Great Green Job of the Week: National Wildlife Federation

Earthfirst.com’s great green job of the week is located in Washington, D.C.  Do you have the credentials and drive to be the National Wildlife Federation’s next Global Warming Policy Director?

Title: Global Warming Policy Director
Position Type: Full Time
Salary Range: Based on Qualifications
Education: Must have an undergraduate degree in government relations, or related field required. Advanced degree preferred.

Required Skills: At least 10 years experience developing and passing legislation at the national level required. Additional international experience desired. At least some of the experience must be directly related to global warming, greenhouse gas reduction, energy policy, or energy conservation legislation. Specific experience with cap and trade legislation and/or natural resource conservation is highly desirable. Must also demonstrate ability to manage projects and supervise staff.

Benefits: NWF offers an excellent benefits package. NWF is an equal opportunity employer committed to workplace diversity. Cover Letter and Resume are required.

Description: National Wildlife Federation (NWF), the nation’s largest member-supported conservation organization, is mobilizing Americans to solve global warming and achieve a cleaner energy future. NWF is seeking a dynamic, results-oriented individual to take up the reins of its global warming policy program and provide policy guidance and leadership throughout the organization.

National Wildlife Federation has identified global warming as the greatest threat to wildlife, nature and our children’s future. To effectively solve global warming, legislation is needed in the United States and a new treaty is needed to fully engage the international community of nations. NWF takes a pragmatic approach to solving global warming. The solution must reduce greenhouse gas emissions and address the impacts of global warming in ways that protect natural resources, the economy, and people. Success solving global warming will provide Americans a new energy future of real choices and new economic opportunity.

The Director, Global Warming Policy will develop and implement programs and lead a team of six legislative and policy professionals to enable NWF to provide strong leadership in the process of developing and implementing new global warming policies. The Director will cultivate effective partnerships, including the U.S. Climate Action Partnership and the Climate Action Network and build coalitions with a wide variety of organizations that can recognize the benefits of solving global warming.

The Director, Global Warming Policy will be the point person for decisions on global warming policy positions and tactics to achieve NWF’s objectives. The Director will supervise NWF’s national and international policy staff and will assist in fundraising and program development.

To learn more about the NWF and apply for this position, see the National Wildlife Federation website.

Link [NWF] via [Treehugger]

Why You’re a Global Warming Denier

So, you don’t believe that global warming is real. You might fall into the ranks of those who think it’s all a big hoax engineered by Al Gore to take your money, or perhaps you make money off oil, pollution-creating factories or other environment killers. There are a lot of reasons that global warming denial can affect you, and you may experience a broad range of symptoms. These symptoms don’t just affect you; they’re harmful to everyone around you.

Global warming denial hurts. EarthFirst.com can help. Here are some common reasons for global warming denial, and what you can do to treat them.

Because you fear change.

You may be among our country’s elder generations, who share a collective re-imagining of how America used to be in the fabled ‘good old days’. In your mind, America was at its best in the 1950s: a time of wholesomeness, when family values came first. You’ve conveniently forgotten that the reality of this time period doesn’t exactly match up with ‘Leave it to Beaver’ or picturesque Norman Rockwell scenes of burgers and malts at the diner – but that doesn’t even matter anymore. You can’t imagine a future where things vary too much from this idealized model – in your mind, that would be a big step down.

The fear of change is closely related to ‘I’m an American, and You Can’t Tell Me What to Do’ syndrome. You believe that you’re entitled to the things you’ve gotten used to: unlimited use of personal vehicles running on cheap gas, homes far larger than they need to be, hundreds of electronic gadgets plugged into your power outlets, 20-minute showers. Basically, using resources as much as you want because, in your mind, you’ve earned it. What you fail to understand is that you’ve grown up in an era of waste and excess, and now you’re spoiled. The prospect of giving up all of those things to ‘save the planet’ makes you angry or scared because damn it, they’re yours and you don’t wanna.

The first step is accepting that change is inevitable. The world is in constant flux. You can’t freeze it and live forever in a bubble of idealism. Things are going to shift and alter around you in a never-ending stream that will drive you insane unless you just let go. The Roman Empire fell. Periods of prosperity don’t last forever. And for that matter, all of the fierce patriotism you can muster up doesn’t make the way America has been doing things right. You may think of wastefulness and complete disregard of the consequences of your lifestyle as the American Way, but the fact is that the world can’t sustain that lifestyle anymore. For a reality check, we recommend watching the documentary The 11th Hour, which quite effectively explains the need for changes to the way we live. But don’t worry too much – the truth is, the world will go on without you, and younger generations aren’t attached to your unreasonable ideals.

Because you’re too caught up in your petty everyday life.

You’re remodeling your kitchen, planning a wedding, trying to decide whether to change your hairstyle and mentally preparing for that weeklong visit from your in-laws. Tonight, Lisa and Dean are coming over to watch The Hills and help you choose nail polish colors, oh and can you believe what LC said to Brody the other day?! Who has time to care about the environment? You don’t believe in global warming because you don’t have the first idea what it even means. You have way too much going on.

The first step is to turn off the television, for the love of god. We’re a nation of zombies who can discuss the latest episode of Grey’s Anatomy ad nauseum but don’t know the first thing about real problems that affect our lives and our surroundings. You know, stuff going on outside that pane of glass that leads to the real world rather than the one that displays advertising with some mindless prepackaged entertainment thrown in every now and then.

You tend to think that what’s going on in your everyday life is more important than the overall scheme of things. This is called narcissism, folks. To get a feel for what the rest of the world is like, we recommend going on a trip to a place like Africa, India or China to help you understand that the world doesn’t revolve around you. Or, you could just volunteer some time at a local homeless shelter or participate in a clean up in a poor community. It might just help awaken you to the fact that there are more important things than who’s screwing who on Desperate Housewives or what you’re wearing to that party tonight, and that might – MIGHT! – lead to awareness of the world at large and the problems affecting it.

