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Fear And Hopelessness In Cleveland

Be afraid. That was the clear message of the GOP nominating convention this week. Far from Reagan's morning in America, we're now living in night of the Purge. And GOP nominee Donald Trump, giving the longest acceptance speech in history, focused on the need for more "law and order." In his world, dangerous immigrants are waiting around every corner.

There are of course real dangers in the world, but are we worried about the right things? Yes and no. We're worried about a very many things these days. Gallup polls show that half of Americans say they are "very" or "somewhat" worried that "you or someone in your family will become a victim of terrorism." But at the same time, Gallup says, 64% of us are worried a "great deal" or "fair amount" about global warming.

But if you listened to this week's convention, we should only focus on terrorism, immigration, and home invasions. This general level of fear has seeped into the mainstream. A couple of days ago, a DJ on the popular New York radio station WPLJ (95.5) said that it seems anyone can get shot at any time. That's technically true, but random shootings are incredibly rare. Yes, it could happen to anyone, but you could also get hit by lightning, win the lottery, or die in a commercial plane crash (yes, I can get nervous when a plane bounces around...but I know it's irrational since the drive to the airport was much more dangerous).

There are well-documented reasons that we humans are fearful of the wrong things (from an odds perspective). One of the best known of the cognitive biases is something called the "availability heuristic." We reach into our brains to find readily available examples, and we consider those much more common than they are. So when the news covers basically every plane crash and every mass shooting in the world, we can easily picture how we'd be next.

Politicians have taken advantage of this natural bias forever. They give us vivid personal examples of a situation, even if they demonstrate a rare phenomenon. Presidents always bring citizens with compelling stories to their state of the union speeches. Look at that single mom over there that started a successful business because of my policies. Trump is no slouch on this front. Taking advantage of our biases, last night he talked the tragic story of a young woman killed by an illegal immigrant. He just left out the part about it not a violent crime, but a drunk driving accident.

But let's go back to our general fear of terrorism. It's a classic case of innumeracy - the lack of numbers sense where small, but emotionally vivid examples, well, trump reality. That Gallup poll is amazing - for 50% of us to think that terrorism will personally touch our families is truly bizarre.

The number of people killed by violent jihadists in the US since 2001 is roughly 100. But let's triple that if we think it's too low. Those 300 are roughly 0.0001% of more than 300 million Americans. But we are really not good with numbers so we inflate the scary extremes in our minds.

Of course terrorism and national security have some unique aspects as risks go. The risks can jump quickly if, say, unstable people get their hands on a weapon of mass destruction. That's also a remote possibility, but it is possible. So obviously we do have to be very vigilant.

But if we go off of emotions only, and not include numbers and risk, we will pursue bad policies and ignore other massive and much more likely risks. I'm no security expert, so perhaps my whole view on this is moot. But how about listening to General Colin Powell on the topic? A few months ago, I spoke at an energy conference that Powell keynoted as well. He spoke clearly about not "overreacting" to threats. A few hundred people have died from terrorism in 15 years, Powell said, while 30,000 people die annually from gun violence.

But clear-eyed, balanced voices seem to be on the wane, and fear is of course a powerful motivator. When you're afraid, the higher functions of your brain take a back seat turn off and you don't think rationally. That's good on some level if you need to fight a saber-tooth tiger by charging it against all reason. It sucks when electing a leader of the free world.

We need our leaders to focus on all the big and real that can impact many, many more people, such as: the economic repercussions from Brexit; tens of millions of refugees moving around the world; deep changes in technology that could eliminate millions of jobs; lack of water in many regions; and of course the existential threat of our time, climate change.

What are your odds of being impacted by climate change? Since it's already happening, how about 100%? Of course the impacts any individual faces can be hard to see clearly. When we pay higher prices for food as droughts affect agriculture, do we know it's climate change hitting our wallets? When diseases like malaria and Zika move north, do we register that it's a warming planet that make mosquitoes more comfortable where we live? When extreme weather swamps a coastline or riverbanks overflow into a town, destroying homes, does that register as a climate issue? Or do we shrug and say it's an "act of God."

Or, more to the point of the Trump fear tour, do we see how climate change has helped destabilize regions, leading to refugee crises and, yes, terrorism? The National Academy of Sciences, among others, has linked the Syrian unrest directly to drought and climate change. And the Pentagon has repeatedly tied climate change to national security.

But even without that "law and order" reason to worry, the impacts of a dangerously shifting climate are orders of magnitude more likely than a terrorist attack or random home invasion. I know we're fighting our lizard brains to get a handle on that reality, but we have to.

Oh, and by the way, building a cleaner economy is not only a risk-reduction strategy. It brings prosperity, resilience, and a healthier and safer world. The pursuit of a low-carbon world creates jobs in vast quantities also.

I've heard so little optimism this week. I only hope we can choose leaders who understand all the threats - and grasp the vast opportunities - that sit in front of us.

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

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Vienna HFC Update #2: Countries Engage and Bargaining Begins

HFC phase-down talks in Vienna are moving forward rapidly this week as countries engage on the specifics of freeze and reduction targets and funding needs. Negotiators have delved into key issues all week, and ministers are arriving for high-level talks over the next two days. Expectations are high for more progress this weekend and for completing the deal in Kigali, Rwanda, this October.

Talks this week have continued in the problem-solving spirit displayed last weekend, when parties resolved a list of key challenges. Having made huge progress on difficult issues, countries are now focused on the core questions: the pace of phase-down schedules for developed and developing countries, and the scope and scale of funding to help developing countries adopt climate-friendly alternatives, through the donor country-supported Multilateral Fund (MLF).

