‘Green News Report’ – August 22, 2019

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IN TODAY’S RADIO REPORT: Record wildfires from the Amazon rainforest to the Arctic North; Alaska is so warm, salmon are dying in rivers; Swedish teen climate activist sails for New York City on a solar-powered boat; PLUS: The 2020 Democratic ‘climate change candidate’ drops out of race… All that and more in today’s Green News Report!

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IN ‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (see links below): Jay Inslee changed everything; Bernie Sanders’ new $16 trillion plan is nothing short of revolutionary; A dangerous new form of climate change denialism is making the rounds; Insurers quietly withdrawing from climate risk areas; Appeals court rules against coal export terminal; Climate change could cost US up to 10 percent of GDP by 2100; Chinese drywall maker agrees to $248 million settlement, 10 years later; Walmart sues Tesla, says solar panels caused series of fires; An unexpected twist to the cannabis revolution… PLUS: This is the beginning of the end of the beef industry… and much, MUCH more! …

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

• 2020 Democratic ‘climate change candidate’ Gov. Jay Inslee drops out of the race:
• VIDEO: Governor Jay Inslee Announces Exit From Democratic Primary Race (The Rachel Maddow Show)
• Jay Inslee, exiting the presidential race, reflects on his campaign (Vox)
• Jay Inslee, Climate Candidate, Exits 2020 Presidential Race (Huffington Post):
  “We left an open-source gold standard of what will get us to a cleaner future and really will end our reliance on fossil fuels,” Inslee told HuffPost by phone Wednesday afternoon. “It was not just a campaign document, it was a governing document, and it could be used by anyone who ends up in the White House.”
• Jay Inslee’s exit shows how bad our presidential selection process is (Washington Post):
  You can blame the Democratic National Committee for setting up a ridiculous debate process whereby unserious candidates took up space on stage, rich candidates could spend gobs of money to collect enough donors to meet the qualification criteria and moderators seemed determine to get candidates to bicker. The media’s over-reliance on horse-race coverage over policy explanation doesn’t help, either.
• Record fires in the Amazon rainforest, with long term consequences:
• Amazon fires could accelerate global warming and cause lasting harm to a cradle of biodiversity (Washington Post):
  Huge tracts of the Amazon, which serves as the lungs of the planet by taking in carbon dioxide, storing it in soils and producing oxygen, are ablaze. Smoke from the widespread fires have turned day into night in Sao Paulo, and intensified a controversy over the Brazilian government’s land use policies.
• VIDEO: Climate scientist Dr. Michael Mann on impact of Amazon rain forest fires (MSNBC/Velshi & Ruehle)
• Blame humans for starting the Amazon fires, environmentalists say (CNN)
• VIDEO: Brazil’s Amazon rainforest is burning at a record rate, research center says (CNN)
• Amazon fires: Bolsonaro says Brazil cannot fight them (BBC)
• Jair Bolsonaro claims NGOs behind Amazon forest fire surge – but provides no evidence (Guardian UK)

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• Wildfire season burning with a vengeance around the world:
• Thousands flee from ‘monster’ wildfire on Canary Islands (AP)
• Siberia just experienced wildfires on a staggering scale. Russia is rethinking how to fight them (LA Times)
• Massive Arctic wildfires emitted more CO2 in June than Sweden does in an entire year (CNBC)
• The northernmost reaches of the Earth are on fire. Here’s what this record-breaking hot summer looks like from space. (Business Insider)
• Alaska: fires and heat waves hitting wildlife hard:
• Wildfires are burning around the world. The most alarming is in the Amazon rainforest. (Vox)
• Warm waters across Alaska cause salmon die-offs (Juneau Empire):
  From the Koyukuk River, to the Kuskokwim, to Norton Sound, to Bristol Bay’s Igushik River, unusually warm temperatures across Alaska this summer led to die-offs of unspawned chum, sockeye and pink salmon. Warm waters also sometimes this summer acted as a “thermal block” — essentially a wall of heat salmon don’t swim past, delaying upriver migration.
• AUDIO: Jeanne Devon of the AK Dem Party, on how global warming is affecting Alaska wildlife (The Brad Blog)
• GRAPHIC: Alaska’s record heat a killer for some salmon, researchers say (KTUU)
• The water is so hot in Alaska it’s killing large numbers of salmon (CNN)
• Breakthrough could help save endangered Florida corals:
  • Scientists coax imperiled Florida coral to spawn in a lab for the first time (Tampa Bay Times):
    After two years and more than $4.5 million, scientists working with the Florida Aquarium have pulled off something no one else ever has: They coaxed imperiled Atlantic Ocean coral into spawning in a laboratory, aquarium officials announced Wednesday.
  • A scientific breakthrough at the Florida Aquarium could save ‘America’s Great Barrier Reef’ (CNN)
  • We finally know why Florida’s coral reefs are dying, and it’s not just climate change (Washington Post):
    Climate change is killing the world’s coral reefs. But it’s not the only factor turning them into white, dead husks. According to a study, chemicals humans are dumping into the ocean are making it easier for the hotter weather to do its deadly work.

