Trump could face the ‘biggest trial of the century’ — over climate change
A few weeks ago, a federal judge in Oregon made headlines when she ruled that a groundbreaking climate lawsuit will proceed to trial. And some experts say its outcome could rewrite the future of climate policy in the United States.
The case, brought by 21 youths aged 9 to 20, claims that the federal government isn’t doing enough to address the problem of climate change to protect their planet’s future — and that, they charge, is a violation of their constitutional rights on the most basic level. The case has already received widespread attention, even garnering the support of well-known climate scientist James Hansen, who has also joined as a plaintiff on behalf of his granddaughter and as a guardian for “future generations.”
The U.S. government under President Obama, along with several others representing members of the fossil fuel industry, filed to have the lawsuit dismissed. But on Nov. 10, federal judge Ann Aiken denied the motion, clearing the case to proceed to trial. According to Our Children’s Trust, the nonprofit representing the youth plaintiffs, a recent case management conference indicated that the case would likely go to trial by summer or early fall of 2017.…
Al Gore: ‘I Felt Good’ About Trump Meeting, Ivanka Is ‘Very Committed’ on Climate Policy
Former Vice President Al Gore appeared on MSNBC tonight to further discuss his meeting with President-elect Donald Trump and Ivanka Trump.
Hayes asked him, “Did you come away encouraged, terrified, or somewhere in between?”
Gore said it was “very interesting” and productive.” And while he would not divulge specific details, he made it clear he “felt good” about the meeting overall.
Hayes asked him if he’s concerned about climate change progress being rolled back under a Trump administration, and Gore ended up striking a more optimistic tone.
Minutes later Hayes returned to his meeting with the Trumps and asked Gore about if he got a sense of where Ivanka is on climate change.
“It’s no secret that Ivanka Trump is very committed,” he said, “to having a climate policy that makes sense for our country and for our world, and that was certainly evident in the conversation I had with her.”
Watch above, via MSNBC.…
EPA Chief warns utilities: ‘Next Administration will never allow’ continuation of Trump policies
Speaking with CNN’s John Sutter, Obama EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy warns America’s utility industry not to invest in coal-fired power plants because the next Administration after Donald Trump’s will shut them down: “They are not going to go backwards… You’ll be asking them to invest in facilities that they know the next Administration would never allow to continue.”
EPA ADMINISTRATOR GINA MCCARTHY: “I know how the utility industry has already planned, not just because of the Clean Power Plan, but because of the shift to clean energy. They are not going to go backwards, cause you’ll be asking them to actually increase energy prices. You’ll be asking them to invest in facilities that they know the next Administration would never allow to continue. Because the longer we go, the more you’re actually going to need to have continued reductions more and more and that’s the challenge. So, the utilities won’t change.”
CNN Politics with John Sutter
December 3, 2016
Al Gore just had ‘an extremely interesting conversation’ with Trump on climate change
…The One Photo From Ivanka Trump’s Meeting With Al Gore
…Al Gore: climate change threat leaves ‘no time to despair’ over Trump victory
…Donald Trump, Ivanka Trump Meet With Al Gore
Donald Trump and his daughter, Ivanka Trump, met with Al Gore, the former vice president and 2000 Democratic presidential nominee, on Monday in New York City.
Gore was originally scheduled to meet only with Ivanka Trump at Trump Tower. It is unclear how his meeting with the president-elect came about.
DESPITE DENIAL, GLOBAL TEMPERATURES ARE DROPPING FAST
All global temperature data sets confirm that global temperature has fallen rapidly in recent months as the recent El Nino ended.
HadCrut4 global land and ocean data
Over the last couple of years there have been many articles about how they have been record-breakers in global temperature. It’s often sold as a simple ‘the planet is getting warmer only because of us’ story. As I have discussed before the concurrent El Nino was dismissed by some climate scientists as having an insignificant contribution to that record. However, there is a great deal of confusion and diversity in the assessment of its contribution. Some scientists maintain that it was the recent very strong El Nino that elevated the temperature to record levels.
Nevertheless some maintain that warm records would have been broken without the El Nino (although the significant contribution made by the highly unusual warm “Pacific Blob” is usually ignored).
As the 2015/16 El Nino started to wane wiser heads said the records would fade along with it, “No El Nino, no record,” they said, showing that the El Nino was responsible for edging the years to be records.
It is obvious that the world is cooling after the El Nino and nobody knows how much it will as global temperatures bottom out. So the time is right, one would have thought, to monitor that cooling process and see what can be deduced to set the recent record warm years into their proper context.
In doing so it seems that you can write a straightforward article, clearly one that can be revisited in the coming months with new data, present some current data, discuss the caveats surrounding it, and still get criticised, especially about what the article did not say. Cut and past comments and quotes blossomed in many blogs, sloppy statistics are banded about, along with not a little hubris wrapped up in ignorance and gratuitous use of the ‘denier’ label.
David Rose’s article in the Mail on Sunday simply reported what has happened recently to the Lower Tropospheric temperature over land. This data set responds more quickly to temperature changes that other sets which follow suite later. Land temperatures heat up and cool down quicker. They show the El Nino spike very clearly and the possible return to pre El Nino temperatures.
Some have said the article is flawed because …