Joseph J. Romm's Blog, page 92
September 23, 2015
9 Massive US Companies Pledge To Go 100% Renewable
Nine more giant corporations, including Nike and Walmart, pledged to transition to 100 percent renewable energy Wednesday. The announcement, made during Climate Week, is intended to show international governments that there is broad-based business support for going off fossil fuels in advance of the United Nations climate talks in December.
Goldman Sachs, Johnson & Johnson, Proctor & Gamble, Salesforce, Starbucks, Steelcase, and Voya Financial also took the RE100 pledge, organized by the Climate Group, an international sustainability non-profit.
“Research shows that the most ambitious companies have seen a 27 percent return on their low carbon investments,” Mark Kenber, CEO of the Climate Group, said in a statement. “Today these companies are signaling loud and clear to COP21 negotiators that forward-thinking businesses back renewables and want to see a strong climate deal in Paris.”
Swiss bank UBS joined the pledge last week. In total, 36 companies have joined RE100 since it was launched at Climate Week last year.
Some of the companies are also part of a White House initiative for sustainability investment announced in July. Those companies, which include Goldman Sachs and Walmart, will invest $140 billion in new low-carbon investment and build more than 1,600 megawatts (MW) of new renewable energy capacity.
The RE100 goals are non-binding, but in the pledge companies agree to release information about their sustainability efforts. And some companies have set specific benchmarks. For instance, Goldman Sachs says it will use 100 percent renewable energy by 2020. Johnson & Johnson has set a goal of 2050. Nike seeks to transition by 2025, and Voya International by 2015.
One company in Wednesday’s announcement, Steelcase, is already operating with 100 percent renewable electricity. Part of the goal of the RE100 initiative, though, is not just to change behavior for the companies involved, but also to draw attention to companies that are committed to renewable energy.
“For Steelcase, joining RE100 is a reflection of our ongoing commitment to renewable energy,” Jim Keane, the company’s president and CEO said. “Our current investment in renewables equaling 100 percent of our global electricity use is an important part of our energy strategy.”
Tags
climateGoldman SachsParisRenewable EnergyStarbucksSustainabilityThe Climate GroupUnited NationsWalmart
The post 9 Massive US Companies Pledge To Go 100% Renewable appeared first on ThinkProgress.
4 Questions About Volkswagen’s Massive Emissions Cheating Scandal That Still Need Answers
On Friday, the EPA announced it was issuing a notice of violation of the Clean Air Act to the German auto manufacturer Volkswagen for allegedly installing software in some of the diesel cars that circumvented EPA emissions standards for certain air pollutants. Backlash to Volkswagen’s emissions cheating has been swift, with the company’s stock plummeting more than 35 percent amid the potential for billions in fines, massive recalls, and criminal prosecution.
In its notice of violation, the EPA accused Volkswagen of installing software in roughly 482,000 “clean diesel” cars manufactured since 2009, including the Jetta, Beetle, Golf, and some Passat models. But Tuesday, Volkswagen admitted that the problem was much more widespread, affecting as many as 11 million vehicles across the world.
“Let’s be clear about this: Our company was dishonest with the EPA, and the California Air Resources Board and with all of you,” Michael Horn, Volkwagen’s U.S. chief, said Monday night. “And in my German words: We have totally screwed up. We must fix the cars to prevent this from ever happening again and we have to make this right. This kind of behavior is totally inconsistent with our qualities.”
The company announced Tuesday that it was going to set aside about $7.3 billion to cover the cost of fixing the cars as well as any additional costs related to customer lawsuits or fines. Volkswagen’s chief executive Martin Winterkorn promised transparency as the company moves through investigations, saying in a video statement that “everything will be laid on the table, as quickly, thoroughly and transparently as possible.”
But in spite of Volkswagen’s promised speedy transparency, there are some questions that remain about the emissions cheating scandal.
Why did Volkswagen do it?
For years, millions of Volkswagen’s deisel cars contained software that turned their pollution controls on only when the cars were being tested by regulators. This means that, since 2009, Volkswagen’s diesel cars have been emitting pollutants — like nitrous oxide — into the atmosphere at levels much higher than permitted standards. But it wasn’t like Volkswagen didn’t have the time or technology to create these pollution controls — they obviously manufactured the controls well enough to pass emissions standards testing. So why add the software that turned this technology — that was already built and on-board the vehicles — off? What did Volkswagen gain from creating a pollution control, installing it in their vehicles, and then only using it for a fraction of a car’s life?
Volkswagen hasn’t answered this question, and as of publication, hadn’t responded to ThinkProgress’ request for comment, but experts have offered their own speculations. The most likely answer is that the pollution controls probably had a negative impact on the car’s overall durability — they made the engines run hotter, made the cars wear out faster, and caused the car to get worse gas mileage than it would have without the pollution controls.