Because you’re uneducated or misinformed.

Your neighbor told you that Al Gore is a swindler and that he and a few companies that stand to profit made up the whole ‘global warming’ thing to rob people of their hard-earned money. An email you got from a co-worker said that climate change is caused by sunspots. You read an article on some website (you can’t remember which) that said the earth is actually cooling down, which obviously disproves the global warming theory, right?

The problem is, none of the people who created all of the nonsense you’ve swallowed as truth are scientists. There’s a lot of misinformation out there. We live in a country where email forwards touting ridiculous claims spread like wildfire regardless of whether there’s a grain of truth to them, because nobody bothers to fact-check. People want to believe something so badly that they pass it on as truth, and the more it gets passed on, the more people believe it. But, that doesn’t make it true. Worse yet, there are a lot of people out there paid by lobbyists and/or corporations to pump out misinformation about climate change. Did we not learn from the ‘cigarettes don’t cause cancer’ fiasco?

The answer is to do some research yourself instead of sounding like an uneducated jackass who just repeats lines that have been fed to you. Seek out authoritative sources. And Jesus tapdancing Christ, stop watching Fox News.

Because you make money off dirty products and/or practices.

The factory that makes the widgets your company sells emits dark billowing pollution from its smokestacks on a daily basis. You’re not entirely sure what’s coming out of there, but one thing you are sure of is that it would be expensive for you to change the way your company operates in order to reduce harmful emissions. Or, perhaps your fortune – or the fortune you’re still seeking – is tied to a polluting industry like oil, and you don’t have the balls to be innovative and seek out moneymaking opportunities in the emerging clean energy industries.

Corporations are reckless polluters, and they fear that climate change legislation will affect their bottom line. The ones run by people with a conscience have already begun working on ways to change, while the rest deny global warming because they don’t want to admit that they’re doing something harmful. Hey, it’s understandable that you don’t want to see everything you’ve worked for go down the drain – but the fact remains that there is a clear right and wrong in this case. If you consider yourself to be a good person, taking a critical and open-minded look at how your business might be harming the environment (and along with it, human health) is the right thing to do. If you’re a slimy, greedy jerk who only cares about making money, see the final item below, ‘Because you’re an asshole’.

Because your religion has caused you to believe that it’s impossible.

The bible doesn’t say anything about global warming, and you take the bible literally, not considering the possibility that a) the bible is creative fiction written by people trying to further their own interests or b) the bible was meant as a guide to moral behavior, not a line-by-line manual to the world. Plus, you think that any day now, you’re going to be beamed up into the clouds to sit around a strum a harp all day while the rest of us are tortured in very creative ways back here on earth, so who cares?

Many religious folk intentionally walk around as if they’ve got blinders on because they don’t want to be exposed to information that may cause them to doubt ‘the word’, often believing that science is the tool of the devil. Religion is a tricky thing. It can be a shining light in the darkness for some people, but it’s also a major cause of death and destruction.

Religion and reason aren’t mutually exclusive. If you believe in god, then it follows for you to believe that god left humans in charge of taking care of the planet. Even if you truly believe that god wouldn’t let global warming happen or that ‘The Rapture’ is going to make it all a moot point, don’t you believe that we as the dominant species on the planet are responsible for looking after god’s creations? There are a lot of bad things in this world that humans are responsible for – how could that not include destroying the earth? Furthermore, if you’re a Christian, shouldn’t you be following the advice on your own cheesy bracelets and asking yourself ‘what would Jesus do’? Seems to me like he’d be out there participating in trash cleanups, riding a bicycle and snacking on organic veggies. In fact, you’d probably label him a hippie. Call me crazy.

Because you’re an asshole.

You don’t give a rat’s ass about the generations to come. You’ll happily go on polluting as much as you can during your limited time on Earth, and go out laughing. The ‘asshole qualities’ that cause you to deny global warming may also be caused by greed (see above, ‘Because you make money off dirty products and/or practices’). Or, you just want to do whatever the hell you please and take offense to the idea of having to change your lifestyle, no matter what the reasons are (see above, ‘I’m an American and You Can’t Tell Me What to Do’.)

Luckily, the global warming deniers who are truly assholes aren’t nearly as common as the other types. It’s nearly impossible to rehab a born-and-bred jackass. The rest of us will just step around them and leave them to die out like the fear-of-change generation, because they’ll be proven wrong before too long.

EarthFirst.com Threw Down For The Sierra Club and Lightbulbs to Leadership

Last week thousands of people got together in over 300 homes, businesses, and at least one tipi (mine, as seen above) to help the Sierra Club bring awareness to the need for direct action on fighting Global Warming.

We need renewable energy, increased gas mileage standards, and more green industries jobs and the Sierra Club’s Lightbulbs to Leadership campaign used a series of videos to call out the politicians who are increasingly falling behind with the will of the people (that’s us).

We joined those hundreds of party hosts and our friends at Ecorazzi, who had a dinner party in Miami (seen in the photo above), and threw two events- one in Chicago and another here at my house and tipi in Maine. The night started off with a presentation about Global Warming, green jobs, and mileage standards, moved into a conference call with Sierra Club Executive Director Carl Pope and activist (and EarthFirst.com official Hot Guy in Green) Van Jones and wrapped up when thousands of letters to Governors demanding action on these issues were written and an unknown number of beers and sodas were consumed (and hopefully recycled).

Check out the Lightbulbs to Leaderships website and the Sierra Club’ s Flickr account to see more photos.

Nicely done Sierra Club.

Researchers Collecting Cow Flatulence in Plastic Tanks to Study Global Warming

10 cows in Argentina are wearing fashionable pink ‘balloon backpacks’ that collect methane directly from their stomachs. Researchers in Argentina are studying the effects of methane on the environment, and they’ve discovered that methane from cows accounts for more than 30 percent of Argentina’s total greenhouse gas emissions.

