On Thursday, Maryland will become the first state in the nation to implement a ban on foam takeout containers. guruXOOX / iStock / Getty Images Plus
Maryland will become the first state in the nation Thursday to implement a ban on foam takeout containers.
<p>The law, which was passed in 2019, prohibits restaurants and other institutions that serve food, such as schools, from using polystyrene containers, <a href="https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/environment/bs-md-stryrofoam-ban-takes-effect-20200925-dc57ytrblbdqrmbvsk4lddyw5a-story.html" target="_blank">The Baltimore Sun reported</a>.</p><p>"Single-use <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/plastics" target="_self">plastics</a> are overrunning our <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/ocean" target="_self">oceans</a> and bays and neighborhoods," chief bill sponsor Democratic Delegate Brooke Lierman <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/03/13/health/maryland-plastic-foam-ban-legislation-trnd/index.html" target="_blank">told CNN when it passed.</a> "We need to take dramatic steps to start stemming our use and reliance on them ... to leave future generations a planet full of wildlife and green space."</p><p>Lierman said she had tried twice before to pass the bill, but a shift in public opinion against plastic pollution finally pushed it over the finish line.</p>
<p>The law was originally scheduled to go into effect July 1, but officials delayed it by three months because of the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/coronavirus" target="_self">coronavirus</a> pandemic, <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/27/us/maryland-foam-container-ban-trnd/index.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">CNN reported further</a>. Dining has shifted from table service to takeout, and the government wanted to give impacted businesses more time to use up their extra foam, The Baltimore Sun explained.</p><p>Some restaurant owners still oppose the ban, arguing that foam containers are cheaper and longer-lasting than alternatives.</p><p>"We don't like increased costs," Dan Schuman of Captain Dan's Crabhouse in Eldersburg told The Baltimore Sun. "No restaurant does. Because we have to pass that onto the customer."</p><p>He said he was raising prices to cover the cost of new plastic containers, as well as an upcoming minimum wage increase.</p>
<p>However, other restaurants have already made the change on their own and were pleased with the results. Victoria Gastro Pub bar manager Megan Purcell said the Victoria Restaurant Group switched to compostable takeaway containers two years ago.</p><p>"It's just the right thing to do and it was time," Purcell told <a href="https://www.wmar2news.com/news/state/md-foam-container-ban-goes-into-effect-thursday" target="_blank">WMAR</a>.</p><p>Environmentalists, meanwhile, say the ban will help fight the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change/" target="_self">climate crisis</a>, because foam containers are made from <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/fossil-fuels" target="_self">fossil fuels</a>, The Baltimore Sun reported. It will also keep the containers out of waterways.</p><p>This has already been the case for Maryland localities and cities that have banned foam containers ahead of the state, including Baltimore City, Anne Arundel, Montgomery and Prince George's counties.</p><p>In Baltimore, the trash wheels that prevent rubbish from entering the Inner Harbor reported a 40 percent reduction in polystyrene containers caught in their spokes.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/maine-bans-styrofoam-2636014775.html" target="_self">Maine</a>, New York and Vermont have passed similar bans, but they have not yet taken effect. Maryland regulators hope that their ban can be a model for these states and others considering phasing out the use of foam containers.</p><p>"We will learn how best to implement it," Maryland environment secretary Ben Grumbles told The Baltimore Sun, "and other states will watch us closely."</p>
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EcoWatch Daily Newsletter
A sea turtle and tropical fish swim in Oahu, Hawaii. M.M. Sweet / Moment / Getty Images
By Ajit Niranjan
Leaders from across the world have promised to turn environmental degradation around and put nature on the path to recovery within a decade.
<p><br/></p>
<p>"We are in a state of planetary emergency," the 65 leaders, who include German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, wrote ahead of a UN <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/biodiversity" target="_self">biodiversity</a> summit on Wednesday. "We commit ourselves not simply to words, but to meaningful action and mutual accountability."</p><p>The commitments, which come two days before a UN biodiversity summit in New York, include eliminating <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/plastics" target="_self">plastic</a> leakage to the <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/oceans" target="_self">oceans</a> by 2050 and <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/the-time-has-come-for-humanity-to-go-through-its-next-evolution/a-53589043" target="_blank">incentivizing banks and businesses</a> to value the natural world. The leaders identify unsustainable production and consumption as a key driver of environmental crises that "require urgent and immediate global action."</p><p>But strongmen leading some of the world's biggest polluters — <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/climate-emissions-paris-agreement/a-55044341" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">U.S., China, India, Russia and Brazil</a> — are not among the signatories.</p>
<h3>Missed Targets</h3><p>The pledge follows the September publication of a landmark assessment of biodiversity which showed humanity had failed to fully achieve any of the 20 global biodiversity targets set by the UN ten years ago. Just six of them had been "partly achieved," the report said. For one goal, on protecting <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/great-barrier-reef-suffers-third-mass-bleaching-in-5-years/a-52921894" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">coral reefs</a>, the world was found to be moving in the opposite direction.</p><p>Data from individual governments shows that a third of national biodiversity targets, which are set by the countries themselves, are on track to be met or exceeded. But these are less ambitious than the UN targets and less than a quarter match up well with the global goals to protect nature.</p><p>The vision for biodiversity set out in 2010 is only achievable if the world responds to "compelling evidence" that "transformative change" is required, said Elizabeth Maruma Mrema, executive secretary of the UN's Convention on Biological Diversity, which prepared the Global Biodiversity Outlook (GBO) report.</p>
<h3>Global Decline in Biodiversity</h3><p>The charge sheet is long. Pollution from <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/environment-conservation-plastic-oceans/a-54436603" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">plastics</a> and pesticides have not been brought down to safe levels. Governments still subsidize businesses that <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/insect-apocalypse-dying-ecosystem-species-loss-a-52160360/a-52160360" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">damage ecosystems</a>. Coral reefs, which are dying across the world, are struck by the triple-threat of human action: climate change, pollution and overfishing. Some of those drivers are getting worse.</p><p>And even where there is progress, it is rarely enough. <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/illegal-logging-mining-threaten-an-amazon-river-community/a-45631645" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Deforestation</a> should have been halted by now, but has only been cut by a third, with Asia and Europe gaining forests while Africa and South America lose them at a faster rate.</p><p>Conservation efforts have saved species like the Puerto Rican amazon parrot and the Mongolian Przewalski's horse. But they have failed to keep others like the Western Black Rhino or the Christmas Island pipistrelle from being wiped out forever.</p><p>While the big trends in biodiversity loss were already known, the UN report included "systematic analysis" on how well the world has achieved the 2010 targets, said Josef Settele, an ecologist at the Helmholtz Center for Environmental Research in Germany, who contributed research to the report but was not involved in writing it.</p>
<h3>Conservation Progress</h3><p>"There is also some brightness," Settele added. "The things we are doing are not completely in vain."</p><p>For instance, almost 100 countries have incorporated biodiversity values into national accounting systems. Over the last 20 years, the world has increased the share of <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/mauritius-oil-spill-compensation-pay/a-54725675" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">protected areas</a> from 10% to 15% on land and from 3% to 7% in water.</p><p>There are now more fish in waters managed by good fishing policies. Governments are increasingly eradicating invasive species from islands. And since 1993, conservation actions have prevented the extinction of between 28 and 48 bird and mammal species, according to a study published this month in the journal <a href="https://conbio.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/conl.12762" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Conservation Letters</a> — though many remain highly threatened and may still become extinct.</p><p>"The progress toward conserving life on earth has been much greater than it would have been [without action]," said Thomas Brooks, chief scientist at the International Union for Conservation of Nature, who was a co-author of the Conservation Letters study but was not involved in the GBO. "The absolutely key question is how to scale up from where things currently are, in terms of responses, to meet targets comprehensively."</p>
<h3>Protecting Wildlife, Not Just Individual Species</h3><p>The way to get that scale, according to the GBO report, is by "mainstreaming" the opportunities and responsibilities from protecting nature. That means every level of society — from individuals and local communities to businesses and national governments — would need to factor biodiversity into their economic decisions.</p><p>Like climate change, ecological collapse is happening at breakneck speed. A 2019 report by IPBES, the UN panel of biodiversity experts, found that humans are altering the natural world at an "unprecedented pace" and threatening 1 million animal and plant species with extinction.</p>
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNDQ0MzgxNC9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYzMzIwOTYzN30.FCDShn8HREGKfOXpVICLoFTFn5Ua_QZDoq-LTH1ZJpI/img.png?width=980" id="d848f" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="560723442ef37fb766ae77a14a2830de" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
<p>Scientists say both issues require systemic changes, but individual actions can help. Agriculture is one of the greatest drivers of biodiversity loss and greenhouse gas emissions. A study published in the journal <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2705-y" target="_blank"><em>Nature</em></a> this month found that more than two-thirds of future biodiversity losses could be avoided by conserving and restoring land, reducing food waste and switching to more plant-based diets.</p><p>They are among many actions laid out in the GBO report to reduce and eventually restore lost biodiversity.</p><p>If we do not act faster, said Inger Andersen, executive director of the UN Environment Program, "biodiversity will continue to buckle" under the weight of overexploitation, climate change, pollution, invasive alien species and changes to land and sea. "This will further damage human health, economies and societies — with particularly detrimental effects on <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/environment-nature-rights-indigenous-activism-legal-personhood/a-52186866" target="_blank">indigenous peoples</a> and local communities."</p>
<p><em>Reposted with permission from <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/global-biodiversity-outlook-targets-extinction-summit-new-york-pledge/a-54932895?maca=en-VAM_volltext_ecowatch-28485-html-copypaste" target="_blank">DW</a>.</em><br/></p>From Your Site Articles
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Smoke from the Glass Fire rises from the hills on September 27, 2020 in Calistoga, California. Justin Sullivan / Getty Images
Just days after a new report detailed the "unequivocal and pervasive role" climate change plays in the increased frequency and intensity of wildfires, new fires burned 10,000 acres on Sunday as a "dome" of hot, dry air over Northern California created ideal fire conditions over the weekend.