There's growing support for an “ambition linkage” that pairs early action by developing countries with early and sufficient donor funding. Many developing countries, especially the African Group and various Latin American countries, are offering to move quickly provided they have sufficient MLF support.

Donor countries are on the same wavelength. The logic is compelling early action best protects the climate by avoiding unnecessary HFC growth, and early financial support actually benefits both sides: It helps developing countries gain earlier access to climate-friendly and energy-efficient products and manufacturing methods, and it saves donors money by avoiding larger transition costs that would be incurred later if developing nations built up larger HFC-dependent industries.

Among the most notable contributions this week, China offered its own proposed schedule for freezing and reducing HFCs. As the world's largest HFC producer, China has supported moving forward with an amendment for several years, but it had yet to offer a specific proposal. China's proposed timetable is slower than schedules offered by the North American countries and Island States, but more aggressive than India's (see comparison chart). None of these countries have drawn lines in the sand; all are emphasizing flexibility.

A number of countries, such as Saudi Arabia, Argentina, and Pakistan are still more cautious, but they too are ready to negotiate.

The engagement by ministers Friday and Saturday including Secretary of State John Kerry and EPA Administrator McCarthy for the U.S. will add political visibility and momentum. Ministers from countries in the Climate and Clean Air Coalition today called for completing an ambitious HFC deal this year. Tomorrow, an expanded list of countries will join a “high ambition group,” like the one that scored a key breakthrough at the Paris climate talks.

As the ministers meet, their negotiators will keep working no doubt once again into the wee hours Sunday morning towards a condensed negotiating text that will set things up for striking the final deal in Kigali.

We'll update you again before the week is out.

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

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If We Each Have The Power To Change The World - Why Is There Such Chaos?

My spiritual journey has taught me that each of us has the power to change the world. Celebrating Nelson Mandela Day on July 18, I was reminded how deeply I believe in his words, "It is in your hands to create a better world for all who live in it." Yet as much as this has been ingrained in me, as much as I have seen the evidence that it is truth, even I am having difficulty amidst all the violence, hatred and uncertainty in the world and have been in search of something to uplift my spirit and my soul. I decided to seek the answers in a good book.

Having grown up devouring Nancy Drew mysteries I have long found reading among the most enjoyable things I do in life. While I generally lean to fiction, one might say it was divine intervention that found me with my head buried in Tosha Silver's Outrageous Openness: Letting the Divine Take the Lead this week.

Outrageous Openness is a book about how to align oneself with the Divine (or God), independent of life's fluctuations. The stories in her book are short vignettes about things that have happened to her or her friends that exemplify what happens when we give up muscling our way through life and open up to go with flow, thus providing ourselves with better outcomes.

Tosha believes that "a force of love exists that can guide, help and interact with each of us in the most intimate and practical way no matter what the conditions." The human condition, she challenges the reader, is "if only we knew how to invite it in."

Her words have helped to lift me out of the chaos and remember how to do just that.

Every morning, after I sit in meditation, I ask the Divine to guide me through my day and show me the perfect partners. Whether I'm asking for purposes of sorting out a love relationship, my kids or business, when I'm paying attention, I find myself in the flow that day, and my miracle appears. It might be something as subtle as a big bowl of red apples in my path as happened a few days when I was longing for one or a new business partner for my company Greenopia. Whatever I need is always provided, as long as I remember to stay open and stay positive to receive it.

I realize that might sound far too simple for such challenging times when it seems as if chaos and fear are trying to swallow us up. But it is our challenge right now - to stay present, think clearly, calmly, keep an open heart, whether it's living a life of health and wellness or negotiating world peace. And I do believe if we make that commitment, each of us does have the power as Nelson Mandela suggests, to make the world a better place.

The evidence is there with groups like Moms Clean Air Force organizing a Play-in for Climate Change in Washington, DC. or End Food Waste Organization's Ugly Fruit and Veg Campaign, who successfully convinced Whole Foods to sell less than perfect produce instead of wasting it and has now set its sights on Walmart. Or with the hundreds of green and eco-friendly companies we have listed on Greenopia. As Chris Castiglione wrote in his recent Huffington Post blog, you are influential. It's up to you to exercise that.

I'm keeping Tosha's book within arms reach for the foreseeable future. It lifts me up and carries me forward, even on days that I don't think I can be carried. She has it organized so that you can open it and find the vignette you were meant to read that day. If I take Tosha's lesson about opening up to the Divine to find the perfect answer and merge it with Mandela's mantra that one person has the power to change the world then I can do my part, despite the daily anxiety the media is ingraining into our brains.

Tosha says in her book: "Use me, whatever I have to give, for the highest good. Just let me be helpful and contribute my all." I'm in. Are you with me?

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

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The Climate Post: Survey, Party Platforms Reveal Deep Divide on Climate Change
In March, the Guardian issued an election-related call-out to online readers in the United States, asking them to identify the "one issue that affects your life you wish the presidential candidates were discussing more." The results are in. Of the 1,385 respondents from all 50 states, one in five expressed discontent about lack of discussion of climate change, an issue described in vivid terms, such as "cataclysmic" and "slow-motion apocalypse." Respondents expressed greatest concern about sea-level rise and decreasing food and water security.

"Climate change is the common denominator for us all regardless of gender, creed or political affiliation," said Sarah Owen in a video response to the survey.

Between parties, there's divide on the topic of climate change. Eleven House Republicans who are trying to change their party's attitude about climate change and four of five Republican senators with a record of supporting action on it skipped this week's GOP convention, where delegates approved aparty platform that rejected the Paris Agreement, a carbon tax, and other action on climate changeand that downplayed use of renewable energy.

