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Media and political attention is being wasted on boosting the public’s notion of scientific consensus, crowding out more important discussion and action
In a democracy, we hope that science helps to inform the public about its problems. In the case of climate change, believe it or not, the evidence suggests this is going relatively well.
Climate science is a vast, sprawling field of knowledge that has achieved great success in occupying the public consciousness. According to Yale University’s Climate Change in the American Mind project, six in ten Americans are worried about global warming, seven in ten think global warming is happening and eight in ten think humans have the ability to reduce global warming. These figures have fluctuated very little since 2012, suggesting that the US public is relatively well informed about the risk, reality and policy potential of climate change, even in the face of well-documented attacks by climate sceptics.
.@ClimateNexus outrageously labels new #EnvComm commentary as "Denier Roundup," proving authors points abt efforts to close off debate. pic.twitter.com/4varP1J1Is
Continue reading...Rising temperatures and the resultant stress on India’s agricultural sector may have contributed to increase in suicides over the past 30 years, research shows
Climate change may have contributed to the suicides of nearly 60,000 Indian farmers and farm workers over the past three decades, according to new research that examines the toll rising temperatures are already taking on vulnerable societies.
Illustrating the extreme sensitivity of the Indian agricultural industry to spikes in temperature, the study from the University of California, Berkeley, found an increase of just 1C on an average day during the growing season was associated with 67 more suicides.
Related: Indian traders boycott Coca-Cola for 'straining water resources'
Continue reading...I feel for Laurie Penny, who is caught between pressure to have children and pressing reasons not to have them (‘Women shouldn’t apologise for the pitter-patter of tiny carbon footprints’, Review, 29 July). However, a solution is staring her in the face: respond to the pressure by citing the pressing reasons. Various global disasters are plausibly likely to occur in a few decades – see The Uninhabitable Earth by David Wallace-Wells. Even if Wallace-Wells’ article overestimates and only half of those disasters really occur, humans will be in for a rough time starting around mid-century. Thus, any man or woman who thinks of having children now should ask perself whether it is right to condemn them to go through that. Each baby not made is a step away from those disasters.Richard StallmanCambridge, Massachusetts
• Join the debate – email guardian.letters@theguardian.com
Continue reading...Researchers find that economic, emissions and population trends point to very small chance Earth will avoid warming more than 2C by century’s end
There is only a 5% chance that the Earth will avoid warming by at least 2C come the end of the century, according to new research that paints a sobering picture of the international effort to stem dangerous climate change.
Related: Bill Nye: 'You can shoot the messenger but climate is still changing'
Related: The fight against climate change: four cities leading the way in the Trump era
Continue reading...2017 is behind only El Niño-amplified 2016.
With the first six months of 2017 in the books, average global surface temperatures so far this year are 0.94°C above the 1950–1980 average, according to NASA. That makes 2017 the second-hottest first six calendar months on record, behind only 2016.
That’s remarkable because 2017 hasn’t had the warming influence of an El Niño event. El Niños bring warm ocean water to the surface, temporarily causing average global surface temperatures to rise. 2016 – including the first six months of the year – was influenced by one of the strongest El Niño events on record.
Continue reading...Australian Council of Social Service and Brotherhood of St Laurence warn of two-tiered energy system that favours the rich
Low-income and disadvantaged Australians are bearing the brunt of energy price rises caused by policy uncertainty, a new report has found.
The Australian Council of Social Service and the Brotherhood of St Laurence have warned they are receiving harrowing reports since steep rises in wholesale energy prices began in mid-2016.
Related: Clean energy target: how the states might make it work
Related: Next time you read your increased power bill, blame Tony Abbott | Matt Grudnoff
Related: Most Australians want renewables to be primary energy source, survey finds
Continue reading...Britain has joined France and India in trying to ban the sale of diesel and petrol cars, but some say Australia’s size makes the transition too difficult
It is only a matter of time until every Australian car is all-electric. But while other countries are speeding up the transition, with plans to ban petrol cars within a couple of decades, Australia is stuck debating even modest cuts to vehicle emissions, let alone policies to encourage zero-emissions cars.
But as the UK, France, India and other countries move quickly towards getting all petrol cars off the roads, could Australia’s fleet be caught up in the winds of change?
Related: Queensland to build one of the world's longest electric vehicle highways
Related: Britain to ban sale of all diesel and petrol cars and vans from 2040
Related: Electric cars: everything you need to know
Related: Auto industry fights back at plan to cut cars' greenhouse gas emissions
Continue reading...With the sequel to his blockbuster documentary An Inconvenient Truth about to be released, Al Gore tells Carole Cadwalladr how his role at the forefront of the fight against climate change consumes his life
In the ballroom of a conference centre in Denver, Colorado, 972 people from 42 countries have come together to talk about climate change. It is March 2017, six weeks since Trump’s inauguration; eight weeks before Trump will announce to the world that he is withdrawing America from the Paris Climate Agreement.
These are the early dark days of the new America and yet, in the conference centre, the crowd is upbeat. They’ve all paid out of their own pockets to travel to Denver. They have taken time off work. And they are here, in the presence of their master, Al Gore. Because Al Gore is to climate change… well, what Donald Trump is to climate change denial.
Large carbon polluters have spent up to $2bn spreading false doubt
Brexit, Trump, climate change, oil producers, dark money, Russian influence, it’s all connected
Big money has so much influence now. Our democracy has been hacked
Continue reading...A sickly sweet smell hangs in the air on the road that zigzags up to the medieval village of Carros, a route that was once lushly forested but now lies in ashes in the wake of wildfires that have devastated swathes of Provence’s countryside.
Among those venturing here on Friday to gaze at the apocalyptic vista of blackened trees were Lennard and Sofie Nystedt, a Swedish couple who were among around 10,000 holidaymakers and locals who were forced to flee to the safety of public shelters and hotels overnight on Tuesday as flames swept down hillsides.
Continue reading...They are one of the harshest environments on the planet and also one of the most important in terms of carbon storage. New research hopes to reveal the role these threatened bogs could play in the climate change story
Randy Kolka hands me a fist-sized clump of brownish-black material pulled up by an auger from a bog. It’s the color and texture of moist chocolate cake. When I look closely I can see filaments of plant material. This hunk of peat, pulled from two meters (7ft) below the surface, is about 8,000 years old. I’m holding plants that lived and died before the Egyptians constructed the pyramids and before humans invented the wheel. In my hand is history. And carbon gold.
You have to find a solution, you can’t just tell people not to burn
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