writeaboutwarming

April 27, 2014 – A report that makes a very thorough assessment of the environmental gains to be made by reshaping our farming methods was issued last Friday. The study was authored by scientists at two consulting firms: Climate Focus (CF) and California Environmental Associates (CEA).   It was funded by the Climate and Land Use Alliance, a coalition of major U.S. foundations.   Strategies studied were numerous; they include managing soil nutrients, halting deforestation, reductions in animal husbandry, using less fertilizer, storing carbon in croplands, and converting manure into compost and biogas through anaerobic digestion.   Consumers, for their part, need to eat less meat and reduce food waste.   A “demitarian” – a term I’d never heard before - is someone who cuts their consumption of red meat in half. Countries poised to make the biggest contributions in this area are, no surprise, big ones: Brazil, China, India, the EU, and the United States. ...

December 2, 2013 – If such a thing is possible, I think countries have grown bored with their own inertia vis-à-vis slowing climate change.   The sense one gets, in reading about the lack of progress at yet another Cop Conference is that, unless the next meeting is held in a place and at a time when a Haiyan-sized typhoon will disrupt the proceedings, very little will get done any time soon.   Since climate change is generally perceived as a time-sensitive issue, I present this as further evidence of our world’s self-inflicted dysfunction. Can businesses do what nations cannot?   Peter Bakker, president of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), says that yes, businesses (plural) can and must come together to collaborate on a mutual agenda designed to slow climate change and, simultaneously, develop renewable energy.   The Council was much in evidence in Warsaw, sponsoring its own conference of member companies and organizational...

April 18, 2011 – Two states of which I have formerly been a resident are enduring weather that nearly defies description. North Carolina experienced 60-plus tornado touchdowns over the past weekend, a large number of them in the Raleigh area, where we used to live. Having grown up in the Midwest, I long since became accustomed to tornadoes as being representative of “typical” spring weather. However, that meant in “Tornado Alley,” a swath of prairie land that ran from Texas up through Wisconsin. While some of the usual places were hard hit this time around – I’m referring here to Oklahoma and Kansas – I don’t think of North Carolina as tornado country. However, my expectations rely upon decades of weather memory that are based on climate behavior that conformed with known patterns and trends. We are now in a transitional period, and the old rules don’t apply. Then there’s Texas. By every account, Texas weather is on a bender, the Forest Service helping to battle 700,000 acres of fires ...