via Origamidon/Flickr

“I find it extraordinary that so many political leaders won’t actually talk about the relationship between climate change, fossil fuels, our continuing irrational exuberance about burning fossil fuels, in light of these storm patterns that we’ve been experiencing.”

-Vermont Governor Peter Shumlin.

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Economic Story of the Week

Insurers Slow on the Climate Uptake

A recently released report from Ceres analyzed 88 leading U.S. insurers’ policies for dealing with the potential growing risks associated with climate change. The surprising finding is that only 11 of these insurers have a formal policy in place.

While climate change is already altering the industry’s global business horizons and could disrupt the risk models upon which it depends, it also poses great threats to the long term availability and affordability of insurance. The report contains a set of recommendations on how insurers can address issues of disclosure and create shared resources on how to analyze and respond to climate trends.

More on this story: Ceres

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Editorial of the Week

Pipeline Needs a Hard Look

(Register-Guard)

There are disturbing signs that the Obama administration already has decided to approve a proposed 1,711-mile pipeline that would carry heavy oil from tar sands in Canada across the Great Plains to terminals in Oklahoma and the Gulf Coast…If that happens, it would be a setback for environmentalists who worked hard to help Obama win the presidency, and three years later have become frustrated with the administration’s lackluster protection of communities, rivers, lakes, oceans, wild lands, air and climate.

Obama has a chance to re-establish his environmental credentials by not rubber-stamping the proposed Keystone XL pipeline, which would carry more than 29 million gallons daily of crude oil from Canadian tar sands to refineries in Oklahoma and south Texas. There are many reasons for caution — and perhaps, ultimately, for rejection of this massive project. (More…)

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Obama Admin Abandons Smog Rules

President Obama has abandoned a proposed set of stricter air-quality rules from the EPA that would have significantly reduced emissions of smog-causing chemicals. The announcement greatly angered environmentalists, who called the move ‘a betrayal.’ While Obama claimed unwavering dedication to the EPA and the Clean Air Act, it was disappointing blow that panders to Big Oil at the expense of American health, as ozone, when combined with other compounds to form smog contributes to many diseases such as heart problems, asthma and lung disorders.

More on this story: NY Times, USA Today

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The People Doth Protest the Pipeline

This weekend the largest environmental civil disobedience in decades concluded at the White House with hundreds pledging to escalate the nationwide campaign against the new tar sands Keystone XL pipeline. After the president’s decision on ozone standards, the pipeline became the next crucial environmental decision facing Obama before the 2012 election.

Over the two-week sit-in at the White House gates 1,252 Americans were arrested including top climate scientists, Texas and Nebraska landowners whose property would be impacted by the pipeline, actresses Daryl Hannah and Margot Kidder, former White House official and author Gus Speth, author Naomi Klein, and 350.org’s Bill McKibben, one of the protest’s instigators.

Read more from NWF’s Jenna Peters here.

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Happening this Week

Wednesday, Sept 7

Senate Appropriations, markup proposed budget estimates for FY2012 Energy and Water Development, 3PM, Dirksen 106.

Thursday, Sept 8

Hearing: HR 2250 and HR 2681, House Energy and Commerce’s Energy and Power panel. H.R. 2550 would delay EPA’s waste disposal regulations for boilers and other incinerators, as well as nullify EPA’s boiler rule and others. H.R. 2681 would nullify certain EPA regulations on cement manufacturing and delay future rules for 15 months. 10:30AM, 2322 Rayburn.

Oversight hearing on offshore and renewable energy, House Natural Resources, 10AM, 1324 Longworth.

House Science’s Technology & Innovation Subcommittee hearing on smart grid technology, 10AM, 2318 Rayburn.

Friday, Sept 9

Hearing on categorical exclusions for onshore energy projects, House Natural Resources Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources, 10 AM, 1324 Longworth.

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For more global warming news on Wildlife Promise click here.

via Gage Skidmore/Flickr

“I think it’s important for us to reduce our emissions of pollutants and greenhouse gases that may well be significant contributors to the climate change and global warming that you’re seeing.”

- Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

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Economic Story of the Week

Cleantech Taking Off

According to Climate Progress, despite a spate of rumors in the media to the contrary, clean energy is creating large numbers of high quality American jobs in emerging industries. ‘Cleantech’ has seen “torrid growth” from 2003 to 2010, 8.3% per year which is almost double the growth rate of the overall economy during that period.

The government’s investment in clean energy jobs through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) and programs like the Better Buildings Initiative have helped stimulate the hardest hit sectors of the economy, increase U.S. competitive advantage in new clean energy industries, and increased both the quality and quantity of clean energy jobs even in the recession. For a more detailed analysis, click here.

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Editorial of the Week

Irene Strikes a Nation Seemingly Content to Worry Less About Climate Change

(New York Times)

The last time a hurricane landed on the shores of the United States, Americans’ belief in climate change was at its peak and House Democrats would soon begin their march toward passage of climate legislation. When Irene boils onto the East Coast this weekend, she will find a nation with degraded belief in global warming, a defeated climate bill, and the absence of a federal plan to address an ominously rising number of natural catastrophes.

It’s time to use current weather events, like Irene, as an analogy for future climate effects, says Frank Nutter, president of the Reinsurance Association of America… “You have to start looking at these things as indicative of the very scenarios that the scientific community say are likely to play out — increased precipitation, more severe storms, probably greater storm surge with rising sea level,” Nutter said. (More…)

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CA Green Lights Cap & Trade

State air regulators in California have affirmed cap and trade as their policy of choice to reduce greenhouse emissions from industrial sectors under California’s global warming law, A.B. 32.

All of the board members who approved the original plan in 2008 upheld their previous votes, but four members voiced preference yesterday for tax on carbon pollution instead of the cap-and-trade regulations.

The regulations are due to be released in final form in the next week or so, followed by a final commenting period before their approval in October. Agency staff stated they are also considering adding three new ways to reduce emissions outside the cap in order to increase the supply of offsets, including reducing the use of nitrogen-based fertilizers, reducing rice straw decomposition and methane generation from flooded rice fields, and replacing valves on oil and gas pipelines with ones that release less methane, said Edie Chang, head of ARB’s climate planning and management department.

More on this story: LA Times

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Come on Irene

Though here inside the Beltway we got off comparatively easy, Hurricane Irene’s wrath could cause more damage along the Eastern Seaboard than any other storm in decades, begging the question of whether climate change may be increasing the strength of hurricanes (not to mention other extreme weather events.) Coincidentally, Irene’s landing coincided with the 6 year anniversary of Katrina’s touchdown in the Gulf and came just a few days after the 5.9 earthquake that shook the east coast.

While scientists are still wary of attributing any single extreme weather event to climate change, according to Massachusetts Institute of Technology expert Kerry Emanuel, “the evidence for a connection between Atlantic hurricanes and global climate change is fairly compelling.” Given the apparent increase in both frequency and strength of these events and their impacts on people and wildlife, we should at least start taking this evidence seriously.

More on this story: NY Times, Huffington Post, Wildlife Promise

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Happening this Week

Tuesday, August 30

Business and policy leaders gather in Las Vegas, NV to discuss the future of renewable energy, efficiency, transportation, and the intelligent grid. Speakers include: Vice-President Joe Biden; Energy Secretary Steven Chu; Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus; the Governors of California, Nevada and Washington; Federal Energy Regulatory Chairman John Wellinghoff; Nevada Senator Harry Reid; Center for American Progress President John Podesta, and more. Check out the live stream here.

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For more global warming news on Wildlife Promise click here.

via Sen. Boxer/Flickr

“They keep trying to overturn the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, the Endangered Species Act. That’s not going to happen.”

-Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA).

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Economic Story of the Week

Think Big, Start Small

While Congress continues to squabble over energy efficient light bulbs a California nonprofit called Zilowatt is spreading energy conservation from the bottom up. The Palo Alto based organization is supplying interactive educational kits to schools this fall for outreach sponsored by the city’s utility departments.