"Climate change is far from this nation's most pressing national security issue. This is the triumph of extremism over common sense, and Congress must stop it," reads the platform.

In resisting aggressive climate action, the Republican platform stands in stark contrast to the draft Democratic Party platform, which calls for more regulations and laws to fight climate change.

Just how ambitious the Democratic Party will be in attempting to reduce carbon emissions--particularly, its stance on a carbon tax--remains to be seen. The full platform committee will hammer out details in Orlando on Friday and Saturday.

In an interview with ClimateWire, U.S. Special Envoy for Climate Change Jonathan Pershing suggested that the U.S. presidential election will have less impact on American efforts to combat climate change than a host of other factors ranging from new technologies and appliance standards to political support for renewable energy tax credits.

Pershing indicted that many U.S. steps to curb greenhouse gas emissions, including the Paris climate change deal negotiated under President Obama, will survive no matter who wins the White House.

"To me, there's more likely to be continuity no matter who's in office," Pershing said.

Projecting Clean Power Plan Costs, Impacts

The Clean Power Plan aims to reduce carbon emissions from existing power plants. Assuming the rule survives judicial review and is implemented, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) projects a reduction of power sector emissions of about 35 percent by 2030.

Assuming the Clean Power plan is upheld, EIA projects emissions outcome and electricity generation mix for multiple state implementation strategies--that is, pursuit of mass-based emissions targets or rate-based emissions targets. EIA projects higher prices if emissions allocations under a mass-based regime are given to generators rather than load-serving entities, but "price effects are similar in the [mass] and CPP rate cases where the average electricity price from 2022 through 2030 in both cases is 2 percent higher than in the No CPP case, and 3 percent higher on average from 2030 through 2040," analysts wrote.

As the EIA data suggests, utilities and other power producers are likely to be in different positions if the rule moves forward--some will benefit from the rule, and others will face costs to comply, which can lead to monetary transfers among different producers and consumers of electricity. A new policy brief by Duke University's Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions builds on this understanding by exploring the distributional impacts of choosing rate-based and mass-based approaches to comply with the Clean Power Plan. It finds that states adopting a mass-based compliance approach can use allowance allocation to largely control monetary transfers within a state. States adopting a rate-based compliance approach lack this direct control mechanism.

Each state's system of electricity regulation and any changes in wholesale prices for electricity due to the policy in regional electricity markets will play a major role in determining how cost distribution and potential transfers play out, the authors said.

Study: Warm Water, Not Air, Accelerating Glacier Retreat on Western Antarctic Peninsula

A study published in the journal Science found that ocean warming, rather than atmospheric warming, is the primary cause of retreat of 90 percent of the 674 glaciers on the western Antarctic Peninsula. Because the peninsula's glaciers are among the main contributors to sea-level rise, the study suggests that better understanding of how and why they're changing will increase the accuracy of ice-loss predictions.

"Scientists know that ocean warming is affecting large glaciers elsewhere on the continent, but thought that atmospheric temperatures were the primary cause of all glacier changes on the Peninsula," said lead author Alison Cook of Swansea University. "We now know that's not the case."

The scientists came to that conclusion after linking a distinct pattern of melt from north to south on the peninsula with a pattern of temperatures at mid-ocean depths that mirrored the melt. At the southern end of the western side of the peninsula, they found that a welling up of warm Circumpolar Deep Water wears away the fronts of glaciers. At the northern end of the peninsula, the fronts of glaciers are more stable because they terminate at colder waters that come from a different source.

"Our results are key for making predictions of ice loss in response to ocean warming in this region," Cook said. "The Antarctic Peninsula is one of the largest current contributors to sea-level rise, and the glaciers here are highly sensitive, so [they] are key indicators of how the ice will respond to future changes."

The Climate Post offers a rundown of the week in climate and energy news. It is produced each Thursday by Duke University's Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions.

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

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Working Families Shouldn't Have To Pay For Coal Mine Clean-Up

Over the past 30 years, coal companies have been playing fast and loose with our land, water, and pocketbooks by using a loophole in our federal laws that allows them to issue non-binding IOUs, instead of purchasing reliable insurance, to clean up dangerous coal mines if they go out of business. This reckless practice is known as self bonding.

Since there is nothing backing up these IOUs except the companies' own impermanent balance sheets and the legal equivalent of a pinky swear, when self-bonded coal companies go out of business, working families and honest taxpayers are left to foot the bill for cleaning up (also known as reclaiming) dangerous coal mines, while coal companies get off scot-free.

This horribly irresponsible practice has been so prevalent that, over the years, coal companies have racked up billions of dollars worth of mining liabilities without providing any assurance that the money will be there to finish the job of reclaiming their mining sites.

Fortunately, the federal Department of Interior is reviewing self bonding and considering making changes to the process. That's why this week, on the last week of the Office of Surface Mining, Reclamation, and Enforcement's (OSMRE) comment period on self bonding, we are standing up and demanding the federal government put a stop to it.

On Wednesday, more than 37,000 Sierra Club members and supporters submitted comments to OSMRE, calling on them to end the practice of self-bonding. Sierra Club volunteers also dropped off a check for $3.86 billion at OSMRE's headquarters, reminding administrators of the enormous amount in self-bonded coal liabilities still outstanding across the US.

