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Weekly spotlight on climate and eco-diaries (10/22/23) Lying to kids about climate; bird eye colors [1]

['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.', 'Daily Kos Staff Emeritus']

Date: 2023-10-22  

The spotlight is a weekly, categorized compilation of links and excerpts from environmentally related posts at Daily Kos. Any posts included in the collection do not necessarily indicate my agreement with or endorsement of them. Because of the interconnectedness of the subject matter, some of these posts could be placed in more than one category.

OUTSTANDING DIARY OF THE WEEK

Daily Bucket: Bird eye color mystery persists, creating big questions and opportunities by Besame. In a 2021 Daily Bucket comment I said, “I’m going to search for info on bird eye colors. Seems that the dramatic red eyes are not just among water birds … Some birds have different eye colors for males and females. Others change eye color as the bird ages, while some have different eye colors during breeding season. I’ll be sure to share the info I find.” I followed through right away, Google searching for info, finding nothing, searching again with different search terms and still finding zip. I abandoned generic Google and searched Scholar, but no matter which database or term was searched, the responses offered little about bird eye color but abundant variations on bird eye designs on butterfly wings, how birds discern color and use that info, and even birds-eye views of non-avian topics. I gave up but the science devas didn’t and answered my query 2.5 years later, last week, when information for my long promised story finally fell into my lap(top) while I scrolled through Twitter. I saw a thread from Eamon Corbett, an ornithology Ph.D. student at Louisiana State University, about his bird eye color review paper, including photos that illustrate some of the bizarre eye colors: The Mechanistic, genetic, and evolutionary causes of bird eye colour variations.

CRITTERS & THE GREAT OUTDOORS

The Daily Bucket: Mountain Loop Highway - Fall Edition by BrownsBay. The Mountain Loop Highway is a 52-mile scenic drive through the North Cascades that runs from Granite Falls to Darrington (or the other way around). It’s not really a loop. Most of the road is a paved two-lane state highway. The middle part is an unpaved 13-mile forest road peppered with potholes. We made two stops along the way for short hikes. First stop was the Big Four Ice Caves. The second stop was North Fork Sauk Falls. Let’s go for a drive and a couple hikes.The Big Four Ice Caves is a nice short hike of about a mile leading to a big pile of snow that never melts. It’s an extremely popular destination of almost amusement park proportions, but one with deadly consequences for the foolish. We were early enough to avoid the crowds. It’s a nice hike, so let’s hike to the Ice Caves.

When your Bug of the Day is a butterfly, life is better.

Daily Bucket - Warblers at the Waterfowl Refuge by CaptBLI. I walked two miles and sat for two hours before I decided to head out of the woods (during a recent visit to the Wildlife Refuge.) It was a pleasant morning and I felt so good. I didn’t mind being denied a single thing to photograph (until I was almost to the truck.) This lovely, unhurried, Viceroy Butterfly landed daintily on some vines cluttering the edges of the trail. It was in no hurry to lap nectar or evade a predator. It was resting from drifting through the morning air. We both enjoyed the moment of quiet. A few steps further, a commotion in a tall Poplar caused me to turn and look upward. A family of Blue Jays were scrambling through the branches as a couple of juvenile Red-headed Woodpeckers collected insects.The brief complaints of the woodies followed the flutter of Jay wings as each successful item found by a Red-head caused a potential ‘mugging” by a blue bandit.

Dawn Chorus Obsession 2023 by appy. This year has been different. Dawn Chorus and Daily Bucket authors have echoed that sentiment and I could not be more agreeable. Natural phenomena colluded to provide serious setbacks at my place here in the Flint Hills of Kansas. Regardless, my priorities remained unchanged. I persisted to document the activities of my local bands of Swallows to the best of my ability, catastrophes be damned. Swallow behavior is my overall primary bird interest. Improving capture of definition for Swallows in flight is my intent. Capturing that one click at a time dream still shot of a Swallow’s Shining Moment is my obsession. I had someone ask me why my Flickr photostream is packed with Swallow photos since Swallows are just “common birds”. My response is that while Swallows are numerous and occupy large areas of our country, they are anything but common. Barn Swallows, in particular, possess skillsets and social behavior that set them apart from any other bird. Moreover, since they live here to share this place for about 6 months of the year, I have the opportunity to record intimate details ‘common observers’ might overlook.

