points is much more concentrated and thus you get more for your capture buck). However, it is clear that these plants do capture carbon and the government is spending 3.5 billion dollars to pilot, test, and improve the process.
President Biden Has Yet ANOTHER Path to Saving the Planet! Boosting Biden Day 97 by GoodNewsRoundup. The U.S. freight system is vital to our nation’s economy. Trucks, ships, trains, and planes move 55 million tons of goods worth more than $49 billion every day. But while emissions in this sector are down, it’s still our biggest source of climate pollution. Emissions from moving freight still threaten millions of Americans with asthma, heart disease, emphysema and more. What’s more, air quality disparities have gotten worse in the last decade even as air pollution levels have fallen. So an even bigger slice of the population at risk is people of color, who have nearly eight times more pediatric asthma and a 1.3 times higher risk of dying early because of pollutants. Guess who’s doing something about it? You guessed it, Handsome Joe!! President Biden’s Investing in America agenda is supporting solutions that address harmful pollution — and has spurred $165 billion of private sector investments in zero-emission vehicle technologies.
CRITTERS & THE GREAT OUTDOORS
Crimes against non-humanity by CarmeninVermont. If I were the goddess of the universe, I would be asking the Universe Criminal Court for warrants against Homo sapiens for committing crimes against all the other Earth species. It has been long known the polar bears are suffering from our, as a species, selfishness. Last year it is estimated that thousands of emperor penguin chicks died before reaching adulthood. Theories abound regarding the honey bees and their demise. The manatees of Florida did not vote for that Death-Sentence Governor. The buffalo, passenger pigeons and others are gone, due to us. And I am sure I am missing some. But this new one seems a little closer to us. Something like third cousins twice removed perhaps? The climate catastrophe is killing threatened howler monkeys. So far only 85 reported falling dead from the trees due to dehydration or the like in Mexico. 45 degrees Celsius (113 Fahrenheit) seems to be a bit too much, even for Homo sapiens as 26 humans have also died due to the heat.
Daily Bucket - Kern National Wildlife Refuge: A Summer Home for Swallows by Cal Birdbrain. I have been driving to Orange County from Sacramento every other month for the last couple of years to spend time with my mom who is 103 years old. I always pass a large colorful billboard promoting the Pixley National Wildlife Refuge (NWR) which is part of the Kern NWR complex and often thought about stopping. I left LA earlier than expected last week and decided to detour to Kern NWR on my way home. The Kern NWR is northwest of Bakersfield in the southern portion of California’s Great Central Valley. There are two refuges in this complex, the Kern NWR and the Pixley NWR. Kern has a 6.5 mile auto loop and a number of walking trails. Pixley has several walking trails with elevated viewing platforms. Kern is one of the many NWRs dotting the Central Valley providing rest stops and winter havens for millions of birds along the Pacific Flyway. As such, Kern NWR is very quiet in May. But I still found a wonderful assortment of birds. First, it is the summer home for hundreds of swallows. As I drove into the refuge, dozens of cliff swallows could be seen swooping and flying all around the office building.
Cliff Swallows fly up to their nests under the eaves of the Pixley National Wildlife Refuge office building.
The Daily Bucket - Big Spring Revisited - With Videos by foresterbob. One of my favorite scenic wonders is Big Spring in the Missouri Ozarks. The spring has been featured in previous Buckets, which I’ll link to at the bottom of the page. During the “halcyon days of my youth,” Big Spring was a state park. Campsites were located along the spring branch, and on the banks of the nearby Current River. I spent many an hour there in the summertime, swimming, fishing, canoeing, and exploring. After the National Park Service took over, the riparian campsites were closed, allowing the streamsides to revert to a more natural setting. My most recent visit to Big Spring happened on April 9. The previous day, a large crowd had assembled at the park to witness the solar eclipse. I observed it from a few miles away, on private land where there were no crowds. On the day after the eclipse, there was little evidence of the previous day’s celebration, other than a line of porta-potties next to a field. Only a handful of visitors milled about, admiring the spring and wandering along the trails.