While this was going on, Sierra Club and our partners also made an aggressive media push that included holding a teleconference outlining the significant risks to letting this practice continue, and also placing ads saying as much in a popular Washington, D.C. newspaper frequented by policy experts. This week, we wanted to make clear that it's not OK to just walk away from land you've destroyed, polluted, and then profited from, while leaving your neighbors to foot the bill for billions of dollars worth of mining liabilities.

The need to end self-bonding is especially urgent given the ongoing wave of coal company bankruptcies ― which has claimed some of the world's biggest coal companies like Peabody Energy, Arch Coal, and Alpha Natural Resources ― and the real danger these coal companies' finances pose to taxpayers. After all, $2.4 billion of the $3.86 billion in outstanding coal mining liabilities across the country is held by bankrupt coal companies.

Unfortunately, it doesn't stop with the costs of reclaiming coal mines. On top of the billions of dollars Americans must pay for these unreclaimed mines, the sites themselves can also be highly polluting and dangerous, and leaving them unreclaimed poses serious health risks to surrounding communities. They also pose an economic threat, because leaving them bare, open, and unreclaimed makes it very hard for communities to attract and support other forms of economic development and opportunity, which is urgently needed in coal country, including here in my home state of West Virginia.

We're calling on OSMRE to immediately issue a new guidance that no new self-bonds should be issued to any coal company and make clear that bankrupt mine operators must not self-bond as they emerge from bankruptcy.

We're committed to making sure local families are protected from irresponsible coal executives who are threatening to leave behind dangerous, polluting mine sites that will plague communities for generations to come.

Self-bonding is about simple fairness, after all: if you destroy the land, you clean it up ― especially if you've made big profits in the process. You don't walk away and leave it to your neighbor. It's time for self bonding to stop, once and for all.

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

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Coral Reefs In Trouble - The Canaries In The Coal Mine

It felt like we had stepped into a scene from Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea as we glided along the Great Barrier Reef in a ten person submersible. Outside the window, gigantic clumps of taupe brain coral, Elkhorn and Stag coral slipped past. Lavender and lettuce-green sea fans waved gently in the current. Plump pink and purple anemones raised their tentacles to trap their next meal. And all around and through the coral forms, a rainbow of tropical fish wandered blue and yellow Tang fish, yellow grunts, orange and white striped clownfish, and so many others I couldn't identify.

It was February 2002 and we were on the adventure of a lifetime with our four kids, then ranging in age from twelve to five. “Wow!” a collective intake of breath swept through our little pod as a sea turtle big enough for one of them to ride floated silently by on the other side of the glass. And as we moved past a shadowed opening in the reef, high-pitched shrieks erupted when an enormous olive-green moray eel whose mouth was all teeth emerged, on the hunt for its next meal. Our scheduled dive of the reef had fallen on a day with chop that made the sea too rough for snorkeling with small children, but in the submersible we were able to motor to the best viewing spots of the incredible variety of plants and creatures.

As longtime residents of Florida, we'd enjoyed snorkeling in the Keys and the Bahamas, but the scale of what we were seeing here was completely different. The Great Barrier Reef appears to be a rocky structure upon which things grow and swim, but the reef itself is actually made up of the accumulated exoskeletons of innumerable individual living organisms stacked upon each other, the marine equivalent of a high-rise apartment building. It is the largest living structure on earth, visible from the moon. We felt blessed to have the opportunity to visit it, and the thousands of plant and animal species that call it home.

Coral reefs are critically important to the planet's health. More than 90% of all marine species are directly or indirectly dependent on the coral reefs, even though they make up less than 5% of the ocean floor. These places are the rain forests of the sea; according to NOAA, they provide habitat to more species of fish, hard corals and other organisms per unit area than any other marine environment. And NOAA estimates there may be as many as eight million species within the coral reef ecosystem that have not yet been discovered. Who knows how many medically useful substances might be waiting for discovery there, as in the tropical rainforests on land?

Fast forward a decade and a half from that submersible ride to May 2015, when CNN reported that as much as 93% of the Great Barrier Reef had recently suffered bleach damage.

Headlines like these are becoming commonplace:

We're now in the third straight year of elevated ocean temperatures causing the worst worldwide reef destruction in history. Analyzing cumulative data, scientists at the Carnegie Institution of Science project the demise of all the reefs by 2100 if current carbon dioxide emission trends continue.

When I read these reports I want to weep. I think of our experience there just fourteen years ago the submersible ride through an underwater wonderland of strange and beautiful fish, mammals and plant life and it's hard to imagine that in this short time parts of that place, then teeming with life, are now a white skeletal structure devoid of color, animals or plants.

Coral bleaching occurs when ocean temperatures rise so high that the corals become stressed and expel the algae that live in symbiosis inside them. Without its algae the coral turns white and starves, and if temperatures remain elevated for too long they die. But the elevated water temperatures create other problems as well.

Warmer water is more acidic and makes reef regeneration after damage more difficult. It also holds less dissolved oxygen, which affects not just the reefs but other fish and animals in the ocean. Marlin and sailfish have already been curtailing deep water diving in search of prey. As deoxygenation becomes more severe, affected waters will no longer support life at all for some fish and crustaceans; populations of large fish such as tuna, cod, swordfish and marlin have already declined; some scientists report by as much as 90% over the last century. And areas of warming are increasing in size. An April 2016 study showed a devastating decline in oxygen levels in many areas of the Pacific Ocean, which by 2030 to 2040 will wipe out populations of marine life dependent on oxygenated water.

The fate of the Great Barrier Reef, and coral reefs worldwide, should be an urgent wake up call for all of humanity. Our planet surface is 70% water, and the health of its water is critical to the survival of life on the planet. The reefs are a barometer of that health, and they are failing. Human-driven climate change might steer us off the cliff of existence if we don't change direction, and change it immediately.

