Free Republic

NEW YORK -- The climate clock in Union Square is a constant reminder to New Yorkers of climate change, counting down the critical time window to reach zero emissions, but the existential nature of the installation leaves some feeling more discouraged than motivated. But there are some positive changemakers in the fight against climate change in our city. Johanna Lawton is a project manager at Rebuild by Design, a nonprofit organization that works to plan for the future with communities that are disproportionately affected by climate racism, among other things. This increased variability and extremes that we're having from climate...

If there is a magic way to stop climate change from wreaking havoc on Florida, reverse sea-level rise and lower the kind of scalding summer temperatures Miami saw last year, lawmakers may have figured it out. It’s called denial. It hasn’t worked in past decades. A 2023 report by scientists, published in the journal Bioscience, warned that inaction to reduce carbon emissions is driving the planet toward “dangerous instability.” (The highest Earth temperature ever recorded happened last July). Apparently, the Republican-dominated Legislature’s plan on how to address climate change in Florida before it’s too late is to hit the “delete”...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Environmental Protection Agency on Friday set strict emissions standards for heavy-duty trucks, buses and other large vehicles, an action that officials said will help clean up some of the nation’s largest sources of planet-warming greenhouse gases. The new rules, which take effect for model years 2027 through 2032, will avoid up to 1 billion tons of greenhouse gas emissions over the next three decades and provide $13 billion in net benefits in the form of fewer hospital visits, lost work days and deaths, the EPA said. The new standards will especially benefit an estimated 72 million...

The Phillies and the Atlanta Braves reputedly are among the elite teams of major-league baseball, but if the quality of play at Citizens Bank Park during their season-opening series doesn’t quite measure up to expectations, go gentle on the booing. These players are experiencing a form of abrupt climate change, says Struan Coleman, a sports medicine specialist who practices in New York and Philly. When the Phillies left Clearwater, Fla., after their final spring training game Monday, the high was 83 degrees, and daily highs since the team began playing their practice games in Florida on Feb. 25 have averaged...

Rep. John Curtis (R-UT), who is running for Senate to replace retiring Sen. Mitt Romney (R-UT), said in 2017 that former President Donald Trump’s border wall carries “pent-up racism.” Curtis is just one of the many candidates running to replace Romney. He was the mayor of Provo and considered himself a Democrat until 2006. During an online debate in 2017, he said, when running for Congress, that hopes to continue then-President Donald Trump’s agenda.

2023 has been a record-breaking year in terms of temperature rise, ocean warming, wildfires and pretty much every other weather event the world over. Various climate attribution reports show that climate change had a guiding hand in making these events more frequent and more intense. Yet, the climate modelling used to plan for and finance adaptation to a warmer world has failed to keep up. This disconnect between models and the likely future that awaits us is deeply problematic. The first European climate risk assessment from the European Environment Agency, published in March, shows Europe has heated up faster than...

BRUSSELS (AP) — A major European Union plan to fight climate change and better protect nature in the 27-nation bloc has been indefinitely postponed Monday, underscoring how farmers’ protests sweeping the continent influence politics ahead of the June EU parliamentary elections. The member states were supposed to give final approval to the bill on Monday following months of proceedings through the EU’s institutional maze. But what was supposed to be a mere rubber stamp has now been possibly shelved forever. “(The plan) is in a very difficult position at the moment and with the upcoming European elections, it won’t be...

There are always questions after any attack as to why it was not stopped or detected. But the Moscow attack raises particularly difficult issues for Vladimir Putin at a time of international tension and mistrust. And much of that comes because of a warning from Washington. The 7 March warning from the US to its own citizens was unusually specific. It talked of reports that "extremists" had "imminent plans to target large gatherings in Moscow" and specifically mentioned concerts. It advised Americans in the city to avoid large gatherings over the coming 48 hours. The timing may not quite match,...

You may have noticed that Easter eggs are more expensive this year. But did you know that climate change is one of the reasons? Most chocolate is made from cocoa grown in West Africa, but a humid heatwave has blasted the crops and massively cut yields. Experts say that human-induced climate change has made the extreme heat 10 times more likely. Which? found some popular eggs have risen in price by 50% or more. The shortage of cocoa resulting from the heatwave has seen prices soar to almost $8,500 (£6,700) a tonne this week. Cocoa trees are particularly vulnerable to...

"Climate cafés" have been popping up worldwide over the past few years to help people deal with their global warming anxiety, according to a recent New York Times report. The article "Can Climate Cafes Help Ease the Anxiety of Planetary Crisis?" documented a new phenomenon of groups meeting, whether publicly or privately, to "discuss their grief, fears, anxiety and other emotions about the climate crisis." One organization, Climate Psychology Alliance North America, claimed to the NYT that it has trained 350 people to run climate cafés in the U.S. and Canada with 300 people on the "climate-aware therapist directory." "The...