As Alec Gutierrez, senior market analyst of automotive insights for Kelley Blue Book, told ThinkProgress, Volkswagen had carved out a niche in the auto market for offering cars with top-notch fuel economy and performance.
“With VW, the whole appeal of their TDI car, speaking not only as an analyst but an owner, is two fold. It’s incredibly fuel efficient — they’re sort of legendary for the kind of fuel economy they are able to bring to the table. And they are able to offer that fuel economy without sacrificing performance,” Gutierrez said. “I think VW was hoping to bring this mix of both fuel economy and performance in a way that forced them to try to circumvent the system.”
But Arvind Thiruvengadam, research assistant professor at West Virginia University’s Center for Alternative Fuels, Engines and Emissions (CAFEE), whose research flagged the problem for the EPA to begin with, wonders if the manufacturer’s reasoning goes beyond fuel efficiency.
“My curiosity in the whole thing is why did Volkswagen take this risky path?” Thiruvengadam told ThinkProgress. “Fuel economy is just the tip of the iceberg.”
Modern diesel engines contain so many components, Thiruvengadam speculated, that it’s possible that Volkswagen saw repeated failures of a particular part in conjunction with the pollution controls, and thought that cheating offered a quick work-around.
“There are so many factors,” Thiruvengadam said. “I’m just curious why they did it.”
Why didn’t the EPA’s own tests catch Volkswagen?
The EPA was the agency that got Volkswagen to confess to cheating — through prolonged and intense investigation and threats to withhold approval for the company’s 2016 diesel models — but the EPA wasn’t the agency that figured out that the cheating was happening in the first place.
The ruse began to unravel for Volkswagen when independent parties looked into how European-manufactured diesel vehicles performed in U.S. driving conditions. The International Council on Clean Transportation, an independent nonprofit organization, partnered with the UWV’s CAFEE to test three vehicles: a BMW, a VW Passat, and a VW Jetta. According to Thiruvengadam, who was directly involved in the research, the point was actually to prove that it was possible for diesel cars to run clean.
“When we started off this study, it wasn’t intended to test these vehicles to see if they were cheating or not,” he said.
CAFEE intended to test the vehicles in real-world driving conditions in California, because the state has such a unique driving pattern due to both terrain and traffic. Before CAFEE began its testing, the California Air Resources Board (CARB) asked to partner with them, offering to run baseline emissions testing of the vehicles in a lab, to give researchers an idea of how the cars were intended to perform.
When researchers at CAFEE compared test results from the CARB lab to their real-world driving tests, they found something surprising: while the BMW performed similarly in the lab and on the road, the Volkswagen cars showed much higher emissions when driven in real-world conditions — 30 to 40 times higher, according to Thiruvengadam.
“This was a very odd pattern,” Thiruvengadam said. “Usually we see differences between real world or the lab, but it’s never the magnitude of 30 to 40 times.”
So why was CAFEE able to catch the problem when the EPA’s own tests didn’t? It comes down to the way that passenger vehicles are tested for emissions. Normally, passenger vehicles are tested in very controlled settings — the chassis of the car is placed on rollers and taken through a simulated set of specific conditions, from driving on a highway to driving in traffic. As the Washington Post points out, the EPA emissions tests are so specific that Volkswagen was able to “teach its cars when to behave more cleanly.”
“When you’re doing standards, which have pass/fail criteria, you need repeatability,” John German, senior fellow for the ICCT, told ThinkProgress. “You design the test so that it’s repeatable.”
What the EPA doesn’t require however, at least for passenger vehicles, is that they be tested on the road — cars are always brought into the lab for testing. Heavy-duty vehicles — like trucks — are required to pass real-world road tests; a requirement that stems from a similar scandal in the late 1990s, when the EPA figured out that some truck manufacturers were programming their diesel trucks to run cleaner in tests than on the road.
But until now, the EPA hasn’t bothered testing light-duty vehicles on the road. The agency’s reasoning, Thiruvengadam wagers, is that laboratory tests are so thorough, and test so many specific conditions, that it hasn’t been necessary. But laboratory conditions are also easier to plan for — and circumvent.
“My guess is that they had not dealt with this specific scenario before, and had placed good faith in the manufacturers to not circumvent their testing procedure, and VW was able to slide under the radar,” Gutierrez said.
By merely taking the cars out for a test drive, CAFEE caught a cheating scandal that the EPA’s testing missed.
How widespread could this be?
It’s unclear how widespread this type of cheating might be, both within Volkswagen and throughout the auto industry. Thiruvengadam said he thinks that, more likely than not, Volkswagen is simply a rouge bad actor that exploited a loophole in the EPA’s emissions testing scheme.
“We tested a BMW and a VW,” he said, “and the BMW did exceptionally well in terms of fuel economy and emissions.”
German echoed Thiruvengadam’s sentiment.
“It’s not the hardware,” German said, explaining that the BMV showed a car can do well in both fuel economy and emissions. “It can be done.”