The kits are packed with visual tools that allow students to learn at their own pace and use character superheroes Reuse, Recycle, Reduce and TIO (“Turn It Off”) to share lessons. The group’s goal is to provide materials to any school but they must first recruit a sponsor and a champion within the school to promote the program.

More on this story: NY Times

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Editorial of the Week

GOP vs. Mother Nature

(LA Times)

They loaded up the appropriations bill that funds the Interior Department and the Environmental Protection Agency with dozens of riders that would encourage deadly pollution of the air and water, set back efforts to reduce greenhouse gases and allow uranium mining near the Grand Canyon, among other things. Such riders are commonplace on annual appropriations bills, but Washington insiders say they’ve never seen such a breathtaking assault on the environment.

If there was any good news from the chaos surrounding this week’s deal to raise the federal debt ceiling, it’s that the drawn-out congressional debate over the issue distracted GOP representatives from passing this monstrosity. (More…)

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Drilling On Up

The Obama Administration just gave the green light to Shell Oil’s Arctic drilling exploration plan, proving once again that oil companies are held to a different standard than everyone else.

In a statement BOEMRE (the offshore regulatory agency) said that they “found no evidence that the proposed action would significantly affect the quality of the human environment.” The final outcome is contingent on a few more approvals – for safety permits and other things – but most observers believe the point is clear: the government wants drilling to happen and is working hard to make that a reality.

But just this week the British government warned that several hundred tons of oil had likely leaked into the North Sea from a Royal Dutch Shell rig, the 11th reported incident since 2009.

So what’s the big deal? A lot of folks have pointed out the obvious: there’s no way Shell or any other company could control a blowout or clean up an oil spill in these conditions.

More on this story: AP

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Feeling Hot Hot Hot?

New data confirms what you already knew – July was incredibly hot, one of the warmest on record. Check out the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Climatic Data Center recap of July 2011.

“We’ve had another unusually warm month and are on the way to another unusually hot year, but the reality is that these conditions are the new normals that we all need to get used to,” said Dr. Amanda Staudt, climate scientist with the National Wildlife Federation.

We’re on pace for the 35th consecutive year with global temperatures above the 20th century average. Some members of Congress may find the validity of climate change an inconvenient truth, but many U.S. cities are going above and beyond to mitigate it by lowering their carbon pollution and financing adaptation methods, for example, planting trees to increase shade to counter heat waves and elevating building foundations to account for projected sea level rise.

More on this story: Wildlife Promise, USA Today, NOAA’s State of the Climate

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DOE Panel Calls for Action on Fracking Impacts

The Secretary of Energy Advisory Board (SEAB) Natural Gas Subcommittee recently called for better enforcement, oversight and transparency for the natural gas industry, including full disclosure of the chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing, or ‘fracking.’

“The chemicals used to extract natural gas through fracking are often a mystery for local communities and state and federal regulators, so we applaud the panel for recommending the public disclosure of fracking chemicals,” said Kate Zimmerman, senior policy advisor on public lands for the National Wildlife Federation. “But this recommendation is just a tiny first step. Congress, the Department of Energy, the Department of the Interior and the EPA also need to move forward to close the gaping loopholes in our environmental laws the natural gas industry continues to exploit. Energy companies and government watchdogs need to balance economics and jobs with protecting wildlife, clean water, clean air and human health.”

The National Wildlife Federation is not opposed to the development of natural gas; however, any energy development must be done in an environmentally sound manner that does not place wildlife and people at risk.

More on this story: NWF Media Center

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Happening this Week

Congress is on summer recess until September 6th.

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For more global warming news on Wildlife Promise click here.

via Center for American Progress Action Fund

“The weather is getting worse and more violent. Catastrophic, in fact. The federal government needs to do more to be ready to protect federal assets and provide disaster assistance on an increasing frequency…We’ve stopped talking about this on Capitol Hill. We’ve decided that the debate over global warming is too contentious. I think it’s a big mistake.”