OF WRESTLING A WHALE, AND OTHER POLITICS by diverdonreed. From 1972-86, I worked as a professional scuba diver at an aquarium-zoo (Marine World Africa USA) in Redwood City, California. Most of the work was peaceful, scrubbing the tanks, feeding the fish. But there was also a more strenuous side. Patches and Koko were pilot whales , jet black, each about 20 feet long, not violent, but extremely strong. Memory says they were Navy whales, part of the U,S. Navy project Deep Ops, initially trained off Point Mugu, where they learned to recover objects from depths of 500 feet or more. But those had different names, and may be different whales. But the whale I knew as Koko liked to play a game with me, when we were both underwater. I did not understand why--- see if you can figure it out. The game had two parts. First. while I used a scrub brush to clean the tank floor, Koko would lean her melon-shaped head against my back, and push. I would push back. She was stronger. In the second part of the game, she would lift me across her head and swim me to the surface. What was she doing?
Folios or leafy
ScienceNote: A Conundrum that is Lichen by EngineerX. Parasitism, symbiosis and comensualism came up in my recent write up on (paen to) ivermectin www.dailykos.com/… and made me think of lichens, which are an interesting example of the later two. First of all, you are an example of very old evolved symbiosis. The organelles (mitochondria and chloroplasts if you be a green thumb) within your cells were once free living bacteria and still have their own genome, distinct from yours. They were ingested by other prokaryotes, came to live inside them and perform essential functions. Now we can't live without each other and have no independent existence. Thus the eukaryote was born! In a lichen, two eukaryotes (an algae or cyanobacteria & a fungi) which have little structure alone, come together to form manifold and varied structures that can be more successful than either organism alone which are limited mainly to films, blobs or fibers. "It is estimated that 6–8% of Earth's land surface is covered by lichens.There are about 20,000 known species.Some lichens have lost the ability to reproduce sexually, yet continue to speciate.They can be seen as being relatively self-contained miniature ecosystems, where the fungi, algae, or cyanobacteria have the potential to engage withother microorganisms in a functioning system that may evolve as an even more complex composite organism. Lichens may be long-lived, with some considered to be among the oldest living things."
A Snail Kite looking for a place to consume the takeout lunch it’s carrying in its beak.
Dawn Chorus:What do snails have to do with Birds and Birdwatching? by Jeff Graham. What does a snail have to do with Birding and Birdwatching? That’s what Dawn Chorus is all about, right? But I wanted to share a special bird that Ms. JG and I observed in our recent Belize trip. It specializes in eating snails. Here are some photos that will help.
Caribbean Matters: It's World Turtle Day. Caribbean people are fighting to protect them by Denise Oliver-Velez. The mainstream U.S. media’s minimal coverage of the Caribbean mostly focuses on hurricanes, political turmoil, or tourism. But the Caribbean is also home to many of the world’s endangered animal populations. That includes sea turtles, who we humans have a responsibility to protect. May 23 is World Turtle Day, which was created in 1990 by American Tortoise Rescue. The group’s website says the day is “a yearly observance to help people celebrate and protect turtles and tortoises and their disappearing habitats around the world.” In 2022 we reported on a victory for activists in Puerto Rico, who were fighting to preserve beach access and a sea turtle habitat. Today we’ll be looking at endeavors to protect these reptiles across the Caribbean, from a sea turtle sanctuary in St. Vincent and the Grenadines to rescue efforts on the Caribbean shores of Mexico.
Daily Bucket - Sights at a southern wildlife refuge by CaptBLI. I saw lots of things while I visited Noxabee Wildlife Refuge (as expected) but not one of the target items I went to see. However, the abundance of creatures is worth the trip any day of the year. I hope you enjoy these things I spotted while I was there.
Male Anhinga
The Daily Bucket: A Surprising Trailcam Sequence, and Open Thread for Nature Observations by Mentha. I live in southwest lower Michigan. [...] The area is a mix of homes, forest, wetlands, fields and farmland. The forested area north of the property is swampy and designated wetland. [...] Usually our trailcam is set to take 10 second videos. But we were going to be on vacation in April for almost 3 weeks, and the memory card would either fill up or the batteries might run out. So we reset it for still images while we were gone. That’s how we ended up with this coyote - cat interaction sequence. We record coyotes now and then, but never see them in real time. We record domestic cats, too, and we rarely see them in daylight. Note that this coyote is walking by the camera at 2:39 AM. When we first put up the new camera, the light made the coyotes skittish but they seem to be getting used to it.