The Daily Bucket. So dratted ugly they're cute. Coot chicks by funningforrest. I see it’s Saturday and no Daily Bucket is yet up, so here goes with a photo diary of “ugly” American Coot chicks (and their not-ugly-but-not-beautiful-either adult form).

The Daily Bucket - madronas and thrushes by OceanDiver. Pacific Madrona, Arbutus menziesii, is common and abundant in dry rocky sites like this up here in the islands. Madrona roots penetrate the tiniest cracks in bedrock, finding anchorage and using the water that seeps in. As their roots grow though they lever open the cracks, breaking off chunks of bedrock. Some years back falling rock landed on the sidewalk by the holding lane and it took a while to secure the area (cones, tape etc). All the madrona trees growing out of the rock wall were cut back at that time. They’ll need to do that again one of these days. Madronas are our only evergreen broadleaf trees. The maples, willows and alders are dropping foliage now, as are most of the local shrubs like oceanspray, salmonberry, snowberry. Besides the reddish bark, madronas also stand out by their curvy shape. Our firs, pines and cedars are more telephone-pole shaped. These trees were all growing on top of the cliff wall, between the ferry lanes and the ocean.

Older madrona bark is darker and built up. Younger trunks and branches shed their thin red outer layer each summer revealing a green inner layer which gradually turns red over the fall and winter.

CLIMATE CRISIS

How the Fossil Fuel Industry Pays for Lies to School Children by ClimateDenierRoundup.The fossil fuel industry has not just bought US senators and members of congress; it’s even buying school board and state board of education members. And, in some states, they’re demanding books or course instruction materials that explicitly lie — or at least confuse students — about the connection between fossil fuels and our climate emergency. You can thank Clarence Thomas, the most corrupt Supreme Court justice in American history, for this one. After years of wining-and-dining from billionaires who would really, really like to be able to buy their very own politicians, in 2010 Thomas was the tie-breaking vote to legalize political bribery in the Citizens United decision, as I lay out in detail in The Hidden History of the Supreme Court and the Betrayal of America. A 2019 NPR/Ipsos poll found that four out of five Americans — and two out of three Republicans — believe our schoolchildren should be taught accurate scientific information about the known and well-documented relationship between climate change and fossil fuels. Yet, the fossil fuel industry has inserted itself deeply into the schoolbook selection process, to the detriment of our children and their future.

Newsmax Makes Climate Change Boring With Denial Rerun Starring Usual Suspects by ClimateDenierRoundup. With all the exciting conspiracy theories out there on social media, we were a bit surprised to see what managed to make it out of the small phone screens and into the medium-sized TV screens this week on Newsmax’s " A Climate Conversation ." The new video sounds like a throwback to disinfo from the old days, when deniers were still trying to pretend like their argument was scientific and legitimate, and not just political partisanship to oppose policies that impact their fossil-fueled funders. Indeed, the film was hosted by Kim Monson, a radio host at KLZ 560 AM, whose webpage advertises the radio station’s app as offering "conservative truth" (not the regular kind).

Professional climate science denier Roy Spencer

Even Deniers' Favorite Data Set Shows September Broke Heat Records by ClimateDenierRoundup. Once upon a time, Drs. Roy Spencer and John Christy from the University of Alabama-Huntsville (UAH) were the last scientific hope for climate deniers, as their satellite data set supposedly showed no global warming. Then other, better scientists repeatedly corrected the many errors in their work that all conveniently lowered the warming these contrarian scientists "found" in the UAH satellite data, until eventually even their satellites showed an unmistakable warming trend. Instead of adjusting their stance on climate change in light of their newly accurate evidence, though, the pair has spent years doubling down on denial . Now, as 2023 looks to almost certainly be the hottest year on record , even Spencer has to admit that it's getting hot. In his latest blog post , he reports that September was 0.9°C warmer than the 1991-2020 global average (which itself is warmer than the 20th century average!) That data apparently "establishes a new monthly high temperature record since satellite temperature monitoring began in December, 1978."