- Senator Dick Durbin, Chair, Senate Subcommittee on Financial Services and Government.

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Economic Story of the Week

Speeding Towards Fuel Efficiency

President Obama has announced new fuel economy standards for cars and light trucks that would double the current requirement to 54.5 miles per gallon (mpg) by 2025, resulting in a dramatic reduction in America’s oil dependence and carbon pollution.

“Whether you’re a commuter in a compact car or a sportsman who needs a pickup truck, every American deserves access to the most fuel-efficient, technologically-advanced vehicles that save them money, cut pollution and deliver great performance,” said Larry Schweiger, president and CEO of the National Wildlife Federation. “These rules are an important step toward reducing our billion-dollar-a-day addiction to imported oil, money that stronger fuel efficiency standards will keep at home to invest in job creation here in America.”

The new standards would raise car fuel efficiency standards 5 percent annually between 2017 and 2025, while light trucks would be required to reach an annual gain of 3.5 percent between 2017 and 2021, and 5 percent between 2022 and 2025.

“A broad range of interests – from automakers to unions to conservationists – has come together behind these new rules,” said Schweiger. “The technology is ready, the standards are achievable and poll after poll shows the American people strongly support getting the job done. We all benefit from robust standards to cut our oil dependence, create American jobs, and protect wildlife and public health, and we stand ready to defend these gains from extremist, politically-motivated attacks.”

Click here to view the embedded video.

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Editorial of the Week

Climate Change & the Plight of the Whitebark Pine

(NY Times)

For centuries, the whitebark pine, Pinus albicaulis, has grown on hundreds of thousands of acres across the West. It is a keystone species of an entire ecosystem — one now seriously at risk. Most of the whitebark pines in Yellowstone and Glacier National Parks are dead. It has been declared an endangered species in Canada. And, last week, the Fish and Wildlife Service stated that the whitebark pine “warranted” listing as threatened or endangered, making it one of the very few species officially acknowledged as threatened by climate change. The tragedy is the ongoing demise of an ecosystem, one for which humans are culpable. What looks, from the air, like a plagued forest has been plagued by the choices we have made over the past century.

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Capps for Clean Air

A press conference was held on Capitol Hill last week in support of an amendment to the House Environment and Interior Appropriations bill that would protect people and wildlife by striking a rider in the bill that delays the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to limit mercury and other harmful air toxics emitted from power plants.

The amendment, introduced by Representative Lois Capps (D-CA) would allow the EPA to set standards for dangerous air pollution that will save thousands of lives each year and reduce 90 percent of mercury that is emitted from coal-fired power plants. Mothers in Congress spoke at the event, including Rep. Lois Capps, Rep. Doris Matsui (D-CA), Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL) and Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), all expressing concern about the effects of mercury on children and women of child bearing age. Mercury is especially dangerous to children and developing fetuses; exposure affects a child’s ability to walk, talk, read, write and learn.

The American Lung Association is also using a nation-wide television campaign to urge Congress not to support policy that, according to Senator Harry Reid, would bring America back to “the robber-baron era where there were no controls on pollution from power plants, oil refineries and factories.”

The EPA is currently accepting public comments on a proposed rule to limit mercury and air toxics from power plants. Click here to take action.

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Will Someone Ask If News Corp. Was Behind Hacked Climate Emails?

Will the media finally start asking if Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. was connected to the illegal hacking of climate scientist emails?

It’s been frustrating that for all the rightful attention paid to The News of the World phone hacking scandal, virtually no journalist has been willing to ask if News Corp.’s lawbreaking extended into email hacking.

Given how quickly the stolen emails were handed to climate science deniers who were then immediately featured on Fox News, it’s a fair question to ask.

When the hacked emails were subject to independent investigation, climate scientists were vindicated. But given the clear as well as alleged connections between Scotland Yard and News Corp. in recent news, there’s been no similar independent investigation of who stole the emails in the first place. And as much as journalists were eager to report to the controversy on the emails, they’ve shown little interest in tracking down the thieves.