From The Telegraph:

As one of the world’s biggest beef producers, Argentina has more than 55 million cows grazing in its famed Pampas grasslands.
Guillermo Berra, a researcher at the National Institute of Agricultural Technology, said every cow produces between 8000 to 1,000 litres of emissions every day.

Methane, which is also released from landfills, coal mines and leaking gas pipes, is 23 times more effective at trapping heat in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide.

Scientists are now carrying out trials of new diets designed to improve cows’s digestion and hopefully reduce global warming. Silvia Valtorta, of the National Council of Scientific and Technical Investigations, said that by feeding cows clover and alfalfa instead of grain “you can reduce methane emissions by 25 percent”.

So, these big balloon-like bags collect the methane that would otherwise come out of the cow at both ends and end up in the atmosphere, and when they’re full the scientists take them off and hang them up in the corral for analysis. Gross. Can you imagine accidentally getting a whiff of methane straight from a cow’s stomach? Though, I guess it may be milder than it would be after traveling through… okay, I’m thinking way too much about cow flatulence first thing in the morning.

Link [The Telegraph] via [Robotzilla]
Photo credit: Reuters

LCD Chemical 17,000 Times More Harmful Than CO2

Looks like LCD monitors might not be so green after all. Nitrogen trifluoride (NF3) was found in a recent study to have a global climate impact 17,000 times greater than that of CO2. NF3 is found in the LCD panels of cell phones, computer monitors and televisions as well as in semiconductors and synthetic diamonds. It’s being called the ‘missing greenhouse gas’ as it’s not currently being monitored by the Kyoto Protocol.

From the Environmental News Network:

What kind of impact is this suppose to have, you ask? The chemical is found to stay in the atmosphere for 550 years and there is no force of nature known to remove it. This year, nitrogen trifluoride emissions are expected to have an impact equal to Austria’s CO2 output. Production of the chemical may double in 2009. The study points to a number of NF3 manufacturing facilities opening up in the US, Korea, and China. The production increase is due in part to the switch to digital television which will lead to increased LCD consumption and the disposal of older sets, some of them early LCD models.

LCD monitors have long been presented as environmentally friendly, particularly next to lead-laden, energy inefficient CRT models. According to ENERGY STAR, they consume half to two-thirds the energy of CRTs. Heat output is also less, leading to lower air conditioning bills. Some companies have gone even further to lessen the environmental impacts of their LCD displays. Lenovo has nearly a dozen EPEAT gold certified displays to offer and Phillips made news with their Eco TV in April. Though the use of mercury and arsenic have been of concern to the environmental and human health, LED-backlit display technology has begun to address these issues.

It’s not known just yet how companies will respond to this. The cost of engineering their products to emit less NF3 would be expensive, and experts think that consumers might have a hard time swallowing a price increase. As the Environmental News Network points out, measuring the NF3 levels in the environment might be enough to spur an outcry.

Link [ENN]
Photo credit: Flickr user laffy4k

Bad Idea: Hotlinking Image From Your Blog. Even Worse Idea: Hotlinking to Earthfirst.com From Your Blog

Everyone can relax. It turns out that Global Warming is a big hoax. We can all calm down and get back to our normal lives of driving Hummers and leaving the front door open in the winter.

I was a little worried there for a bit after hearing that the worlds scientific community had come to consensus on the fact that our world was heating up due to the massive amounts of CO2 and other nasties that we’ve been pumping into the air in earnest for the last few hundred years or two.

Imagine how relieved I was to read that Myck Kilcup, a homeschooled teenager who wants to be a history professor when he grows up, has figured out that Global Warming is a bunch of ‘hot air’. He knows because he’s been a ‘fierce fighter against the theory of “global warming”‘ and has written “lots of papers” about the subject. Plus, his dad thinks he is a “great thinker”, and you know that dads are never wrong.

Myck doesn’t let verifiable fact get in his way and has figured out that the planet has gone through this all warming before in the High Middle Ages when all of a sudden there was a lot more food to go around.

Isn’t that awesome news! Instead of looking at the possibly destruction of our world (at least the parts that allow us to live comfy lives) due to our shortsighted use of fossil fuels, we’re looking at a booming harvest (and maybe an Inquisition or two)! Kick ass! Bring on the High Middle Ages Redux!

Thank the Great Flying Spaghetti Monster that the world has mental giants like Myck Kilcup to think for us, otherwise we’d all end up as slaves to Al Gore and his army of Carbon Trading Evil Doer Greenies.

(Lesson to be learned here: Don’t hotlink to EarthFirst.com photos, especially if you’re some asshat teen with a stupid theory on Global Warming. See Myck’s blog and the hotlinked photo while it’s up. If Myck gets around to taking the photo down you can see a full sized screenie by clicking the thumbnail there on the left)

EarthFirst.com is Getting It’s Party Groove On Tonight With The Sierra Club and Lightbulbs for Leadership

We’ve written about the Sierra Club’s Lightbulbs to Leadership campaign a couple of times but wanted to do something more tangible to help them bring awareness to the cause.

So we’re joining a few tens of thousands of people throwing a party tonight to bring people together to speak up about the necessary action we need to take to fight Global Warming. We’re so excited that we’re actually throwing two parties- the EarthFirst.com (mid)West crew will be throwing down the green groove in Chicago and I’ll be having an East Coast party in my backyard tipi here in Maine (as seen in a rave I recently threw in it in the photo above). Our friends at Ecorazzi are joining in on the fun with a party in Miami.

The premise of the Lightbulbs to Leadership campaign is that changing our lightbulbs is not enough. It’s a great small step that We The People are taking, but isn’t enough to really turn things around. For that we need our politicians and leaders to get in line and start getting some laws in place to drive change.