What will the world look like if we don't? In areas where colorful and vital coral reefs exist today, stark white boulders and skeletal branched antler-like forms will be all that remain to remind us of what we've lost. The stench of rotting animals will saturate the waters around these graveyards. Those periodic algal blooms and red tides along coastal waters? They will become commonplace, the sulfurous smell of rotting vegetation, the sickly sweet odor of dead and decaying fish and mammals, and the respiratory difficulties in susceptible people in beach towns all will define a new normal. As many as five hundred million people will starve or become climate refugees.

The sad truth is that we aren't taking very good care of what we've been entrusted with. My Christian faith forms my own views on this; we are called to be stewards of God's creation. But even if you feel no particular religious or philosophical urge to care for this most vulnerable piece of earth, you would do well to be motivated by survival instincts. The reefs are the canaries in the planetary coal mine; their death presages conditions hostile to life in the ocean, and by extension, the planet.

There are some recent glimmers of hope. Efforts like Sweden's pledge to become one of the first countries to end its dependence on fossil fuel entirely, and the sharp uptick in renewable energy production in countries like Denmark, the United Kingdom, Germany, Scotland and Ireland, are encouraging signals that humanity might yet recognize the crucial role the oceans play in the health of the planet, and the devastating effects the last hundred and fifty years' explosion of carbon emissions have had on them. The business world, too, is beginning to see that there is money, and lots of it, to be had in developing renewable energy and non-petroleum based products.

As individuals, there are many actions we can take to spur the corporate world to move in more planet-healthy directions. Some of these actions are ridiculously simple. Turn out lights when you leave a room, use canvas bags for shopping instead of plastic ones made from petrochemicals, recycle paper, plastics, clothing. So many easy changes can be steps to free us from our addiction to petrochemicals and fossil fuels.

We will not stop global warming by switching out incandescent light bulbs for LED ones. But changed habits change people's paradigms, and changed paradigms are what changes the world. The most influential player in the capitalist system is the consumer who drives it you and me. If we don't buy it, they won't make it. Of course I recognize that I am less than a drop of water in the grand scheme of things. I am one molecule, maybe less. But imagine what we might do if each of us took simple and easy steps like these. Collectively we would unleash a tsunami of change.

Perhaps the current plight of the reefs will force us to wake up to the danger of unchecked planetary abuse. By all means, let us hope and pray that it is so. But let us also act.

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

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Sh*t's Bad Right Now, So Here's A Short Story About A Rescued Cat
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Shit's kind of heavy for all of us right now, and we have a long road ahead, but I thought maybe, just maybe, you'd like five minutes of light reading about how I saved a cat and she saved me.

Her name is FatFace.

She's been feral for at least five years and she has three teeth and she weighs under five pounds.

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FatFace was part of a feral colony my neighbor took care of, and which I've subsequently taken over after my neighbor moved across town.

I enjoy our cat colony, which totals between 10-12 mostly black or Russian blue cats, but let me tell you something about taking care of cat colonies: Don't publicly share that info at parties. One time I was at a networking event and met a handful of interesting people and had to stop this sentence from coming out of my mouth: "Oh, man. I have to get going! My cat colony is going to be piiiiissed if I don't get home soon for feed time."

(Side note: Our colony is fixed and if any genitalia-sporting cats come into the colony, my former neighbor traps them and gets them fixed through the Austin Humane Society's trap-neuter-release program.)

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FatFace was one of the oldest cats in the colony, and like most of the other ferals, she was terrified of us. Most of her time was spent hiding under the neighbor's house or keeping herself at a distance, squinting, watching our every move. However, we took a shine to the little goober because of her tiny stature and her expressive face. When I acquired the colony and discovered she only had three teeth, I began feeding her soft food.

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Over the course of nine months, FatFace went from eating soft food we left out, to letting us get very close to her, to letting us touch her, to letting us brush her, to letting us pet her. Now I'm happy to say she lives in our house and enjoys sleeping on my butt and sniffing my armpits. She also enjoys curling up like a tiny donut.

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Here are some other fun fact about FatFace:

She's between 5-10 years old.

We called her "he" for five years until I asked my vet to check out her netherparts.

She also likes to sleep on my chest and stare at me from about two-to-three inches from my face.

She does not like to be picked up; she makes this pathetic "muu-annn" sound when you do it.

She doesn't like fancy-ass soft food; she likes good-ol' mystery meat from Friskies.

We've managed to put one pound on her; she now weighs over five pounds.

My bf thinks she is part dwarf cat.

She has mouth herpes.

She loves when you push on her nose really hard. She gets so into it that she might bite your face.

She doesn't mind if you scratch her stomach -- but not the feet.

She's a very affectionate, chill cat. Even when she's ready to party at 3AM or eat at 7AM, she just stares at us or head bunts us.

She's kind of a slob. Because she has mouth herpes and few teeth, she can't eat or groom well. Most of the time we get salmon sneezes all over our faces.

During the day, I'll lay on the bed next to her and instantly fall asleep.

At night time I can no longer get work done because she sleeps on my neck.

She's very much loved by us.

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I've never owned a cat before, and I never thought I could love a cat as much as I do. She has brought great joy to my life, and I hope I bring joy to hers.

If you'd like to follow the #LifeofFatFace, let's hook up on Instagram!

A version of this post originally appeared on Medium.