Read more from NWF CEO and president Larry Schweiger, here.

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Preview Study: Climate-Induced Weather Extremes and the Future for Indian Country

The National Wildlife Federation is releasing a new report on the disproportionate impacts of climate change on North American Indian Tribes. North American Indian Tribes are especially harmed by climate change, as more ecological shifts and more frequent, more extreme weather events occur. Because Tribes are heavily dependent on natural resources, severe weather events like droughts, floods, wildfires, and snowstorms make tribal communities particularly vulnerable and impact American Indians and Alaska Natives more than they impact the general population.

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Debt Deal, No Deal for Climate

Legislation to raise the debt ceiling and cut federal spending passed Congress today and was signed into law by President Obama. The deal imposes discretionary budget program caps, resulting in reductions for the Departments of Interior, Agriculture and Energy, Environmental Protection Agency, and other agencies that focus on conservation and little chance of attaching a tax on carbon pollution to pay down the deficit. The Waxman-Markey bill that passed the House last congress and Senator John Kerry’s climate proposal were both deficit reducers.

According to Climate Progress there have been 110 anti-environmental votes taken since the 112th Congress began with 20 related to climate change, 28 on air and water pollution, and 22 on clean energy. Click here to take action and tell your Congressperson to stop the attacks on our health, wildlife and the nation’s national resources.

“The deal to resolve the Congressional debt ceiling crisis and avoid the catastrophe of a national default is clearly a relief for America,” said NWF president and CEO Larry Schweiger. “But moving forward, members of Congress must remember the heavier a burden our conservation programs are forced to bear in the short term, the higher a risk we face in the long term – not just in higher public health costs, but in jeopardizing the wildlife and special places that generations of Americans have protected and handed down to their children and grandchildren.”

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Happening this Week

Wednesday, August 3

Teleconference and Report Release: Climate Change Hurts Indian Tribes Disproportionately, 12 PM EST, email Weinmanna@nwf.org for more information

Hearing on energy tax policy reform, Ways and Means, 10:00 AM, 1100 Longworth

Hearing on five public lands bills, Energy and Natural Resources, 2:30 PM, 366 Dirksen

Thursday, August 4

Proposed DC Biodiesel Plant and the Environment, DC Environmental Network, 12PM, Global Green USA, 1100 15th Street NW, 11th Floor , RSVP for the August 4th DCEN Event Here!

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For more global warming news on Wildlife Promise click here.

Steny Hoyer, Center for American Progress Action Fund

“I got no message from any voter that I ought to come to Congress and undermine the air, water, land that they survive on, recreate on and rely on for the quality of their lives. Not one constituent, whether they voted for me or against me, said ‘undermine the protections of our land and water and air.’ Not one.”

-Congressman Steny H. Hoyer (MD-5) during the mini-filibuster against H.R. 2584, a bill that would significantly undermine U.S. environmental protection laws.

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Economic Story of the Week

Energy-Saving LEDs, Unstoppable

Despite House attempts to strip funding for federal lighting efficiency standards, LEDs are driving the lighting market as commercial, industrial and outdoor sectors (96 percent of the world’s lighting energy use) realize massive savings from the growing technology.

According to the CEO of Digital Lumens, Tom Pincine, “The adoption rate of LED is so profound … and is happening at a clip that is surprising even for us in the marketplace.”

Some politicians have been targeting a 2007 energy law that would phase out traditional 100-watt incandescent light bulbs to make America’s light bulbs 25 percent more efficient. The House approved an amendment by voice vote to prohibit the use of funds to implement the federal light bulb standards and then added the measure to an Energy and Water Development appropriations bill for 2012 spending.

Meanwhile, the Department of Energy (DOE) is fighting back by launching a national education campaign with the Ad Council to help consumers save money on their energy bills by promoting sealing leaks in homes and energy efficient products. Click here to watch the advertisements.

