‘Green News Report’ – March 22, 2022

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IN TODAY’S RADIO REPORT: Texas wildfires continue to spread across the state; Supreme Court confirmation hearings for Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson begin at fraught moment for climate action; Wildfire smoke is accelerating Arctic warming; PLUS: Both Antarctica and the Arctic see unprecedented, simultaneous extreme heat waves… All that and more in today’s Green News Report!

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IN ‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (see links below): U.N. secretary general says global climate target ‘is on life support’; ‘Watershed Moment’: SEC proposed landmark climate rules; How war in the world’s breadbasket “changes everything”; 4th round of UN talks fail to finalize a treaty to manage the high seas; ‘Evolving intelligence’ puts U.S. energy industry on high alert; A Chumash tribe and conservationists fight offshore wind turbines; Black, low-income areas in FL still haven’t recovered from Hurricane Michael… PLUS: The late Rep. Don Young leaves ab outsize natural resources legacy… and much, MUCH more! …

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

• Texas wildfires continue to spread across the state:
• Gov. Greg Abbott declares disaster as wildfires rage in several Texas counties (Texas Tribune)
• Texas wildfire kills 1, as officials worry extreme drought could worsen conditions (Washington Post):
  Researchers and meteorologists in Texas have worried about spring and summer fires for months after the Lone Star State experienced one of its driest and warmest summers on record, developments closely linked with global warming.
• ‘Critical’ fire risk remains in Texas as more blazes erupt (Washington Post/MSN):
  The burst of fires in Texas have occurred as widespread drought covers the state. Moderate to exceptional drought conditions affect more than 90 percent of state, according to the federal drought monitor.
• VIDEO: Gov. Abbott speaks about the state response to the wildfires in Eastland County (WFAA-Dallas)
• In Texas, Raging Fire has Climate Connection (Climate Crocks)
• Texas firefighters have battled 178 fires in the past week that have burned more than 108,000 acres, the state’s forest service says (CNN)
• Wildfires are Texas’s new reality. Here’s how we can deal with them (Dallas Morning News):
  At the root of the problem: “a change in the climate cycle that increases the occurrence of drought.”…Texas has become a tinderbox as the climate has become drier and land management practices have shifted over the decades.
• Wildfire smoke linked to Arctic warming:
• Wildfire smoke linked to Arctic melting (BBC):
  The dense plumes of wildfire smoke seen in recent years are contributing to the warming of the Arctic, say scientists. Their study says that particles of “brown carbon” in the smoke are drifting north and attracting heat to the polar region.
• Wildfires caused by global warming ‘are accelerating global warming’ (Yahoo News)
• Wildfires are increasing due to climate change and will get worse, scientists warn (Yahoo News UK)
• Unprecedented simultaneous extreme heat waves at both poles:
• Record heat wave in Antarctica brought exceptional snow, rain and melting (Washington Post)
• It’s 70 degrees warmer than normal in eastern Antarctica. Scientists are flabbergasted. (Washington Post/MSN)
• Both of the planet’s poles experience extreme heat, and Antarctica breaks records (AP):
  It caught officials at the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colorado, by surprise because they were paying attention to the Arctic where it was 50 degrees warmer than average and areas around the North Pole were nearing or at the melting point, which is really unusual for mid-March…”They are opposite seasons. You don’t see the north and the south (poles) both melting at the same time,” Meier told The Associated Press Friday evening. “It’s definitely an unusual occurrence.”
• Record ‘bomb cyclone’ bringing exceptional warmth to North Pole (Washington Post)
• Russian military destroys steel plant, Ukraine MP vows to build back better:
• One Of Europe’s Biggest Steel Works Damaged in Ukraine’s Mariupol (Voice of America News)
• Russian shelling damages the huge Mariupol iron and steelworks (Quartz):
  Ukraine is the 12th largest steel producer in the world and Metinvest accounted for 45% of the country’s crude steel output last year.
• Lesia Vasylenko, Ukrainian member of Parliament (Twitter):
  Last time #Azovstal stopped was in 1941. Restarted in 1943 with newest technology of the time. In 2021 the steel plant was a top polluter in #Ukraine. Destruction brings creation, as plant will be rebuilt using green technology.
• Supreme Court confirmation hearings begin for Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson:
• Biden Supreme Court nominee faces big climate questions (E&E News):
  “We’re now seating justices who are going to be steering the ship as we deal with increasingly disruptive climate effects,” said Katrina Fischer Kuh, an environmental law professor at Pace University’s Elisabeth Haub School of Law. “These are the justices who will be guiding our legal response to all of the impacts we’ve known are coming for a very long time but that seem to be manifesting more quickly and with greater severity.”
• Feinstein Notes Supreme Court’s Abortion, Environmental Cases (Wall St. Journal):
  Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California highlighted abortion and environmental issues being considered by the Supreme Court in her opening remarks at the confirmation hearing of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, calling those cases “foundational to who we are as a country.”