Gutierrez said that he wouldn’t be surprised if other niche vehciles in oddball segments of the auto industry have used Volkswagen’s tactics to skirt emissions regulations, but he doesn’t think the problem is widespread among mainstream manufacturers.
“There’s such a high degree of parity that if this is relatively widespread, you’d see someone jumping out from the mix offering some sort of revolutionary technology that no one knows about,” he said. “But you don’t see anyone else like VW putting forth these extraordinary claims of performance and fuel economy.”
But some European officials are calling for the investigation into Volkswagen to be widened to include much of the auto industry.
“It’s vital that the public has confidence in vehicle emissions tests and I am calling for the European Commission to investigate this issue as a matter of urgency,” the U.K.’s transportation secretary Patrick McLoughlin said in a statement on Tuesday.
What comes next? (For Volkswagen, and the EPA, and consumers, and the auto industry…)
Volkswagen has already announced that it won’t continue to sell vehicles outfitted with the diesel engines flagged by the EPA. And the company could face fines of up to $37,500 for each vehicle that wasn’t in compliance with the Clean Air Act, which could amount to $18 billion in total. As Brad Plumer points out at Vox, Volkswagen’s total profit last year was about $12 billion, so $18 billion in fines would be huge for the company.
The outing of Volkswagen’s cheating scheme could also impact how vehicles are tested in the United States. Europe is already requiring road tests for passenger vehicles starting in 2017, and something similar could likely happen in the United States as well.
“Certainly beyond the potential financial implications and brand impacts to Volkswagen, for the industry at large I would definitely see a greater emphasis on real world testing for emissions and fuel economy numbers,” Gutierrez said. “More than likely, the EPA will revisit their testing procedure, even just to add a short drive around the parking lot to test real world conditions.”
But in the wake of the Volkswagen scandal — and on the heels of news last year that Hyundai and Kia were overstating their real-world fuel economy — regulators might not be the only ones to approach auto manufacturers with more skepticism.
“I think you’ll find a little more skepticism from consumer action groups or even just owners of cars to really try and test things on their own,” Gutierrez said. “You do get a sense that perhaps some of that trust has been broken and consumers will be less likely to take the claims of manufacturers at face value.”
Tags
Climate ChangeemissionsVehicles
The post 4 Questions About Volkswagen’s Massive Emissions Cheating Scandal That Still Need Answers appeared first on ThinkProgress.
September 22, 2015
AP Stylebook Switches Climate ‘Skeptics’ To ‘Doubters’ — I Deny That Makes Sense
The Associated Press just made one of the most pointless — if not most senseless — moves in the storied history of its widely used AP Stylebook:
Our guidance is to use climate change doubters or those who reject mainstream climate science and to avoid the use of skeptics or deniers.
The half good news is that the phrase “those who reject mainstream climate science” is not half bad. But the fully bad news is that the phrase is so clumsy, the many newspapers who follow the Stylebook may simply fall back on the senseless phrase “climate change doubters.” Let’s hope they don’t.
Does the AP recommend newspapers use the phrase “smoking health risk doubters” or “tobacco science doubters”? Of course not — and yet scientists have the same level of certainty about human-caused climate change as they do that cigarettes harm your health. Indeed the AP itself explained that very point in a 2014 Seth Borenstein article that began, “Top scientists from a variety of fields say they are about as certain that global warming is a real, man-made threat as they are that cigarettes kill.”
The media doesn’t even pay attention to people who deny the health dangers of tobacco smoke anymore. So why treat those who deny the reality — and danger — of human-caused climate change any differently?
“As they say, if the shoe fits, wear it. Those who are in denial of basic science, be it evolution or human-caused climate change, are in fact science deniers,” as leading climatologist Michael Mann emailed me. “To call them anything else, be it ‘skeptic’ or ‘doubter,’ is to grant an undeserved air of legitimacy to something that is simply not legitimate.”
Here’s another reason “doubter” makes no sense. The Senate’s leading climate science denier/denialist/disinformer James Inhofe (R-OK) still maintains “global warming is a hoax.” Is he expressing “doubt”? Is he expressing what Oxford Dictionaries calls “a feeling of uncertainty or lack of conviction.” No. He is denying the science.
Before discussing the AP’s utterly inadequate explanation for rejecting the term “denier,” we need to review the relevant history.
Back in December, four dozen leading scientists and science journalists/communicators — Fellows of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry (CSI), issued an open letter headlined “Deniers are not Skeptics,” which urged the media to “Please stop using the word ‘skeptic’ to describe deniers” of climate science.
“Proper skepticism promotes scientific inquiry, critical investigation, and the use of reason in examining controversial and extraordinary claims,” the statement reads. “It is foundational to the scientific method. Denial, on the other hand, is the a priori rejection of ideas without objective consideration.”