<p>In Napa County, the <a href="https://newsletter.climatenexus.org/e2t/tc/MVsnnZz8yLxW6P5d-B4dc0qsW8LzBkh4gwXy7N9cd5Jc3p_b1V1-WJV7CgWgFVy0qkd5XbdwLW5rt4gV4w-xTxV-h4Sg7DzJBzW5VDwxQ3l7DhlVCBttb6m7nxWW8h_xDy6FQdyWN1MjKcdcmhpSW2PLWml7pwBvcW1F6-cJ2tvc7YVLFDBf6T5bxTW23C4-w3v4S8DN8Q-7gX1b8vjW7qpRrH4rKWlkW30JwJZ855nXJW19qdGb16-Nl-W3j2wJ85gX-N5W23Yjdj2WwgVkW1jYthC6rq58qW84KgzL4s_BFqN1gy5rt_sw_1W6SFvpr79sx-dW8BvcQr56DrDjW4QJnYK7VYJQqW3pXL934WSgQ_VkF-F63ZtxGzW3LYfZW47SGGpW8QTrvx7qv7wjW6fxRYj96cjcGW42NZpM87shmPW6_T2nL6KbSm_2jj1" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Glass Fire</a> burned more than 2,500 acres, forcing at least 2,000 residents and a hospital to evacuate and threatening about 2,200 structures. </p><p>The fire tore through vineyards and jumped two rivers Sunday evening and was zero percent contained as of late Sunday night. </p><p>"It's a cremation," Craig Battuello, whose family has raised grapes in St. Helena for more than a century, told KPIX.</p>
<p>As of Monday morning, the Shady and Boysen Fires, burning near the Sonoma-Napa county line were believed to be spot fires from the Glass Fire. </p><p>Further north, the <a href="https://newsletter.climatenexus.org/e2t/tc/MVsnnZz8yLxW6P5d-B4dc0qsW8LzBkh4gwXy7N9cd5Jc3p_b1V1-WJV7CgCKFW50rbql5Kh3Q5N2KHP3P2ScQpW1P-1sG1C8V06W2CLx6N7GgT9BW8qGKpg2vggG-N8vd4vHfRgblW8zkwnS7lVrSGVcvmJ783gfdwW6jC5L78V29r2W2c49zy50gjRHW1ZlstL5wlHn9W6XZmDT55sqxNVCbwwc7xFcL0W6_mQlr1b_tzxN15BHn-N0nvsW6xCrys8JvpZRN2yl4Z979WpGW9jcx4F5zKNh_W4fwqXR5CcvncW4RDx9Z3wWt60N10kQLMKP46nW2JkYKK1j91VMW8928mj2dj6KdW7KgRGL7GLxJyW7yzmXm8dT1KxW8ZDR5K92wwwvW7W69vt7mSF4TW2BvFh62rGtxHW2Mr1r98ZFby7W98zv6k3y1t0n2jH1" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Zogg Fire</a> had burned 7,000 acres as of Sunday evening. </p><p>Electricity will be shut off for 65,000 Northern California customers in 16 counties to prevent the spread of the fires.</p>
<p><strong>For a deeper dive:</strong></p><p>Increased frequency and intensity: <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-54278988?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=96174415&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-8qp2mUDhBu291ydfwMMiNGyBDHagoosg_k0IqcpI7CtDhXLM4ZmHgVGa2PRKbaxWoLM6t_MPwLlThcOqkbF70YlOx1D3YHNqvErsDeqFeQuAoxwfg&utm_content=96174415&utm_source=hs_email" target="_blank">BBC</a>, <a href="https://www.eenews.net/climatewire/2020/09/25/stories/1063714657?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=96174415&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-9sDZNbxU236xY4m-Wo12Sv03RABQinScs_T_bXj4OydAg0HafEAxz-H2tjZKojcYTytgAwY8kgfctp1KmPD3T51QSw1yqzM2Lj9nwXcoZ5f1nJLS4&utm_content=96174415&utm_source=hs_email" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">E&E</a>; Weekend conditions: <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2020/09/27/california-wildfires-winds-heat/?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=96174415&_hsenc=p2ANqtz--eGMrt1syferudaktlGVVKMEY0GtRdCEFE9kh0KVmGUeUqMyFxCIQ0uuU2lQiOoEr4QLg9SDVH3DRcvNTzOD1qgp5_WGz9BcjX4N6GuTxUYJeS0iY&utm_content=96174415&utm_source=hs_email" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Washington Post</a>, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/sep/25/california-heatwave-temperatures-wildfires?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=96174415&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-852YwT7VEURpg5t5xAoR9oxVViLPVsN2P0wwSp11Y3ArzCpfgKhMttNcRhmr_ZAomIiv3yOhYRU9x44rztsRiJh1QWy3JUwMnn5w_RhEaPG7mkePg&utm_content=96174415&utm_source=hs_email" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">The Guardian</a>, <a href="https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/Hot-temperatures-high-fire-danger-and-slightly-15599419.php?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=96174415&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-_deidYKtyzBYgRzfz2uTLKmxXv7ayQ9lx4prpYBmk0kLTr7XmVEO45lydcOhKT74ojRRHrUShZFsnjD4TQoNdt38iAOjvFlvIkNgg1flRtlzrqUkw&utm_content=96174415&utm_source=hs_email" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">San Francisco Chronicle</a>; Fires: <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/28/us/california-wildfires-zogg-fire-glass-fire-monday/index.html?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=96174415&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-_6pqkRWXQh8abROXh8Hd8JX9gf5cB1_tgZjEct1oPBJU-OrfFF6Q8f60lOTKo-GU2tzseTSf9Kv0RNIhWzEacsX3m07IuEMen-BjYaTXskOaX9vMk&utm_content=96174415&utm_source=hs_email" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">CNN</a>, <a href="https://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2020/09/28/wildfire-erupts-near-st-helena-evacuations-underway-in-neighborhoods-near-silverado-trail/?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=96174415&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-8mQ894hiDyvTPS1n2NPmnSWmEw4Lq7lWXD4R9cqHT4X8F9PuphlEQ31smYpTnEAm9eJ1U4o02_809pVEuttvmBz9a4J9bK1xqiiT0eCKP6tAb7aQk&utm_content=96174415&utm_source=hs_email" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">KPIX</a>, <a href="https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/calistoga-st-helena-deer-park-wildfire-evacuations-15600692.php?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=96174415&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-9F4-Wab7eZREhnULDmGIV0k9x_NThFQU5_MSquHuNaZDkQ7bRH6a4Yu-qDDXa55xAVioefHg3tLRHunHs43IHEeaKIrF1QvA6KBmbV5pgy7QjydDY&utm_content=96174415&utm_source=hs_email" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">San Francisco Gate</a>, <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/california-wildfires0st-helena-wine-country-napa-county-today-2020-09-28/?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=96174415&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-9P0BbBx9nYT3T_1W-lOffDYHQEjYmkZbDQQIibib1tKlKDaqb51l8wXnA6X5XEXFXkzvfGhFT2z79GUksHfelxxg4MVYL0bPHMOlCY5A65LlPsFHc&utm_content=96174415&utm_source=hs_email" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">CBS</a>, <a href="https://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/news/early-morning-napa-county-fire-grows-to-800-acres/?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=96174415&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-9Exio8Ld8lxE0RHLM1p_BgKjdAw9k32hG2HsVJiYGLt3RNPgtSKhF03njhfHjzZlgD9DRwXqHzr10D8ESwuVg7A9wh0Rp9bPno6hjxvZ3wuXPRzPo&utm_content=96174415&utm_source=hs_email" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">The Press Democrat</a>, <a href="https://www.sfchronicle.com/california-wildfires/article/Wildfire-breaks-out-near-St-Helena-in-Napa-15600677.php?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=96174415&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-99w-thHE2aSzf_q6Xk1dgS6yrogihar09euhVC0DLPcYKVgtV0q10OqQhPZWSfU4T404sedEO8ONHYXClq4HmIwj3L2Qe3_8lbm7JIt2LVUjLJxCc&utm_content=96174415&utm_source=hs_email" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">San Francisco Chronicle</a>, <a href="https://abc7news.com/wildfires-trigger-new-evacuation-orders-in-napa-county/6619307/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">ABC-7 KGO News</a>, <a href="https://www.mercurynews.com/2020/09/27/fire-breaks-out-in-napa-as-forecasters-predict-hot-smoky-week/?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=96174415&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-91dr7E9vqo3PKR-X9I3GwmK5scJrwMwNSrP6keEdMz9OtJtMplme2bHxd5_ifedEYGRxjWBUN_ENqITOVBN2pUdFobXvQHWm5LUisYU0sJcru9b4Q&utm_content=96174415&utm_source=hs_email" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Mercury News</a>, <a href="https://krcrtv.com/news/local/fire-breaks-out-in-igo?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=96174415&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-_YUqKikCN8aIADKO_iTe_OqXWKrw5UUYBNuwNHJX914J9zo_nLfPjCd-7DlhquzwJJgLe53hGZYorAMbJ5AOb1Rdx0xVYXjwwjj12TjjjHrZSqmSs&utm_content=96174415&utm_source=hs_email" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">KRCR</a>, <a href="https://sfist.com/2020/09/27/napa-county-glass-fire-grows-to-over-800-acres-more-evacuations-underway-structures-burned-as-blaze-continues-ballooning/?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=96174415&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-9ltVJVENifXl3oUfL35FYoQ3V3kLoZchjPypQecv1NlGERt1mMFbUPlwXdxHLOeAV8faIokxuwaY3ytvFDyz795UAyxF-uYAMOrgf-OfhGLD196vg&utm_content=96174415&utm_source=hs_email" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">SFist</a>, <a href="https://www.sfchronicle.com/california-wildfires/article/California-blazes-exploding-New-evacuations-from-15602171.php?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=96174415&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-9dkNr9eCqgGEvxi7dOEa1aCUevyW70sAoQecnkS5HXDhUnLD7j22Q0CbtWWj-QIZOAHcVir2IcolKHa58GHN4jLhEp03DjMLML6hxI0-aY6EQnV3w&utm_content=96174415&utm_source=hs_email" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">San Francisco Chronicle</a>, <a href="https://weather.com/news/news/2020-09-27-california-napa-county-glass-fire-impacts-evacuations?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=96174415&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-9dHhWSMpBzxlxna9RotW7frfqtFg37auwCIa7aomquA5T0AocvkVfG4cXDC46SDmnLmRY5H4DZleZFT5J6o5pqaqGxhrrOfvJpMSabN5m_8ToB39A&utm_content=96174415&utm_source=hs_email" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Weather Channel</a>; Climate signals background: <a href="https://www.climatesignals.org/climate-change-wildfires?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=96174415&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-9zQsXAgonNscvqMBp2K5xbAheSFH5-kQT_5wAP3h2PJMHU4BrnyEMk0rDW8Y7i6GEy__b9ICr4Wq88tNUf6Y10Q4t9gWyCHDhIjx7tiiHjVdBBP8A&utm_content=96174415&utm_source=hs_email" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Wildfires</a>, <a href="https://www.climatesignals.org/events/western-wildfire-season-2020?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_medium=email&_hsmi=96174415&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-_jlihPzlQ5DGWbcnHKcnMuMmAZLm2WudQwftKMhR4ey5l8X06_xMSJqNkdNBq4nj6SMP1pr2rIH_4BDtVYCZ5dB2V6pRZ_Ka6CMg6qOQFA0koy2Z8&utm_content=96174415&utm_source=hs_email" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">2020 Western wildfire season</a><br/></p><p><em>For more </em><a href="http://ecowatch.com/climate-change-news/" target="_blank"><em>climate change</em></a><em> and </em><a href="http://ecowatch.com/business/renewables/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><em>clean energy</em></a><em> news, you can follow Climate Nexus on </em><a href="https://twitter.com/ClimateNexus" target="_blank"><em>Twitter</em></a><em> and </em><a href="https://www.facebook.com/ClimateNexus/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><em>Facebook</em></a><em>, and sign up for daily </em><a href="http://climatenexus.us4.list-manage1.com/subscribe?u=d1f5797e59060083034310930&id=7c84c08aaa" target="_blank"><em>Hot News</em></a><em>. </em></p>From Your Site Articles
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Sir David Attenborough speaks at the launch of the UK-hosted COP26 UN Climate Summit at the Science Museum on Feb. 4, 2020 in London, England. Jeremy Selwyn - WPA Pool / Getty Images
Sir David Attenborough wants to share a message about the climate crisis. And it looks like his fellow Earthlings are ready to listen.