So we’ll be focusing on how people can take real action in prodding politicians to action. We’ll be talking about Global Warming, the need for higher fuel efficiency standards, investments in Green Jobs, cutting worldwide emissions, and then capping it all off with some good ol’ fashion letter writing. There will be a conference call with Sierra Club Executive Director Carl Pope and Green for All President (and EarthFirst.com’s #2 Hottest Guy in Green) Van Jones thrown in the middle for good measure.

Check out the video we shot earlier this week:

Find a House Party near you over at Lightbulbs to Leadership and get out tonight to help save the world from ourselves.

Link [Lightbulbs to Leadership]

Photo credit: Flickr user pokpok313

Scientists Warn that the North Pole May Have No Ice this Summer

What’s the North Pole without ice? Can you even imagine it? When there’s no ice at the North Pole, something is very very wrong. And indeed, scientists are predicting that Arctic sea ice may disappear entirely from the area this year. The disappearance of North Pole ice would be one of the most dramatic and frightening examples of the impact of global warming thus far.

Santa is not happy.

From The Independent:

“From the viewpoint of science, the North Pole is just another point on the globe, but symbolically it is hugely important. There is supposed to be ice at the North Pole, not open water,” said Mark Serreze of the US National Snow and Ice Data Centre in Colorado.

If it happens, it raises the prospect of the Arctic nations being able to exploit the valuable oil and mineral deposits below these a bed which have until now been impossible to extract because of the thick sea ice above.

Seasoned polar scientists believe the chances of a totally ice-free North Pole this summer are greater than 50:50 because the normally thick ice formed over many years at the Pole has been blown away and replaced by huge swathes of thinner ice formed over a single year.

One-year ice is highly vulnerable to melting in the summer. So far this year, satellite data has shown that the ice is melting even faster than last year, when there was an all-time record loss of Arctic sea ice. The North Pole has never before been exposed, and it’s likely that we’ll see that happen over the next few months.

What’s that you say, global warming deniers? Oh, right, you have no argument aside from the same old tired idiotic ‘not caused by humans’ spiel. Get your heads out of the fucking sand. This is the point where intelligent people – even those who have been stubbornly wrong about global warming for whatever reasons – should be seeing the light.

Link [The Independent]
Photo credit: The Independent

Climate Change Could Spark Wars Worldwide

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to determine that drastically changing weather patterns could promote instability around the world, especially in areas that are already dealing with conflict. Environmental groups have been saying so for years, and now U.S. spies are warning the government that global warming could lead to the collapse of governments and the creation of terrorist safe havens.

From Inside Defense, via Wired:

In addition to examining how weather could add stress to governments with a weak grip on power … the authors mulled a spectrum of second- and third-order consequences for Washington policymakers to consider — including indirect security concerns like impacts on economies, energy, social unrest and migration.

Foreign-policy concerns were also weighed, including how flooding, rising water levels or drought might create humanitarian crises. Also examined was how extreme weather events could challenge the response capabilities of governments around the world.

Though the Bush administration has done everything they could to suppress the knowledge that climate change is actually happening and will get worse, the nation’s military leaders have taken the strategic implications very seriously. Last Wednesday, leading spies testified on Capitol Hill about the report.

The panel who spoke to the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming and the Intelligence Community Management Subcommittee included retired army generals and ‘geoengineering’ proponents along with a global warming skeptic put in place by Republicans on the Intelligence Committee, who were opposed to the report in the first place.

That’s right, Republicans are still – even after all of the information and dire predictions that have come out – denying that climate change is real. Amazing.

Link [Wired]
Photo credit: Darfur Refugees, via Wikimedia Commons

Top Climatologist Wants Oil Company CEOs on Trial for Crimes Against Humanity

Climate scientist James E. Hansen called for putting oil companies on trial for crimes against humanity last Monday on Capitol Hill. Hansen stated that the heads of oil companies, who knowingly delayed action on greenhouse gas emissions, are guilty of crimes against humanity and nature and should be prosecuted thusly.

From Hansen’s speech, via Dot Earth:

CEOs of fossil energy companies know what they are doing and are aware of long-term consequences of continued business as usual. In my opinion, these CEOs should be tried for high crimes against humanity and nature.

Conviction of ExxonMobil and Peabody Coal CEOs will be no consolation, if we pass on a runaway climate to our children. Humanity would be impoverished by ravages of continually shifting shorelines and intensification of regional climate extremes. Loss of countless species would leave a more desolate planet.

If politicians remain at loggerheads, citizens must lead. We must demand a moratorium on new coal-fired power plants. We must block fossil fuel interests who aim to squeeze every last drop of oil from public lands, off-shore, and wilderness areas. Those last drops are no solution. They yield continued exorbitant profits for a short-sighted self-serving industry, but no alleviation of our addiction or long-term energy source.

Hell yeah! We’ll sign that petition. A commenter calling himself ‘blindjester’ on a related story at The Huffington Post Green sums it up nicely: “If you cause the injury of a few people, you get sued. You cause the death of someone, you go to jail. If you’re wealthy enough and powerful enough to contribute to disease and death worldwide, you get to live in a mansion.”

Link [Dot Earth] + [The Huffington Post]

Climatologist Renews Call to Act on Global Warming

20 years ago, climatologist James E. Hansen addressed the Senate with a dire warning about global warming: it was time to act. The climate was already changing, and the heat-trapping blanket of carbon dioxide and other gases in the atmosphere was accumulating fast.

Since then, little real action has been taken; if anything, things have gotten much worse. We’ve continued to release huge amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere as we stubbornly cling to an era of fossil fuels and free-flowing pollution. Now, Hansen says, it’s almost getting to be too late: we’re approaching the red line, and soon there will be no going back.

From The New York Times:

“If we don’t begin to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the next several years, and really on a very different course, then we are in trouble,” Dr. Hansen said Friday at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, which he has directed since 1981. “Then the ice sheets are in trouble. Many species on the planet are in trouble.”