The signatories ended by explaining:
As scientific skeptics, we are well aware of political efforts to undermine climate science by those who deny reality but do not engage in scientific research or consider evidence that their deeply held opinions are wrong. The most appropriate word to describe the behavior of those individuals is “denial.” Not all individuals who call themselves climate change skeptics are deniers. But virtually all deniers have falsely branded themselves as skeptics. By perpetrating this misnomer, journalists have granted undeserved credibility to those who reject science and scientific inquiry.
The group Forecast the Facts then launched a petition drive that quickly picked up more than 20,000 signatures. By February 2015, the New York Times published an by its lead climate reporter, Justin Gillis, on why the people who spread disinformation about climate change are not “skeptics” — and why it’s no surprise they are called climate science “deniers.”
The Times explains that the denial “movement” — those who “so vigorously denounce the science” — is “mainly rooted in ideology, but much of the money to disseminate its writings comes from companies that profit from fossil fuels.” These people tend to be conservatives because “Many of these conservatives understand that since greenhouse emissions are caused by virtually every economic activity of modern society, they are likely to be reduced only by extensive government intervention in the market.”
It is in this context that the AP explains the “background on the change”:
Scientists who consider themselves real skeptics — who debunk mysticism, ESP and other pseudoscience, such as those who are part of the Center for Skeptical Inquiry — complain that non-scientists who reject mainstream climate science have usurped the phrase skeptic. They say they aren’t skeptics because “proper skepticism promotes scientific inquiry, critical investigation and the use of reason in examining controversial and extraordinary claims.” That group prefers the phrase “climate change deniers” for those who reject accepted global warming data and theory. But those who reject climate science say the phrase denier has the pejorative ring of Holocaust denier so The Associated Press prefers climate change doubter or someone who rejects mainstream science.
The first problem is that the AP had another alternative. As the NY Times piece explained, “others have started using the slightly softer word ‘denialist’ to make the same point without stirring complaints about evoking the Holocaust.”
Second, the deniers — the ones who generally make it into the newspapers, like James Inhofe — knowingly use phony arguments to stop the world from acting in time to avoid what the world’s leading scientists and governments agree are catastrophic impacts that will cause misery for billions of people for centuries to come. Since when should anyone care about the phony concerns of such self-destructive anti-scientific people?
Third, the concern about the word “denier” is phony. How phony? As the National Center for Science Education explained in a 2012 post, “Why Is It Called Denial?”
“Denial” is the term preferred even by many deniers. “I actually like ‘denier.’ That’s closer than skeptic,” says MIT’s Richard Lindzen, one of the most prominent deniers. Minnesotans for Global Warming and other major denier groups go so far as to sing, “I’m a Denier!”.
Even disinformers associated with the beyond-hard-core extremists at the Heartland Institute like the term:
So clearly, using the term ‘denier’ doesn’t inherently mean you are equating a disinformer with a Holocaust denier. Let me add that I have explained many times in the past why “denier” is not a perfect term. There are no perfect terms. Years ago I tried to coin the terms “delayer” and “disinformer” for those who make a living spreading disinformation about climate science in order to delay action — and I still use the term “disinformer.”
But coining terms is nearly impossible, and the fact is that almost everybody has embraced the term “deniers” — including many disinformers. I seriously doubt that the term “doubter” will be widely embraced or that the phrase “those who reject mainstream climate science” will either.
So for clarity’s and consistency’s sake, “denier” has become the term of art.
Final note: I also try to say “climate science denier” and not “climate change denier,” because even the most outrageous deniers (like Inhofe or Donald Trump) acknowledge the climate is changing. It is the overwhelming scientific evidence and analysis that proves humans are the overwhelming cause of recent climate change that they deny.
Tags
Climate ChangeClimate Change Deniers
The post AP Stylebook Switches Climate ‘Skeptics’ To ‘Doubters’ — I Deny That Makes Sense appeared first on ThinkProgress.
Hillary Clinton Has Finally Taken A Position On The Keystone XL Pipeline
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton is officially against the Keystone XL pipeline.
After months of hedging on the issue, Clinton said she opposes the controversial tar sands pipeline proposal because it represents a “distraction from the important work we have to do on climate change.” The Democratic front-runner made her comments on Wednesday afternoon after a student asked her about the pipeline at a town hall meeting in Iowa.
Clinton’s full comments are below:
Hillary Clinton calls Keystone XL a distraction, says she opposes its construction pic.twitter.com/dW4FaxfEBR
— Jennifer Epstein (@jeneps) September 22, 2015
The proposed Keystone XL pipeline is a 1,179-mile extension to the Keystone Pipeline System, and it would bring tar sands crude oil from Canada down to refineries on the Gulf coast. The project has been stalled for years, as President Obama has been reluctant to approve it partially due to environmental concerns.
Clinton had previously refused to take a position on Keystone XL, citing the fact that she oversaw the approval process during her tenure as Secretary of State and wanted to wait until the Obama administration had come to a decision. Four days ago, however, she said she could not wait much longer, and said her decision would come “soon.”