<p>The beloved 94-year-old nature broadcaster joined Instagram Thursday, and quickly broke the world record for the shortest amount of time to reach one million followers, <a href="https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/news/2020/9/sir-david-attenborough-breaks-instagram-record-for-fastest-time-to-reach-one-mill-632391" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Guinness World Records announced</a>. He reached the milestone in just two hours and 44 minutes.</p><p>"I've been appearing on radio and television for the past 60 years," Attenborough said in a video accompanying his first post, "but this is my first time on Instagram."</p>
<div id="c7bda" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="43ae754c1b220cbfda72d241f25dbf5d"><blockquote class="instagram-media"
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<p>In the video, Attenborough said he was trying the new (to him) form of communication in order to spread awareness about the threats facing life on Earth.</p><p>"As we all know, the world is in trouble," he said. "Continents are on fire. Glaciers are melting. Coral reefs are dying. Fish are disappearing from our oceans. The list goes on and on. But we know what to do about it."</p><p>Attenborough said he would be recording video messages over the next few weeks explaining both the problems facing our planet and possible solutions.</p>
<p>In breaking the record Thursday, Attenborough racked up one million followers more quickly than Friends star Jennifer Aniston, the previous record holder who amassed one million followers in five hours and 16 minutes last October. Previous record holders also included Pope Francis and the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, Guinness said.</p><p>As of Monday morning, the broadcaster had a follower count of 4.5 million. That's still well below the highest total Instagram follower count, which is held by soccer star Cristiano Ronaldo with 238 million, according to <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-54292947" target="_blank">BBC News</a>.</p><p>This isn't the first time that Attenborough has broken a record in his decades-long career, Guinness World Records pointed out. He also holds the record for the longest career as both a TV presenter and a TV naturalist.</p>
<p>While Attenborough is recording the messages for his Instagram account, the account is being managed by some of the team behind the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/environment-movies-2020-2647790203.html" target="_self">new documentary</a> <em>David Attenborough: A Life on Our Planet</em>, which <a href="https://www.netflix.com/title/80216393" target="_blank">premieres on Netflix Oct. 4</a>.</p><p>"Social media isn't David's usual habitat," director Jonnie Hughes and executive producer Colin Butfield of the <a href="https://www.worldwildlife.org/" target="_blank">World Wildlife Fund</a> explained in the text accompanying the post.</p><p>The pair said the Instagram feed would also feature exclusive clips and behind-the-scenes footage from the new film.</p><p>"Saving our planet is now a communications challenge," Hughes and Butfield wrote. "We know what to do, we just need the will."</p>
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People walk down a flooded street as they evacuate their homes after the area was inundated with flooding from Hurricane Harvey on August 27, 2017 in Houston, Texas. Joe Raedle / Getty Images
Kevin T. Smiley
When hurricanes and other extreme storms unleash downpours like Tropical Storm Beta has been doing in the South, the floodwater doesn't always stay within the government's flood risk zones.
New research suggests that nearly twice as many properties are at risk from a 100-year flood today than the Federal Emergency Management Agency's flood maps indicate.
<p>Unfortunately, many of the people living in those properties have no idea that their homes are at risk until the floodwaters rise.</p><p>I am a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=SmYUxIEAAAAJ&hl=en" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">sociologist who works on disaster vulnerability</a>. In a new study, I looked at the makeup of communities in Houston that aren't in the 100-year flood zone, but that still flood. What I found tells a story of racial disparities in the city. Research in other cities has shown <a href="https://www.nap.edu/read/25381/chapter/4" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">similar flooding problems</a> in predominantly Black and Hispanic neighborhoods.</p><p>Poor stormwater infrastructure, expanding urbanization and limited flood mitigation efforts are a few of the reasons why.</p>
Flooding Outside the Zones
<p>About <a href="https://furmancenter.org/files/Floodplain_PopulationBrief_12DEC2017.pdf" target="_blank">15 million</a> Americans live in FEMA's current 100-year flood zones. The designation warns them that their properties face a 1% risk of flooding in any given year. They must obtain flood insurance if they want a federally ensured loan – insurance that helps them recover from flooding.</p><p>In Greater Houston, however, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1539-6924.2012.01840.x" target="_blank">47% of claims</a> made to FEMA across three decades before Hurricane Harvey were outside of the 100-year flood zones. Harris County, recognizing that FEMA flood maps don't capture the full risk, now <a href="https://www.hcfcd.org/floodinsurance" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">recommends that every household</a> in Houston and the rest of the county have flood insurance.</p><p>New risk models point to a similar conclusion: Flood risk in these areas outstrips expectations in the current FEMA flood maps.</p><p>One of those models, from the <a href="https://firststreet.org/flood-lab/research/2020-national-flood-risk-assessment-highlights/" target="_blank">First Street Foundation</a>, estimates that the number of properties at risk in a 100-year storm is 1.7 times higher than the FEMA maps suggest. Other <a href="https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/aaac65" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">researchers</a> find an even higher margin, with 2.6 to 3.1 times more people exposed to serious flooding in a 100-year storm than FEMA estimates.</p>What FEMA’s Flood Maps Miss
<p>Understanding why areas outside the 100-year flood zones are flooding more often than the FEMA maps suggest involves larger social and environmental issues. Three reasons stand out.</p><p>First, some places rely on relatively old FEMA maps that don't account for recent urbanization.</p><p>Urbanization matters because impervious surfaces – think pavement and buildings – are not effective sponges like natural landscapes can be. Moreover, the process for updating floodplain maps is locally variable and can take years to complete. Famously, New York City was updating its maps when Hurricane Sandy hit in 2012 but hadn't finished, meaning flood maps in effect <a href="https://projects.propublica.org/nyc-flood/" target="_blank">were from 1983</a>. FEMA is required to assess whether updates are needed every five years, but the <a href="https://www.fema.gov/cis/nation.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">majority of maps</a> <a href="https://www.oig.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/assets/2017/OIG-17-110-Sep17.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">are older</a>.</p><p>Second, binary thinking can lead people to an underaccounting of risk, and that can mean communities fail to take steps that could protect a neighborhood from flooding. The logic goes: if I'm not in the 100-year floodplain, then I'm not at risk. Risk perception <a href="https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ab195a" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">research</a> backs this up. FEMA-delineated flood zones are the major factor shaping flood mitigation behaviors.</p><p>Third, the era of climate change scuttles conventional assumptions.</p><p>As the planet warms, extreme storms are becoming <a href="https://nca2018.globalchange.gov/" target="_blank">more common and severe</a>. If greenhouse gas emissions continue to increase at a high rate, computer models suggest that the chances of a severe storm dropping 20 inches of rain on Texas in any given year will increase from about 1% at the end of the last century to 18% at the end of this one, a chance of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1716222114" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">once every 5.5 years</a>. So far, <a href="https://www.rstreet.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/195.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">FEMA hasn't taken into account the impact climate change is having</a> on extreme weather and sea level rise.</p>Racial Disparities in Flooding Outside the Zones
<p>So, who is at risk?</p><p>Years of research and evidence from storms have highlighted social inequalities in areas with a high risk of flooding. But most local governments have less understanding of the social and demographic composition of communities that experience flood impacts outside of flood zones.</p><p>In analyzing the damage from Hurricane Harvey in the Houston area, I found that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/aba0fe" target="_blank">Black and Hispanic residents disproportionately experienced flooding</a> in areas beyond FEMA's 100-year flood zones.</p><p>With the majority of flooding from Hurricane Harvey occurring outside of 100-year flood zones, this meant that the overall impact of Harvey was racially unequal too.</p><p>Research into where flooding occurs in Baltimore, Chicago and Phoenix points to some of the potential causes. <a href="https://www.nap.edu/read/25381/chapter/4#16" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">In Baltimore and Chicago</a>, for example, aging storm and sewer infrastructure, poor construction and insufficient efforts to mitigate flooding are part of the flooding problem in some predominantly Black neighborhoods.</p>What Can Be Done About It
<p>Better accounting for those three reasons could substantively improve risk assessments and help cities prioritize infrastructure improvements and flood mitigation projects in these at-risk neighborhoods.</p><p>For example, First Street Foundation's risk maps account for <a href="https://firststreet.org/flood-lab/research/flood-model-methodology_overview/" target="_blank">climate change</a> and present <a href="https://floodfactor.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">ratings</a> on a scale from 1 to 10. FEMA, which works with communities to update flood maps, is <a href="https://www.fema.gov/media-library-data/1521054297905-ca85d066dddb84c975b165db653c9049/TMAC_2017_Annual_Report_Final508(v8)_03-12-2018.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">exploring rating systems</a>. And the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine recently <a href="https://www.nationalacademies.org/news/2019/03/new-report-calls-for-different-approaches-to-predict-and-understand-urban-flooding" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">called for a new generation of flood maps</a> that takes climate change into account.</p><p>Including recent urbanization in those assessments will matter too, especially in fast-growing cities like Houston, where <a href="https://authors.elsevier.com/a/1boBRyDvMFW6W" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">386 new square miles</a> of impervious surfaces were created in the last 20 years. That's greater than the land area of New York City. New construction in one area can also <a href="https://scalawagmagazine.org/2018/01/city-in-a-swamp-as-houston-booms-its-flood-problems-are-only-getting-worse/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">impact older neighborhoods downhill</a> during a flood, as some Houston communities discovered in Hurricane Harvey.</p><p>Improving risk assessments is needed not just to better prepare communities for major flood events, but also to prevent racial inequalities – in housing and beyond – from <a href="https://www.npr.org/2019/03/05/688786177/how-federal-disaster-money-favors-the-rich" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">growing</a> after the unequal impacts of disasters.</p>From Your Site Articles
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Trump's Bureau of Land Management Chief Forced Out After Judge Says He's Serving Unlawfully
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Politics
William Perry Pendley is questioned at a National Parks, Forests, and Public Lands Subcommittee hearing on Sept. 10, 2019. Natural Resources Democrats
A federal judge in Montana ordered William Perry Pendley, the head of the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), to quit immediately after finding that the Trump administration official had served in the post unlawfully for 14 months, according to CNN.
