Nick Sundt's blog

In his second inaugural address, President Barack Obama said today (21 January 2013) at the Capitol in Washington, DC: "We will respond to the threat of climate change, knowing that the failure to do so would betray our children and future generations."  Lou Leonard, head of WWF’s climate change program, is heartened by the President's statement, saying that "it is an important first step for using the power of the Presidency to spur a practical national conversation on climate change. The importance of the President regularly raising his voice on this issue cannot be overstated. But a sustained national conversation isn’t enough. The President should lay out the steps he can and will take to clean up our energy system, help communities prepare for climate disruption and encourage the rest of the world to ramp up action."

Chicago, Cincinnati and San Francisco have been selected as U.S. finalists in World Wildlife Fund’s Earth Hour City Challenge, a year-long challenge rewarding cities that are preparing for increasingly extreme weather and promoting renewable energy. Both Chicago and Cincinnati experienced their warmest years on record in 2012.  

In the latest in his “Climate Denial Crock of the Week" video series, Peter Sinclair provides an overview of the climate extremes in 2012 that battered the U.S.  The conditions have helped shift public opinion and elevate the public debate around climate change. 

"I wager," says WWF President and CEO Carter Roberts in this Huffington Post piece, "that like Lincoln, President Obama will be remembered most for what he does to address the existential threat that history has presented on his watch: the breakdown of our planet's natural systems upon which all life depends, and specifically human-caused climate change."

New study shows nearly 60 percent of world’s largest companies have renewable energy or greenhouse gas reduction commitments, citing strong business case.

This twelve minute video from the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) starts with the biologists describing some of the many endearing qualities of walruses,  explaining how important sea ice is to the animals and why the decline of that ice is so disruptive and threatening -- not just to the walruses but for the people of the region.  The second half of the video shows how USGS biologists use satellite radio tags to track the movement and behavior of the walruses. "The information identifies areas of special importance to walruses during sparse summer sea ice and as human presence increases in the region from oil drilling and activities such as shipping and tourism now possible with less ice," says the USGS. In addition to the video, we provide a transcript.

From an 8 pm EST kickoff on Wednesday 14 November to a 7-8 pm finale on Thursday 15 November 2012, watch the live online broadcast of 24 Hours of Reality on climate disruption and its affect on all of us. The event spotlights every region of the globe across all 24 time zones, highlighting different impacts and solutions every hour from a variety of voices—musicians, comedians, experts, every day people.

With two months still left in 2012, the preliminary data indicate that the U.S. has thus far experienced eleven weather-related disasters each with damages of at least a billion dollars. Since 1980, only 2011 saw more billion-dollar weather disasters (14 in all). With the drought and Hurricane Sandy likely to be among the costliest weather-related disasters on record (i.e. since 1980), 2012 also is likely to edge out 1988 as the second costliest year in terms of billion-dollar weather-extremes.

Should cities be preparing for the consequences of climate disruption and rising sea levels?  As part of the PBS Newshour series on "Coping With Climate Change," Ray Suarez discusses the question with Joseph Romm of Center for American Progress and American Enterprise Institute's Kenneth Green.

In 2009, a publicly funded assessment of the impacts of climate change, Global Climate Change Impacts in the United States, warned in its key findings that "coastal areas are at increasing risk from sea-level rise and storm surge." Now, just days after "Frankenstorm" Sandy pushed the most destructive and costly storm surge on record for the U.S. mid-Atlantic into the region's heavily populated coastal areas, the libertarian Cato Institute is treating Americans to a Halloween trick. It released today (31 October 2012) a slick study masquerading as an updated "Addendum" to the Federal report. In its key findings, Cato entirely drops any mention of storm surges and says the "[i]mpacts of observed climate change have little national significance."