James Hansen challenges The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change 1.5 C guardrail by Pakalolo. James Hansen, the former director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, commonly known as the Godfather of Climate Science, and three colleagues, Makiko Sato, Reto Ruedy, and Leon Simons, suggest that by early next year, the world may have reached the dreaded 1.5 Celsius above long-term temperature average. Hansen’s testimony to Congress three-plus decades ago was the first time climate change finally became an issue in international mass media.Keeping temperature rise below the 1.5 C temperature limit was the fundamental goal of the Paris Climate Agreement. In climate circles, it “has been widely adopted as a guardrail for avoiding worsening devastation that affects lives, livelihoods and nature.” In September, news that the temperature rise had reached 1.8 caught many of us off guard. It does not mean that the 1.5 C guardrail is gone. According to reporting by Adam Morton of The Guardian, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) noted that 1.5 C temperature would need to be trending for twenty years to be determinative of a breach. James Hansen’s paper challenges that timeframe. They argue that the energy imbalance (more sun reaching Earth than being reflected to space) guarantees increasing temperatures.

x James Hansen sounded the climate alarm in 1988. To this day, emissions are rising. His latest paper announces the era of "accelerated warming". Focusing on the average anomaly of the past 4 months of +0.44°C, he warns:



"If this relative anomaly is maintained through this El… pic.twitter.com/gpENkjFzK8 — Assaad Razzouk (@AssaadRazzouk) October 16, 2023

Kitchen Table Kibitzing: “Change your diet, save the climate – eat the rich” by boatsie. Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg participated earlier today in Fossil Free London’s protest outside the JP Morgan building after having been arrested at an earlier demonstration Tuesday. The company was selected as site for the protest because, according to the organization, over the last seven years JP Morgan has financed fossil fuels to the tune of $434bn annually, earning it the position as number one funder of fossil fuels in the world. “Society in the future is likely to judge companies that continue such fossil fuel investments as both immoral and as operating outside international law,’ said a statement issued to JP Morgan’s head of sustainability Luke Nelson. “What does JP Morgan plan to do right now to avoid such a judgment?” Protestors handed out £10 notes issued by the “bank of climate chaos” which said: “I promise to pay the bearer on demand the sum of loss and damage,” while chanting “Change your diet, save the climate – eat the rich,” the Guardian reports.

Overnight News Digest: Heat is making the earth uninhabitable; Gulf Stream weakening now 99% certain by Magnnifico. From Salon: Put bluntly: If global temperatures increase by 1 degree Celsius or more above their current levels, billions of people will face wet-bulb temperatures every year so intense that their bodies will not be able to naturally cool themselves. Indeed, if global temperatures exceed 2 degrees above pre-industrial levels, 4 billion people will encounter intolerable heat and humidity on a yearly basis, often in regions where air conditioning and other forms of relief are not widely available. That could include more than 2 billion people in Pakistan and India, 1 billion in eastern China and 800 million people in sub-Saharan Africa. Once global temperatures rise 3 degrees above pre-industrial levels, much of the U.S. Northeast, Southeast and Midwest will also regularly experience unlivable wet-bulb temperatures.

Overnight News Digest - Saturday Science: Gray whales, School nurses, Extinct species, Banksy by Rise above the swamp. From Axios: The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service removed 21 species from its endangered list on Monday due to extinction. The big picture: They were among a list of 23 native species proposed for delisting in 2021 due to extinction, including the ivory-billed woodpecker. But unverified possible images of the bird last officially seen in 1944 means wildlife officials are continuing to monitor for more details, per a FWS statement Monday. The FWS declared one mammal (Guam's Little Mariana fruit bat), eight mussels, two fish and 10 birds extinct. Eight of the birds delisted were endemic to Hawai'i'.