The Daily Bucket - wild rose season by OceanDiver. Mid May, 2024, Pacific Northwest. Roses grow wild and prolifically in the Pacific Northwest islands. We have thickets anywhere they are allowed, including roadsides and hedgerows. In fact unless you constantly cut them back, they’ll take over your backyard and driveway, coming up from vigorous underground runners. I don’t go barefoot in my yard; too many years of thorns getting embedded and infected. But at this season, the roses are coming into full bloom and we’ll have a month of glorious fragrance filling the air everywhere. It’s especially strong after a rainfall, which we had a couple days ago. Most of our wild roses are the Nootka rose, which does well in open sunny areas. We also have Baldhip roses growing in shadier woodsy sites. They have a less bushy habit and more delicate flowers but are equally if not more thorny.
Wild Florida: Some Florida Dragonflies by Lenny Flank. Florida has a wide variety of dragonfly species. I’m not up on my dragonfly IDs so I am depending on Google for it—my apologies in advance if some of these are mistaken. "Wild Florida" is a diary series that explores the flora and fauna of the Sunshine State. Yes, we are a single-party wannabe-fascist state, but we have some amazing wildlife here.
Cherry-Faced Meadowhawk
ENERGY & TRANSPORTATION
5/21 Renewable Tuesday: Peak Global Pollution, Too! by Mokurai.
Good climate news this week
1 China: New EVs hit 44% of sales in April
2 EU: we're cutting trucks' emissions 90% by 2040
3 India: coal below 50% for 1st time since 1960s
4 US: New grid rules to speed energy transition
5 Court: Germany must amend bad climate plan
6 Philippines extends zero tariffs on EVs
7 Russian activists sue over weak climate policy
Good climate news this week
1 Wind+solar fastest-growing electricity sources in history
2 Renewables pass 30% of world electricity supply
3 Cleantech manufacturing investment up 70%
4 Vermont 1st to charge Big Oil for climate damage
5 UK's climate action plan unlawful, High Court rules
6 London mayor vows more climate action after win
7 Massive Shell Oil sales of phantom carbon credits exposed
5 Reasons This Police Department Switched to Electric Vehicles and Number Four Will Shock You!!! by Rusty Robot. Bargersville, Indiana, is a former farm town that is now a bedroom community for Indianapolis and has grown from 2,000 to 10,000 residents since the 2000 census. This also means that needed services such as policing have grown and changed. In 2019 the police department was both hiring officers and buying patrol vehicles for them, which was putting a strain on the town budget. Police Chief Todd Bertram, after much analysis, decided on a bold course by purchasing a Tesla Model 3 instead of the usual Dodge Charger. In 2020 the Daily Journal published a story on the experience. Last year, Bargersville police became the first in Indiana to add Teslas to its fleet. Though Teslas are more expensive upfront compared to traditional gas-powered police cars, the town will save money on fuel and maintenance. Right now, a 2021 Tesla Model 3 starts at $37,990, while a new Dodge Charger starts at $29,995. Though the savings were less than expected this year due to gas prices falling amid the coronavirus pandemic, Bertram is happy with the savings. He is so happy, in fact, he is working on a cost comparison to determine if the town should expand its Tesla fleet even further next year, when the department plans to purchase three SUVs. If his analysis suggests more Teslas would be a better value, he would pursue purchasing those instead, he said.