‘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

• U.N. secretary general says global climate target ‘is on life support’ (Washington Post)
• ‘Watershed Moment’: SEC Proposed Landmark Climate Rules (E&E News)
• Factbox: The U.S. SEC’s proposed new climate risk disclosure requirements (Reuters)
• How War in the World’s Breadbasket “Changes Everything” (Mother Jones)
• 4th Round of UN Talks Fail To Finalize A Treaty To Manage The High Seas (Mongabay)
• ‘Evolving Intelligence’ Puts U.S. Energy Industry On High Alert (E&E News)
• A Chumash Tribe And Conservationists Fight Offshore Wind Turbines (LA Times)
• Top Democrats Probe USPS Fleet Contractor (E&E News)
• Black, Low-Income Areas in Fla. Still Haven’t Recovered From Michael (Inside Climate News)
• Calif. Plan Would Give $100M To Indigenous Leaders To Buy Ancestral Lands (Guardian UK)
• Dr. Oz Supports Fracking As Candidate, But Raised Concern As Celeb (Inside Climate News)
• Ice Skating at a Rink Is Fun. Gliding Through a Forest? Glorious. (NY Times)
• EPA Union Urges Agency To Scrap Trump-Era Plan To Relocate Houston Lab (Huffington Post)
• UN Chief: Don’t Let Russia Crisis Fuel Climate Destruction (AP)
• Germany Opens Door to Qatar Natural Gas in Pivot From Russia (Bloomberg)
• There’s a Messaging Battle Right Now Over America’s Energy Future (NY Times)
• Report Looks At Water Quality 50 Years After The Clean Water Act Passed (NM Political Report)
• Don Young Leaves Outsize Natural Resources Legacy (E&E News)
• Environmental Sacrifice Zones: 8 Places We’ve Given Up-Probably Forever (Environmental Health Network)
• “Rare Earths” from Coal Waste (Climate Crocks)
• Feeling Hopeless About the Climate? Try Our 30-Day Action Plan (The Revelator)
• Green Upheaval: The New Geopolitics of Energy (Foreign Affairs)
• VIDEO: 2050: what happens if we ignore the climate crisis (Guardian UK)
• Guilt, grief and anxiety as young people fear for climate’s future (Reuters)
• 99.9 percent Of Scientists Agree Climate Emergency Caused By Humans (Guardian UK)
• An Empire of Dying Wells: Old oil and gas sites are a climate menace. Meet the company that owns more of America’s decaying wells than any other. (Bloomberg)
• Climate Fund Choices for Investors Are Multiplying (Bloomberg/Yahoo)
• How climate change could undo 50 years of public health gains (Grist)
• Climate Change Will Force a New American Migration (Pro Publica)
• Exxon’s Snake Oil: 100 years of deception (Columbia Journalism Review)
• What Does ’12 Years to Act on Climate Change’ (Now 9 Years) Really Mean? (Inside Climate News)
• VIDEO: A Message From the Future With Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (The Intercept)
• 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.