Scientists Are Desperately Trying to Figure Out How Long We Have Until “Doomsday Glaciers” Melt
The Getz Ice Shelf in West AntarcticaNASA/Jeremy Harbeck This story was originally published by Grist appears here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. In a remote region of Antarctica known as Pine Island Bay, 2,500 miles from the tip of South America, two glaciers hold human civilization hostage. Stretching across a frozen plain more than 150 miles long,…
The Turkey Industry Is Very Thankful for Donald Trump
Ron Sachs/CNP/Zuma In keeping with a longstanding pre-Thanksgiving presidential tradition, President Trump on Tuesday spared the lives of two turkeys—Wishbone and Drumstick. “I have been very active in overturning a number of executive actions by my predecessor,” he said. “However, I have been informed by the White House Counsel’s Office that Tater and Tot’s [Obama-era]…
This Isn’t Over Yet. The Keystone Pipeline Can Still Be Stopped.
Oliver Contreras/ZUMA The Nebraska Public Service Commission removed a major regulatory roadblock to the construction of the controversial Keystone XL pipeline on Monday. Though that might seem like the final judgement in the nine-year battle waged by the US environmental movement against it, nothing about the fate of the once-dead, then-revived pipeline has ever been certain. Even though the commission…
When Jacksonville Floods, the Rich Don’t Worry; the Poor Fight to Get Through
Bastiaan Slabbers/Zuma This story was originally published by CityLab and appears here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. Jacksonville’s Northside region was covered with swampland before the 1950s. The floodplain was home to some bait and tackle shops, commercial fisheries, and luxury waterfront homes, but all that changed as the fledgling city grew. Builders constructed middle-class white suburbs…
Will Washington State Pass the Nation’s First Carbon Tax?
Downtown Seattle, with Mt. Rainier.kanonsky/iStock/Getty Last November, some environmentalists in Washington state went to the polls hoping voters would back an initiative creating the nation’s first tax on carbon pollution. Initiative 732 went down to defeat as the country’s attention focused on Donald Trump’s shocking electoral college win. But now, one year later and buoyed…
California Will Get Half its Energy From Renewables by 2020
California Coastline along State Road 1Robert Bohrer/Shutterstock The US fight against climate change hasn’t exactly made much progress recently. Just this week, for instance, the Trump administration spent its time at the UN conference on climate change in Bonn praising the benefits of coal. But there is actually one bit of good news. A report released Monday from the California Public Utilities Commission shows that the state will get half of its…