Environmentalists decry tar sands oil extraction in part because of its carbon intensity. The extraction process causes more greenhouse gas emissions than other types of oil.
Tags
Election 20216Hillary ClintonKeystone XL
The post Hillary Clinton Has Finally Taken A Position On The Keystone XL Pipeline appeared first on ThinkProgress.
The Divestment Movement Has Grown 50-Fold In Just One Year
The divestment movement is really gaining steam — non-coal, non-fossil-fuel powered steam.
Investors representing $2.6 trillion in assets have pledged to cut fossil fuels from their portfolios, a fifty-fold increase from last year. At least 436 institutions have pledged to stop investing in fossil fuels — for moral or financial reasons. Large pension funds and private companies make up 95 percent of the assets, according to analysis released Tuesday by Arabella Advisors.
“If these numbers tell us anything, it’s that the divestment movement is catching fire,” said May Boeve, executive director of campaigners 350.org.
Actor Leonardo DiCaprio, who established a fund for conservation projects in 1998, also announced that he would join the movement by divesting his assets and those of the Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation.
“Mainstream financial views of fossil fuels will never be the same,” Ellen Dorsey, executive director of the Wallace Daniel Fund, said at a press conference Tuesday. “It is increasingly clear that it is neither OK nor smart to be invested in fossil fuels.”
The divestment movement has two primary components: The idea that owning fossil fuel investments is tantamount to funding climate change, and the idea that the fossil fuel industry itself is poised to lose value over the long term.
“The movement has exposed the embedded vulnerabilities in the fossil fuel industries, from carbon reserves that can never be burned to wasting of company funds on continued exploration for new fossil fuels that can never be used,” Dorsey said. “You are increasingly risking the value of your portfolio if you stay invested in fossil fuels.”
Another analysis found that Massachusetts’ pension plan lost half a billion dollars in the last fiscal year through its fossil fuel investments, ThinkProgress reported Monday.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, as the divestment movement’s reach expands, its geographic footprint does, too. Since last year, the number of divesting foundations based outside the United States has increased from 20 to 34 percent, according to Tuesday’s report. Likewise, the number of universities has expanded from 14 to 40, now representing $130 billion in assets.
The diversity of organizations — from religious institutions to universities to giant public pension funds — suggests that divestment is trumping public or corporate pressures.
“When an organization divests, there’s an acknowledgment of the seriousness of climate change and an acknowledgment that some of these [fossil fuel] companies bear some of the responsibility and could be viewed as part of the problem,” Will Lana, a partner at Trillium Asset Management, told ThinkProgress. “It takes a lot of courage for an institution to recognize that, even if it’s clearly the case,” he added.
That’s a far cry from divesting. But the smaller move appears to have been spurred by Pope Francis’ visit to the United States this week. The pope has been outspoken in the need to act on climate change, which has alienated some U.S. Catholics. Georgetown University, another Catholic institution, has already voted to divest from coal.
In addition to DiCaprio, 2,039 other individual investors have pledged to withdraw from fossil fuel investments. And it is becoming easier for people concerned about climate change to track their money. A website launched last week, Fossil Free Funds, allows people to check their mutual funds and retirement plans for fossil fuel investments.
Tags
Arabella AdvisorsassetsdivestDivestmentinvestorsLeonardo DiCaprio
The post The Divestment Movement Has Grown 50-Fold In Just One Year appeared first on ThinkProgress.
What One Church Had To Say About Pope Francis’ Fight Against Climate Change
During his trip to the United Staes, Pope Francis is expected to press Americans to fight climate change by replacing fossil fuels with renewable energy sources. Francis will make his moral case for sustainability just as scientists argue that all 50 states already possess the technology necessary to power their entire energy infrastructure — their electricity, transportation, heating, and cooling systems — with wind, water and sunlight by 2050.
Tags
Climate ChangePope FrancisSustainability
The post What One Church Had To Say About Pope Francis’ Fight Against Climate Change appeared first on ThinkProgress.
Donald Trump Admits He Believes In Weather
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump doubled down on his climate denial this week, saying on the Hugh Hewitt radio show that climate change isn’t something he thinks is happening.
“I’m not a believer in global warming,” he said after Hewitt asked about his views on climate change. “And I’m not a believer in man-made global warming. It could be warming, and it’s going to start to cool at some point. And you know, in the early, in the 1920s, people talked about global cooling. I don’t know if you know that or not.”
As David Roberts at Vox points out, no one in the 1920s thought the Earth was cooling. The “global cooling” argument is one that’s been cited by multiple climate deniers over the years, in various fashions — some have claimed that the earth is actively cooling now, instead of warming, but most have relied on a 1970s article that claimed that the earth was cooling as evidence that scientists create new theories about the earth’s temperature all the time and, therefore, shouldn’t be trusted when they speak about the earth’s current trend.
