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WASHINGTON — Nearly all of the Obama administration’s science staff has departed the White House since January, and the Trump administration has moved slowly to replace them. In the meantime, however, an unofficial shadow office, stocked with Obama loyalists, is quietly at work. The network, described to STAT by officials from the previous administration who are involved, is informal yet organized, allowing for a far-reaching if largely inconspicuous effort to continue advocating for the Obama science agenda. Participants have provided counsel to Democratic lawmakers and their staffs on Capitol Hill, and they have held group-wide strategy sessions much in the...

As an apocalyptic haze blanketed Seattle last week, temperatures soared into the 90s and left Seattleites ruing their lack of air conditioning. Welcome to the future? Scientists project climate change will exacerbate wildfire activity. Extremely hot days — 95 degrees and above — are expected to become more common. How hot will it get? A consortium of researchers with the Climate Impact Lab has analyzed two consensus climate models and projected changes nationwide. The lab shared data for each of Washington’s counties with The Seattle Times. Historically, King County has averaged less than one day (.37) a year at or...

BOULDER, Colo. - - Behind a locked door on the ground floor of a new University of Colorado science center here, a laboratory outfitted with specially reinforced concrete floors sits dark and empty, like a dining room set for a guest who never arrived. In this case, the no-show is a $2 million, 12-ton machine that is vital to addressing global warming. The machine, a high-precision accelerator mass spectrometer, uses nuclear physics to detect the presence of a rare, heavy isotope of carbon. It enables scientists to distinguish fossil fuel emissions from all other sources of carbon dioxide in the...

HAMBURG, Germany — World powers lined up against U.S. President Donald Trump on climate change Saturday, reaffirming their support for international efforts to fight global warming. The final statement of the Group of 20 summit in Hamburg, Germany, underlined that the other countries and the European Union supported the Paris climate agreement rejected by Trump. They called the deal to reduce greenhouse gases “irreversible” and vowed to implement it quickly and without exception. The other countries, from European powers such as Germany to emerging ones such as China and energy producers such as Saudi Arabia, dismissively “took note” of the...

...He did even worse; he launched a campaign of punitive lawsuits against anyone who criticized him. He has sued Mark Steyn, National Review Online, and climatologist Dr. Timothy Ball. Mann shot himself in the foot with that last. For several years, Mann had refused to produce his data for the court (in support of his own case), claiming that it was “proprietary.” After missing a February 20th deadline, he now finds himself in contempt. Under Canadian law, the court is now required to dismiss the suit. John O'Sullivan goes into detail: "The defendant in the libel trial, the 79-year-old Canadian...

Penn State climate scientist, Michael ‘hockey stick’ Mann commits contempt of court in the ‘climate science trial of the century.’ Prominent alarmist shockingly defies judge and refuses to surrender data for open court examination. Only possible outcome: Mann’s humiliation, defeat and likely criminal investigation in the U.S. The defendant in the libel trial, the 79-year-old Canadian climatologist, Dr Tim Ball (above, right) is expected to instruct his British Columbia attorneys to trigger mandatory punitive court sanctions, including a ruling that Mann did act with criminal intent when using public funds to commit climate data fraud. Mann’s imminent defeat is set...

Penn State climate scientist, Michael ‘hockey stick’ Mann commits contempt of court in the ‘climate science trial of the century.’ Prominent alarmist shockingly defies judge and refuses to surrender data for open court examination. Only possible outcome: Mann’s humiliation, defeat and likely criminal investigation in the U.S. The defendant in the libel trial, the 79-year-old Canadian climatologist, Dr Tim Ball (above, right) is expected to instruct his British Columbia attorneys to trigger mandatory punitive court sanctions, including a ruling that Mann did act with criminal intent when using public funds to commit climate data fraud. Mann’s imminent defeat is set...

A new island forms and the article never mentions global warming: New island appears off coast of North Carolina's Outer Banks This mile-long sandbar, dubbed "Shelly Island" for its plethora of seashells and colorful pebbles, has been forming and growing since late spring. INSTAGRAM/@CHADONKA 9 Comment Share Tweet Stumble Email The secret's out. A new island has appeared off the coast of North Carolina's Cape Hatteras National Seashore, and unfortunately for locals, word is spreading -- fast. The mile-long sandbar, dubbed "Shelly Island" for its plethora of seashells and colorful pebbles, has been forming and growing since late spring. Residents...

Three senior House Democrats asked U.S. teachers Monday to destroy a book written by climate scientists challenging the environmentalist view of global warming. The Democrats were responding to a campaign by the conservative Heartland Institute copies of the 2015 book, “Why Climate Scientists Disagree About Global Warming” to about 200,000 science teachers. Democratic Reps. Bobby Scott of the Committee on Education, Raúl M. Grijalva of the Committee on Natural Resources, and Eddie Bernice Johnson of the Committee on Science, Space and Technology all issued a statement telling teachers to trash the book. “Public school classrooms are no place for anti-science...