Dr. Hansen said the natural skepticism and debates embedded in the scientific process had distracted the public from the confidence experts have in a future with centuries of changing climate patterns and higher sea levels under rising carbon dioxide concentrations. The confusion has been amplified by industries that extract or rely on fossil fuels, he said, and this has given cover to politicians who rely on contributions from such industries.

Dr. Hansen said the United States must begin a sustained effort to exploit new energy sources and phase out unfettered burning of finite fossil fuels, starting with a moratorium on the construction of coal-burning power plants if they lack systems for capturing and burying carbon dioxide. Such systems exist but have not been tested at anywhere near the scale required to blunt emissions. Ultimately he is seeking a worldwide end to emissions from coal burning by 2030.

Since the time to act was decades ago, it makes it all the more urgent to make swift, far-reaching, dramatic changes to the way we live in order to preserve the planet – and the species that live upon it.

This makes me want to shake global warming skeptics. We’ve seen enough of them drop by EarthFirst and leave comments to the effect of, ‘it’s too expensive to change’, ‘I don’t want to give up my lifestyle’ or ‘I just don’t believe that global warming is caused by humans’. Are you really that selfish and naïve? Do you really believe that you’re so entitled to your current lifestyle of driving an SUV, living in a needlessly large house, profiting off of oil industry stock and whatever else it is that’s so precious to you, you refuse to give it up? What about your grandchildren – what kind of a world are they going to live in? You’re leaving behind a legacy of death and destruction because you’re set in your selfish ways.

Here’s the thing: deny that global warming is caused by humans all you want, or even that global warming isn’t real, as unbelievably stupid as that is. What it comes down to is our way of life is putting a huge strain on our planet. We’re using up precious resources at an alarming pace, removing mountaintops to get to coal, spewing pollution into the atmosphere, killing millions of species, dumping trash in the oceans, creating mountains upon mountains of toxic refuse. We’re poisoning our bodies, our soil, our air, our water, the animals around us – everything that we depend upon to survive. These actions will have consequences, whether you want to face it or not. It’s time to move forward into the 21st century, and take responsibility.

Link [The New York Times]
Photo credit: Flickr user ximenatapia

Unleash Your Power! Demand Action on Climate Change

Don’t let politicians stand in the way of saving our planet for the generations to come. Demand that our leaders support bold and fast action on climate change. The Sierra Club has released this follow-up video to ‘Lawmakers in the Dark’, and it’s a good one!

“Right now, the people are ahead of the politicians. And if we are serious about fixing global warming, we must use our power to take climate change head-on.”

Link [Lightbulbs to Leadership] & [YouTube]

McCain Counts on Public Ignorance with New Global Warming Ads

One thing about this election season has been made very clear: McCain thinks that we’re all a bunch of idiots. And, maybe a lot of us are (namely, the people who are already planning to vote for him), but he’d better hope that the independents he’s targeting with his new global warming ads are totally uneducated on environment-related topics.

From Salon’s War Room:

The commercial, titled “Global,” starts out like an attack ad aimed at smog, traffic and all things hazardous for the environment, with alarming images flashing on the screen before a sun sets in heavy haze. Then soft, comforting Muzak comes up behind a woman’s voice, reading a script that makes clear what the answer to all those problems is: McCain.

“John McCain stood up to the president and sounded the alarm on global warming, five years ago,” the narrator says. “Today, he has a realistic plan that will curb greenhouse gas emissions. A plan that will help grow our economy and protect our environment.” Those black-and-white shots of clogged highways and polluting factories from the opening are gone, replaced by nice color images of windmills, blue sky, water flowing over a dam, a worker assembling a truck (could it be a hybrid?) and, finally, McCain himself, standing on a windy bluff, looking like Mark Trail as he surveys the wilderness around him.

“Reform. Prosperity. Peace,” the narrator purrs. “John McCain.”

“John McCain stood up to the president and sounded the alarm on global warming, five years ago” is the stupidest sentence I’ve ever heard. McCain’s record speaks louder than words. His past voting shows that his views on environmental policy don’t vary much from those of the Bush administration. McCain has lobbyist connections to Big Oil and foreign dictators of oil-rich countries. Plus, he supports offshore drilling. Need I say more?

Watch the video at Salon, I’ve OD’ed on John McCain ads after all the ones that were plastered all over EarthFirst for a while there.

Link [Salon]

Grist Explains How to Smack Down Global Warming Deniers, Point by Point

If you’ve ever gotten into an argument about global warming with a skeptic, you know how frustrating it can be. Grist.org has a crazily comprehensive guide to smacking down climate change deniers and their tired, weak arguments as to why they think global warming is a hoax.

Grist guest author Coby Beck has created an entire outline that goes first through the ‘Stages of Denial’ – there’s nothing happening, we don’t know why it’s happening, climate change is natural, climate change is not bad and climate change can’t be stopped. Then it cycles through scientific topics, types of argument and level of sophistication. For example, under ‘Uninformed’ you’ll find the answer to the argument, ‘what’s wrong with warmer weather?’ and under ‘Naïve’ you can read the answer to ‘it’s the sun, stupid’.

Here’s a sample from one of my favorites, which you hear so often: ‘They predicted global cooling in the 1970s’.

Objection: The alarmists were predicting the onset of an ice age in the ’70s. Now it’s too much warming! Why should we believe them this time?

Answer: It is true that there were some predictions of an “imminent ice age” in the 1970s, but a cursory comparison of those warnings and today’s reveals a huge difference.

Today, you have a widespread scientific consensus, supported by national academies and all the major scientific institutions, solidly behind the warning that the temperature is rising, anthropogenic CO2 is the primary cause, and it will worsen unless we reduce emissions. (Read more)

This is the first time we’ve ever seen such an extensive reference of climate change information in one place, laid out in a way that’s so easy to navigate. Props to Grist! This is a great resource.

