Category: Climate

Photo A farm served by the San Luis Canal Company, which manages the water supply for about 45,000 acres in California. Credit Chad Ress for The New York Times Early one morning in late April, Parvinder Hundal stood beside a hole in the ground at the edge of his almond farm near Tulare in the Central Valley of California. The hole, which was about the size of a volleyball and was encased in a shallow block of concrete, was the opening of a well, one that went hundreds of feet into the earth. He had paid $100,000 to have it drilled, but it wasn’t producing water. Mr. Hundal was hoping that if he cleaned out the well, the water would start flowing again. On the nearby trees, some leaves had turned yellow and the almond husks appeared smaller than usual. In February, Mr. Hundal received emails from various water […]

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The pace of global warming hasn’t slowed since 1998, a finding that contradicts a major United Nations study and challenges a key argument of skeptics of manmade climate change. Temperatures since 2000 have risen at a pace that is “virtually indistinguishable” from the rate of the five preceding decades, researchers led by Thomas Karl at the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said Thursday in the journal Science. That challenges the biggest-ever UN study on warming published in September 2013, which found that the rate of temperature gains had fallen by more than half since 1998. Doubters of man’s influence on the climate have cited the reported slowdown as proof that the scientific understanding of climate change isn’t robust and steps to cut greenhouse gases aren’t worth the cost. “A whole cottage industry has been built by climate skeptics on the false premise that there is currently a hiatus […]

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SINGAPORE—Unusually dry weather in parts of Southeast Asia in recent weeks has raised the prospect that food crops across the region could be severely harmed this summer by the return of the El Niño weather phenomenon. Countries in this region are among the top global producers of a range of agricultural commodities from coffee to rubber. If prolonged dry weather sets in, their crop output will likely be reduced, potentially hitting raw-material costs for a myriad of industries from food to tires. A growing number of weather forecasters, including the official U.S., Australian and Japanese weather bureaus, have confirmed that the El Niño weather pattern will return this year after a near five-year absence, although its likely duration and intensity is as yet unclear. El Niño is typified by a warming of the central and eastern Pacific Ocean and a cooling of its western region. That leads to a […]

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By Sarah Kent and Inti Landauro PARIS–Europe’s largest oil companies on Tuesday came out forcefully against coal, taking aim at a competing fossil fuel as they push cleaner-burning natural gas ahead of climate-change talks. Executives from Royal Dutch Shell PLC, BP PLC, Total SA and others told industry officials at a conference that their increased production of gas could help reduce carbon emissions and lessen the world’s reliance on coal for heating homes and creating electricity. Coal, they said, was a pollutant that set back environmental efforts. "Together with renewable energies it is important to promote the use of gas to replace coal," Total CEO Patrick Pouyanné said. "It would contribute at a low cost to meet carbon emissions targets." The message was delivered at the World Gas Conference in Paris six months before United Nations climate-change talks that could result in an agreement to curb carbon emissions and […]

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BONN/WASHINGTON The U.N.’s Paris climate conference, designed to reach a plan for curbing global warming, may instead become the graveyard for its defining goal: to stop temperatures rising more than 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. Achieving the 2C (3.6 Fahrenheit) target has been the driving force for climate negotiators and scientists, who say it is the limit beyond which the world will suffer ever worsening floods, droughts, storms and rising seas. But six months before world leaders convene in Paris, prospects are fading for a deal that would keep average temperatures below the ceiling. Greenhouse gas emissions have reached record highs in recent years. And proposed cuts in carbon emissions from 2020 and promises to deepen them in subsequent reviews – offered by governments wary of the economic cost of shifting from fossil fuels – are unlikely to be enough for the 2C goal. "Paris will be a […]

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Six of the biggest European energy companies issue plea for a mechanism that will help advance low-carbon goals. File Photo by Stephen Shaver/UPI LONDON, June 1 (UPI) — Six of the largest European oil and gas companies issued a global appeal Monday for a mechanism to limit global warming and curb emissions. The heads of BG Group, BP, Eni, Royal Dutch Shell, Statoil and Total called on governments and the United Nations to introduce a carbon pricing scheme . "We now need governments around the world to provide us with this framework, and we believe our presence at the table will be helpful in designing an approach that will be both practical and deliverable," they said in a joint statement. Their appeal comes as world leaders are working toward finding climate solutions at a December conference in Paris. Last week in Mexico, the International Energy Agency said policy uncertainty […]

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DALLAS—This week’s devastating Texas floods capped an exceptionally wet spring for the Lone Star State that has effectively ended its yearslong drought. Eighty-two percent of Texas was drought-free as of May 26, up from just 11% a year earlier, according to U.S. Drought Monitor estimates released by the government Thursday. None of the state remained in severe drought. May is already the wettest month in recorded Texas history, averaging 7.54 inches of rain, beating the record of 6.66 inches set in June 2004, according to state climatologist John Nielsen-Gammon, a professor of atmospheric sciences at Texas A&M University. Some counties north of the Dallas-Fort Worth metro area have received more than 20 inches. Formerly shrunken lakes and reservoirs are brimming with water—to the point where the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers was strategically releasing water from many to reduce flooding, even before this week’s torrential rains. And the rainy […]

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Rex Tillerson, chairman and chief executive officer of Exxon Mobil Corp. Photographer: F. Carter Smith/Bloomberg The biggest U.S. oil producers have dismissed the prospect of joining their European peers in forging a common stance on climate change, with Exxon Mobil Corp.’s CEO saying he doesn’t intend to “fake it.” Exxon Mobil and Chevron Corp.’s go-it-alone strategy could weaken the impact of any targets, carbon goals or other climate-friendly measures endorsed by explorers including Royal Dutch Shell Plc, BP Plc and Total SA. The European energy giants are coordinating a strategy ahead of the United Nations’ climate talks in Paris this December. The industry is under mounting pressure from politicians and some investors to take a leading role in fighting climate change. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said last week the onus is on energy producers to voluntarily curb emissions and encourage governments to adopt ambitious carbon limits. “We […]

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