A timeline of milestones:
news, science, expert analysis.
Continually updated; send submissions here please.
Ben Geman on Axios, March 6, 2019.
“You may have read by now that Michael Bloomberg isn't running for president, but I'm more interested in something he is doing: expanding his climate campaign to fight oil-and-gas.
Where it stands: The billionaire activist announced something called the "Beyond Carbon" campaign yesterday. It's an expansion of his longstanding work with the Sierra Club to shut down coal plants via an effort called "Beyond Coal," a campaign that will also continue.
▸ Editorial Board, The New York Times. “The Green New Deal is Better than Our Climate Nightmare,” Feb. 23, 2019. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/23/opinion/green-new-deal-climate-democrats.html
“The ambitious plan has had a rocky start, but it has also changed the national conversation. That alone is reason to applaud it.”
▸ Rignot, Eric et al TK, “Four decades of Antarctic Ice Sheet mass balance from 1979–2017,” Feb. 19, 2019. https://www.pnas.org/content/116/4/1095 Antarctica’s ice is melting 6x faster than previously: “The total mass loss from Antarctica increased {from 40 ± 9 Gt/y in the 11-y time period} 1979–1990 {to 50 ± 14 Gt/y in 1989–2000, 166 ± 18 Gt/y in 1999–2009, and 252 ± 26 Gt/y in 2009–2017, that is,} by a factor of 6.” {SFR brackets for ease of comprehension.}
▸ Walden, Greg, Upton, Fred, Shimkus, John. “Republicans Have Better Solutions to Climate Change.” RealClear Policy, Feb. 13, 2019. https://www.realclearpolicy.com/articles/2019/02/13/republicans_have_better_solutions_to_climate_change_111045.html
“Climate change is real, and as Republican Leaders of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, we are focused on solutions. A serious, solutions-oriented discussion about how to address this challenge, while protecting the interests of the American people, our communities, and our country’s economic well-being is fundamental to getting this right.”
▸ A smart team @CNN found that more & more people are searching for basic facts on climate change. They’re asking Google, What is climate change? Why is climate change happening now, what are the causes? Can climate change be stopped? CNN’s Ryan Smith et al. created this quick guide, easy to read + share: “Climate change: Do you know the basics?” https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/18/health/climate-change-google-questions-answered/index.html
▸ Leiserowitz, A., Maibach, E., Rosenthal, S., Kotcher, J., Goldberg, M., Ballew, M., Gustafson, A., & Bergquist, P. (2019). Politics & Global Warming, December 2018. Yale University and George Mason University. New Haven, CT: Yale Program on Climate Change Communication. http://climatecommunication.yale.edu/publications/politics-global-warming-december-2018/2/
“Among other important findings, this survey documents an increase in Republican understanding of the reality of human-caused global warming, worry about the threat, and support for several climate policies over the past 14 months.”
▸ Cheng, Lijing, et al. TK. “How Fast are the Oceans Warming?” [SFR: way too fast, and faster than we expected them to.] Science. Jan. 11, 2019. http://science.sciencemag.org/content/363/6423/128.summary
“Recent observation-based estimates show rapid warming of Earth's oceans over the past few decades (see the figure) (1, 2). This warming has contributed to increases in rainfall intensity, rising sea levels, the destruction of coral reefs, declining ocean oxygen levels, and declines in ice sheets; glaciers; and ice caps in the polar regions (3, 4).”
▸ Low, Petra, “The natural disasters of 2018 in figures: Losses in 2018 dominated by wildfires and tropical storms,” Munich RE, Jan. 8, 2019. https://www.munichre.com/topics-online/en/climate-change-and-natural-disasters/natural-disasters/the-natural-disasters-of-2018-in-figures.html
“When compared with the record losses of the previous year from Hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria, the indications at the start of 2018 were that it would be a more moderate year. However, the second half of the year saw an accumulation of billion-dollar losses from floods, tropical cyclones in the US and Japan, wildfires and earthquakes. The overall economic impact was US$ 160bn, of which US$ 80bn was insured.”
▸ The Rhodium Group, “Preliminary US Emissions Estimates for 2018,” Jan. 8, 2019. https://rhg.com/research/preliminary-us-emissions-estimates-for-2018/.
“After three years of decline, US carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions rose sharply last year. Based on preliminary power generation, natural gas, and oil consumption data, we estimate emissions increased by 3.4% in 2018. This marks the second largest annual gain in more than two decades.”