Link [Grist]
Photo credit: Flickr user Neubie

Bill Gates has 10,000 Times the Carbon Footprint of an Average American

Americans already have large carbon footprints: where the world average is 4 tons, the American average is 20. A study at MIT found that no matter what you do, if you live in America, you’re automatically going to have a large footprint – whether you’re homeless, a child or a Buddhist monk – because our public services and infrastructure create a ‘baseline’ of 8.5 tons, which no American can drop below. But, even though you won’t find someone with a tiny carbon footprint here, you will find people with huge ones – especially the richest man in the country, Microsoft founder Bill Gates.

EcoGeek has it:

Bill Gates, specifically chosen for the study, has a carbon footprint about 10,000 times the average. Of course, he also has produced a great deal of wealth and growth for the world. In general, the researchers found that as income rises, so do emissions. A homeless person, who ate at soup kitchens and slept in shelters, had an average carbon footprint of 8.5 tonnes, still twice as much as the world average. Even monks, who lived half the year in the forest, had carbon footprints of 10.5 tonnes.

Big shocker – the richest techie nerd in the world has a huge CO2 footprint. This guy has more giant, expensive, energy sucking toys than you can possibly imagine. He has a house with a 3-car garage – for his servants. At last count, old Bill was worth $56 billion.

Link [EcoGeek]
Photo credit: Mugshots.org

Republican Sen. Bob Corker for the Environment?

A lot of people, including us, have been talking about the Lieberman-Warner bill that passed through the Senate last week. The bill aimed to cap greenhouse emissions starting in 2012, requiring electric utilities, refineries, industrial and transportation sectors to make some big changes in how they operate. As expected, the bill didn’t make it through – but what really has people scratching their heads is that it featured some surprising amendments tacked on by Republican Senator Bob Corker (Tenn.).

Grist sums up the amendments:

One would boost the percentage of permits auctioned and return all revenue to citizens; the other would eliminate international offsets as a means of compliance.

Some people think that this was a sign that the issue of global warming is finally starting to transcend partisan boundaries; others are highly skeptical that Corker’s motivations are sincere. Some called the amendments ‘poison pills’, intentional attempts to derail the bill to prevent it from passing, and Sen. Corker all but confirmed that last week when he stated,

“This bill is not going to become law,” Mr. Corker said. “It has no chance, none.”

Sen. Corker’s and other Republican lawmakers’ issues with the bill are explained by The New York Times:

One of the major points of contention arises from the bill’s treatment of goods from developing countries that are among the world’s biggest carbon emitters, including China, India, Brazil and Mexico.

The measure directs the president to negotiate agreements with those countries to ensure they are imposing binding limits on carbon emissions on their own industries. If they fail to do so, the United States will impose unspecified tariffs on carbon-intensive products like steel, paper, concrete and glass from those countries. The provision was included at the behest of labor unions and American companies in those industries who would not support the bill without such a cost equalizer.

Senator Corker’s amendments, though intentionally added to prevent the bill from passing, seem to come from a sincere place. Corker strongly supports biofuel and other alternatives to reduce our dependence on oil. But, he also voted ‘no’ on factoring global warming into federal project planning. What sets Corker apart from other Republicans, however, is the fact that he’s willing to learn about the issue of climate change and figure out how Republicans can ‘balance’ related legislation to make it more palatable for their side of the political spectrum.

The Chattanooga Times reports,

Energy issues have been one of Sen. Corker’s top priorities since the beginning of his tenure, landing him a seat on the Senate Energy Committee. From that pulpit, he has emerged as a leading Republican ally in the fight against global warming.

In meetings with his Republican colleagues, he has urged even those most resistant to the idea that global warming is influenced by human activity that legislative action ought to be pursued to combat its acceleration.

“There’s becoming a consensus that there’s no reason to debate the science,” Sen. Corker said. “The place to be in this debate is in discussing the policies and how it affects the world.”

Sen. Corker said his stances reflect a delicate dance between wanting to combat global warming and maintaining ample energy supplies to keep the economy robust in the long-term.

“We’re trying to create a balance between protecting the environment and our country being energy secure,” he said.

We’d love to see more Republican lawmakers unite with Democrats on the environment, and hope that in the future, if Sen. Corker is truly an ally on the issue of global warming, that he’ll stop partaking in such tactics to derail climate change legislation. The times are definitely a-changin’, and we’re optimistic enough to hope that Republicans and Democrats will be able to work together to help save the planet. But that will only happen if Republicans stop pushing their free trade agenda that resists environmental standards and thus prevents real change from taking place.

Link [Grist] + [New York Times] + [Chattanooga Times]
Photo credit: corker.senate.gov

Dramatic Photos of Melting Glaciers Just a Hoax?

We’ve all heard it: proclamations that global warming is ‘the biggest hoax ever perpetuated on the people of the world, bar none.’ (That quote, of course, comes courtesy of the renowned village idiot Tom DeWeese of the American Policy Center). Global warming deniers think that the entire green movement is a conspiracy to take their money and, as we’ve mentioned several times, ‘end the American way of life’.

So, I guess these dramatic photos of a melting glacier in Norway are just one big trick – photoshopped, or set up. Perhaps Al Gore himself was there with a blowtorch, melting it back so he could claim it was an effect of global warming. Because, as Rush Limbaugh wants you to think, Al Gore is just getting rich off of all us stupid treehuggers that care about the environment. Ignore the man behind the curtain!

These photographs were taken over a period of eight years. The change is, indeed, mind boggling.

Link [Glacsweb]

The Collapse of the Arctic Ice Shelf Could Mean the End of Life As We Know It

Via the BBC: Satellite image of Ward Hunt Ice Shelf.
(Red lines: new cracks; yellow lines: cracks from 2002; blue lines: extent of the ice shelf)

In April of this year, scientists accompanied the Canadian military to remote areas of the Arctic ice shelf to evaluate any changes that may have occurred since the previous assessment in 2007. What the team found was shocking: a network of cracks in the largest remaining ice shelf, Ward Hunt, stretched more than 10 miles.