WASHINGTON - Exxon Mobil Corp. and other large oil companies are backing a carbon tax proposal put forward earlier this year by a group of former Republican leaders including James A. Baker III, the former secretary of state and a Houston attorney. The Climate Leadership Coalition, a group that includes Baker, former Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson, and former Secretary of State George Shultz, announced a list of "founding members" Tuesday that includes Exxon Mobil, BP, Shell, Total, General Motors and Johnson & Johnson. "We support @TheCLCouncil as a founding member and are working to support its policy development process," Exxon...

In a decision that evokes former President Obama’s environmental agenda, the Colorado Public Utilities Commission (PUC) on March 23, 2017, expanded its authority in a way that’s likely to drive up electricity rates. Every four years, Xcel Energy undergoes a resource planning process that outlines their ability to meet ratepayers’ electricity demand. They present portfolios containing cost analyses regarding the utility’s generation, and the Commission selects the “lowest cost resources available to provide the company with enough capacity and energy to in turn be able to provide customers with reliable electricity.” However, in the 2016 Energy Resource Plan, the Public...

Chain controls are in effect on the 15-mile stretch of Interstate 80 between Kingvale and Donner Lake. Scattered snow and rain is expected to continue Monday morning in the Truckee area.. The National Weather Service has issued a winter weather advisory until 10 a.m. Monday for the Sierra from Shasta to Calaveras counties. In Yosemite National Park, the slow work of clearing Tioga Road continues. The park reported on Tuesday that the two crews plowing Highway 120 — one going west from Lee Vining, the other east from Crane Flat — had met at Tioga Pass. But “road opening is...

Solar cycle 24 has seen very low solar activity thus far, likely the lowest in 100 years. Figure 1: F10.7 Flux 2014 – 2017 The F10.7 flux shows that over the last three and a half years the Sun has gone from solar maximum through a bounded decline to the current stage of the trail to minimum. Solar minimum is likely to be still three years away. Figure 2: F10.7 Flux of Solar Cycles 19 to 24 aligned on month of minimum Solar Cycle 24 is sitting at the lower bound of activity for solar cycles back to 1964, the...

It is beyond my power of discernment to identify the most over-the-top comment criticizing President Trump’s decision to pull out of the Paris climate accord. But this tweet by a Harvard professor named Joyce Chaplin is surely a contender: The USA, created by int’l community in Treaty of Paris in 1783, betrays int’l community by withdrawing from #parisclimateagreement today. Chaplin teaches American Studies. Yet, she appears not to know how America was created. Ted Cruz reminded her: Just sad. Tenured chair at Harvard, doesn’t seem to know how USA was created. Not a treaty. Declaration+Revolutionary War+Constitution=USA. He added: Lefty academics...

MSNBC host Joe Scarborough on Friday blamed White House chief strategist Stephen Bannon for President Trump's decision to back out of the Paris climate accord, saying that the move signals that Bannon "is now the president of the United States." "Time Magazine was right. Steve Bannon is president of the United States," Scarborough said on his show "Morning Joe."

News 2 wants to know… do you agree with President Trump’s decision to withdraw from climate agreement? Vote in our poll below:

Billionaire climate activist Tom Steyer called President Trump a traitor if he makes good on his promise and exits the Paris climate change agreement. "If Trump pulls the US out of the #ParisAgreement he will be committing a traitorous act of war against the American people," Steyer tweeted. Steyer was very active during the presidential campaign through his group, NextGen Climate, and has become a leading activist in an agenda that supports moving the nation toward 100 percent renewable energy over the next 25 years.

In a few minutes, watch LIVE as President Donald J. Trump makes a statement regarding the Paris Accord.

President Trump is nearing a final decision on whether to withdraw from the Paris climate agreement, with one White House official saying Wednesday that the president is leaning toward an exit but three others cautioning that he has not reached a verdict. The matter has deeply divided the administration for months. Ivanka Trump and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson have urged the president to remain in the deal, and White House strategist Stephen K. Bannon and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt have been pushing for a withdrawal.

An academic tipped to be President Donald Trump's White House Science Adviser has called for the United States to withdraw from the Paris climate accord. Professor William Happer, a Princeton physicist, told The Telegraph in an interview: "I hope he will. Our friends in Europe wanted it so everybody had to sign up but it's a complete waste. ... "It (the Paris agreement) is not going to hurt the environmentalists, it's going to hurt people in Asia and Africa and I think it's profoundly immoral. What people there need is electricity you can afford. Prosperity, what's wrong with that? This...