Earth Matters: Biden bars new coal leases in Powder River Basin; solar installations hit 5 million by Meteor Blades. For more than a decade, climate activists have fought against new federal leases for fossil fuel operations, and the Bureau of Land Management previously generated land-use plans that would partially curtail the practice. But litigation knocked those down as inadequate. On Thursday, to the expected howls of Republicans like body-slamming, illegal wolf-shooting Montana Gov. Greg Gianforte, President Joe Biden announced a proposed rule to end offering new coal leases on 13 million federally owned acres in the basin. This wouldn’t immediately end coal production there. Far from it. The Bureau of Land Management’s two land-use plans would let existing operations keep going for decades—until 2041 in Wyoming and 2060 in Montana. However, recently finalized Environmental Protection Agency rules mandating strict new emissions controls at power plants could shutter all of them by 2039 if the rules survive the lawsuits already filed. Since basin coal goes almost exclusively to generate electricity, that means future production would depend on exports abroad. These make up just 2% of current output. A list of the 16 existing mines can be seen here. Public comments on the proposed rule will be open for 30 days. The no-leasing proposal is a response to a 2022 court order saying proposed land-use plans under the Trump administration had failed to fully account for climate change and public health problems caused by burning coal.
Open pit mine in ‘Thunder Basin National Grassland,’ near Wright, Wyoming.
Earth Matters: California renewables met 100% of electricity demand for 69 days, which is a BFD Meteor Blades. California’s experience this spring gives reason for maintaining the cautious optimism some of us climate hawks hope is not misplaced. As of May 21, for 69 of the past 75 days (45 of them consecutive), generation from wind, water, and solar have exceeded 100% of California’s electricity demand. A sincere wow to that. It was only two years ago in May that California first exceeded 100% of that demand on just one day, and last year it only did so for seven days. Now there’s a bit of a catch. This wasn’t meeting 24 hours of demand for 69 days. The 100%+ generation happened for as many as six hours a day or as little as 15 minutes. Over the 75 days, renewables met 100% of demand on an average of 5.3 hours a day. This happened at a good time of year, when temperatures aren’t yet high enough for everyone to crank up demand by flipping on the A/C. Rainstorms amplified by El Niño meant more available hydropower after years of drought. Plus, the state is still running a lot of natural gas power plants because they’re needed when the sun goes down and the big ones take hours to warm up and so must be ignited well before evening when they’re actually needed. But all these on-the-other-hand caveats don’t make this achievement of consistently meeting 100% demand any less impressive. Mark Z. Jacobson, whose book No Miracles Needed: How Today’s Technology Can Save Our Climate and Clean Our Air is a must-read can be seen gleefully jumping up and down at Twitter.
Throwback Thursday: That ‘70s gas crunch by Alan Kandel. The late 1970s oil embargo really put a damper on things, and domestic travel especially. It would not even be a stretch if one were to assert that the citizenry’s forward progress was crimped. Mine was, for sure! For you see, at this time, I was driving a ‘69 hardtop that was on its last legs. On the highway it burned through about a quart of oil every 200 miles. To make matters worse, there was a hole in the gasoline tank inlet and when driving uphill, gas fumes could be detected by the vehicle occupant’s proboscis?, um, that would be, nose! And, of course, there were the begrudgingly long lines of drivers-in-their-cars waiting, inching their way ever so slowly up to the pumps at gas stations by that time, eager if not desperate, to get their tanks topped off. Something had to be done! And there was! People were all of a sudden buying more fuel-efficient imports. In need of a new car anyway, I opted for a utility vehicle, like a pickup without it actually being a pickup. In California, if you had one of these, you were allowed to get gas any day of the week and twice on Sunday even if need be. Otherwise, for the standard passenger vehicle, as an owner of, the days on which you were permitted to get gas were limited.
POLLUTION & PLASTICS
Microplastics found in human testicles could be causing sperm counts to fall by nailkeg. “The tiny plastic particles were found in all 23 human testes in a new study, and all 47 testes from pet dogs.” By Euronews Green. Polyethylene, a ubiquitous type of plastic used in everyday items such as bags and bottles, has been linked to potential health risks, particularly concerning male reproductive health. Studies have shown that exposure to Polyethylene may have a negative impact on the male reproductive system, specifically on the testicles. Research has suggested that chemicals found in Polyethylene, can disrupt hormonal balance in the body, leading to hormonal imbalances that can affect sperm production and quality. These chemicals have been shown to mimic estrogen in the body, leading to a decrease in testosterone levels and potentially causing issues such as infertility, reduced sperm count, and abnormal sperm morphology. To reduce exposure to Polyethylene and safeguard male reproductive health, individuals can take several preventative measures. These include avoiding the use of plastic bottles and containers for storing food and beverages, opting for glass or stainless steel alternatives, and minimizing the use of plastic bags. Additionally, reducing exposure to products containing phthalates and BPA, such as personal care products and food packaging, can help mitigate the potential risks associated with Polyethylene exposure.
