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June 27, 2016
On June 20, President Obama discussed the negative impacts of climate change on U.S. national parks during a visit to Yosemite in California. Image courtesy of the White House.
On June 20, President Obama discussed the negative impacts of climate change on the American landscape during a speech in Yosemite National Park, stating, "Climate change is no longer just a threat – it's already a reality." President Obama stated, "In Yosemite, meadows are drying up, bird ranges are shifting farther northward, [and] alpine mammals like pikas are being forced further upslope to escape higher temperatures. Yosemite’s largest glacier, once a mile wide, is now almost gone.” During his visit to the park with the First Family, President Obama also highlighted his Administration’s addition of an unprecedented 265 million more acres of U.S. wilderness lands to the national park system.
For more information see:
Voice of America, BBC, Los Angeles Times, Speech
On June 17, Secretary of State John Kerry visited the Jakobshavn glacier in Greenland on a Danish naval vessel, as part of an Arctic tour to observe the impact of climate change on the region. Sec. Kerry commented that Jakobshavn was "the most active ice flow in the Northern Hemisphere," with about 86 million metric tons of ice melting into the ocean daily. "There is no mistaking that we are contributing to climate change . . . There is profound change throughout the Arctic region," Kerry stated. Sec. Kerry's focus on the Arctic comes as the United States heads the Arctic Council in 2016. Kerry also visited Copenhagen and the Norwegian Arctic on the trip.
The Washington Post, Reuters, Associated Press
On June 22, Jason Furman, chairman of the White House Council on Economic Advisers, announced a new report by the White House and four outside experts which calls for reform to the federal coal leasing program, during a Resources for the Future event in Washington, DC. The report calls for a 300 percent increase from current levels of the royalties companies pay to extract coal on public lands, in order to increase compensation to taxpayers and protect the climate. Companies today often pay much less than the statutory requirement of 12.5 percent in royalties to the government. This change would cut 319 million metric tons of carbon dioxide annually, and reduce coal production on public lands by around 50 percent.
ClimateChangeNews, Report
On June 21, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released a draft report titled “Evaluating Urban Resilience to Climate Change: A Multi-Sector Approach.” The report, from EPA’s Air, Climate, and Energy (ACE) program, provides tools and guidelines for state and local planners that intend to make their cities more resilient to climate change. The report addresses ways to build resilience in multiple sectors, including water, energy, transportation, health, economic, land use, environmental, and telecommunications. The draft supplies case studies from Washington, D.C. and Worcester, MA as examples of how the tools, methods and actions would work. The EPA will be accepting public comments on the draft for 30 days.
Environmental Protection Agency, Federal Register
On June 21, U.S. District Judge Scott Skavdahl ruled that the Obama administration did not have the authority to regulate fracking, an oil and gas extraction process, through the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). The BLM regulations called for companies fracking on public land to disclose which chemicals they used in fracking fluid and where they have drilled wells, as well as requiring cement barriers between wells and water and putting protocols in place for storing wastewater. Kassie Siegel, an attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, stated, “The Bureau of Land Management clearly has the authority not only to set this weak rule on fracking but to take the much stronger actions.” The Obama administration plans to appeal the ruling.
Reuters, NPR
On June 24, the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit announced it was delaying the schedule for hearing a case on the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Clean Power Plan regulation on carbon emissions from existing power plants. States and interest groups which filed suit against the EPA requested the delay, saying that groups which filed a petition to the EPA to overturn the regulation, which was denied in May, should be permitted time to file their own lawsuits. Those groups can now file appeals on EPA's denial of their petition by July 5, and they have until July 12 to ask the Court of Appeals to consolidate their suits with the larger case against the EPA. This delay likely means the court will not hear the Clean Power Plan case until after President Obama leaves office.
The Hill, Washington Examiner
On June 22, over 7,100 cities in 119 countries created a group called the Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy. This alliance, formed out of the Covenant of Mayors and the Compact of Mayors, is now the largest coalition on climate in the world, according to its co-chairs Marcos Sefcovic (European Commission vice-president) and Michael Bloomberg (former mayor of New York City). Bloomberg pointed to the importance of cities in meeting the Paris Climate Agreement commitments, and Sefcovic said, “When mayors share a vision of a low-carbon future and roll up their sleeves, things get done.” The United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) reports that cities produce 75 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, and consume 70 percent of the world's energy.
Reuters, The Guardian
On June 21, the European Environment Agency (EEA) reported that the European Union has surpassed its greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction goal of 20 percent by 2020, with overall GHG emissions diminishing by almost 25 percent (or 1383 million metric tons) between 1990 and 2014. The report attributes the unexpected decrease to a decline in coal use, increased reliance on renewable energy, and warmer winters. EEA chief Hans Bruyninckx commented, “To accelerate the transition towards a low-carbon society, we need to further boost our investments in technology and innovation aimed at reducing our dependence on fossil fuels.” However, the report also states that greenhouse gas emissions from transportation (i.e., automotive, aviation, and shipping) and the air conditioning and refrigeration industries have increased, and represent a challenge to future emissions reductions.
Climate Change News, BBC, The Guardian, European Environment Agency
On June 16, Geophysical Research Letters published a study concerning the impact of rising temperatures on the permafrost below many Arctic lakes. Scientists discovered that declines in the thickness of lake ice and increased snowfall over the last 30 years, due to climate change, have allowed the permafrost lakebeds of shallow lakes to warm and melt. Lakebed permafrost is melting about 70 years earlier than is expected for terrestrial permafrost. Study co-author Vladimir Romanovsky, of the UAF Geophysical Institute, commented, “With further thawing of sub-lake permafrost there is a good chance that the ground will subside, increasing the lake depth and accelerating further permafrost thawing.” Researchers also expressed concern over the carbon currently stored within the Arctic permafrost, which could be released into the atmosphere if soil temperatures continue to increase.
Geophysical Research Letters, Nature World News, Alaska Dispatch News
On June 20, the Center for American Progress (CAP) released a report examining onshore U.S. oil and gas companies' 2014 emissions of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, using emission estimates that companies self-reported to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). CAP found that ConocoPhillips released the most methane in 2014, followed by ExxonMobil, Chesapeake Energy, EOG Resources, and BP America. ConocoPhillips told Fortune that it has cut nine billion cubic feet of methane emissions in the last five years; however, CAP found that in 2014 the company emitted at least 33 percent more methane than Exxon, the second largest emitter. Report author Alison Cassady at CAP commented that "without mandatory limits on methane pollution," the oil and gas industry will continue to release millions of metric tons of methane.
Fortune, Center for American Progress
New US Nuclear Power Plant Comes Online for First Time in 20 years
Solar-Powered Plane Embarks on 90-Hour Transatlantic Flight
Some Arctic Land May Collapse as Warm Temperatures Continue to Melt Permafrost
Two Nuclear Power Reactors in California Will Be Replaced with 100% Renewable Energy
China Releases Food Guidelines Aimed at Cutting Meat Consumption in Half to Help Climate
Authors: Rebecca Chillrud, Daniel Lopez and Caitlin Majewski
Editor: Laura Small
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