▸ November 23, 2018. Fourth National Climate Assessment (NCA4): Volume II: Impacts, Risks, and Adaptation in the United States. https://nca2018.globalchange.gov
▸ October 18, 2018. “Effective Carbon Rates 2018: Pricing Carbon Emissions through Taxes and Emissions Trading,” Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
Few countries are pricing carbon high enough to meet IPCC targets: “The gulf between today’s carbon prices and the actual cost of emissions to our planet is unacceptable,” said OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurría. “Pricing carbon correctly is a concrete and cost-effective way to slow climate change. We are wasting an opportunity to steer our economies along a low-carbon growth path and losing precious time with every day that passes.”
▸ October 10, 2018. WATCH:"A Brief History of American Inaction on Climate Change,” Vox. https://youtu.be/yzDjjUAt3zc
▸ October 8, 2018. “The Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5°C, with Summary for Policymakers.” Special Report, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). “The decisions we make today are critical in ensuring a safe and sustainable world for everyone, both now and in the future, said Debra Roberts, Co-Chair of IPCC Working Group II. “This report gives policymakers and practitioners the information they need to make decisions that tackle climate change while considering local context and people’s needs. The next few years are probably the most important in our history,” she said.” Established by the United Nations in 1988, the IPCC is the world’s leading body for assessing the science related to climate change, its impacts and potential future risks, and possible response options. https://www.ipcc.ch/2018/10/08/summary-for-policymakers-of-ipcc-special-report-on-global-warming-of-1-5c-approved-by-governments/. The fifth assessment report, AR5, is the most comprehensive synthesis to date. Experts from more than 80 countries contributed to this assessment, which represents six years of work. More than 830 lead authors and review editors drew on the work of over 1000 contributors. About 2,000 expert reviewers provided over 140,000 review comments. “The IPCC: Who Are They and Why Do Their Climate Reports Matter?” Union of Concerned Scientists. https://www.ucsusa.org/global-warming/science-and-impacts/science/ipcc-backgrounder.html “If the report works and governments take it seriously, it should increase their ambition for expeditiously reducing emissions,” said Michael Oppenheimer, a climate scientist at Princeton.
▸ October 8, 2018. LISTEN: The IPCC Report is “an important reminder of the dangers we face and the work that n needs to be done…. the governments are lagging behind the people here.” — William Nordhaus, Yale. Telephone interview as he won the 2018 Nobel prize in economics. https://youtu.be/JAIgXIMFpsk’
“We’re going to have to really want it, and even then it will be tough…. We could order in Chinese and lock ourselves in the closet, but we shouldn’t. Because there’s good news: We’re perfect for the job. If the human species specializes in one thing, it’s taking on the impossible.”
▸. Schendler, Auden, and Jones, Andrew P. “Stopping Climate Change is Hopeless. Let’s Do It.” The New York Times, Oct. 6, 2018. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/06/opinion/sunday/climate-change-global-warming.html
▸ July 1, 2018: President Trump announces US withdrawal from the Paris Agreement.
▸ The Anthropocene Working Group met in Oslo in April 2016 to consolidate evidence supporting the argument for the Anthropocene as a true geologic epoch.[25]Evidence was evaluated and the group voted to recommend "Anthropocene" as the new geological age in August 2016.[8] Should the International Commission on Stratigraphy approve the recommendation, the proposal to adopt the term will have to be ratified by the IUGS before its formal adoption as part of the geologic time scale.[7]
▸ Friedman, Thomas L., “A Warning From the Garden.” The New York Times, Jan. 19, 2007. https://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/19/opinion/19friedman.html “The right rallying call is for a “Green New Deal.” The New Deal was not built on a magic bullet, but on a broad range of programs and industrial projects to revitalize America. Ditto for an energy New Deal. If we are to turn the tide on climate change and end our oil addiction, we need more of everything: solar, wind, hydro, ethanol, biodiesel, clean coal and nuclear power — and conservation. It takes a Green New Deal because to nurture all of these technologies to a point that they really scale would be a huge industrial project. If you have put a windmill in your yard or some solar panels on your roof, bless your heart. But we will only green the world when we change the very nature of the electricity grid — moving it away from dirty coal or oil to clean coal and renewables. And that is a huge industrial project — much bigger than anyone has told you. Finally, like the New Deal, if we undertake the green version, it has the potential to create a whole new clean power industry to spur our economy into the 21st century.”