You and Thwaites: Sudden Ocean Front Property by oaksong. The Thwaites glacier is a segment of Antarctica that is nearly the size of Rhode Island. Scientists have predicted that sometime in the next 10 years this large mass will break off into the ocean. As a result, sea level may rise as much as 10 feet or roughly 3 meters. This rather rapid rise in sea level will have a dramatic effect on the coasts of the countries of the world. Depending on how low or how close to basic sea level these coasts are, substantial amounts of property will suddenly be found underwater. For instance, the population of Miami will suddenly need to improve their resiliency as Ron DeSantis would put it. Automobiles with gas engines will suddenly require snorkels, floats, and a deployable propeller. First floor apartments will become fish bowls or maybe homes for manatees. I-75, the famous alligator alley, will become the southern border of the state separating land from ocean.

Our Asteroid is Us—Are We the Dinosaurs of the 21st Century? And How Our Wars Distract Us. by Tom Engelhardt at TomDispatch. With our increasingly dire global situation in mind, ask yourself this: How is humanity reacting to the deep dangers we now face? Are we focusing our attention on putting out the flames, so to speak? I’m afraid — despite the heroic efforts of any number of young people — the overall answer would have to be: Not on your life! Sadly enough, instead of facing the crisis of climate change head-on, much of humanity seems all too intent on starting fires of the kind that have defined us since time immemorial. I have in mind, of course, a different kind of planetary destruction entirely: war-making. In fact, sometimes that seems to be by far our greatest, if grimmest, skill and deepest nature.

ENERGY & TRANSPORTATION

Energy Transition In Transportation Stories by Rusty Robot. A sampler of news happening around the world in energy transition and specifically electric vehicles using a high level and holistic view. This is a rather lazy diary entry since I’m mostly quoting stories but the transition to EVs and renewables is very complicated and I prefer to let the articles speak for themselves. If I try to rewrite what the article says I will likely get things wrong and confuse people. So please click on the links to get more of the story. A super interesting car experiment in one of the sunniest and harshest place on Earth. While it won’t work everywhere it shows what is possible by building and testing — which is awesome! Solar-powered off-road car finishes 620-mile test drive across north Africa. The Stella Terra was designed by students at Eindhoven University of Technology and completed trip without recharging.

The Stella Terra in the Sahara

Denver schools getting solar canopies and EV chargers by solarman55. Another win for the Democrats’ Inflation Reduction Act. When he was younger, David Laloata watched climate change raise the waters around his native Guam, destroy coral reefs and increase wildfires on what should be a tropical island. As a 15-year-old transfer sophomore at Denver Public Schools’ Northeast Early College, Laloata stood under a new solar array serving as a power station and parking lot canopy and talked about the thrill of helping his fellow students lead the next generation of climate change problem-solvers. “This may only be the beginning of solving one of our major issues,” Laloata said..

Ask Solarman: Examples of Strong Economics by solarman55. Scientific articles (like the one I posted from NYT recently) and well known climate scientists, tell us it is NOT too late. It seems obvious but I’ll say it- we need every change we can make. Nothing should get excluded because other things are “needed more” or some upcoming technology breakthrough might “be better”. Changing one incandescent light bulb to an LED is progress. Okay, you might say, what does the change to carbon free power for a home look like, on an economic basis? Might I be able to afford it, or afford to finance it? How does it pay for itself? I know, I know- the environmental benefits should be taken into account. But with most projects we have no way to place a value on them. So we nail down every concrete, immediate value we can. Fortunately the Democrats we elected figured out economic incentives, which go a long way to placing a value on carbon free energy systems. Here are a few examples of how we can use the economic advantages of energy efficiency, renewable energy and EV adoption.