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Obama's Landmark Greenhouse Gas And Fuel Economy Standards Are Working - Now Let's Look to the Future

(Tom Toles, Washington Post, Sept 2, 2012)

This week the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the National Highway Traffic and Safety Administration (NHTSA) and the California Air Resources Board (CARB) released a very positive report regarding the historic federal greenhouse gas and fuel economy standards. In a nutshell, car manufacturers can meet the current 2025 goals to improve efficiency and slash greenhouse gas emissions at a cost similar or less than expected four years ago.

But despite these clear and comprehensive findings, some elements in the auto industry will inevitably push back, arguing that the rules will be too expensive or that gasoline prices are so low that customers don't want fuel-efficient vehicles.

These arguments against long-term standards are myopic. Remember that when these rules were first adopted in 2009, the auto industry was in collapse. The fate of iconic car companies, for decades the pride of the United States, was a huge question mark. Eventually, the federal government decided to throw GM, Chrysler and Ford a multi-billion dollar lifeline. It was in the midst of these economic conditions, with fragile domestic manufacturers and gasoline prices around $2.00 a gallon--actually lower than today--that EPA, NHTSA and CARB first began developing today's greenhouse gas and fuel economy standards.

To its credit, domestic and foreign manufacturers agreed to the groundbreaking standards. American manufacturers realized they had become overly dependent on heavy, gas-guzzling trucks and SUVs. In 2009, they began to chart a new course that would ensure their long-term competitiveness, both domestically and globally. They bet on building a next generation of vehicles for a cleaner and more efficient future. The environmental upside to this innovation was staggering. Six billion metric tons of CO2 emissions would be avoided and consumers would save $1.7 trillion at the pump.

So how does the auto industry stand seven years later? Have manufacturers crashed and burned? No. From a bankrupt shambles in 2009, US auto industry sales have expanded dramatically. In 2015, they grew by 4.5 million vehicles, numbers on par with historic highs. Profits are also back on solid footing. GM, the largest of the Big Three, has swung from a $30.9 billion loss in 2008 to nearly $10 billion in profits in 2015. In fact, according to one analysis, the "Big Three" stand to fully recover compliance costs and be even more profitable per a range of future scenarios.

What about the variety of vehicles available? It's the largest and most diverse ever. The vast majority of vehicles are still internal combustion, but there are more than 76 alternative powertrain models available. Drivers can choose a large Chevy Suburban with a conventional engine, a hybrid Ford Focus or an all-electric Nissan Leaf. And every single model is more efficient than its 2009 counterpart, making it less polluting and cheaper to operate.

Does the industry have problems meeting the standards? Not at all. In fact, according to the EPA, over a quarter of the 2015 models met the 2018 standards. Fuel economy is at the highest level ever by 5 miles per gallon since 2004. Currently, the 2016 Honda Civic and the Scion iA already meet the 2023 standards. Several Ford-150 models already meet the 2021 standards, as do the Toyota Rav4, Chevy Malibu hybrid and Chevy Cruze.

Just seven years after the auto industry's 2009 nadir, it is in the midst of an innovation renaissance. The costs and the performance of current powertrain technologies are advancing faster than was anticipated. New technologies, such as Li-Ion batteries - the primary driver of cost in an electric vehicle - have come down nearly 70% in the last 6-7 years. So, even with national gasoline prices averaging $2.34 a gallon in early June, an electric vehicle is still about 50 percent cheaper to fuel than a gasoline vehicle.

The drop in battery costs is also translating into greater range. The mid-priced Chevy Bolt EV, which boasts a 200-mile range before being recharged, will be available at the end of the year. Tesla's mid-priced all-electric Model 3, expected in 2018, got over 400,000 advance orders in a matter of weeks. After federal incentives, both are expected to cost around $30,000 - cheaper than the average transaction price of a vehicle last December. What's more, that pricing is based on an electric vehicle market that is less than 1% of all car sales. Over the next decade, increased market penetration combined with technology advances will reduce those prices even further.

Meanwhile, what seemed like science fiction just decades ago is quickly becoming reality. A tech company, Google, continues to make rapid advances in self-driving. Cars with fuel cell powertrains produce only water from the exhaust. The first generation fuel cell production car, the Toyota Mirai is already available for sale in California.

The innovation that has been unleashed over the past seven years is exactly what is needed to take on the biggest threat to our future: climate change. But while it is merely a good start, these rules are not nearly enough for the world to avert the worst impacts of climate change. This past December, nations from around the world agreed that we have to keep average global temperatures from rising more than 2º Celsius from 2005 levels by 2050. In order to meet that goal, the International Energy Agency projects that we will need 100 million electric cars on the road by 2030--up from the 1.26 million in 2015. This is a huge task--but it is still doable with companies continuing to invest and the right government policies.

This year, as the regulatory agencies review the 2025 standards, industry voices should not be calling for the standards to be rolled back. This is not the time to again look in the rearview mirror. Instead, industry and government must set ambitious future targets for 2030 and beyond. We need to provide long-term certainty for the innovative companies that have set us on our current trajectory. We must enhance the Nation's energy security. We have to deal head-on with climate change.

To do so, EPA, NHTSA and CARB should consider setting greenhouse gas standards for cars in 2030 that would lead to a significant number of plugged-in electric vehicles to be on the road. Once again, the auto industry should bring its expertise to be an integral part of the process.

Government policies should also consider incorporating electric vehicles that are shared and autonomous into the standards. Shared and autonomous cars have the potential to use much less fuel or electricity. Under the right government policies and incentives, these vehicles could contribute to lower greenhouse gas emissions and other air pollutants, while reducing congestion and accidents.

