• Climate Change

Southeast As A Region Lags In Coming To Grips With Climate Change

• carbon
• carbon emissions
• climate change
• climate crisis
• coal
• solar power

Inside Climate News published over the weekend, in collaboration with 9 newspapers across 7 Southeastern states a series of stories called “Caught Off Guard” describing how and why the region lags behind others in renewable electricity and faces some of the biggest global warming threats in the nation.  

Why This Matters:  The Southeast is particularly vulnerable on its coast due to increasingly severe storms and flooding, but the region’s problems extend far inland too.

• Forests

Top Stories of 2019: Forests on Fire All Over the World

• carbon emissions
• carbon sink
• climate change
• Fire
• trees

This year will be remembered for searing images of the Amazon burning at an unprecedented rate (there were so many fires you could see them from space), with Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro alternating between downplaying the severity of them and then sending in Brazilian military troops to fight the tens of thousands of fires burning there.  As we reported, world leaders and environmental organizations — even the Pope — pushed Brazil to take action — and the worst part was most of the fires were started by people who wanted to clear land for agriculture and other development.  But fires were bad all over the planet — from the Arctic tundra in Greenland, Alaska, and Siberia, to Australia, and of course, California.

• Air

Top Stories of 2019: Car Wars and Federalism

• air pollution
• California cars
• carbon emissions
• electric vehicles

News about electric vehicles — both cars and trucks — and particularly the efforts of California and other states to elevate their standards on tailpipe emissions to both reduce carbon and toxic air emissions made headlines throughout the year in Our Daily Planet.

Why This Matters: The future of cars is electric — if only we can get out of our own way to speed them to the finish line.

• Weather

Global Temps in April Second Warmest in Recorded History

• carbon emissions
• climate change
• CO2
• Keeling Curve
• record
• temperatures
• warmest

According to the Japanese Space Agency and NASA, April was the second warmest since record-keeping began in 1891 — only April 2016 was warmer.   Axios’ Andrew Freeman reported yesterday that because March of this year was in the top 3 warmest, 2019 could be another year of record-breaking warmth. 

• Climate Change

House of Representatives Takes A Stand On Paris Agreement

• #ClimateActionNow
• carbon emissions
• climate change
• House of Representatives
• Paris Agreement

Yesterday the House of Representatives voted to demand that the Trump Administration re-commit the United States to the Paris Climate Agreement, with only three Republican Members of Congress crossing over to vote with the Democrats who all supported the measure. 

• Green New Deal

Los Angeles Mayor Pledges Green New Deal for the City

• carbon emissions
• climate change
• electric vehicles
• Green New Deal
• Los Angeles
• smog

It was Green Day in California on Monday because, in addition to Beto O’Roarke’s climate policy rollout, the Mayor of Los Angeles, Eric Garcetti, announced a Green New Deal for Los Angeles — a bold plan to deal with carbon emissions in the city, with particular focus on green buildings and zero-emission cars, which would remake the city which is known for both its traffic and its smog. 

• Climate Change

Etsy becomes first online retailer to offset shipping emissions

• Amazon
• carbon emissions
• ecommerce
• Etsy
• online retail

E-commerce accounted for nearly 14% of all retail sales in America in 2018 (as well as $520 billion in sales) and the vast majority of Americans have purchased items from the internet. However aside from online retail’s huge packaging problem, most retailers haven’t addressed the carbon emissions associated with shipping their items. That’s why e-marketplace […]

• Sustainability

Cities Saying Bye-Bye to Styrofoam

• ban
• carbon emissions
• D.C.
• Forbes
• New York City
• News10
• recycle
• restaurant
• San Diego
• San Francisco
• Seattle
• styrofoam
• trash
• Washington

On Tuesday, the City of San Diego became the latest U.S. city to ban the use of styrofoam within city limits.  The ban covers the use and distribution some very common products like egg cartons, food containers, coolers, ice chests, pool or beach toys, mooring buoys and navigation markers made fully or partially of polystyrene foam, commonly known as styrofoam.  Other major cities like New York, San Francisco, Seattle, Minneapolis and Washington, D.C. also now have styrofoam bans in effect. 

Why This Matters:  Styrofoam needs to go.  The new replacements are better for the planet and completely recyclable.  For example, TemperPack’s  “ClimaCell” packaging produces 97% less carbon emissions in the manufacturing process than styrofoam and will replace tens of millions of pounds of plastic foam that would otherwise be dumped in landfills and never biodegrade.  Good for the economy and good for mother earth.  Good for these cities for taking this bold action.