Renewable Tuesday: Hydrogen Colors by Mokurai. Demand for oil, gas and coal will peak by 2030, but that’s not fast enough to keep global warming within 1.5 degrees, says IEA chief IEA and other analysts constantly point out that current national targets for decarbonizing are nowhere near enough to hold Global Warming to 1.5℃, but whenever I read such a statement I push back that this is due to gross lack of imagination among government officials and analysts. In reality, government targets are constantly being raised as the public gains more experience with rapidly falling costs and increasing capabilities, while the specialists in these areas and the activist organizations keep on telling us how much better we can do.

Trains and dirty energy causing problems again by tjlord. We see the issues with rail transport of oil and other oil products all the time, especially when they crash and burn. Well, Colorado got to play host to the “why we don’t want to keep supplying Texas and the world with coal” show again. A coal train, likely from Wyoming and headed either to Texas or to export, derailed between Colorado Springs — population about 480,000 — and Pueblo — 110,000. The derailment didn’t hurt anyone but it dumped multiple cars of coal directly onto Interstate 25, the main North-South highway in Colorado and a major truck shipping rout.

CO2 reduction is nice, but we need to focus on sloppy methane leakage by ohthatoneguy. Talking about our impending collapse and even extinction has become a taboo topic. People respond with “I don't really watch the news anymore.” or “Why dwell on things beyond your control?” So here's the deal. Yes, you can ignore that your car seems to be making a waka-waka soound on right turns, ignore an engine warning light, and if you want to, you can pretend the roads are perfect and just drive at speed over the potholes and try to ignore the resulting obviously rough ride. But if you keep driving anyway with a flat tire, you're not gonna make it to work on time, even if you drive faster. The statistic often cited is that methane is 80 times as strong as CO2 as a greenhouse gas over 8 years. It's also 28 times as strong over 80 years. Both are oversimplifications. Methane traps a lot more heat than CO2, over 100 times as much upon entering the atmosphere but in the process gets broken down into water and CO2 in 9-12 years. Methane is the primary contributor of global warming.

WATER & INFRASTRUCTURE

Westlands Water District Asks CA Supreme Court to Overturn Environmental Restoration Obligations by Dan Bacher. Westlands Water District, the largest agricultural water district in the country, is asking the California Supreme Court to overrule four state court decisions in its most recent effort to evade payment of at least $100 million in environmental restoration and other costs.These decisions refused to “rubber stamp a federal contract to eliminate Westlands’ massive debt to the United States Treasury,” according to the Hoopa Valley Tribe in a press statement. Westlands, located on drainage-impaired land on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley, has been dubbed the “Darth Vader of California Water Politics” by its opponents for its legal, legislative and administration attacks on fish restoration efforts on the Trinity River, a major tributary of the Klamath River, and the Sacramento and San Joaquin River systems for decades. “The courts ruled that the contract between Westlands and the federal Bureau of Reclamation (Reclamation) is incomplete because it omitted a critical term—how much is owed,” the Tribe stated.

Proposed Water Conservation Rule Exempts California’s Most Profligate Users by Dan Bacher. A proposed regulation supported by the State Water Resources Control Board (SWRCB) would impose permanent water conservation mandates on about 400 California cities and water agencies that collectively serve about 95% of the state’s residents, according to a press statement from the California Water Impact Network (C-WIN). Newsom administration regulators claim the measure would save about 413,000 acre-feet of water annually, or enough to supply about 1.2 million households. But Max Gomberg, a water policy expert, former SWRCB member, and a senior consulting analyst for the California Water Impact Network, said the new rule does nothing to rein in the most profligate consumers of the state’s water: Central Valley agribusiness. “While additional urban conservation is important, it’s just a drop in the bucket compared to the savings that could be realized by adjusting agribusiness allocations so they are equitable and resilient to climate change,” Gomberg said.