<p>The ruling may reverse an entire year of decisions that Pendley made to open up the American West to oil and gas drilling, as <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2020/09/26/william-pendley-blm-montana-judge/" target="_blank">The Washington Post</a> reported. The judge in the case, <a href="https://www.mtd.uscourts.gov/chief-judge-brian-morris-chambers" target="_blank" title="">Brian Morris</a> of the U.S. District Court for the District of Montana, said that Pendley had been appointed to the post, but his name had never been submitted to the Senate for confirmation.</p><p>"Pendley has served and continues to serve unlawfully as the Acting B.L.M. director," wrote Morris in a 34-page ruling he issued on Friday, as <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/26/us/william-perry-pendley-blm.html" target="_blank">The New York Times</a> reported. He added that Pendley's authority "did not follow any of the permissible paths set forth by the U.S. Constitution."</p>
<p>He added, as CNN reported, "Secretary Bernhardt lacked the authority to appoint Pendley as an Acting B.L.M Director under the (Federal Vacancies Reform Act). Pendley unlawfully took the temporary position beyond the 210-day maximum allowed by the F.V.R.A. Pendley unlawfully served as Acting B.L.M Director after the President submitted his permanent appointment to the Senate for confirmation — another violation of the F.V.R.A. And Pendley unlawfully serves as Acting B.L.M Director today, under color of the Succession Memo."</p><p>The ruling went on to prohibit Secretary of the Interior David Bernhardt, who appointed Pendley, from appointing a successor, according to The New York Times.</p>
<p>The plaintiff in the case, Montana's Governor Steve Bullock, now has 10 days to present examples of decisions Pendley made that should be nullified, according to The Washington Post.</p><p>"They've never had a valid person running that agency," said Brett Hartl, government affairs director at the Center for Biological Diversity, as <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/sep/26/trump-public-lands-chief-removed-william-perry-pendley" target="_blank">The Guardian</a> reported. "Even before Pendley there was just a never-ending list of rotating acting people, and that's not what you're supposed to do."</p><p>Hartl added the lack of legitimate leadership could mean every BLM decision from the last three years is reversed.</p>
<p>"If this case becomes a template in other districts, then it would follow that all other land use plans that have been approved during Pendley's illegal tenure could also get thrown out," said Aaron Weiss, deputy director of the Center for Western Priorities, as The Washington Post reported. "The potential implication there is stunning — effectively erasing all of the planning work B.L.M has finalized over the last year, possibly longer."</p><p>On Friday, Bullock wrote on <a href="https://twitter.com/GovernorBullock/status/1309635303146057729" target="_blank">Twitter</a>, "Today's ruling is a win for the Constitution, the rule of law, and our <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/public-lands">public lands</a>. Montanans can rest easy knowing that National Public Lands Day will begin with William Perry Pendley packing his desk and vacating the Director's Office."</p><p>Joe Biden took to <a href="https://twitter.com/JoeBiden/status/1309887202529177601" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Twitter</a> on Saturday to echo Bullock's sentiment. "Today is Public Lands Day and National Hunting and Fishing Day — and what better way to celebrate than the long overdue removal of William Perry Pendley from @blmnational. It's a victory for everyone who values our public lands over those who want to exploit them for profit."</p>
<p>The decision may have a cascading effect for federal policy since the administration has not nominated 133 of the 750 leadership positions that require Senate confirmation, as The Washington Post reported. That means their decisions could be nullified as well.</p><p>"We're talking here about an acting official or someone designated to be the equivalent who may have no authority to make decisions," said Max Stier, president of the Partnership for Public Service, to The Washington Post. "It creates uncertainty across the board and there are many other instances where the same or similar circumstances might exist."</p><p>Bullock started the lawsuit after Pendley tried to open up vast areas in southwest Montana to oil and gas drilling. The BLM manages 27 million acres in Montana, roughly one-third of the state. In one area, Pendley attempted to lease 95 percent of a 650,000-acre area to oil and gas exploration.</p><p>"This ruling enshrines in law what Montanans already knew: William Perry Pendley has no business overseeing our public lands," Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.) said in a statement, as The Washington Post reported. "Montanans and future generations will benefit from Governor Bullock's work protecting our public lands from Pendley's reckless agenda."</p>
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President Donald Trump hands coal miners the pen he used to sign a bill eliminating environmental regulations on the mining industry at the White House in Washington, D.C., on February 16, 2017. Nicholas Kamm / AFP / Getty Images
By Oliver Milman
Art Sullivan is considered something of a political heretic by other coal miners in south-western Pennsylvania, where a wave of support for Donald Trump based upon his flamboyant promises of a resurgence in coal helped propel the Republican to the U.S. presidency.
"Many of my coal miner friends voted for him," said Sullivan, who has spent 54 years as a coal miner and, more latterly, consultant to a struggling industry. "They were deceived. Trump had no plan, no concept of how to resurrect the coal industry. My friends were lied to."
<p>Sullivan's friends may disagree with this assessment but the coal comeback promised by Trump in the 2016 election campaign has failed to materialize, with his first term studded with bankruptcies and closures of mines and coal-fired power plants.</p><p>There are now about 5,000 fewer miners than when Trump strode into the White House. The coronavirus pandemic has turbo-charged the decline – so far this year U.S. coal production has <a href="https://www.eia.gov/coal/production/weekly/?src=email" target="_blank">collapsed</a> by more than 25% compared with the same period in 2019.</p><p>It has been a bruising few years rather than the glorious new dawn promised when Trump donned a miner's helmet, mimed digging coal and excoriated Barack Obama's "war on coal" on the campaign trail four years ago. One of Trump's <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/remarks-president-trump-signing-executive-order-create-energy-independence/" target="_blank">first executive orders</a> removed a ban on coal mining on federal land and dumped Obama's plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. "Come on, fellas," said Trump at the order's signing, where he was surrounded by beaming miners. "Basically, you know what this is? You know what it says, right? You're going back to work."</p><p>Such assurances were eagerly accepted by coal mining communities in <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/west-virginia" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">West Virginia</a>, Pennsylvania and Kentucky who backed Trump and prepared for salvation. "When he came into office, it was like someone pulled their finger out of the dyke," said Thomas McLoughlin, a former mine inspector who trains new miners. "I was flooded with new mining students. It was overwhelming." McLoughlin said he would vote for the president again because Trump was the only candidate prepared to stand up for coal workers. "My business won't go under if he's re-elected," he added.</p>
<p>The Trump administration has set about weakening or scrapping a slew of environmental rules that bound the industry, such as requirements that new coal-fired power plants capture their carbon emissions and that coal firms do not release <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/aug/31/trump-toxic-water-pollution-wastewater" target="_blank">wastewater laced with dangerous pollutants</a>, such as lead, selenium and arsenic, into rivers and streams.</p><p>Bob Murray, a major Trump donor and founder of the largest private coal company in the U.S., has <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/a-coal-executives-action-plan-for-trump-is-made-public/" target="_blank">boasted</a> of an "action plan" he gave the administration to undo what he called "eight years of pure hell" under Obama. Much of Murray's three-and-a-half-page wishlist has been ticked off, including the U.S. withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement. A particular prize was <a href="https://e360.yale.edu/digest/trump-administration-to-weaken-limits-on-mercury-and-other-toxic-pollutants" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">a weakening of Obama-era standards</a> to reduce mercury pollution from coal plants, a rollback undertaken after Andrew Wheeler, a former lobbyist for Murray Energy, became administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency.</p><p>"We are still feeling the effects of the damage from the Obama administration," said Jason Bostic, vice-president of the West Virginia Coal Association. "The social devastation in mining communities has been breathtaking. The support for <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/donaldtrump" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Donald Trump</a> is as strong if not stronger than in 2016. West Virginia is a Democratic state that has been dyed deep red because of the last administration."</p><p>But while Appalachia will largely stick with Trump in 2020, more coal capacity <a href="https://www.eenews.net/stories/1063430425" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">has been retired</a> under Trump than during Obama's second term. "Coal's not back," as Cecil Roberts, president of the United Mine Workers of America, glumly conceded last year. "Nobody saved the coal industry."</p>
<p>Coal production fell so sharply last year that renewable energy such as solar and wind <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/jun/03/renewables-surpass-coal-us-energy-generation-130-years" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">overtook it in electricity generation for the first time since at least 1885</a>, the year Mark Twain published The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, America's first skyscraper was erected in Chicago and people were burning more wood than coal. Last year also saw Murray Energy <a href="https://www.waterwaysjournal.net/2019/11/08/murray-energy-files-for-chapter-11-protection/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">file for bankruptcy</a>, one of half a dozen coal companies to do so that year.</p><p>Cheap, abundant gas, retrieved via fracking, and the advance of renewables have been greater causes of coal's demise than any green regulation, <a href="https://kleinmanenergy.upenn.edu/sites/default/files/proceedingsreports/Whither-the-Regulatory-War-on-Coal.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">experts say</a>, rendering Trump's rollbacks simply environmentally destructive.</p><p>"The fall of coal is first and foremost a market story," said Daniel Kaffine, a University of Colorado economist who has <a href="https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/pol.20150321" target="_blank">researched the issue</a>. "The days of coal supplying the majority of U.S. electricity production are not coming back." While metallurgical coal – needed for the making of steel – will hang on, the practice of burning thermal coal for energy is in "a death spiral," Kaffine said.</p><p><span></span>There are about 45,000 coal miners <a href="https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES1021210001" target="_blank">left in the U.S</a>., half the number employed during Obama's first term. Plenty of political rhetoric surrounds a workforce that is actually quite small – there are double the number of flight attendants in the U.S. than coal miners, for example, and roughly the same number of chiropractors.</p>