AGRICULTURE, FOOD & GARDENING
Gymea lily with me (5 ft 4 in) in comparison, the red lily flowers at top of photo are helpfully labeled.
Saturday Morning Garden Blogging - Vol. 20.21: Some Flora Down Under by birdsandbees23. A while ago, actually more than a decade ago already!, my husband and I went on a month-long birding tout of eastern and northern Australia led by members of the Audubon Society of Corvallis, Oregon. While the group was scanning various parts of the scenery for avifauna, I was fascinated by the exotic plants endemic to Australia. Like kangaroos, koalas, echidnas and other unique fauna, Australian flora evolved in isolation after techtonic forces broke it off from supercontinent Gondwana about 135 million years ago, and Australia began its majestic drift to its present location bounded by the Indian, Pacific, and Southern Oceans. October was Southern Hemisphere’s spring, so many plants were in bloom. One surprise was stumbling upon the world’s tallest lily, the Gymea lily, Doryanthes excelsa, in bloom along a road in the coastal Royal National Park of New South Wales. Who knew?
City Agriculture - May 23, 2024 by gmoke. $1 billion, 6,000 acres for agrivoltaics in Ohio. Solar racking design specifically for agrivoltaics. American Solar Grazing Association—agrivoltaics, combining agriculture and solar power production. The energy costs of controlled environment agriculture If you need to get past the pay wall: https://archive.ph/TrQqF. Editorial Comment: In all the years I’ve been collecting these links I have found very few CEA businesses that thought about energy from the beginning. Orbital Farms “is a Circular Project Development company which is developing 200 large scale closed loop farms around the world in the next 10 years." Editorial Comment: Orbital Farms is one of those few CEA businesses I mentioned above. The House of Green—buildings that bring nature inside. World’s first zero waste restaurant
GOP Farm Bill shows Republican priorities screw their own and the rest of us by Egberto Willies. The GOP Farm Bill, a glaring example of pro-corporate priorities overshadowing the needs of ordinary Americans, underscores a significant disconnect between Republican rhetoric and the realities their constituencies face. While the political circus involving figures like Marjorie Taylor Greene and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez grabs headlines, critical legislative issues such as the Farm Bill often go unnoticed. This essay delves into the controversial GOP Farm Bill, highlighting its detrimental impacts on farmers, families, and the broader society and the underlying hypocrisy of Republican policies.
MISCELLANY & AGGREGATIONS
Climate Crisis -- What Are Your Plans For Mental Health? by birches. This week the question is about What are your plans for mental health? Climate chaos has enormous impacts on mental health. Mental health issues caused by climate change are already being seen around the globe. These include trauma, depression, grief, loss, self-harm, violence, negativity, isolation, anxiety, PTSD, chronic stress, addiction, suicide, moral distress, and even neurological conditions and reduction in intelligence (See Climate Change and Disorders of the Nervous System in The Lancet, and “Climate change is affecting mental health literally everywhere” at Yale Climate Connection). Add in war, violence, loss of income, loss of housing, loss of ecosystem, loss of a way of life — all caused by climate change — and the mental health impacts are amplified. And our mental health systems are already in crisis. The impacts of the pandemic (itself a climate chaos event) on mental health cannot be overstated. From the abstract of “The impact of COVID-19 on the mental health workforce: A rapid review” (www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/...)