Gaza's last seawater desalination plant has shut down in the shadow of a daunting climate crisis by Pakalolo. Alarm bells are ringing over the Gaza Strip as freshwater sources are no longer available or running out to a growing and displaced population of Palestinians caught in a war between Hamas and Israel over the vicious slaughter of Israelis on October 7, 2023. The World Health Organization (WHO) states that people need 50 liters (13 gallons) of water daily for survival. Currently, people in Gaza only receive three, less than one gallon. In the south of Gaza, reporting shows only one liter (one quart) is available as refugees flood the area from the north. Dehydration is now occurring, stated the WHO, as reported by The Guardian. Symptoms in people include dizziness, fatigue, and confusion. In severe cases, organ shutdown and brain damage occur. Fresh clean water is critical in a healthcare setting to prevent infections. The UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, said on Tuesday that Gaza’s last seawater desalination plant had shut down, bringing the risk of further deaths and waterborne diseases such as cholera and dysentery. Six water wells, three water pumping stations and one water reservoir – which collectively served more than 1.1million people – are also out of action, it said.

FOOD, AGRICULTURE & GARDENING

Saturday Morning Garden Blogging Vol. 19.42-early fall and a few apples by robtctwo. Apple pies and a photo collection of gorgeous flowering plants.

Climate resilience: Food by Gardening Toad. Food is becoming an increasingly important aspect of adjusting to Climate Change/Global Warming. What we eat, how it is produced, and where it comes from are all things we need to ponder in addition to the monetary cost of food, which is likely to increase dramatically in the years ahead as the climate crisis causes multiple crop failures around the globe. What we eat may affect the global climate. Imported foods and meat (especially beef) typically have a large carbon footprint. Highly processed food, even domestically produced, may have a relatively large carbon footprint compared to locally or regionally produced unprocessed foods. My personal goal is to transition to a largely homegrown or regionally produced diet, and cut out most processed foods and beef.

ACTION

Greta Thunberg is ‘alive & kicking’ (ass)…are we? by mikeymikey. Now that the novelty of a child confronting the world about the crime of Gaiacide seems to have worn off, we see and hear a lot less about Greta Thunberg these days — but that does not mean she has retired from the fight. When Covid took over the world in 2020, she along with all environmental issues, was knocked off the media shelf and while the environment’s public relations advocates, La Niña and now El Nino, have done a Cracker Jack job of reestablishing ‘climate celebrity’, Greta has basically remained in the media shadows, which ‘coincidentally’ is exactly where the FF Industry wants her. How ‘fortunate’ for them. During her moment in the ‘spotlight’ she was feted like a modern version of General Tom Thumb. It would appear that the message she brought was overshadowed by the age and hutzpah of the messenger. This was no where made more plain, than when she spoke to the U.N.. After effectively ripping new asses for the august assembly of world leaders gathered to hear her speak, she was applauded by them as if she had provided a whole new form of entertainment catering to their jaded palates. “What pluck this child has!” they thought. “How remarkable”, while others thought, “How marketable, what a shame such talent and drive is wasted on our deaf ears”.

[Note: The climate strike action began at San Francisco City Hall in 2019. The following entries are excerpts from “letters” that were issued each week of the action. Although the strike was focused on San Francisco, many of the same issues affect countless U.S. cities.]

Cars: What Are They Good For? -- Strike for the Planet week 111 by birches. This week’s topic: Cars — What Are They Good For? What is the city doing to deal with literal carnage of pedestrians and cyclists? Cars are causing a problem? Open more spaces to cars cause that’ll fix things for sure!5 Cars are harming neighborhoods? Don’t change things to reduce or eliminate those cars no matter what!6 Getting rid of cars upsets big donors and people with privilege and power? Make false comparisons and try to get cars back everywhere. San Francisco is not built for cars. The roads, in fact, were built for bikes. SF is geographically too small to need or accommodate cars, and is the second most densely populated city in the U.S. With more people per area and less space that is not inhabited, cars traveling at high speeds and breaking traffic laws on a regular basis cause deaths and injuries. Traffic is both bad and insanely dangerous in San Francisco.The situation would be bad enough if that was the extent of our problem, but it’s not.