Trump appears to have taken the latter approach in the interview, though he got his decades mixed up. And, for the record, the author of that 1975 article has acknowledged the scientific consensus that the earth is, in fact, now warming, and has expressed his dismay that the article is still being used as proof for climate deniers.
Trump goes on lament the fact that the government is spending money addressing a problem that he doesn’t think exists.
“I believe there’s weather. I believe there’s change, and I believe it goes up and it goes down, and it goes up again. And it changes depending on years and centuries, but I am not a believer, and we have much bigger problems,” he said.
The earth’s climate does fluctuate naturally, but 97 percent of climate scientists agree that the planet is currently warming, and that warming is being driven by human activities.
[image error]
CREDIT: NASA
Trump then transitions into talking about nuclear issues.
“You know, to me, the worst global warming, and I mentioned this to you once before, is nuclear warming. That’s our global warming,” he said. “That’s what I see, because we have incompetent people, and we have these rogue nations, and not even rogue nations anymore.”
Trump’s climate denial is nothing new. The billionaire businessman has used cold weather numerous times before to dispute that the earth is warming — a theory that’s been soundly debunked.
Ice storm rolls from Texas to Tennessee – I'm in Los Angeles and it's freezing. Global warming is a total, and very expensive, hoax!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 6, 2013
Trump has also fought hard against a wind development in Scotland that he says would have impacted the views of a golf course he was building (the wind development was scrapped for another, unrelated reason). Trump, who is currently leading the Republican field in primary polls, has blamed China for the “concept of global warming,” and has said the Environmental Protection Agency is “an impediment to both growth and jobs.”
Tags
Climate ChangeDonald Trump
The post Donald Trump Admits He Believes In Weather appeared first on ThinkProgress.
Why The Greater Sage Grouse Isn’t Being Listed As An Endangered Species
The greater sage grouse, a bird that’s been at the center of a major conservation fight over the last year, will not be protected under the Endangered Species Act, the Department of Interior announced Tuesday.
In a video announcement, Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell called the decision a “milestone for conservation in America.” She said that the decision not to list the bird — a designation that would have meant that the greater sage grouse was “in danger of extinction throughout all or a significant portion of its range,” and would have subjected it to certain federal protections — came because of an “unprecedented” conservation effort in 11 western states over the last few years.
Basically, that conservation effort among state leaders, ranchers, conservation groups, and other stakeholders has made enough progress that the bird’s future looks bright enough to leave it off the endangered species list. Avoiding the listing also carries lessons for conserving other threatened species, proponents say, and impacts energy development on public lands.
“This is a new paradigm for dealing with managed public lands across the West,” Jim Lyons, deputy assistant secretary for the Land and Minerals Management program of the Department of the Interior, said on a call Monday.
Gary Frazer, the Assistant Director for Endangered Species, said on the call that the scientific research that went into deciding whether or not to list the species found that this conservation effort reduced the greater sage grouse’s key risks by up to 90 percent. Those risks include rangeland fires, which experts on the call said was the key threat faced by sage grouse. Other threats include invasive cheatgrass, which crowds out the native sagebrush that the sage grouse depends on and also exacerbates the risk of rangeland fires. Habitat fragmentation, due to development of homes, businesses, and energy sources like oil and gas, is also making life difficult for the sage grouse, whose population has plunged from as many as 16 million a century ago to less than half a million today. The sage grouse, a bird that, each year, displays a magnificent mating ritual among the sagebrush, is an indicator species — if the bird’s populations are healthy, it’s likely that the overall sagebrush habitat is healthy too.
Now that the decision not to list the bird is final, the oil and gas leases in the western states that had been deferred while the decision was being made will now be evaluated by the Bureau of Land Management. The officials on the call said that the federal government would prioritize oil and gas leases that fall outside of the birds’ habitat.
It’s the most important conservation act on the planet, but that doesn’t mean it is positioned to do all the work
Brian Rutledge, Central Flyway conservation strategy and policy adviser for the Audubon Society’s Rockies office, said that as long as the federal government sticks to its plan to preserve sage grouse habitat on public lands — a plan that includes limits on oil, gas, solar, and wind development inside the sage grouse’s habitat — he doesn’t think additional drilling will be a major threat to the bird. He also said that the changes in energy development in the West that have been implemented over the last 10 years have been beneficial for sage grouse. In Wyoming — the first state in the West to implement a sage grouse conservation plan — there’s been a 60 percent reduction of conventional drilling in major sage grouse regions, a process that creates “maximum disturbance,” Rutledge said. At the same time, there’s been a 1,600 percent increase in directional drilling, a process in which up to 30 wells can be drilled from one drilling pad and therefore takes up less land than conventional drilling. Still, though directional drilling is better for the landscape, it doesn’t carry any benefits for the climate — extracting more oil from a single well, rather than multiple wells, still means that oil will be emitting greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.