<p>Whole communities sprang up around mining, however, meaning several dependent jobs are lost for each miner put out of work. The long decline of well-paying mining jobs, through machinery automation and now creeping obsolescence, has left deep scars in Appalachian towns now blighted by unemployment and opioid addiction.</p><p>"People drank Trump's Kool-Aid and he hasn't done it for them," said Blair Zimmerman, a former coal miner who is now commissioner of Greene county, Pennsylvania. "I'm very worried about the future because without mining, our tax base would go and we couldn't survive. People are leaving the area, it's tough. We should have looked at other options a long time ago."</p><p><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/joebiden" target="_blank">Joe Biden</a>, the Democratic presidential nominee, has outlined a $2tn plan to generate millions of jobs in renewable energy, potentially providing a new path for threatened coal workers. But coal mining has deep roots in communities that many are unwilling to relinquish. "It's a damned joke," said Bostic, of the West Virginia Coal Association. "It's an affront to a coal miner to say: 'We will take your job away for one that pays less well, and by the way, you have to pack your family up and move.'"</p><p>According to Sullivan, coal miners feel they have little choice. "The coal miner had no friends and was desperate," he said. "No one was speaking for us and then Trump was, so people backed him. Miners see him as their guy."</p>
<p>The externalities of coal reach far beyond mining communities, however. As the most carbon-intensive of fuels, coal is a key driver of the climate crisis, indirectly spurring the sorts of huge wildfires that have ravaged the U.S. west coast this year, as well as the continuing deterioration of the polar ice sheets that imperil coastal cities through sea level rise and storms.</p><p>Direct air pollution from the soot and chemicals given off by burned coal is also a major health burden. Not far from Sullivan and his friends, the Cheswick power plant, close to the banks of the Allegheny River, is close enough to people's homes that nearby residents have to <a href="https://earthjustice.org/features/photos-life-under-the-stacks" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">wipe the coal soot from their houses</a>. Five miles downstream towards Pittsburgh, in the suburb of Verona, Laura Jacko suspects emissions from the power plant could be behind her husband's asthma and the breathing problems suffered by her son, who was born prematurely.</p><p>"There is nothing more horrifying than holding down your small baby to shove a breathing machine into them," Jacko said. "It affects me personally and I get pretty angry about it."</p><p>Environmental groups have long pushed for the closure of Cheswick, which has previously <a href="https://gasp-pgh.org/2020/08/17/cheswick-generating-station-assessed-32k-civil-penalty-for-emissions-issues/" target="_blank">been handed a civil penalty</a> for breaching pollution limits. In Jacko's view, the era of coal needs to come to a managed but swift end. "My uncle was a coal worker and had black lung," a disease that develops from inhaling coal dust, she said. "I don't want their jobs to kill them. I want them to transition. These jobs are going away, it's just a matter of when. Pushing ahead with coal does everyone a disservice."</p>
<p><em>This story originally appeared in</em> <em><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/" target="_blank">The Guardian</a></em> <em>and is republished here as part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story.</em></p>From Your Site Articles
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'Regenerative Agriculture and the Soil Carbon Solution': New Paper Outlines Vision for Climate Action
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Climate
A new white paper explains how to transform current widespread agricultural practices to regenerative agriculture. PickPik
By Andrea Germanos
A white paper out Friday declares that "there is hope right beneath our feet" to address the climate crisis as it touts regenerative agriculture as a "win-win-win" solution to tackling runaway carbon emissions.
<p>"Humans broke the planet with grave agricultural malpractice," Tom Newmark, chairman of <a href="https://thecarbonunderground.org/" target="_blank">The Carbon Underground</a> and a contributor to the research, said in a <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2020/09/25/new-white-paper-shows-shift-regenerative-ag-could-sequester-100-percent-annual" target="_blank">statement</a>. "With this white paper, Rodale Institute shows us how regenerative agriculture has the potential to repair that damage and actually reverse some of the threatening impacts of our climate crisis."</p><p>"This is a compelling call to action!" he added.</p><p>Released by the Rodale Institute and entitled <em><a href="https://rodaleinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/Rodale-Soil-Carbon-White-Paper_v8.pdf" target="_blank">Regenerative Agriculture and the Soil Carbon Solution</a></em>, the white paper discusses how a transformation of current widespread agricultural practices—which now contribute indirectly and directly to the climate crisis—"can be rolled out tomorrow providing multiple benefits beyond climate stabilization."</p><p>The findings are based on Rodale's own trials, research data, and interviews with experts, and build upon the institute's 2014 <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/2014/10/09/solution-soil-how-organic-farming-can-feed-world-and-save-planet" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">paper</a> <em>Regenerative Organic Agriculture and Climate Change: A Down-to-Earth Solution to Global Warming</em>.</p>
<img lazy-loadable="true" src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNDQ0MzM2NS9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYyNzczMDk0M30.g3bMMcdsxChGxcYN8onbvkGVHEJUwfLJZTIcX_tPZQk/img.png?width=980" id="1290a" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="89e0122fc2627a2a88dfe53a7c0aa395" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" />
Graph from Rodale Institute's new white paper "Regenerative Agriculture and the Soil Carbon Solution."
<p>The claim made in the new paper is bold: "Data from farming and grazing studies show the power of exemplary regenerative systems that, if achieved globally, would drawdown more than 100% of current annual CO2 emissions.</p><p>"Regenerative agriculture, as the researchers describe, represents "a system of farming principles that rehabilitates the entire ecosystem and enhances natural resources, rather than depleting them."</p><p>In contrast to industrial practices dependent upon monocultures, extensive tillage, pesticides, and synthetic fertilizers, a regenerative approach uses, at minimum, seven practices which aim to boost biodiversity both above and underground and make possible carbon sequestration in soil.</p><ul><li>Diversifying crop rotations</li><li>Planting cover crops, green manures, and perennials</li><li>Retaining crop residues</li><li>Using natural sources of fertilizer, such as compost</li><li>Employing highly managed grazing and/or integrating crops and livestock</li><li>Reducing tillage frequency and depth</li><li>Eliminating synthetic chemicals</li></ul><p>While passers-by may easily spot visual differences above ground between the divergent agricultural approaches, what's happening below ground is also vital. From the paper:</p><blockquote>Contrary to previous thought, it's not the recalcitrant plant material that persists and creates long-term soil carbon stores, instead it's the microbes who process this plant matter that are most responsible for soil carbon sequestration. Stable soil carbon is formed mostly by microbial necromass (dead biomass) bonded to minerals (silt and clay) in the soil. Long term carbon storage is dependent on the protection of the microbially-derived carbon from decomposition.<br></blockquote><p>As for claims such as agricultural transformation wouldn't be able to produce enough food, the paper counters: "Actual yields in well-designed regenerative organic systems, rather than agglomerated averages, have been shown to outcompete conventional yields for almost all food crops including corn, wheat, rice, soybean, and sunflower."</p><p>But that is far from the only benefit. "When compared to conventional industrial agriculture," the authors write, "regenerative systems improve":</p><ul><li>Biodiversity abundance and species richness</li><li>Soil health, including soil carbon</li><li>Pesticide impacts on food and ecosystems</li><li>Total farm outputs</li><li>Nutrient density of outputs</li><li>Resilience to climate shocks</li><li>Provision of ecosystem services</li><li>Resource use efficiency</li><li>Job creation and farmworker welfare</li><li>Farm profitability</li><li>Rural community revitalization</li></ul>
<p>Rather than framing it as a "wake-up call," the institute says the paper should be seen as an "invitation to journey in a new direction."</p><p>"It is intended to be both a road map to change and a call to action to follow a new path," the authors write. "One led by science and blazed by farmers and ranchers across the globe."</p><p>"Together we both sound the alarm and proclaim the regenerative farming solution: It's time to start our journey with a brighter future for our planet and ourselves as the destination," the paper states.</p><p>Resources accompanying the white paper include a sample letter to members of Congress to urge support for the Agriculture Resilience Act (H.R. 5861), <a href="https://blog.ucsusa.org/mike-lavender/a-resilience-roadmap-fulfilling-agricultures-role-as-a-climate-solution" target="_blank">introduced</a> in February by Rep. Chellie Pingree (D-Maine), and a "buyer's guide to regenerative food" to help decipher food labels and questions to ask suppliers at farmers' markets.</p><p>"A vast amount of data on the carbon sequestration potential of agricultural soils has been published, including from Rodale Institute, and recent findings are starting to reinforce the benefits of regenerative agricultural practices in the fight against the climate crisis," said Dr. Andrew Smith, COO and chief scientist of Rodale Institute.</p>
<p><em>Reposted with permission from <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/09/26/regenerative-agriculture-and-soil-carbon-solution-new-paper-outlines-vision-climate?cd-origin=rss" target="_blank">Common Dreams</a>.</em></p>
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Brain-eating amoeba, naegleria fowleri, was detected in the water storage tank for the Lake Jackson Civic Center Splash Pad, according to Lake Jackson city officials. Lake Jackson Civic Center
Environmental officials have warned residents of Lake Jackson, Texas to boil their water before using it for cooking or drinking after a six-year-old boy died from a brain-eating amoeba in the water. Tests for naegleria fowleri showed its presence in three of 11 samples in the Lake Jackson area, including one from a hose at the boy's home, according to the AP.
