Category: Climate

Americans have just endured one of the coldest winters in memory, so global warming may not be on their radar. But a new U.N. panel report has just refocused the public debate on a problem some scientists call the greatest threat facing the world.

There is trouble ahead for global agriculture, warns the influential Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, if measures are not taken quickly to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The panel, which synthesizes the findings of thousands of peer-reviewed studies every seven years, has issued a report card on the state of the planet.

Click here to view full article at blogs.reuters.com

Just one source, methane from the arctic…leads us [by 2030] to…a temperature beyond which humans have never existed on the planet.” Guy McPherson, professor emeritus of University of Arizona in Environmental Studies, shares highlights from his compilation of recent reports on climate change effects. Their number and extent have grown exponentially since he began five years ago. In this interview, he shares his personal journey through despair and deep grief to recent acceptance. “I suspect we get to see the end of this movie… Nobody else in human history [has]… We get to see how humans act in the face of their own demise.” Episode 262. [guymcpherson.com] Watch Guy’s Climate Change presentation February 2014

Click here to view full article at peakoil.com

If you think of climate change as a hazard for some far-off polar bears years from now, you’re mistaken. That’s the message from top climate scientists gathering in Japan this week to assess the impact of global warming. In fact, they will say, the dangers of a warming Earth are immediate and very human. "The polar bear is us," says Patricia Romero Lankao of the federally financed National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo., referring to the first species to be listed as threatened by global warming due to melting sea ice. She will be among the more than 60 scientists in Japan to finish writing a massive and authoritative report on the impacts of global warming. With representatives from about 100 governments at this week’s meeting of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, they’ll wrap up a summary that tells world leaders how bad the problem is. […]

Click here to view full article at hosted.ap.org

A lingering cold spell in much of the United States is suppressing the demand for petroleum and petroleum products, the American Petroleum Institute said. API said the delivery of petroleum products, a measure of demand, declined 0.6 percent in February to 18.5 million barrels per day, the lowest average for any February since 1998. API Chief Economist John Felmy said the cold weather was suppressing demand for petroleum products like gasoline. "Cold weather tends to have a dampening effect on the economy, which helped reduce demand for many types of fuel in February," he said in a statement Thursday. API said demand for gasoline declined 0.2 percent from February 2013, though it was up 1.1 percent from the previous month. January’s gasoline demand of the equivalent of 8.4 million barrels per day, however, was a 13-year low for the month. API said crude oil […]

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Exxon Mobil is set to disclose the impact of carbon regulations on its investments, such as mining oil sands in Alberta, Canada. Exxon Mobil Corp. has agreed to disclose how the regulation of carbon emissions could affect the value of its oil and gas holdings, a sign that America’s biggest energy company is stepping up efforts to address shareholders’ environmental concerns. The oil giant will publish a report later this month explaining how it weighs the risks that regulations could make it prohibitively expensive to tap oil and gas, according to Arjuna Capital, an investment management firm focused on social responsibility that submitted a shareholder resolution asking for such a report. Exxon is set to disclose a range of measures in the report, including a calculation of the carbon emissions that its operations give off and a discussion of how it incorporates the risk of regulation into its spending […]

Click here to view full article at online.wsj.com

Exxon Mobil is set to disclose the impact of carbon regulations on its investments, such as mining oil sands in Alberta, Canada. Exxon Mobil Corp. has agreed to disclose how the regulation of carbon emissions could affect the value of its oil and gas holdings, a sign that America’s biggest energy company is stepping up efforts to address shareholders’ environmental concerns. The oil giant will publish a report later this month explaining how it weighs the risks that regulations could make it prohibitively expensive to tap oil and gas, according to Arjuna Capital, an investment management firm focused on social responsibility that submitted a shareholder resolution asking for such a report. Exxon is set to disclose a range of measures in the report, including a calculation of the carbon emissions that its operations give off and a discussion of how it incorporates the risk of regulation into its spending […]

Click here to view full article at online.wsj.com

In Michigan’s way-up-north Keweenaw Peninsula, where 200 inches of snow in a single season elicits barely a shrug, officials know there’s nothing in the budget more important than keeping the roads passable. Yet even they have been caught short this merciless winter. Houghton County planned to spend around $2.1 million for plowing, salting and related maintenance, which experience suggested would be plenty, but has overshot it by $500,000 and counting. State and local governments across a huge swath of the nation, from the Great Plains to the Upper Midwest and the Deep South to New England, are experiencing sticker shock after one of the coldest, snowiest, iciest winters in memory. Many have spent two or three times as much as they budgeted for clearing roads. More bad weather could send costs higher. Even as Thursday’s official arrival of […]

Click here to view full article at hosted.ap.org

In Michigan’s way-up-north Keweenaw Peninsula, where 200 inches of snow in a single season elicits barely a shrug, officials know there’s nothing in the budget more important than keeping the roads passable. Yet even they have been caught short this merciless winter. Houghton County planned to spend around $2.1 million for plowing, salting and related maintenance, which experience suggested would be plenty, but has overshot it by $500,000 and counting. State and local governments across a huge swath of the nation, from the Great Plains to the Upper Midwest and the Deep South to New England, are experiencing sticker shock after one of the coldest, snowiest, iciest winters in memory. Many have spent two or three times as much as they budgeted for clearing roads. More bad weather could send costs higher. Even as Thursday’s official arrival of […]

Click here to view full article at hosted.ap.org