The Ward Hunt ice shelf is 433 square kilometers in size – over seven times as large as the Ayles ice shelf, which broke off in 2005 from Ellesmere Island’s western coast. The 3,000-year-old ice, which is 40 meters thick, was found to be fractured by dozens of deep cracks.

A single crack in the Arctic ice shelf was first noticed in 2002, and the deterioration that has occurred since then is astounding. The cracks seem to all but guarantee that yet another large landmark in the Arctic is destined to break up and disappear. Scientists theorize that, since the cracks are so dramatic and appeared so quickly, climate change in the area must have crossed some kind of threshold. Rapid changes in the Arctic are considered the main harbinger of climate change.

BBC News reporter David Shukman interviewed two of the scientists after the expedition, and their shock was apparent:

“I was astonished to see these new cracks. It means the ice shelf is disintegrating, the pieces are pinned together like a jigsaw but could float away,” Dr Mueller explained.

According to another scientist on the expedition, Dr Luke Copland of the University of Ottawa, the new cracks fit into a pattern of change in the Arctic.

“We’re seeing very dramatic changes; from the retreat of the glaciers, to the melting of the sea ice. We had 23% less (sea ice) last year than we’ve ever had, and what’s happening to the ice shelves is part of that picture.”

Some experts are painting an undeniably gloomy scenario: one in which the entire Arctic ice cap melts by the end of this summer. More conservative estimates place it happening sometime between 2013 and 2030. Scientists will be watching nervously to see if last year’s record melting will be matched or exceeded. Since so much ice melted so quickly last year, it seems feasible.

One effect of a large decrease in the arctic ice cap would be a corresponding decrease in sunlight being reflected away from the region, which would cause temperatures to rise. As the sunlight grew more intense, it could increase the rate of glacier loss in Greenland, which would raise sea levels – most notably in Asia, where a one meter rise would affect nearly 100 million people and cause nearly 400 billion U.S. dollars in damage.

The biggest threat to us as a result of the melting is changes in our weather patterns. It’s a sort of catch-22 that we’ve already perpetuated on ourselves, like it or not. Our bad habits have contributed greatly to global warming. Now, as the atmosphere gets warmer and Arctic summers get clearer and sunnier, the ice continues to melt. As it does, it will set changes in motion that will further change weather patterns all over the world.

NASA’s Earth Observatory explains it:

While these large shifts in temperature and ice cover appear to be tucked far away in the Arctic, our Earth’s processes are dynamic and interconnected. In other words, rapid loss of sea ice and a warming Arctic will undoubtedly have far-reaching and serious effects for everyone. “Societies have developed and gotten used to climate the way it is now, and changes will very likely be highly disruptive,” Rind says.

For starters, as sea ice melts, Arctic waters warm, greatly altering ocean processes, which in turn have an effect on Arctic and global climate, says Michael Steele, senior oceanographer at the University of Washington, Seattle. As the oceans warm and ice thins, more solar energy gets absorbed by the water, creating a positive feedback that leads to further melting and warming.

Such mechanisms can change the temperature of ocean layers and impact ocean circulation and salinity, Steele says. For example, the Arctic Ocean during winter is usually very cold and produces lots of sea ice, which creates cold, salty water that sinks to deep levels and drives ocean circulation. But if surface waters warm and ice does not form as well in winter, these processes involving salinity and circulation could be reduced or eliminated. “Then the Arctic Ocean and the North Atlantic Ocean will look very different,” Steele says.

As the Arctic continued to warm, the soil would begin to thaw, releasing frozen natural gases like methane and carbon dioxide, which would act as greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Additionally, many areas of the world depend upon Arctic air masses during the winter for many reasons, not the least of which is the vernalization of crops. Many plant species require low winter temperatures in order to produce flowers the following spring, and a difference of even a few degrees could be catastrophic. Humans and livestock depend upon these crops, and widespread famine could result. Imagine the chaos that would result in that scenario: absolute and utter panic over food shortages.

Those aren’t the only disastrous weather-related effects that could occur as a result of the Arctic ice caps melting. As illustrated in Al Gore’s celebrated documentary An Inconvenient Truth, abrupt climate changes could lead to a shut-off of the Gulf Stream current, increased insect infestations and tropical diseases and loss of coral reefs. Each of these scenarios would have very dangerous effects of their own.

The Arctic region’s ecosystems are already incredibly fragile. Exactly how the ecosystems would respond to dramatic weather changes is unpredictable. One thing that’s for certain is that these changes could wipe out hundreds or even thousands of species, which would, beyond the shadow of a doubt, have a major effect on the ecology of the entire world in a sort of ‘butterfly effect’.

Also ominous is the fact that as the sea ice melts, numerous superpowers in the world are eyeing the territory for its untapped resources. The Northwest Passage could become more navigable, providing a quick and easy route through the Arctic Ocean connecting the Pacific and Atlantic. Sea journeys would be reduced by thousands of miles.

Russia drew the ire of other Arctic countries last year when it planted its flag on the seabed under the North Pole, which as of now cannot be claimed by any governing entity. The nation’s lead explorer, Artur Chilingarov, claimed the 460,000 miles of ocean floor as belonging to Russia. Greenland, Denmark, Canada and the United States responded by increasing military presence in the region. Canada flies their flag on snowmobiles lined up around Ayles Ice Island as a display of control.

Last week, Greenland hosted a meeting to resolve the dispute, and the five countries involved agreed to follow the 1982 Law of the Sea as they seek resources like oil and natural gas. Under this law, countries only own the seabed 200 miles out from their respective coasts if it’s part of their continental shelf. Naturally, each country decided to interpret the law in their own special way, making sure that it worked out to their advantage – so, the United Nations has a battle ahead of them in maintaining peace.