Overall, Rutledge is happy with the decision not to list the sage grouse. A listing, he said, would have put the fate of the sage grouse solely in the hands of the federal government — whereas right now, the bird has officials and stakeholders from 11 western states working on its protection. Allowing the states to continue to work on the conservation of the sage grouse will maintain and hopefully increase the level of investment in the sage grouse’s future.
“Having worked on the Endangered Species Act since its inception, this is how it’s intended to be used,” Rutledge told ThinkProgress. “It’s not to see how many things we can list — it’s to avoid the necessity of listing. It encourages us to plan for the future of our ecosystems and species rather than using this as a catch all.”
The Endangered Species Act, he said, “doesn’t have the ability to do everything. It’s the most important conservation act on the planet, but that doesn’t mean it is positioned to do all the work.”
And, Rutledge said, this decision not to list the bird doesn’t mean the threat of a listing isn’t still out there. The federal government will reevaluate the sage grouse’s standing in five years, and will decide then whether the bird is still doing well enough to avoid a listing. That provides some incentive for western states to continue to work to conserve sage grouse habitat.
“If we don’t do the job right, it will come back around to haunt us,” Rutledge said.
Matt Lee-Ashley, director of the Public Lands division at the Center for American Progress, also praised the decision not to list the bird. So far, the Sage Grouse Initiative has provided certain protections — including easements, invasive removal, and rangeland replanting — on 4.4 million acres of land in the West.
“Today’s decision shows what is possible when national, state and local leaders work together to protect wildlife habitat before a species reaches the brink of extinction,” Lee-Ashley said in an emailed statement. “The conservation plans that the Administration is implementing will help save the fast-disappearing sagebrush expanses in the West and are one of the most significant land protection achievements of the last two decades.”
The Natural Resources Defense Council and the National Wildlife Federation have also come out in support of the decision not to list the bird. But not all environmental groups are happy about the choice — as the Washington Post notes, WildEarth Guardians and the Center for Biological Diversity have both expressed concerns that not enough is being done to protect the sage grouse and its habitat. These concerns may result in lawsuits from groups who want to see more done on the conservation front.
“Greater sage grouse need much more help than these plans provide. You can’t say you want to save these birds and then, in the next breath, recommend more oil and gas development in some of the most important places where they live,” Randi Spivak, public lands director with the Center for Biological Diversity, said in a June statement.
The oil industry, as well as some western governors and members of Congress, fought hard against an Endangered Species Act listing, as it would limit the land available for drilling. Republicans successfully added a measure to the federal spending bill last year that prohibited funds going towards the bird’s endangered species listing. However, officials said on the call Monday that opposition did not factor in to their decision not to list the bird.
Rutledge said that preserving the bird’s habitat will take significant continued effort, but that he’s proud of the success of the conservation program so far.
“We incorporated information from ranchers, miners, and land developers, and looked at how we need to manage ourselves in order that we have truly long term sustainable relationship with ecosystem,” he said. “This is the way of the future — or at least it better be.”
Tags
Oil and GasSage GrouseWest
The post Why The Greater Sage Grouse Isn’t Being Listed As An Endangered Species appeared first on ThinkProgress.
What Caused Massachusetts’ Pension Fund To Lose Half A Billion Dollars Last Year?
Massachusetts’ public pension fund lost more than half a billion dollars due to fossil fuel investments during the fiscal year that ended in June, according to new data analysis released Monday from Trillium Group.
The Massachusetts Pension Reserves Investment Trust Fund’s fossil fuel investments, including in coal, oil and gas, and production and exploration companies, lost 28 percent of their value — $521 million — the analysts found, using public records. The pension fund has been under scrutiny for its investments recently, and there are companion bills in the Massachusetts Senate and state House that would force the public fund to divest from all fossil fuels.
There are a lot of challenges for the [fossil fuel] industry, and big picture, they don’t look like short-term challenges to me
“I think sometimes divestment is assumed to be a financial mistake,” Will Lana, a partner at Trillium Asset Management, told ThinkProgress. “It’s important to stop for a moment and say, well, it hasn’t been a mistake [lately].”
Divestment has gained popularity among Massachusetts’ public sector unions. The Massachusetts Nurses Association, the Boston Teachers Union, and two other unions have come out in support of divestment. In addition, 14 Massachusetts towns and cities have passed resolutions supporting the move.
“The enthusiasm for fossil fuels is waning a bit,” Lana said. “There are a lot of challenges for the industry, and big picture, they don’t look like short-term challenges to me.”
And, in this case, investment in fossil fuels seems to run counter to the fund management’s fiduciary duty. “They have been warned over and over again, even by former Treasury Secretary Paulson,” Robert Massie, former executive director of Ceres and author of a book on the divestment movement’s success in addressing the South African apartheid, told ThinkProgress
There are essentially two key arguments for divestment, according to Massie. First, there is a political, moral argument to move away from fossil fuels that contribute to global warming and put the world’s health and well-being in jeopardy. But there is also a strict financial argument.