More on this story: SolveClimateNews

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Editorial of the Week

Sizzle Factor for a Restless Climate

(NY Times)

Enjoying the heat wave? Yes, it has been a very hot summer after one of the most extreme-weather springs on record. It’s time to face the fact that the weather isn’t what it used to be. For climate geeks like me, the new normals offer a fascinating and disturbing snapshot of a restless climate. The numbers don’t take sides or point fingers. They acknowledge both powerful natural climate fluctuations as well as the steady drumbeat of warming caused by roughly seven billion people trying to live and prosper on a small planet, emitting heat-trapping greenhouse gases in the process. (More…)

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Bad News for Bears

The eastern U.S. is suffering through stifling heat and humidity, which have caused 22 deaths already. The U.S. Weather Service says heat is the number one weather-related killer in the country, claiming more lives each year than floods, lightning, tornadoes and hurricanes combined.

Had enough? Climate experts warn that our future will be hotter because of carbon pollution causing global warming. But it’s not just us, the heat waves are bad news for bears too.

Polar bears are being forced to swim very long distances because of melting sea ice due to climate change, which can be deadly for their cubs. A new study shows that when mother polar bears had no choice but to swim long distances to reach the safety of sea ice or land, nearly half of their cubs simply didn’t survive! Polar bears are outstanding swimmers, but scientists warn that these long-distance marathon swims — some more than 400 miles and lasting up to 12 days — puts them at risk of drowning, not to mention severe exhaustion if they survive.

More on this story: NY Times, Washington Post, Wildlife Promise

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Clean Energy is Blowing in the Wind

America’s offshore wind resources are immense, and it is time to get serious about bringing this significant, domestic clean energy source ashore. NWF applauds Senators Carper (D-DE) and Snowe (R-ME) for their leadership in building a bipartisan coalition of support for offshore wind energy. The introduction of the Incentivizing Offshore Wind Energy Act, which will provide much-needed incentives for investments in offshore wind projects, demonstrates a bipartisan commitment to advancing job-producing clean energy.NWF has joined more than 120 organizations in calling on the Obama Administration (Letter to Obama 3.7.11, Loan Guarantee Letter 6.10.11) and Congressional leaders to take positive steps to advance offshore wind development in a manner that is protective of our coastal and marine resources. Providing financial incentives such as an investment tax credit is a critical way to support this emerging industry that has the potential to create thousands of jobs while helping revitalize America’s manufacturing and maritime industries.

With great potential to reduce harmful pollution, create thousands of high-quality jobs, and help achieve energy independence, offshore wind energy is a wise investment in America’s future.

More on this story: Wildlife Promise, Clean Energy News

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Bloomberg Boos Pollution

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg recently expressed frustration with the national paralysis on setting climate change policies and is supporting the environmental campaign to shut down coal-fired power plants across the United States with a donation of $50 million. The plants produce nearly half the nation’s electricity, but they also pump out pollution that contributes to our warming climate, makes people sick and causes premature deaths.

“If we are going to get serious about reducing our carbon footprint in the United States, we have to get serious about coal,” he said in a statement. “Coal is a self-inflicted public health risk, polluting the air we breathe, adding mercury to our water, and the leading cause of climate disruption.”

More on this story: NPR, NY Times

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Happening this Week

Tuesday, July 26

Hearing on EPA power plant rules, House Oversight and Government Reform, 1:30 PM, 2154 Rayburn

Wednesday, July 27

Hearing on U.S. economic interests in Arctic, Oceans, Atmosphere, Fisheries, and Coast Guard Subcommittee, 10:30 AM, 253 Russell Senate Office Building

Thursday, July 28

Hearing on endangered species bills, Natural Resources Committee, 10AM, 1324 Longworth

Hearing on land and water bills, Energy and Natural Resources Subcommittee on National Parks,
9 AM, 366 Dirksen

Hearing on DOE, Fish and Wildlife nominations, Energy and Natural Resources, 10AM, 366 Dirksen

Hearing on long-term budget issues of climate, Appropriations Committee, 2 PM, 138 Dirksen Senate Office Building

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For more global warming news on Wildlife Promise click here.