So, what exactly is the root of this deepening conflict? Mostly, oil. Las Vegas-based company Arctic Oil & Gas has stated that according to new geological data, the Arctic might contain up to 400 billion barrels of it. That’s over twice as much as the largest known oil field in the world, located in Saudi Arabia.

It hasn’t been confirmed, but it’s got an awful lot of people panting like dogs. Politicians and corporate businessmen alike are chomping at the bit to get in there and drill. As you may have guessed, they’re not overly concerned about what the melting ice means to the fate of the world, or how drilling could worsen the situation. It’s all about greed, power and the status quo. People just can’t seem to let go of oil, regardless of what it might mean to the future of the planet. Environmentalist groups are pushing to keep the Arctic protected from drilling, but with the current energy crisis, that seems highly unlikely.

What does the possibility of oil drilling in the Arctic mean to us? It’s obvious to many that such news will be greeted by the average consumer with relief. If there’s more oil, it will be assumed that prices will go back down and they can go on living their normal every day oil-consuming lives. The movement toward sustainable energy will be slowed down considerably. It would create a false sense of security that would lull people into wasting more time continuing the bad habits that have helped get us into this jam in the first place. At least, until we really ran out of oil and were forced to deal with the situation, ready or not.

Why, when we practically have neon warning signs flashing in our faces, are we not changing faster? To survive, we must adapt. We’re facing dramatic changes at this point, no matter what we do – but that doesn’t mean we should just give up and continue living the selfish, wasteful lifestyle that helped cause all of these problems. We are evolved beings with a conscience and an understanding of the concept of the future, and we’re wasting it, ensuring that the generations that come after us – those who will really have to deal with the worst of all of this – will have it even harder.

It almost seems as though the current situation in the Arctic, and what it illustrates about how we’ve treated the planet over the past few generations, is a test. A test to see if we as a species can learn an important lesson for the sake of our own kind’s survival as well as that of so many other species that still have a delicate grip on existence. Where are the instincts that should be pushing us toward action? So many of us go through life as if in a dream state, thinking only of the plots of our favorite television shows and what we’ll have for dinner instead of the big picture. Evidently, whether our current lifestyle affects the future of the planet isn’t as important as what designer Sarah Jessica Parker wears to a movie premiere, or whether we get that job promotion.

Though we currently lord over the earth, serving as the top predators in the food chain, we can’t assume that we’ll remain that way forever. We’re dooming ourselves with the arrogant belief that no matter what we do to our surroundings, we will not just survive, but continue to thrive and dominate. That’s a very dangerous assumption, and one that may well be the end of us. Once climate change takes over, life will go on. Planet Earth will survive. But we may not be there to see it happen.

Czech President Klaus Whines About ‘Sacrificing Freedom for the Planet’

Who knew that the president of the Czech Republic is just another Republican in the vein of Bush and Cheney? Last week President Vaclav Klaus said he’s ready to debate Al Gore on global warming, but that “he [Gore]’s not too much willing to make such a conversation”. Klaus, if Al Gore gave in to every conservative douche that wanted to debate him about global warming, he’d never have time to eat or sleep. Klaus is pushing the English version of his book, which argues that environmentalism poses a threat to basic human freedoms. Egads.

From The Earth Times:

Klaus was speaking a the National Press Building in Washington to present his new book, Blue Planet in Green Shackles - What Is Endangered: Climate or Freedom?, before meeting with Vice President Dick Cheney Wednesday.

“My answer is it is our freedom and, I might add, and our prosperity,” he said.

Gore a former US vice president who has become a leading international voice in the cause against global warming, was co-winner of this year’s Nobel Peace Prize. Gore’s effort was highlighted by his Oscar winning documentary film An Inconvienent Truth.

Klaus, an economist, said he opposed the “climate alarmism” perpetuated by environmentalism trying to impose their ideals, comparing it to the decades of communist rule he experienced growing up in Soviet-dominated Czechoslovakia.

“Like their (communist) predecessors, they will be certain that they have the right to sacrifice man and his freedom to make their idea reality,” he said.

“In the past, it was in the name of the Marxists or of the proletariat - this time, in the name of the planet,” he added.

Klaus is concerned that environmentalism will limit the continued rise of technology and progress. Because, apparently, progress means continuing with unsustainable, selfish, dirty practices that harm the planet and everything on it – including humans. Many conservatives that share Klaus’ viewpoints seem to feel as if progress and pollution-emitting technology are irreversibly linked – as if we can’t continue to move forward in a smarter, more sustainable way.

Klaus believes that the answer isn’t government regulations, but rather allowing the free market to address environmental concerns. Isn’t that just what we need? Let’s allow profit-hungry corporations to make all of the decisions that will determine whether we slow or stop our death march toward the destruction of the planet (the only one we have to live on, in case you forgot), or simply enjoy the sorts of modern money-making luxuries that we’re used to while we’re still around. Who cares about the generations to come?

Where did this idea come from, that we are so entitled to this lifestyle and all that comes with it, including spewing millions of tons of carbon into the atmosphere via factories, motor vehicles and other modern inventions? Global warming deniers continue to hide behind the faulty idea that scientific facts about global warming are nothing more than propaganda. They’re trying to turn the ‘greed’ accusation around on environmentalists, claiming that efforts to stop harmful practices is all part of a big conspiracy to take their precious money.

Poor Klaus. Change is scary, I know. You and all the other deniers here in our own country that chant the tired old “you’re taking away our American lifestyle” refrain can’t imagine a world without your coal-fired power plants, SUVs and ridiculously large homes. The thing is, no matter how frightened you are of a society that asks you to go without those things, climate change is much scarier. Perhaps you all just have a death wish: you want to perish clinging tenaciously to your dirty, comforting modern luxuries and leave the consequences for others to deal with. Well, honestly, most of us don’t care if that’s what you do. But we’re not going along with it. Lead, follow or get out of the way.

Link [Earth Times]
Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons

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