• Swedish teen climate activist sets sail for UN climate talks in NYC:
• Greta Thunberg Sets Sail for U.N. Climate Talks (NY Times)
• VIDEO: Greta Thunberg begins zero-carbon Atlantic voyage (Guardian UK)
• ‘No sea sickness so far’: Greta Thunberg update on Atlantic crossing (Guardian UK):
  August is not the ideal time to cross the ocean as it is in the middle of the Atlantic’s hurricane season. The team’s progress is being tracked on a website….The yacht is powered by solar panels and underwater turbines to generate electricity for lighting and communication, although internet access is patchy. There are no bathroom facilities onboard so the crew must make do with blue plastic buckets.
• Climate Action Summit 2019 (United Nations Environment Programme)
• It’s time FOR A CLIMATE STRIKE (Climate Strike)
• A Month Ahead of Global Climate Strike, Thousands Pledge to Attend Rallies Across Planet to ‘Turn Up the Political Heat’ and Demand Action (Common Dreams)
• How To Join The 2019 Global Climate Strike & Demand Change Right Now (Bustle)
• How Greta Thunberg mobilised millions to act on climate emergency in just a year (First Post)
• Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg is sailing to America amid a storm of online attacks (Washington Post)
• Greta Thunberg’s attackers are morally bankrupt, but her deification isn’t helpful (Guardian UK):
  The climate-crisis activist has made it clear herself that she wants the focus to be on the message, not the messenger.

‘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 Copenhagen plans to reach carbon-neutral status in just six years (Fast Company)
• Jay Inslee Changed Everything (Earther)
• Bernie Sanders’ $16 Trillion Climate Plan Is Nothing Short of a Revolution (Earther)
• A Dangerous New Form of Climate Denialism Is Making the Rounds (op-ed, Dr. Michael Mann, Dr. Andrea Dutton)
• Insurers Quietly Withdrawing from Climate Risk Areas (Climate Crocks)
• Appeals Court Rules Against Coal Export Terminal, Upholding State’s Decision to Reject It (Inside Climate News)
• Climate Change Could Cost The U.S. Up To 10.5% Of Its GDP by 2100 (Washington Post)
• Chinese Drywall Maker Agrees To $248 Million Settlement, 10 Years Later (Norfolk Virginian-Pilot)
• Walmart sues Tesla, says solar panels caused series of fires (Utility Dive)
• A Republican Firm Is Targeting EPA Staff Who Have Donated to Democrats (Mother Jones)
• This Is the Beginning of the End of the Beef Industry (Outside Magazine)
• An unexpected twist to the cannabis revolution (Utility Dive)
• Research shows carbon sequestration potential of compost in California (Waste Dive)
• Mines No Safer Despite $1 Billion In Fines, Federal Audit Says (NPR)
• Arundel farmers say their blood samples show high levels of PFAS ‘forever chemicals’ (Portland Press-Herald)
• New York Sues EPA Over GE’s Hudson River PCB Cleanup (Reuters)
• VIDEO: A Message From the Future With Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (The Intercept)
• This Is How Human Extinction Could Play Out (Rolling Stone)
• SEJ Backgrounder: Green New Deal Proposes Sweeping Economic Transformation (Society of Environmental Journalists)
• Explainer: The ‘Green New Deal’: Mobilizing for a just, prosperous, and sustainable economy (New Consensus)
• What genuine, no-bullshit ambition on climate change would look like: How to hit the most stringent targets, with no loopholes. (David Roberts, Vox)
• A Global Shift To Sustainability Would Save Us $26 Trillion (Vox)
• Project Drawdown: 100 Solutions to Reverse Global Warming (Drawdown.org)
• An Optimist’s Guide to Solving Climate Change and Saving the World (Vice)
• The great nutrient collapse: The atmosphere is literally changing the food we eat, for the worse. And almost nobody is paying attention. (Politico)
• 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)
• 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.

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).