Traffic and Toilets -- Strike for the Planet week 110 by birches. This week’s topic: Traffic and toilets. You can do your job, or you can pander and backpedal and play politics. The right choices are obvious and cheaper, so why keep making the wrong ones? Wait, you think you’re not making wrong choices? But we’ve got receipts. Receipt #1: Traffic Traffic is both bad and insanely dangerous in San Francisco. Why? • For starters, San Francisco wasn’t built for cars at all; the roads were built for bikes. • SF is geographically small, too small to need cars and too small to accommodate cars. • It is the second most densely populated city in the U.S. This means there are more people per area and less space that is not inhabited. Add cars to the mix, traveling at high speeds and breaking traffic laws on a regular basis, and you cause deaths and injuries.• Cars are expensive and the poorest households spend the most money on them. • And in SF it is the loudest who get heard, no matter how privileged they already are or how peripherally involved in an issue.13

We're Doing Water Wrong -- Strike for the Planet week 109 by birches. This week’s topic: We’re doing water wrong. Sure, SF is a regional power, but what’s that got to do with water? We get our water from 167 miles away. It travels by aqueducts and pipelines through seven counties and down 10,000 feet in elevation, crosses three major faults and innumerable smaller ones, and is the water supply for 2.8 million people. Our impact on water in the state is enormous. All right, but what does it matter if our water supply isn’t local? It wouldn’t matter if we were good stewards of the water, but we’re not. The ways in which we get and how we value the water are wrong and cause damage. How do we know we’re wrong and causing damage? Lawsuits are a good clue. Take the most recent one, where SF is suing the state to not increase water flow to support fish and the river ecosystems we’re taking the water from, even though they’re dying in the drought. Sounds evil, right? Then there was the one where SF sided with Central Valley farmers against using water to support dying fish and ecosystems. If a company acted like this, we’d call it greenwashing: pretending to care about the environment but only so long as it’s easy and suits us.

The Lab -- Strike for the Planet week 108 by birches. Water in SF, the Lab. SF has major water problems — Statement of the Problem. Almost all of SF’s water is from the Sierra snowpack and the snowpack is gone possibly for the duration of the megadrought, possibly for longer. This means we have to be a LOT more responsible4, and much less political about water or we will lose everything. To work the problem, let’s start with a few postulates — Background 1. If CA isn’t healthy, SF suffers. 2. A healthy CA and SF require a biosphere that is hydrated as much and as authentically as possible, even as there is less and less water available.

Nothing's More Important Than Water -- Strike for the Planet week 107 by birches. This week’s topic: Nothing’s More Important Than Water Water is the basic, first requirement for sustaining life. Without it, we die in a few days. So what can we do? Use the water available sanely and wisely. That means: • Blackwater recycling • Conservation Ecosystem restoration • Sprawl reduction Rights for living systems • Conservation • Eliminating pollutants • Widespread urban use of bioswales And enforcing permeable surfaces regulations.

Big Basin Redwood State Park

Return of the Native -- Strike for the Planet week 106 by birches. This week’s topic: The Return of the Natives. Because the survival of San Francisco depends on the health, diversity, and biomass of native species. Define “native.” The UN Bern Convention defines native as “a species that has been observed in the form of a naturally occurring and self-sustaining population in historical times” while the International Council for Exploration of the Sea, modified after the Convention on Biological Diversity, defines native as a species “living within its natural range (past or present) including the area which it can reach and occupy using its natural dispersal systems.” In simpler terms, native means present in an area without any human intervention.4 What is native in San Francisco? Trees: California buckeye, White alder, Red alder, Pacific madrone, Water birch, California hazel, Monterey cypress, California buckwheat, California black walnut, Juniper, Tan oak, Bishop pine, Monterey pine, California poplar, Holly-lead cherry, Coast live oak, Canyon live oak, Red willow, White willow, Coast redwood, California bay laurel, and more.