PALO ALTO -- The Arctic fox is a natural beauty but this captivating creature with its playful nature and distinctive look is under threat. Experts say Arctic foxes need to hunt rodents to survive long winters and climate change is thinning the rodent population. "If we get warmer and more unstable climate, where you can get snow melt and you get icing on the ground, that is going to affect how well the rodents can survive," explained conservation biologist Kristine Ulvund with the Norwegian Institute for Nature Research. Stanford professor of biology Elizabeth Hadley, who has studied biodiversity for decades,...

The strain that rising global temperatures could have on on the agriculture industry and inflation around the world will likely cause food prices to increase even more, according to new research. Changes in average monthly temperatures have the strongest and most consistent correlation to productivity and inflation figures, according to a paper published in the journal Communications Earth & Environment on Thursday. Researchers at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany looked at historical food prices in different categories of food goods across countries around the world to explore how fluctuations in different climatic conditions have historically impacted...

The Russian military fired a missile at its [own] trawler Kapitan Lobanov during a Baltic Fleet exercise. [A] second rocket fell into fishing nets nearby. This was reported by the Russian TV channel “Dozhd” with reference to a relative of a crew member. According to him, the rocket fell on the captain’s cabin of a fishing trawler and was simply blown away. As a result of the strike, three crew members were killed and four more were injured. According to the source, the survivors are in the Pionersk hospital, one of the victims is in serious condition. They have already...

French President Emmanuel Macron, in a private conversation, said that in the near future, the confrontation between Ukraine and russia could end in defeat for Kyiv. Politico reported this, citing unnamed participants in a conversation with Macron. The first interlocutor of the publication said that during a private conversation in the Elysee Palace, Macron considered a quick defeat of Ukraine possible. "Ukraine can fall very quickly," Macron allegedly said.

DRAMATIC footage has captured the moment a furious Vladimir Putin used fighter bombers to unleash hell on his own territory. Moscow's forces for the first time deliberately targeted a Russian border village with deadly glide bombs after it was taken captive by rebel groups. The humiliated tyrant, 71, carried out an aerial bombing blitz in the village of Kozinka in Belgorod - a border region increasingly ravaged by Ukrainian attacks and incursions by Russian partisans. Following the savage FAB-500 glide bomb strikes, there is reportedly not a single home left intact in Kozinka - which had a pre-war population of...

If you thought that NATO troop activities in Ukraine is something that developed in the aftermath of the 2014 Maidan coup, think again. NATO has been mucking around in Ukraine since 1991. That 33 years for the math challenged out there. Before I dig into this topic, I participated in a Zoom Webinar put on by the European Association for the Defense of Minorities, which was held in Athens, Greece. The topic — Ukraine: The Search of a Peaceful Solution of the Military Conflict. I recorded a video that replicates my remarks to that group. I don’t know if they...

It may be tempting to look at new rules finalized Wednesday by the Biden administration boosting sales of electric vehicles as a big step toward slashing climate-changing pollution. But the Environmental Protection Agency rules are more an incremental move, too weak and slow to respond appropriately to the gravity of the unfolding environmental crisis. And that’s a shame, because with a divided Congress, administrative action is the only way for the federal government to do big things such as protect the public from climate change and pollution. Speed matters, after all, in preventing catastrophic climate impacts, and the longer we...

GENEVA (AP) — The U.N. weather agency is sounding a “red alert” about global warming, citing record-smashing increases last year in greenhouse gases, land and water temperatures and melting of glaciers and sea ice, and warning that the world’s efforts to reverse the trend have been inadequate. The World Meteorological Organization, in a “State of the Global Climate” report released Tuesday, ratcheted up concerns that a much-vaunted climate goal is increasingly in jeopardy: That the world can unite to limit planetary warming to no more than 1.5 degrees. “Earth’s issuing a distress call,” U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said. “The latest...

Eco-activists’ claims that they have a right to cause damage as part of their protests have been rejected by Court of Appeal judges. Victoria Prentis, the Attorney General, asked the Court to rule on whether eco-protesters could use a defence of “lawful excuse” to cause criminal damage to banks, businesses and private property and avoid conviction at trial. It follows the acquittal of a protester from a climate action group known as Burning Pink who threw paint at the offices of Greenpeace, Amnesty International, Christian Aid, Friends of the Earth, plus the Conservative, Labour, Lib Dem and Green parties, causing...

Something unusual is happening in America. Demand for electricity, which has stayed largely flat for two decades, has begun to surge. Over the past year, electric utilities have nearly doubled their forecasts of how much additional power they’ll need by 2028 as they confront an unexpected explosion in the number of data centers, an abrupt resurgence in manufacturing driven by new federal laws, and millions of electric vehicles being plugged in. Many power companies were already struggling to keep the lights on, especially during extreme weather, and say the strain on the grid will only increase. Peak demand in the...