‘Green News Report’ – May 31, 2018

Follow @GreenNewsReport…

(Or use “Click here to listen…” link below.)

IN TODAY’S RADIO REPORT: Hurricane Maria’s death toll in Puerto Rico is 70 times greater than the official government count; Ellicott City, MD hit with second 1000-year flood in two years; FEMA denies reconstruction funds to some victims of Hurricane Harvey; PLUS: New study finds U.S. insurers are not ready for climate change… All that and more in today’s Green News Report!

Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.

IN ‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (see links below): How more carbon dioxide can make food less nutritious; Humans are giving many other species cancer; Pro-Trump Sinclair analyst gives a softball interview to corrupt EPA administrator Scott Pruitt; Trump slaps U.S. allies with tariffs; Canadian government to buy Trans Mountain pipeline for $4.5B; Major paint companies lobby California lawmakers to overturn a court ruling forcing them to clean up lead in homes; Lowe’s drops paint strippers blamed in dozens of deaths; Barriers to a circular economy: 5 reasons the world wastes so much stuff; Radium widely spread on Pennsylvania roadways without regulation… PLUS: Trump’s abandonment of Paris climate deal to cost U.S. economy trillions, new study reveals… and much, MUCH more! …

STORIES DISCUSSED ON TODAY’S ‘GREEN NEWS REPORT’…

• Puerto Rico: Study estimates Hurricane Maria death toll 70x greater than official count:
• Mortality in Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria (New England Journal of Medicine)
• Harvard study estimates thousands died in Puerto Rico because of Hurricane Maria (Washington Post):
  A new Harvard study published Tuesday in the New England Journal of Medicine estimates that at least 4,645 deaths can be linked to the hurricane and its immediate aftermath, making the storm far deadlier than previously thought.
• AUDIO: Mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz on the Puerto Rico Hurricane María Death Toll (Latino Rebels Radio)
• Death toll in Puerto Rico post-Maria more than 70 times higher than official government count (Climate Progress)
• New Hurricane Maria death toll estimates spotlight data-reliability issues in Puerto Rico (NBC News):
  “We warned them. Harvard puts out a study that confirms what we saw and they are still denying it,” said the mayor of the town of Cayey.
• Harvard Study On Puerto Rico Is Devastating For More Reasons Than The Alarmingly High Death Toll (Huffington Post):
  The study found that about 4,645 people died in the aftermath of Maria, and it provided some damning details about life on the island after the storm.
• Puerto Rico will be an enduring stain on Trump’s presidency (CNN)
• Cable news virtually ignores study on Puerto Rico death toll:
• Study finds 5,000 people may have died from Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico. Cable news focused on Roseanne instead. (Media Matters):
  Cable news covered Roseanne for over 10 hours. They covered Hurricane Maria’s death toll in Puerto Rico for just over 30 minutes.
• First named Atlantic storm of 2018 lands 4 days before season officially begins:
• Updated 2018 Atlantic Hurricane Season Outlook Calls for Near-Average Activity (Weather Channel)
• Weather Whiplash: After Cold Spring, Tropical Cyclone Targets Midwest (Climate Crocks)
• Storm in North Carolina triggers flash floods and landslides — and almost caused a dam to fail (Washington Post)
• 4 people have died this week in North Carolina since Alberto made landfall (CNN)
• FEMA denies reconstruction funds to some victims of Hurricane Harvey:
• ‘People just give up’: Low-income hurricane victims slam federal relief programs (Politico):
  Nine months after Harvey, middle-class Houston has recovered, but low-income neighborhoods are in disarray.
• Ellicott City, MD hit with second catastrophic flood in two years:
• VIDEO: Al Roker connects devastating flooding in Ellicott City, MD, to climate change on ‘Today’ (Media Matters)
• The second 1,000-year rainstorm in two years engulfed Ellicott City. Here’s how it happened. (Washington Post)
• America’s Flooded Future: Why rain in the Northeastern United States is getting more intense and more destructive (The New Republic):
  When weather disasters happen, people tend to divide into camps about the cause: climate change, unwise development, or simple bad luck. We’ll keep paying more for these disasters until we accept it’s all three.
• Ellicott City flood: Here’s what a ‘1,000-year storm’ actually means (Balitmore Sun)
• Did development around Ellicott City lead to worsening of catastrophic floods? (WUSA)
• ‘It’s even worse’: Ellicott City, still recovering from 2016 flood, hammered again (CNN):
  When the rain came Sunday, many residents remained in the throes of recovery…Money from a Federal Emergency Management Agency grant had just arrived and was slated for repairs and construction, Kittleman said.
• National Guardsman’s heroism in Ellicott City flood recalled as ‘the most Eddie thing ever’ (Baltimore Sun)
• Study: U.S. insurers not ready for climate change impacts:
• Insurance and Climate Change Risk Management: Rescaling to Look Beyond the Horizon (British Journal of Management)
• U.S. insurers unprepared for climate change disasters – study (Reuters):
  “Insurers that ignore climate change will not put away enough money to cover their claims. To re-coup those losses, they’ll have to raise rates or pull coverage from high risk areas.”
• Study Says Insurance Industry Dangerously Unprepared for Extreme Weather (Flood List)
• Professor Says Window to Prevent Dangerous Impacts from Climate Change Closing Fast (Insurance Journal)
• VIDEO: Climate Change and Extreme Weather (Climate Central)

‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (Stuff we didn’t have time for in today’s audio report)…

For a comprehensive roundup of daily environmental news you can trust, see the Society of Environmental Journalists’ Daily Headlines page

• How More Carbon Dioxide Can Make Food Less Nutritious (NY Times)
• Humans are giving many other species cancer (Cosmos Magazine)
• Climate Change and Rapidly Intensifying Hurricanes (Climate Central)
• Pro-Trump Sinclair analyst gives a softball interview to corrupt EPA administrator Scott Pruitt (Media Matters)
• ‘Today is a bad day for world trade’: Trump slaps U.S. allies with tariffs (Politico)
• Trump’s abandonment of Paris climate deal to cost U.S. economy trillions, new study reveals (Climate Progress)
• Canadian government to buy Trans Mountain pipeline for $4.5B to ensure expansion is built (CBC)
• Major paint companies lobby California lawmakers to overturn a court ruling forcing them to clean up lead in homes (LA Times)
• Lowe’s Drops Paint Strippers Blamed in Dozens of Deaths (NY Times)
• Barriers to a Circular Economy: 5 Reasons the World Wastes So Much Stuff (and Why It’s Not Just the Consumer’s Fault) (World Resources Institute)
• Ellicott City a Poster Child for Denial, Ignorance, Arrogance, and Greed (Climate Crocks)
• Weaponizing the Worst in Us: Lee Atwater’s “Southern Strategy” – a 50 year campaign by the Republican Party to take advantage of white resentment (Climate Crocks)
• Pruitt Defense Fund Draws Ethics Complaint: Critics Call It ‘Tip Jar’ (Inside Climate News)
• Radium Widely Spread On Pennsylvania Roadways Without Regulation: Study (Environmental Health News)
• ANWR Coastal Plain Lease Plan Draws Heated Opposition In Fairbanks (KUAC-Fairbanks)
• Your Recycling Gets Recycled, Right? Maybe, or Maybe Not (NY Times)
• U.S. Scraps Rule Requiring States To Measure Tailpipe Gases (Reuters)
• Organic Crops Lucrative, Challenging For U.S. Farmers (Investigate West)
• Former Chemical Industry Attorney Takes Over EPA’s Superfund Task Force (Climate Progress)
• Japan Slaughters More Than 120 Pregnant Whales For ‘Research’ (Sydney Morning Herald)
• E.U. Proposes Ban on Some Plastic Items to Reduce Marine Pollution (NY Times)
• Flint Estimates 14,000 Lead Water Service Lines Still In The Ground (MLive)
• Montana Judge Halts Drilling for Gold at Mine Near Yellowstone (Bozeman Daily Chronicle)
• Bayer to Win U.S. Antitrust Nod for Monsanto Deal Next Week (Bloomberg)
• The world’s bleak climate situation, in 3 charts: We’ve got a long way to go and a short time to get there. (Vox)
• Limiting global warming to 1.5C would have ‘significant economic benefits (GreenBiz)
• AUDIO: An Inconvenient ‘BradCast’ with Al Gore (The BRAD BLOG):
  Guest Host Angie Coiro’s exclusive interview with the former Vice President on elections, pollution, persuasion, activism, and hope…
• The Climate Risks We Face (NY Times):
  To stabilize global temperature, net carbon dioxide emissions must be reduced to zero. The window of time is rapidly closing to reduce emissions and limit warming to no more than 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit or 2 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels, the goal set in the Paris climate accord. The further we push the climate system beyond historical conditions, the greater the risks of potentially unforeseen and even catastrophic changes to the climate – so every reduction in emissions helps.
• The Uninhabitable Earth: When will climate change make earth too hot for humans? (New York Magazine):
  Famine, economic collapse, a sun that cooks us: What climate change could wreak – sooner than you think.
• A beginner’s guide to the debate over 100% renewable energy (Vox):
  Clean-energy enthusiasts frequently claim that we can go bigger, that it’s possible for the whole world to run on renewables – we merely lack the “political will.” So, is it true? Do we know how get to an all-renewables system? Not yet. Not really.
• No country on Earth is taking the 2 degree climate target seriously (Vox):
  If we mean what we say, no more new fossil fuels, anywhere.

FOR MORE on Climate Science and Climate Change, go to our Green News Report: Essential Background Page

• NASA climate change video: This is the U.S. in 2100 (NASA).