American pikas tolerate climate change better than expected The American pika (Ochotona princeps), a relative of rabbits, occupies rocky environments in the mountains of western Northern America. It has been widely thought that pikas could not survive extremes of temperature and thus were at risk of running out of space at the tops of mountains…
Here in California, we have one of the more deluded Governors in history, Jerry Brown. He has gotten his sobriquet “Governor Moonbeam” the old fashioned way … he earned it honestly through things like maniacally supporting his multibillion-dollar “Bullet Train To Nowhere“, and plenty more craziness-du-jour. But I never thought that even Governor Moonbeam could…
It was 20 years ago, climate scientist Michael Mann published his famous “hockey stick” graph that he says “galvanized climate action” by showing unprecedented global warming. Mann used the 20-year anniversary of the graph to opine on the “industry-funded” attacks “to discredit the iconic symbol of the human impact on our climate,” which Mann claimed…
I did a double-take when I saw this, and at first I thought this must be coming from a fake Twitter account. So, I checked. And yes, it is from the official Nobel Twitter account: Unfortunately, it’s all too real. We’ve known for a long time (ever since Al Gore and sex-crazed IPPC Director Rajenda…
By Nic Lewis Plain language summary A new paper by Andrew Dessler et al. claims, based on 100 simulations of the historical period (1850 to date) by the MPI‑ESM1.1 climate model, that estimates of climate sensitivity using the energy-budget method can vary widely due to internal climate system variability. I calculated what effect the uncertainty…
By Andy May The EPA secretary, Scott Pruitt, testified before the House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee on Thursday April 26, 2018. He had been charged with spending too much money on travel, security and a secure phone booth for his office. Certainly, a reason to reprimand him, but I’m not sure a full…
Guest essay by Eric Worrall The World Travel and Tourism Council meeting in Buenos Aires has announced a formal partnership with the UNFCCC to jointly tackle climate damage caused by global tourism. WTTC AND UN CLIMATE CHANGE IN NEW PARTNERSHIP TO TACKLE GLOBAL WARMING APRIL 26, 2018 ENVIRONMENT / TOURISM The World Travel and Tourism…
Study suggests Facebook, Twitter sentiments correlate with weather patterns – no mention of climate linked sentiments Sentiments expressed on Facebook and Twitter may be associated with certain weather patterns, according to a study published April 25, 2018 in the open-access journal PLOS ONEby Patrick Baylis from the Vancouver School of Economics, Canada, Nick Obradovich from the…
Brought to You by SEPP (www.SEPP.org) The Science and Environmental Policy Project THIS WEEK: By Ken Haapala, President Where’s the Theory? Last week’s TWTW discussed the report by the National Association of Scholars presenting the causes, consequences, and recommendations for reforms in the failure to be able to reproduce studies in the medical profession. The…
Administrator Pruitt initiates overdue changes to bring transparency, integrity to rulemaking Guest opinion by Paul Driessen Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt has proposed to end the longstanding EPA practice of using secretive, often questionable, even deceptive science to support agency policy and regulatory initiatives. His proposed rules will ensure that any science underlying agency…