These type of commitments will help us avoid the worst impacts of climate change. Setting our standards higher is the only way to shift the balance from an intensely polluting fossil fuel economy to a cleaner and more sustainable future. They will also help the nation's automakers be global leaders in environmental innovation and, as already demonstrated, to profitably secure their futures.

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A PV Panel On Every Roof
In the home stretch of his presidency, Barack Obama still has some ideas up his sleeve. The latest is his crusade to make sure that every American household and business can become a solar power plant.

There has been plenty of good news about solar energy in recent years. It is becoming much more affordable and it's sprouting up on rooftops nearly everywhere in the United States. Yet we have barely begun to capture its potential. Sunlight is free, ubiquitous, domestic, inexhaustible and clean, but it still provides less than 1 percent of the nation's electricity.

Its potential is much greater. The U.S. Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Colorado calculates that if every suitable roof was equipped with solar panels, we could get 40 percent of our electricity from sunlight.

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That's a theoretical number, not a plan. But reality will get much closer to theory if solar energy's virtuous cycle continues. The cycle goes like this: Because of state and federal incentives, improvements in technology and state renewable energy mandates, the price of rooftop solar systems has dropped so that more people can afford them. As more people buy solar panels, more must be manufactured. The more that are manufactured, the less expensive they become because of economies of manufacturing scale. As they get even less expensive, more people buy them, more are manufactured, there are more economies of scale, and so on.

However, the virtuous cycle has not yet brought the price of rooftop solar systems down to the point where low-income families or people with low credit scores can afford them. In a study it issued in January 2015, the George Washington University Solar Institute reported that the 40 percent of American households that earn less than $40,000 each year account for less than 5 percent of the nation's solar installations. In other words, we still have a solar income gap in the United States. The study noted that solar energy has the ability to "alleviate the financial burdens of lower income communities, but targeted policies will be necessary for solar to expand into this underserved market."

President Obama responded six months later with some of those targeted policies. In July 2015, the White House announced a National Community Solar Partnership designed to make solar accessible to all income levels. The objective is 300 megawatts of solar power on federally subsidized housing. In addition, because half of the nation's homes and businesses are not suitable for producing solar power, the Administration budgeted $520 million for the development of community solar systems that serve multiple buildings. Several of these arrangements are in place today around the United States so that several buildings can share the capital costs and the savings of a photovoltaic array, including buildings where rooftop solar would not work because of ownership issues, poor solar access and so on.

Many moderate- and low-income families face two other barriers. They may not have the money to pay the up-front costs of a system, and they may have trouble finding affordable financing. The marketplace has spawned some innovative solutions. Today, a homeowner can lease a solar system rather than buy one. The lessor pays all the up-front costs to install the system, plus the cost of maintaining it. The homeowner uses part of the savings on his energy bills and the income from selling solar power to his utility to make lease payments.

Some utilities offer on-bill financing for homeowners to make energy efficiency and renewable energy improvements. The utility loans the homeowner the money for energy upgrades; the homeowner repays the loan with a special charge on his or her monthly utility bills. When on-bill financing is done correctly, the homeowner's energy savings are more than his or her loan payments.

Yet another low-interest option is Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) financing. Similar to utility financing, the municipality puts up the money for energy efficiency and renewable energy improvements. The building owner repays the assessment with a fee on his or her property tax bill. This option has worked well for commercial buildings, but PACE loans for residences have been in limbo for several years because of objections from the Federal Housing Authority (FHA) over who gets paid first when the house is sold -- the municipality or the mortgage holder.

The Obama Administration has worked out a solution. Earlier this week, the White House unveiled another initiative called Clean Energy Savings for All. It clears up the FHA's objections to residential PACE programs so that municipalities can create them by designating energy financing districts and issuing bonds so homeowners can add PACE assessments to their HUD and Veterans Administration mortgages.

In addition, the Administration will make it easier for the federal Low Income Home Energy Assistance program at HUD to fund renewable energy systems.

The goal for this new package of initiatives is 1 gigawatt of solar for low- and moderate-income families by 2020.

The old rap against rooftop solar was that it is a boutique technology that only upper-income homeowners could afford. But because of falling prices for solar panels and innovative financing options, and because of the Obama Administration's ongoing work to make solar power accessible to everyone, distributed solar systems are rapidly becoming an egalitarian technology that gives all of us some choice in where our energy comes from. It also gives us the opportunity to do our patriotic duty and join America's clean energy revolution.

It's time to make America's energy system great again.

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Why Wasting Water Is Even Worse for the Environment Than You Think
Is wasting water actually bad for the environment? originally appeared on Quora: the knowledge sharing network where compelling questions are answered by people with unique insights.

Answer by Ava Mohsenin, Communcations Associate at WaterNow Alliance, on Quora:

Yes, wasting water is actually bad for the environment. There are anthropocentric, biocentric, and ecocentric reasons why wasting water is bad.

Anthropocentrically, fresh water is a vital resource for the survival of our population. Seeing as less than 1% of the world's water is freshwater and available for us to consume (not trapped in glaciers), there are limitations that factor into our carrying capacity as a population on Earth including the availability and distribution of freshwater. Different countries are endowed with different stocks of freshwater, and depending on their replenishment rate and usage rate, each has varying degrees of water scarcity that needs to be addressed. Below is a map by World Resources Institute that outlines the water stress by country, with 36 countries displaying an "Extremely High Stress (>80%)," which means that "more than 80 percent of the water available to agricultural, domestic and industrial users is withdrawn annually--leaving businesses, farms and communities vulnerable to scarcity" (World's 36 Most Water-Stressed Countries).