MISCELLANY

The Chosen Species (an Environmental Message to the Conservatives in My Rural VA Area) by AndySchmookler. The need for environmental responsibility has been made newly urgent, as our new level of impact threatens consequences at an altogether more dire level than humankind faced during civilization’s long history of denuded soils, deforested mountains, spreading deserts (and the occasional extinction). Most immediately, this crisis of climate disruption has revealed that if a civilized species multiplies its power over nature many times over – without taking adequate heed of what’s required of a Good Steward -- that creature’s civilization might careen into a self-inflicted catastrophe. And with the altogether inadequate way that human civilization has responded to this challenge (to bring our activities into balance with the needs of the living systems of the earth) – which a responsible species would have been addressing seriously for decades by now – it becomes clear: we urgently need to counterbalance the Spirit of Dominion with the Spirit of the Good Steward.

Earth Matters: 1000s interested in Climate Corps; IRS rule will help lower-income people afford EVs by Meteor Blades. Three weeks ago, President Joe Biden took the action many climate activists had been pushing for a long time—forming an American Climate Corps. The idea is to put tens of thousands of young people to work on climate-friendly projects like installing solar panels, removing invasive species, restoring wetlands, building resiliency, and other such efforts in the move to a green economy. A job and job-training program all in one. In what can only be viewed as exciting news, the White House said on Thursday that since its September announcement, more than 42,000 people have dropped in to the corps’ website to express interest. More than two-thirds of those were between the ages of 18 and 35, according to National Climate Adviser Ali Zaidi, who told Chase DiBenedetto at the news website Mashable: "All across the country, young people want to be part of the solution. They want to be part of physically building the clean energy economy. They want skills that catapult them into careers in this new and growing clean energy economy. We've also been hearing from employers that there's a lot of value in opening up new pathways to these clean energy jobs. So we feel vindicated. We feel very positive about the momentum. We're going to keep working to recruit even more folks."

Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer speaks July 20, 2021, at a Capitol Hill press conference urging the inclusion of a Civilian Climate Corps in the budget reconciliation bill.

Mistake of the mind. Not of the heart by Alan Kandel. When I finished writing, my thinking was that not only had I produced a quality product, but that I had all the bases covered — that is, until I learned otherwise through commenter feedback. That being the case, then to those of you who provided such input, what I can say to you now is you’ve enlightened me. That said, now I am left to wonder whether I myself should remove that entry, text, comments and all. But, also know this: If it was a misstep, it was a mistake of the mind, not one of the heart as my heart was in the right place. These kinds of situations can and do occur. And, when they do, it’s unfortunate, most being honest mistakes I would guess. And, if I ever try to tackle the climate in a post again on this site, I surely better do nothing less than a bang-up job. Otherwise, I’ll steer clear of this “hot-button” topic with a vengeance. You have my word.

SCOTUS Putting Chevron Deference, Basically All Regulations, On Chopping Block Next Term by ClimateDenierRoundup. As the highest court in the country deals with seemingly never-ending revelations of questionable ethical decisions made by justices taking private jets to party with bajillionaires with business before their court , the justices continue to clearly indicate their willingness to do exactly what the people paying for their fancy vacations are asking for. Specifically, they seem ready and willing to dismantle the administrative state by stripping away the authority of the federal government to actually enforce the laws it's meant to enforce; in other words, it looks like they’re going to striking down what's known as the Chevron deference. We spotted the giant red flag at, of all places, SeaFoodSource dot com, which reported Monday that the Supreme Court would be taking up the case Relentless, Inc. v. the U.S. Department of Commerce. Lower courts had ruled in favor of the Department of Commerce, citing the Chevron deference and making the fishing company mad about having to pay for regulators to make sure they weren't breaking the law while at sea.

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