<p>Lake Jackson is a suburb of Houston, just over 50 miles south of the city.</p><p>Texas Governor Greg Abbot referred to the water sample tests when he issued a <a href="https://gov.texas.gov/uploads/files/press/DISASTER_Brazoria_County_water_disaster_IMAGE_09-27-2020.pdf" target="_blank">disaster declaration</a> Sunday. He said, "the presence of naegleria fowleri, which can cause a rare and devastating infection of the brain called primary amebic meningoencephalitis, was identified in three of 11 tests of the water supply, posing an imminent threat to public health and safety, including loss of life," as <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/texas-governor-issues-disaster-declaration-over-brain-eating-amoeba-found-in-lake-jackson-water-supply/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">CBS News</a> reported.</p>
<p>Health officials let Lake Jackson know that a boy had become infected with the brain-eating amoeba in early September. Exposure to the microbe usually happens through the nose and the boy's family believes he was exposed through the family's hose or from the nearby Lake Jackson Civic Center Splash Pad where water sprays up from the ground, according to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/27/us/water-supply-brain-eating-amoeba.html" target="_blank">The New York Times</a>.</p><p>The splash pad was tested and the brain-eating amoeba was detected in both the splash pad's storage tank and a nearby fire hydrant, said Lake Jackson city officials, as NBC News reported.</p>
<p>According to the <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/parasites/naegleria/general.html" target="_blank">Centers for Disease Control and Prevention</a> (CDC), the dangerous species is found in freshwater lakes, warm rivers, hot springs and soil. It can also thrive in poorly maintained pools or unchlorinated ones, as well as warm water waste from factories, as <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/26/us/brain-eating-amoeba-found-in-texas-water-supply-trnd/index.html" target="_blank">CNN</a> reported.</p><p>"You cannot get infected from swallowing water contaminated with Naegleria," said the CDC in guidance on parasites posted on its website, as <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/houston-area-water-may-be-tainted-brain-eating-microbe-n1241185" target="_blank">NBC News</a> reported.</p><p>Initially, eight communities were warned not to use tap water for anything except flushing the toilet. However, further testing localized the problem and the warning was lifted on Saturday for all cities in Brazoria County except for Lake Jackson, according to CBS News.</p><p>Then late in the day, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality relaxed its decree for Lake Jackson, changing it from an order not to use the water to a notice to boil the water before consumption. It also warned residents not to let water up their nose during various activities such as bathing, swimming and washing their face, according to the AP.</p>
<p>Lake Jackson, a city of 27,000, will see its water flushed and then tested before the "do not drink" order is lifted, according to the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-54313110" target="_blank">BBC</a>.</p><p>"During this period of disinfection and flushing, boiling the tap water makes it safe for drinking and cooking," said the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality in a statement, as the AP reported. "Naegleria fowleri is a type of amoeba that can be managed using standard treatment and disinfection processes."</p>
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A crowd of climate activists march behind a banner in NYC during Climate Week on September 20, 2020. Erik McGregor / LightRocket / Getty Images
After decades on the political periphery, the climate movement is entering the mainstream in 2020, with young leaders at the fore. The Sunrise Movement now includes more than 400 local groups educating and advocating for political action on climate change. Countless students around the world have clearly communicated what's at stake for their futures, notably Swedish activist Greta Thunberg, who just finished her yearlong school strike for climate. Youth activists have been praised for their flexible, big-picture thinking and ability to harness social media to deliver political wins, as Sunrise recently did for U.S. Sen. Ed Markey's primary campaign. They necessarily challenge the status quo.
<p>"Every social movement in the U.S. that has been successful has always had strong youth and students out there leading the charge—and in most cases, leading the charge more aggressively and demanding actions over and beyond the general population," says Robert Bullard, a professor of urban planning and environmental policy at Texas Southern University. That's certainly true for climate, with youth demanding a radical transition away from fossil fuels on decidedly tighter timelines than their predecessors have advocated for. Pressure from youth such as Varshini Prakash, the co-founder of the Sunrise Movement, led Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden to endorse a bolder <a href="https://www.npr.org/2020/07/14/890814007/biden-outlines-2-trillion-climate-plan" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">$2 trillion climate platform</a> over the course of the campaign.</p><p>Sena Wazer, co-director of Sunrise Connecticut, describes how her work is often viewed by older activists: "The main response that I think many of us get from older folks is, 'Well, you're so inspirational and give me hope,' which is nice, but it ends up getting really frustrating, because we're not here to give you hope, you know? We're here to get something done."</p><p>Bullard says it's critical that we, as a society, allow youth's energy and optimism bubble to the top, and to empower young people to assume the leadership they're seeking. Having written more than a dozen books on environmental justice, he considers himself an elder in the movement. In contrast, Bullard calls young people "the tip of the spear," and says it's absolutely critical to have them out there "pushing hard for transformative change."</p>
A Convergence of Issues
<p>The unequal impacts of a changing climate have become extremely clear in 2020, so equity has come to the fore of climate conversations in every corner of the country. A global deadly pandemic continues to rage out of control in the U.S., heat waves are setting new temperature records, wildfires are scorching American Western states, and the hurricane season has already made it to the end of the alphabet for naming storms. In all cases, low-income, Black, Latinx, and Indigenous communities are bearing a disproportionate amount of the impacts.</p><p>"Today, the scab is off, the ugly reality of injustice is hitting us up close and personal, made more realistic by this COVID pandemic," Bullard says.</p><p>This year the decidedly youthful focus on intersectionality is a big part of what defines the transformation of the climate movement. Climate is not just an environmental issue, according to youth activists. It's also a racial justice issue, an economic issue, and an access-to-health care issue.</p><p>"Environmental justice is really seeing the intersection of these issues," says Alex Rodriguez, a community organizer with the Connecticut League of Conservation Voters, which aims to make environmental issues a priority for the state's elected leaders. The group is now focusing their efforts on the coming election and recently succeeded in persuading the state to allow absentee voting in November. "We want people to be safe when casting their vote," says Rodriguez, 26, whose fellow grassroots committee members range from age 16 to 60.</p><p>Rodriguez, who also serves on the equity and environmental justice working group for the Governor's Council on Climate Change, says, "We see our programmatic work as a way to help lawmakers see what they can do to improve the dignity of those suffering from environmental racism, systematic racism, and economic oppression."</p><p>Seeing the overlap and bringing these issues together is a strength that Bullard says was missing from the civil rights organizing he was involved with in the 1960s. He says 2020 is unique in many ways.</p><p>"The number of marchers is unprecedented, from different economic, ethnic, and racial groups—an awakening unlike any that I've seen on this Earth in over 70 years," Bullard says. "Today, the different movements are converging, and I think that convergence makes for greater potential for success."</p>Young and Old
<p>But young people are one essential demographic among many when it comes to climate action. With all that's on the line for climate in the coming elections, up and down the ballot, collaboration becomes key. Bullard says previous generations of climate activists can now play the critical role of mentoring, assisting, and supporting. Standing with, not in front of, youth.</p><p>"Youth are leading us and taking on frontline activity," says Jayce Chiblow, the community engagement lead for Indigenous Climate Action, a Canadian organization that works for Indigenous-led climate justice solutions. But in doing so, she says many young Indigenous activists are experiencing the trauma of violence, getting arrested, and being taken away from their land. "All of our older people are supporting those youth: Elders, mentors, people trained in nonviolent action," Chiblow says. "The youth aren't alone."</p><p>That support can go a long way. "There's a lot of anger and a lot of fear, and that's understandable," says Wazer of Sunrise Connecticut. "I definitely feel those things, too, just considering the ways that our future has been threatened and kind of trashed by older generations."</p><p>Under the Trump administration, the number of environmental rollbacks alone can be disheartening, not to mention new <a href="https://www.yesmagazine.org/video/arctic-national-wildlife-refuge/" target="_blank">drilling permits in the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge going up for auction</a>.</p><p>Wazer is frank about the risks of burnout, depression, and anxiety from the stress of it all, but draws inspiration from the example of the late U.S. representative and lifelong civil rights activist John Lewis. "That forgiveness and that ability to keep fighting and stay motivated … I think that that is something really powerful to learn from older generations."</p><p>An intergenerational approach can leverage the individual strengths of youth and older people in all their diversity.</p><p>"The elders hold our stories," says Chiblow, who is Anishinaabe from Garden River First Nation, Ontario. Those stories include lived experiences, culture, history, and generations of adapting to changes in climate. Such collective experience continues to inform Indigenous knowledge and connections to the land, as well as how people manage and govern themselves in relation to it. This knowledge is passed on through relationship-building and storytelling.</p><p>"Every time you hear that story, you're at a different point in your life, and you'll pick up something else … something new," Chiblow says.</p><p>Changes in perspectives that come with time and experience are among the reasons why intergenerational learning and coalitions are critical to the climate movement. To combine that living and learning is to expand the reach and meaning of the message exponentially. As part of her research for her master's degree, Chiblow brought together youth, community leaders, and knowledge keepers in her community to workshop climate action. "Those relationships are vital to keep that movement going," Chiblow says.</p><p>The value of intergenerational relationships resonates far beyond Indigenous cultures, too. Rick Lent, a member of Elders Climate Action in Massachusetts, says he is motivated to act for his granddaughter. He recounts the time she said to him, "Please tell me that there is something hopeful regarding the climate in our, in the future, because I'm going to be living with the repercussions, and I'm scared."</p><p>Lent takes that request seriously and says that working on behalf of future generations translates into effective messaging. "When you show up as a group of elders, and you're talking to your legislator, our pitch is, 'I'm not doing this for me. I'm doing this for my grandchildren.' So it gives you a whole different story about who you are and why you're doing this work."</p><p>Elders Climate Action has <a href="https://malegislature.gov/Bills/191/H832" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">campaigned to pass a decarbonization plan</a> in the Massachusetts legislature, which would set a net-zero emissions goal for 2050 and codify environmental justice in state law. With the November elections fast approaching, the group's focus is now on assuring everybody can vote safely. In some states, the group's chapters are pushing for voter registration and in others, ensuring people can vote by mail.</p><p>"We're going to be in a pandemic in this year's elections," Lent says, which poses risks to people's health, especially that of older voters. And because most poll workers, traditionally, have been seniors, Elders Climate Action is also encouraging youth to take up that mantle. "We need vote-by-mail," Lent says, "And we need more poll workers, younger poll workers."</p>
The Unique Value Proposition of Elders