We need new stories, and new commitments by Peter Olandt. The only way out of the climate crisis is the collective action. I cannot solve the problem as an individual while everyone else on my block expands their carbon footprint. Even should I be President of the United States, I cannot solve our climate problems while countries like Russia remain uncooperative, or while our US born and bred oligarchs fail to take action or actively oppose us with their economic empires. And should I be dictator for life of the entire world, I could not save us if the global population fails to embrace our goals of dealing with climate change. We need large scale cooperation. We don’t need new technology. We have everything we need in terms of material and know-how. We lack global cooperation. And part of that is we lack a global story of collective cooperation that can be told without the need for the narrative of the individual. We must comprehend a story system which transmits in a visceral way the story of everyone coming together to do our part. And for those who are willing, to come together to pool our resources and remove power from the few who oppose us. For they are the few. They simply control a lot. We need to retell our morality tales not as a person subservient to a god or an ideal, but as people who willingly embrace a responsibility to each other.
‘Locked & loaded’ The intransigence of our FF ‘masters’, while sawing through limb they sit on by mikeymikey. Wealth and power are highly addictive and as a rule, anything that threatens them is dealt with summarily without any reflective afterthought other than how not to let it happen again. The reactive behavior of the fossil fuel industry is every bit as ruthless and aggressive as of the druglords of the Medellin Cartel. This comparison to the purveyors of crack cocaine may seem hyperbolic, however, it is only our long-term and day-to-day familiarity with oil that seduces us into thinking it is the lesser evil. Taking it for granted is denial ‘white washing’ our bargain with the devil.I have often marveled at the cold-blooded monstrousness that infuses decision-making by the fossil fuel industry. My compulsion to delve into this toxic bonfire of incomprehensibility, was ignited by being intrigued with the conundrum that many of the people who are in charge of promoting this vile business have families, which, if for no other reason, one would think would at least ‘chasten’ their deranged willfulness to destroy the world for profit.
Andrew “Wrecker” Wheeler
Former Trump EPA head hopes for a second chance to destroy the planet by Aldous J. Pennyfarthing. Unless Cyborg Al Gore suddenly returns from the distant future with a full suite of planet-saving technology—or travels back to 2000 to tell all those nice old Jewish ladies in Florida to stop voting for Pat Buchanan—Earth is facing a reckoning, and soon. With extreme weather events becoming more frequent and alarming (Houston’s weekend windstorm is just the latest example), we’ll be lucky if we haven’t already Wile E. Coyote’d off the climate change cliff. Yet Republicans see a planet choking on the predictable results of 50 years of bad decisions and say, “Hold my beer—it’s brewed with fossil fuels and bears distinctive notes of hazelnut, fruit, and fermented panda.” In the latest episode of “Freddy Krueger Has Left Your Nightmares to Focus Full-Time on Donald Trump’s 2024 Transition,” Politico is reporting that Andrew Wheeler, Trump’s former Environmental Protection Agency administrator and an ex-coal company lobbyist, would be keenly interested in returning to the White House to finish the job he started. Which, again, mostly entails killing the planet.
Save a Spoon for the Earth... let's help Pakalolo and Meteor Blades...and the future by rflctammt. The Spoon Theory is a metaphor used to explain the limited amount of energy or resources that someone living with chronic illness or disability has at their disposal. Your energy or resources are “spoons,” with each spoon representing a specific amount of energy or effort required to complete a task. The more spoons you have, the more things you can accomplish during a day. However, you have a finite number of spoons, and when you run out, you’re done for the day. www.thinkoutsidetheclosethouston.com/… We all have only so many spoons available to us each day. Some people just naturally have more than other people, every day. Some people have more some days than they do other days. Some people have to use a lot of their spoons taking care of other people. Some people spend most of their spoons at work. Or on their kids. Some folks spend spoons on fun. Some don’t. We spend spoons on love. Or hate. It takes spoons just to survive. Some things use a lot of spoons. Anger. Animals. Or cleaning. Or looking for something. Or learning. Or exploring. Or writing. Or teaching. Or driving. Or hiding. I know I thought I had endless spoons when I was younger, before my brain injury. But we really don’t, we have to choose carefully. It’s hard to focus on something as scary and also as inevitable as Climate Change. It’s easy to look away. There are some amazing people at Daily Kos who use up most of their spoons every day of the week in their efforts to follow the dynamic and ever-changing environmental threats, and then to take this knowledge and attempt to educate the rest of us. They know the Climate Crisis is here.
