#dot earth

[organisemybiz]

Today’s Climate Progress and Tomorrow’s Climate Challenges

Today’s Climate Progress and Tomorrow’s Climate Challenges

Photo Air-conditioning units in New Delhi.Credit Roberto Schmidt/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Tracking recent headlines, you might think the world is finally on a path toward controlling global warming. On Saturday, diplomats announced a new international agreement aimed at phasing out a family of climate-warming compounds called hydrofluorocarbons, or HFCs. And earlier this month an…

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[organisemybiz]

Species, Interrupted – Why it Matters When Extinction Silences a Tree Frog

Species, Interrupted – Why it Matters When Extinction Silences a Tree Frog

When someone notable attains a certain age, newspapers get reporters to draft advance obituaries, with just the top two or three paragraphs to add when the inevitable happens. As news spread late last month of the death of “Toughie,” the last known Rabbs’ fringe-limbed tree frog, I used Twitter to museon whether media will have to start doing the same thing for species of living things that are…

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[adammccauley]

Why Media Struggles to Tell Compelling Climate Change Stories

Why Media Struggles to Tell Compelling Climate Change Stories

Surprise Glacier is photographed during a trip to Alaska to catalog glacial melt and other climate-related research. Image: Don Becker. August 22, 2008. USGS Writing today in for The Guardian, George Monbiot was at it again with a column sporting a memorable title: “On climate change this government is indifferent to life, in love with death.” He was referencing David Cameron’s government,…

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[newsio-blog]

A farewell to ice.

“If I follow a reasonable scenario, not an extreme one, for global warming,” Dr. Haeberli said, “I can say that we will see it here first. In other places, it may be more difficult to see the impact — on, say, changing vegetation or soils. But here, with the glaciers, this will be clear to everybody. A clear signal. My children, for instance, will very clearly know in 30 years — when they are as old as I am now — what the greenhouse effect really was all about.”

[jvnla]

"I’ve seen wheat fields ruined by a night of hail, rice fields destroyed by raiding wild pigs, cauliflower plants killed by frost, chick peas ravaged by root fungi and seeds that died before the monsoon rains arrived. I’ve seen people salvage what they can and plant new crops in their place. I’ve seen people haul water on their shoulders for their thirsty crops. I’ve seen the depth of wisdom and experience about different varieties of lentils and which should be planted on what part of the field. I’ve seen heartfelt generosity in offering tea to visitors made with scarce stores of sugar and milk. In other words, people struggle and use their knowledge to adapt as best they can. They do not sit back passively as they are confronted with adversity. People evolve and change with circumstances. The notion that there is a pre-determined boundary, defined by scientists halfway around the world, for how much fertilizer these farmers can use or how much forest they can fell before the planet becomes too hostile for civilization seems disconnected from reality in this landscape. These farmers’ lives are unimaginably laborious and difficult. They deserve better. But they also have resilience, knowledge and grit to figure out how to plant different crops or even find new livelihoods to survive in the face of adversity."

--Ruth Defries, author of The Big Ratchet, discusses 'Planetary Boundaries' in Rural India via NYTimes.com

[robynwoolston]

Image Credit: Robyn Woolston 

Source: The New York Times - Dot Earth Blog by Andrew Revkin

Date: 16/06/2014 

[meteorologistaustenlonek]

 Closer Look at Climate Panel’s Findings on Global Warming Impacts

"Whatever climate change ends up throwing at us on top of today’s climate hazards, there are plenty of glaring opportunities now to cut vulnerability. There’s much more, so I encourage you to download the draft and explore."

[iwild]

NYT's Bash-Bill-McKibben Fit

Can the New York Times get any more wrongheaded?  Last month, Joe Nocera lit out after McKibben and NASA's James Hansen for suggesting that oil companies pay taxes on carbon emissions.  A few days ago, he targeted Hansen again.  (Here's McKibben on why he's wrong).  Now, Andrew Revkin is telling us to stop what we're doing and read a 73-page exegesis by a Harvard Kennedy School scholar which criticizes McKibben for his advocacy journalism and support for "'soft' technologies" and--yes--praises Revkin's own NYT Dot Earth blog and its search for a "'safe path'."

I've always found Dot Earth useful, until today.  But this comes right after the NYT cancelled its Green Blog in what the Columbia Journalism Review described as "a horrible decision" and "an act of total cowardice." Of course, we all know that the New York Times never advocates for anything (except war in Iraq--thanks Judy Miller) and thus can safely look down on those who do.

Photo: Jenna Pope