<p>Older activists bring unique strengths to the table, according to gerontologist Mick Smyer, who designs strategies to move people from anxiety to action on climate. He calls himself "the aging whisperer to climate groups" and "the climate whisperer to aging groups." He is quick to point out that the learning can go in both directions.</p><p>"I think older adults are untapped resources," Smyer says. "Older adults bring several resources, one of which is their circles of influence. Just by virtue of having lived longer, older adults are going to have denser and richer networks," Smyer says. "The second is, when it comes to voting and civic engagement, older adults, as an age group, outperform all other age groups."</p><p>He uses the 2016 presidential election to illustrate his point: "The older age groups, 70% of them voted. Nobody [else] came close." He is cautious about making sweeping statements about older people broadly, but he says that ageism is alive and well. And that can deter the kind of collaboration that would beget necessary progress on climate action.</p><p>As the twin global patterns of an aging population and a changing climate continue arm in arm, Smyer says a good place for starting this work is within one's family.</p><p>"We each have that power to use in our circles of influence, particularly in our families, and we don't realize it," Smyer says. Whether it's via Zoom or FaceTime or a phone call or a chat in the living room, Smyer says, family members have a superpower: They will listen to each other, and they'll at least start the conversation.</p><p> "Intergenerational collaboration around climate issues, particularly in this election season, starts at home, and then goes to the polling booth," he says.</p>Speaking the Same Language
<p>As an individual's network of family, friends, and connections becomes wider and more diverse, the more work will need to be done to have them all working toward the same goals. That is equally true for the climate movement at large.</p><p>In bridging the gaps among baby boomers, Gen Xers, and millennials, Bullard says, "Each generation will have some idiosyncrasy and uniqueness about it that another generation will not understand or comprehend."</p><p>If everybody in a group or institution is similar, then there's no need to explain a lot, Bullard says. There's usually a fair amount of shared knowledge and values. But the more diverse that group gets, in age, race, gender, or culture, he says, the greater the potential for making mistakes, stepping on people's culture, and causing pain. But the potential for learning also increases exponentially.</p><p>Chiblow says successful collaboration comes down to being able to speak in shared concepts. The term "justice," for example, is an English word that's hard to translate into the Anishinaabe language. Chiblow says that because her community sees itself as belonging to the land, and being part of the land, the Anishinaabe worldview, and therefore their understanding of justice, is necessarily more holistic than the mainstream.</p><p>"Indigenous people have been feeling [the effects of climate change] for so long," Chiblow says. Today, as wildfires rage across the West, the mantra of "I can't breathe" is being driven home on a grand scale. For better and worse, climate justice is finally a front-page story.</p><p>"It's affecting the broader society," Chiblow says. "We're finally at the turning point where we could start to make real change because … people are really starting to feel that urgency."</p><p>The urgency will be tantamount in the coming election. A lot is at stake, says Chiblow: "Incentives, funding, all-around agreement, and also the way we're able to manage our lands and ourselves as people."</p><p>Bullard, too, is insistent on urgency. "This election is one of the most important elections of a generation, because there's so many things at stake," he says. "We can't wait another 40 years on climate. We don't have that much time. We don't have 40 years to get justice."</p><p>Issues of climate justice will be on the ballot in state and local elections this fall, such as Nevada's proposed renewable energy standards and Louisiana's proposed disaster funding. And the topic has finally made it onto the national stage. Joe Biden called Trump a "climate arsonist" for not acting on or even admitting that the wildfires in California are clearly climate-related. The frequency and intensity of such disasters is indisputable.</p><p>"Hurricanes don't swerve to avoid red states or blue states. Wildfires don't skip towns that voted a certain way," Biden <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/biden-address-west-coast-fires-confront-growing-threat/story?id=73000218" target="_blank">said in a speech on Sept. 14</a>. "The impacts of climate change don't pick and choose. That's because it's not a partisan phenomenon."</p><p>In many ways, the results of the upcoming elections will reflect the ways youth activists and older activists are able come to a common understanding of what climate justice means and what they want the future world to look like. </p><p>"There's a lot of knowledge built up in experience, and there's a lot of energy that's stored in young people," Bullard says. "When you put those two together, you have … an excellent recipe for potential success."</p>From Your Site Articles
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Presidential nominee Joe Biden has not taken a stance on gas exports, including liquefied natural gas. Ken Hodge / Wikimedia Commons / CC by 2.0
By Simon Montlake
For more than a decade, Susan Jane Brown has been battling to stop a natural gas pipeline and export terminal from being built in the backcountry of Oregon. As an attorney at the nonprofit Western Environmental Law Center, she has repeatedly argued that the project's environmental, social, and health costs are too high.
All that was before this month's deadly wildfires in Oregon shrouded the skies above her home office in Portland. "It puts a fine point on it. These fossil fuel projects are contributing to global climate change," she says.
<p>Jordan Cove, the $10-billion liquefied natural gas (LNG) project that Ms. Brown is trying to stop, has yet to break ground. But environmental lawsuits and permitting delays aren't the only barriers. A calamitous crash in natural gas prices and a glut of LNG capacity have cast doubts over its commercial viability and, more broadly, the easy promise of converting abundant U.S. gas into a global commodity and geopolitical tool.</p><p>"There's too much oil. There's too much gas. There's not enough demand," says Clark Williams-Derry at the liberal-leaning Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis.</p><p>Still, even if projects like Jordan Cove are shelved, several other LNG terminals on the Gulf Coast already have all their permits and are waiting to secure financing. Their expansion over the next five years would make the U.S. the world's largest LNG producer, creating jobs at home and opening new markets in energy-hungry Asia. </p><p>For a future Biden administration, that's a wrinkle in any serious climate plan. Once built, these LNG plants would potentially lock in decades of heat-trapping emissions that are already hurling the planet toward a hotter, less stable future. "Once you build the infrastructure it's there, and it gets run on a different economic basis than if it's not there," says Mr. Williams-Derry, who tracks the LNG industry. </p>
<p>Proponents say natural gas is cleaner than the coal that it replaces both in the U.S., where it now produces around 40% of electricity, and in countries like India and China. That makes it a "bridge fuel" to a fully renewable energy future that hasn't yet arrived, says Fred Hutchison, president and CEO of LNG Allies, an industry group. "Gas can continue to be part of a low-carbon energy system globally," he says.</p><p>He predicts that LNG firms would be comfortable with a Biden presidency. "He's got a great affinity for working people and labor, and labor is very much on board with regards to LNG," he says. </p><p>On the campaign trail, Mr. Biden has gotten heat over his support for hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, which left-leaning Democrats oppose but which is seen as important for winning Pennsylvania, a battleground state in November's election. Far less attention has been paid to where the oil and gas goes, and whether support for LNG exports is compatible with Mr. Biden's clean-energy agenda and plans for tackling climate change.</p><p>"It's not going to save the climate if we're just exporting our emissions overseas," says Collin Rees, a campaigner for Oil Change U.S., an environmental nonprofit. </p>
Moderates Feeling the Heat
<p>If elected, Mr. Biden has vowed to stop new drilling for oil and gas on federal land and in federal waters and to rejoin the 2015 Paris climate accord that President Donald Trump gave notice of quitting. He would reinstate Obama-era regulations of greenhouse gas emissions, including methane, the largest component of natural gas.</p><p>The Biden climate platform also states that all federal infrastructure investments and federal permits would need to be assessed for their climate impacts. Analysts say such a test could impede future LNG plants and pipelines, though not those that already have federal approval. </p><p>Climate change activists who pushed for that language say much depends on who would have oversight of federal agencies that regulate the industry. Some are wary of Biden's reliance on advice from Obama-era officials, including former Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz, who is now on the board of Southern Company, a utility, and a former Obama environmental aide, Heather Zichal, who has served on the board of Cheniere Energy, an LNG exporter. </p><p>In a letter sent earlier this month, Mr. Rees and other signatories urged Mr. Biden to ban "all fossil fuel executives, lobbyists, and representatives" from any future administration.</p><p>That Obama-era moderates are under fire over their climate bona fides is a measure of rising leftist clout in the Democratic coalition. It also reflects how the climate debate has shifted since Biden was in office, in response to extreme weather events and troubling scientific findings. This includes research into lifecycle emissions from natural gas production and methane leaks and flaring that muddies the argument that it's a transition fuel to a carbon-free future.</p><p>"We've gotten more proof on the science that switching to gas is not enough," says Mr. Rees. </p>
The Push for U.S. Fuel Exports
<p>As vice president, Biden was part of an administration that pushed hard for global climate action while also promoting U.S. oil and gas exports to its allies and trading partners. As fracking boomed, Obama ended a 40-year ban on crude oil exports. In Europe, LNG was touted both as an alternative to coal and as strategic competition with Russian pipelines.</p><p>That much, at least, continued with President Trump. Under Energy Secretary Rick Perry, the agency referred to liquified U.S. hydrocarbons as "<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/29/us/freedom-gas-energy-department.html" target="_blank">freedom gas</a>."</p><p>Mr. Trump has also championed the interests of coal, oil, and gas while denigrating the findings of government climate scientists. He rejected the Paris accord as unfair to the U.S. and detrimental to its economy, but has offered no alternative path to emissions cuts. </p><p>Still, Trump's foreign policy has not always served the LNG industry: Tariffs on foreign steel drove up pipeline costs, and a trade war with China stayed the hand of Chinese LNG importers wary of reliance on U.S. suppliers. </p><p>Even his regulatory rollbacks could be a double-edged sword. By relaxing curbs last month on methane leaks, the U.S. has ceded ground to European regulators who are drafting emissions standards that LNG producers are watching closely. "That's a precursor of fights that will be fought in all the rest of the developed world," says Mr. Hutchison. </p><p>Indeed, some oil-and-gas exporters had urged the Trump administration not to abandon the tougher rules, since they undercut their claim to offer a cleaner-burning way of producing heat and electricity. "U.S. LNG is not going to be able to compete in a world that's focused on methane emissions and intensity," says Erin Blanton, a senior research scholar at the Center on Global Energy Policy at Columbia University. </p>Stepping on the Gas
<p>In July, the Department of Energy issued an export license to Jordan Cove's developer, Canada's Pembina Pipeline Corp. In a statement, Energy Secretary Dan Brouillette said the project would provide "reliable, affordable, and cleaner-burning natural gas to our allies around the world."</p><p>As a West Coast terminal, Jordan Cove offers a faster route to Asia where its capacity of 7.8 million tons of LNG a year could serve to heat more than 15 million homes. At its peak, its construction would also create 6,000 jobs, the company says, in a stagnant corner of Oregon.</p><p>But the project still lacks multiple local and state permits, and its biggest asset – a Pacific port – has become its biggest handicap, says Ms. Blanton. "They are putting infrastructure in a state where there's no political support for the pipeline or the terminal, unlike in Louisiana or Texas," she says. </p><p>Ms. Brown, the environmental lawyer, says she wants to see Jordan Cove buried, not just mothballed until natural gas prices recover. But she knows that it's only one among many LNG projects and that others will likely get built, even if Biden is elected in November, despite growing evidence of the harm caused by methane emissions. </p>From Your Site Articles
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Eating lots of fruits and vegetables will boost the immune system. Stevens Fremont / The Image Bank / Getty Images
By Grayson Jaggers
The connection between the pandemic and our dietary habits is undeniable. The stress of isolation coupled with a struggling economy has caused many of us to seek comfort with our old friends: Big Mac, Tom Collins, Ben and Jerry. But overindulging in this kind of food and drink might not just be affecting your waistline, but could potentially put you at greater risk of illness by hindering your immune system.