Are We Humans Acting Out an Answer to the Fermi Paradox? by dratler. Please don’t click out yet. This essay will get relevant—quite relevant—to your life here on Earth. I promise. But first consider the Fermi Paradox. That’s the puzzle that Enrico Fermi, the nuclear physicist, noted on beholding the vast number of stars in our Universe. There are trillions of them. So there must be at least a few million, give or take, with “just the right” combination of solid ground, seas, and atmosphere to have evolved carbon-based intelligent creatures like us. So why don’t we see any? Where are all our fellow intelligent species? That’s the Fermi Paradox. Now that we’ve discovered dozens of exoplanets, we see it even more acutely. Some of them even look somewhat like Earth, at least as far as we can tell from a distance. For decades we’ve searched diligently for evidence of extraterrestrial intelligent life, with massive projects like SETI. So far, we have nothing to show for our efforts. So what explains our inability to detect, let alone contact, our fellow intelligent creatures?
Occult & Psychical Sciences:"Is the Earth itself a giant living creature?"(From Lovelock) by Angmar. Is the Earth itself a giant living creature? An old, much-ridiculed hypothesis said yes. It’s time to take it seriously. vox.com In the 1970s, chemist James Lovelock and microbiologist Lynn Margulis put forth a bold theory: The Earth is a giant living organism. When a mammal is hot, it sweats to cool itself off. If you nick your skin with a knife, the skin will scab and heal. Lovelock and Margulis argued that our planet has similar processes of self-regulation, which arguably, make it seem like the Earth itself is alive. The philosopher Karl Popper argued that scientific beliefs must be falsifiable: there must be some experiment you can perform that puts your beliefs to the test. A belief which cannot be criticised cannot be falsified, and so cannot be science. The silencing of critics is an anathema to science: a scientist must subject their ideas to the severest scrutiny and must welcome the scrutiny of others. The reward is that the greatest discoveries in science arise when we admit that what we once believed is wrong.
Transitioning to Matriarchy by PopulationMediaCenter. The patriarchy thrives on dominating not only women and girls but also extends its grasp to nature and animals. Rooted in systems of power and control, patriarchal norms perpetuate exploitation across various spheres of life. Women and girls are subjected to systemic discrimination, limited opportunities, and gender-based violence, reinforcing the patriarchal grip on power dynamics. Similarly, nature and animals are often exploited and commodified within patriarchal frameworks, with environmental degradation and species extinction being symptomatic of this exploitative mentality. Factory farms and the exploitation of animals for testing, consumption, and entertainment, all underscore the insidious nature of patriarchal oppression. These practices reflect a worldview rooted in domination and exploitation, where the interests of privileged humans are prioritized at the expense of the well-being and autonomy of all sentient beings. Factory farms subject animals to inhumane conditions, treating them as mere commodities for profit, while animal testing perpetuates a culture of violence and exploitation in the name of scientific advancement. Similarly, the use of animals for entertainment purposes, such as in circuses and zoos, reinforces a paradigm where animals are objectified and commodified for human amusement.
Overnight News Digest May 20, 2024 by side pocket. The Guardian—More than third of Amazon rainforest struggling to recover from drought, study finds: More than a third of the Amazon rainforest is struggling to recover from drought, according to a new study that warns of a “critical slowing down” of this globally important ecosystem. The signs of weakening resilience raise concerns that the world’s greatest tropical forest – and biggest terrestrial carbon sink – is degrading towards a point of no return. It follows four supposedly “one-in-a-century” dry spells in less than 20 years, highlighting how a human-disrupted climate is putting unusually intense strains on trees and other plants, many of which are dying of dehydration.In the past, the canopy of the South American tropical forest, which covers an area equivalent to about half of Europe, would shrink and expand in tandem with the annual dry and rainy seasons. It also had the capacity to bounce back from a single drought. But in recent times, recoveries have become more sluggish because droughts are growing more intense in the south-east of the Amazon and more frequent in the north-west.