Fossil fuel industries are in what Massie argues is “structural decline.” In other words, the industry models are not sustainable. Several big coal companies have already declared bankruptcy, but other fossil fuel industries are also exposed to risk, as the world moves to a more and more sustainable future.
For instance, new U.S. guidelines require cars to get 40 miles per gallon by 2017, and 55 mpg by 2022, Massie said. “You can imagine what’s going to start to happen. You’re going to see a permanent drop in oil.”
The long-term prospects of fossil fuel — in a world where we already know we need to keep two-thirds of fuel reserves in the ground — are tenuous, Massie said. Fossil fuel companies spend “almost $700 billion a year in looking for new resources at a moment when we already understand that we cannot burn what we already have,” Massie told ThinkProgress.
This is not the first report of its kind intended to show lawmakers how important fossil fuel divestment is.
Trillium released a report earlier this year showing that California’s two public pension plans lost $5 billion due to their fossil fuel investments. The report may have helped spur support for a divestment bill in that state, which was approved by the state legislature earlier this month. Gov. Jerry Brown (D) is expected to sign the bill into law.
The Massachusetts report was requested by 350Mass, a state-based climate advocacy organization.
Tags
Fossil FuelsInvestmentMassachusettspension
The post What Caused Massachusetts’ Pension Fund To Lose Half A Billion Dollars Last Year? appeared first on ThinkProgress.
September 21, 2015
Why This Week Is Huge For Climate Action
Monday marks the beginning of a week full of national and global action to combat climate change and push for environmental justice. Events ranging from the United Nations’ sustainability assembly to climate change rallies on the National Mall are all happening over the course of this week, in coordination with Pope Francis’ visit to the United States.
This week, the United Nations is meeting to adopt a new 15-year plan for sustainable development. The plan outlines 17 broad goals and 169 specific targets to end world poverty, improve health and education, ensure gender and racial equality for all, implement sustainable building and agricultural practices in impoverished countries, conserve world oceans, and take urgent action to combat climate change. These Sustainable Development Goals replace the previously developed Millennium Development Goals and are intended to be achieved by 2030.
Right now there are no specific plans on how to measure the progress of each target. The goals will be discussed at the Sustainable Development Summit scheduled to take place September 25 to 27, preceding the annual U.N. general assembly on September 28 in New York City.
Critics of the Sustainable Development Goals are calling the targets “too broad,” while supporters are saying that “there is no choice but to go big in a world of expanding population, growing inequality, dwindling resources and the existential threat from global warming,” according to the Global Gazette.
The goals clearly emphasize the need to connect the impacts of climate change to gender and racial equality — specifically women in developing and impoverished countries. With women often being charged with providing critical resources such as food and water, as well as making up the majority of the agricultural workforce, sustainability movements have been pushing the importance of women’s rights in the realm of environmental protection.
“I urge partners across the world to embrace the ambition embodied in the new set of goals. I look forward to working together to deliver on the unfinished MDG commitments, tackle inequality and meet the new challenges that have emerged across the three dimensions of sustainable development — economic, social and environmental,” Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said at a press conference in New York on September 18.
Complimenting this new season of goal setting, the Climate Group kicked-off its 7th annual “Climate Week NYC” Monday at the United Nation’s Headquarters in New York City. This week-long event is intended to highlight bold climate action from business and political leaders, as well as set sights for furthering renewable energy growth. Leaders such as U.S. Secretary John Kerry, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius, World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim and Ban Ki-Moon spoke at last year’s conference, making it the largest thus far.
Under-pinning this week’s climate action, “Popemania” is sparking even further public action towards environmental and social justice. Cities across the U.S. East Coast have been anticipating Pope Francis’ first-ever visit from September 22 to the 28. Americans are expecting to hear him speak on the moral case of climate change, along with other social issues. Given his historically progressive stance towards people contributing to climate change, all signs point to Francis making climate a major component of his visit.
“Climate change is a global problem with grave implications: environmental, social, economic, political and for the distribution of goods. It represents one of the principal challenges facing humanity in our day,” he wrote is his 192-page papal encyclical earlier this year. In his words, “climate is a common good” and stronger action must be taken in order to protect it.
Francis will be speaking at the United Nations in New York on Friday, September 25, the day after he plans to deliver a speech to Congress. It is not confirmed that his speech will be centered on environmental action, but several environmental groups have organized a climate rally and free concert on the National Mall at the same time. Over 200,000 people are expected to attend and call on political leaders to follow Pope Francis’ lead in demanding for climate justice.
This week’s wide mix of environmental and global goal-setting are paving the way for further climate action expected at the United Nations climate conference in Paris later this year.
Tags
Climate ChangePope FrancisUnited Nations
The post Why This Week Is Huge For Climate Action appeared first on ThinkProgress.
Joseph J. Romm's Blog
- Joseph J. Romm's profile
- 10 followers