<p>Hear the word "nutrition," and often what comes to mind are fad diets, juice "cleanses" and supplements. Americans certainly seem concerned with their weight; 45 million of us spend <a href="https://www.bmc.org/nutrition-and-weight-management/weight-management" target="_blank">US$33 billion</a> annually on weight loss products. But <a href="https://nccd.cdc.gov/dnpao_dtm/rdPage.aspx?rdReport=DNPAO_DTM.ExploreByLocation&rdRequestForwarding=Form" target="_blank">one in five Americans</a> consumes nearly no vegetables – less than one serving per day.</p><p>When the emphasis is on weight loss products, and not healthy day-to-day eating, the essential role that nutrition plays in keeping us well never gets communicated. Among the many things I teach students in my <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=o_1CmfkAAAAJ&hl=en" target="_blank">nutritional biochemistry course</a> is the clear relationship between a balanced diet and a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nutres.2020.07.005" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">strong, well-regulated immune system</a>.</p><p>Along with social distancing measures and effective vaccines, a healthy immune system is our best defense against coronavirus infection. To keep it that way, proper nutrition is an absolute must. Although not a replacement for medicine, good nutrition can work synergistically with medicine to improve vaccine effectiveness, reduce the prevalence of chronic disease and lower the burden on the health care system.</p>
<h3>The Impact of the Western Diet</h3><p>Scientists know that people with <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/need-extra-precautions/people-with-medical-conditions.html?" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">preexisting health conditions</a> are at greater risk for severe COVID-19 infections. That includes those with diabetes, obesity, and kidney, lung or cardiovascular disease. Many of these conditions are linked to a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dsx.2020.05.025" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">dysfunctional immune system</a>.</p><p>Patients with cardiovascular or metabolic disease have a delayed immune response, giving viral invaders a head start. When that happens, the body reacts with a more intense inflammatory response, and healthy tissues are damaged along with the virus. It's not yet clear how much this damage factors into the increased mortality rate, but it is a factor.</p><p>What does this have to do with nutrition? The Western diet typically has a high proportion of red meat, saturated fat and what's known as "<a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41538-018-0020-x" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">bliss point foods</a>" rich in sugar and salt. Adequate fruit and vegetable consumption is missing. Despite the abundance of calories that often accompanies the Western diet, many Americans <a href="https://doi.org/10.3390/nu12061735" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">don't consume nearly enough</a> of the essential nutrients our bodies need to function properly, including vitamins A, C and D, and the minerals iron and potassium. And that, at least in part, causes a dysfunctional immune system: too few vitamins and minerals, and too many empty calories.</p><p>A healthy immune system responds quickly to limit or prevent infection, but it also promptly "turns down the dial" to avoid damaging the cells of the body. Sugar disrupts this balance. A high proportion of refined sugar in the diet can cause <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pcad.2017.12.001" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">chronic, low-grade inflammation</a> in addition to diabetes and obesity. Essentially, that "dial" is never turned all the way off.</p><p>While inflammation is a natural part of the immune response, it can be harmful when it's constantly active. Indeed, obesity is itself characterized by chronic, low-grade inflammation and a dysregulated immune response.</p><p>And <a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/fimmu.2019.01071" target="_blank">research shows</a> that vaccines may be less effective in obese people. <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4590616/" target="_blank">The same applies</a> to those who regularly drink too much alcohol.</p>
<h3>How Nutrients Help</h3><p>Nutrients, essential substances that help us grow properly and remain healthy, help maintain the immune system. In contrast to the delayed responses associated with malnutrition, <a href="https://doi.org/10.3390/jcm7090258" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">vitamin A</a> fights against multiple infectious diseases, including measles. Along with <a href="https://doi.org/10.3390/nu7043011" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">vitamin D</a>, it regulates the immune system and helps to prevent its overactivation. <a href="https://doi.org/10.3390/nu9111211" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Vitamin C</a>, an antioxidant, protects us from the injury caused by free radicals.</p><p>Polyphenols, a wide-ranging group of molecules found in all plants, also have anti-inflammatory properties. There's plenty of evidence to show a diet rich in <a href="https://doi.org/10.3390/nu11040751" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">plant polyphenols</a> can lower the risk of chronic conditions, like hypertension, insulin insensitivity and cardiovascular disease.</p><p>Why don't we Americans eat more of these plant-based foods and fewer of the bliss-based foods? It's complicated. People are swayed by advertising and influenced by hectic schedules. One starting place would be to teach people how to eat better from an early age. Nutrition education should be emphasized, from kindergarten through high school to medical schools.</p><p>Millions of Americans live in <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/pcd/issues/2017/16_0408.htm" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">food deserts</a>, having limited access to healthy foods. In these circumstances, education must be paired with increased access. These long-term goals could bring profound returns with a relatively small investment.</p><p>Meantime, all of us can take small steps to incrementally improve our own dietary habits. I'm not suggesting we stop eating cake, french fries and soda completely. But we as a society have yet to realize the food that actually makes us feel good and healthy is not comfort food.</p><p>The COVID-19 pandemic won't be the last we face, so it's vital that we use every preventive tool we as a society have. Think of good nutrition as a seat belt for your health; it doesn't guarantee you won't get sick, but it helps to ensure the best outcomes.</p>
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<em>Grayson Jaggers is an assistant professor at the University of Southern California – Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences.</em><br/>
</p><p>
<em>Disclosure statement: </em><em>Grayson Jaggers does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond his academic appointment.</em>
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<em>Reposted with permission from <a href="https://theconversation.com/good-nutrition-can-contribute-to-keeping-covid-19-and-other-diseases-away-145086" target="_blank">The Conversation</a>.</em>
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Affordable, Self-Administered COVID-19 Tests Could Use Your Cell Phone
25 September
Health + Wellness
A graphic shows how Rhoel Dinglasan's smartphone-based saliva test works. University of Florida
As the world continues to navigate the line between reopening and maintaining safety protocols to slow the spread of the coronavirus, rapid and accurate diagnostic screening remains critical to control the outbreak. New mobile-phone-based, self-administered COVID-19 tests being developed independently around the world could be a key breakthrough in making testing more widely available, especially in developing nations.
<p>Point-of-care testing (POCT) involves the use of easily portable devices to carry out analytical testing outside of a central laboratory, in places like long-term care facilities, local clinics and patients' homes, a new study by the <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7288261/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">National Center for Biomedical Information</a> said. POCT provides early and fast diagnostic results; when combined with microfluidic systems that can measure traces of diseases and infections based on small amounts of fluids with daily high sensitivity and speed, POCT can result in faster, more cost-effective diagnostic instruments that do not require any trained healthcare workers to administer them, the study reported. Smartphone-based microfluidic POCT uses personal mobile devices to carry out the whole analytical process using bodily fluids like saliva. Critically, this also will result in earlier diagnoses that can help slow the spread of diseases like COVID-19.</p>
<p>Recently, Rhoel Dinglasan, a University of Florida infectious diseases professor and his industry collaborators won second place in a national technology competition sponsored by the National Institutes of Health for a smartphone-based, rapid saliva test they developed that can be used to diagnose COVID-19, along with two other diseases of major global importance, malaria and anemia. The test adapted the team's existing mobile-based test for malaria to also test for anemia and COVID-19, explained Dinglasan in a <a href="https://ufhealth.org/news/2020/smartphone-based-saliva-test-can-detect-covid-19-earns-uf-professor-honors-national" target="_blank">University of Florida Health news release</a>.</p><p>"This test will leverage existing technology to fill a pressing and unmet need in global public health by allowing us to differentiate between three diseases that can present similarly in terms of symptoms," Dinglasan said in the release. "As treatment and containment protocols differ for each disease, the proper diagnosis delivered in literally minutes could save lives."</p>
<p>Their solution is the CLIP-CAM, an adapter that attaches to a smartphone that fits a detection cassette, the release detailed. A saliva sample is self-collected and activated, and a droplet is put into the cassette. The camera flash is used to excite the detection system in the cassette, which can then be read by a smartphone app. Results are available in 15 minutes or less, Dinglasan said, the release reported.</p><p>He further explained the importance of quick diagnoses to the <a href="https://www.gainesville.com/story/news/coronavirus/2020/09/18/uf-professor-earns-national-honors-smartphone-base-saliva-test-covid-19/3486844001/" target="_blank">Gainesville Sun</a>: "When we go out to work in these different countries, we need to differentiate when a person comes in, we need to know if it is COVID-19, malaria or anemia. Without that ability, how would we know if we should send this person home to quarantine because we think he has COVID-19? What if it is malaria? You need to give that child or adult anti-malaria drugs or they will die."</p>
<p>Similar prototyping is underway around the world. At the University of Utah, electrical and computer engineering professor Massood Tabib-Azar adapted the platform he used to detect the Zika virus to now detect COVID-19, reported <a href="https://www.biospace.com/article/nsf-funded-smartphone-covid-19-dx-puts-testing-in-the-hands-of-the-public/" target="_blank">BioSpace</a>. His sensor can also test for the presence of the virus on surfaces like door handles or desks by brushing a swab on a surface and then onto the sensor, the news report said. Tabib-Azar is also exploring the potential of detecting COVID-19 in floating microscopic particles in enclosed spaces like an elevator.</p><p>The Utah sensor is reusable, because samples can be destroyed using a small electrical current to disintegrate viruses or saliva can be placed on a disposable sheet like a piece of paper put on top of the sensor, Tabib-Azar told BioSpace. His test is also designed to upload the results to a central server that can map out positive results in an area to give public health experts a better idea of where outbreak hotspots are, the report said.</p>
<p>"Mobile-based epidemic monitoring is nothing but a logical next step, because only the mobile devices that move with people can keep up with the contacts they make," Tabib-Azar said, speaking of related research in <a href="https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/8626091" target="_blank">IEEE Access</a>.</p><p>In Ontario, Canada, a third diagnostic prototype called Atlas hopes to use the same saliva-to-mobile-phone testing concept to make testing more widely available, from remote communities to front-line screening, reported <a href="https://www.hospimedica.com/covid-19/articles/294783026/smartphone-powered-saliva-based-covid-19-diagnostic-test-delivers-lab-quality-results-to-app-in-20-minutes.html" target="_blank">HospiMedica.com</a>. Atlas is designed as a single-use, disposable device that could deliver results in 20 minutes.</p><p>All three tests have received enough funding to get through the prototype phase. Additional support will help to quickly transform the design concepts into mass-produced products for global health.</p>
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