Therefore, wasting water in a country where it may appear water just magically comes out of the tap (i.e. Canada, the U.S., most developed countries), is wasting a precious, vital resource that millions (663 million, according to Water Facts: Facts About the Global Water Shortage) don't even have clean, safe access to.

Furthermore, in places where clean water is scarce, overusing or wasting household water limits the availability of it for other communities to use for drinking, cleaning, cooking or growing--and thus contributes to disease, illness, or agricultural scarcity/starvation.

You could tack on the economic incentive to save water, as it means lower household water utility bills, one of the largest incentives for water-wise individuals or households to conserve water.

Biocentrically, other species rely on freshwater besides humans as a vital component to their survival! Overuse of freshwater in household settings means there is less fresh water for agricultural use (which affects humans on an food scarcity level), but many livestock species rely on freshwater. Also, as we divert more freshwater from aquatic environments to supplement agriculturally, many plant and animal species are threatened or can become endangered. Despite our attempts to separate man from nature, we are indeed part of one ecosystem (the biosphere), and reliant on plants and animals; therefore sharing and properly managing our most precious resource is crucial.

Ecocentrically, wasting water while our demand for water increases (as population and standards of living increase globally), means that we need to supplement for this lack of freshwater by pulling it out of aquifers or groundwater supplies in which their regeneration rate is lower than the extraction rate. This unsustainable practice decreases long term water security and availability.

Furthermore, and almost most importantly, water takes a lot of energy, time, and money to filter and clean so that it's drinkable. Wasting water or overusing household water means you're wasting the energy-intensive process of filtration. The many steps of this process--extraction, transportation, filtration, etc.--require non-renewable fossil fuels and as these resources become depleted, their dangerous by-products such as carbon dioxide build up in the Earth's atmosphere, contributing to your carbon footprint and the Earth's rising temperatures.

This question originally appeared on Quora. Ask a question, get a great answer. Learn from experts and access insider knowledge. You can follow Quora on Twitter, Facebook, and Google+. More questions:

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The Cruel Market: Nuclear Pain And Environmental Loss
Just when it needs it most, the United States is losing its most potent weapon in the fight against climate change, which might better be called global pollution. One nuclear plant is closed in Vermont, two are under threat of closure in Illinois, and the only plant in climate-conscious California is to close.

These four plants represent a substantial withdrawal of clean, carbon-free electricity from the market, mostly to be replaced by natural gas, and some wind and solar. Gas will do the bulk of the generating, and it is a carbon-emitter -- less than coal, but a carbon source nonetheless.

What is more, these plants are up and running, which means none of the pollution associated with construction, steel-making or quarrying will have to be repeated. Some, including Marvin Fertel, president of the Nuclear Energy Institute, have expressed fears that 20 more nuclear plants may yet close.

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Diablo Canyon: No fault of its own

The ostensible reason for these closures is that market forces dictate them. That bald statement implies that electricity is bought and sold as freely as any multi-sourced commodity.

But electricity is not traded in any conventional way. And it is weighted in favor of the short term and political goals.

The trouble started when it was decided to deregulate electricity markets in the 1990s. The goal had nobility: Consumers would have choice. At least that is how it was sold by advocates, such as Enron.

Well, choice did not really work for consumers, but it has worked for some large industrial customers, who have been able to shop for price.

Mostly, deregulation has created two kinds of utilities: those that swallowed the deregulation pill, and those who did not, mostly in the South. The northern tier of utilities, under pressure from their state governments, deregulated, some even selling off their generating assets.

The result has been other than anticipated: Consumers have had little or no choice, and the market has set about exterminating long-lived plant, like nuclear, in favor of today's cheapest fuel -- at this moment, natural gas.

The utilities which have remained strictly regulated by their state utility commissions have been more secure financially and able to raise money more cheaply. The leader in this pack, the giant Southern Company, headquartered in Atlanta, has become a technological innovator as well as a builder of new nuclear plant.

Deregulation of the telephone monopoly -- often cited during the passion to deregulate electricity -- created a profusion of innovations. By contrast, deregulating electricity has just brought about a rush to the cheapest fuel of the day.

Electric utilities operate what are known as natural monopolies. Competing entities cannot install a new set of transmission wires, so the deregulated electric market had to be contrived. It was also subject to political and cultural manipulation, as the solar and wind lobbies insisted that their product get preference. Coal was edged out financially, before environmental concerns.

Deregulated utilities have formed transmission organizations to rationalize the system. These are the independent system operators, such as the Midwest ISO or PJM in the Mid-Atlantic. They auction power and the auction system favors the cheapest kilowatt on offer.

That sounds fair, right? Not quite. Some of the power comes from wind and solar, which has been subsidized by an array of tax preferences and other government supports.

Many states have renewable energy portfolios which decree that a percentage of the power has to come from these renewable resources. This is fine because they produce no carbon. But they do not produce that much reliable electricity either. It takes a lot of solar arrays or wind turbines -- and then only when the sun is shining or the wind is blowing -- to produce the same electricity as a nuclear power plant or an old-fashioned, coal-fired power plant. They need reliable backup -- and that is natural gas, a fossil fuel.

Also to replace a nuclear plant with renewables chews up a lot of land, whether solar arrays or wind farms. Imperfect markets produce imperfect results. -- For InsideSources

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Water, Wildlife and Hope: Rejuvenating a Kogi Sacred Site

After years of planning, designing, acquiring materials, developing infrastructure, laying and burying 1,200 meters of pipe, and testing water quality and functionality, the seemingly impossible was achieved: for Colombia's Kogi people, and their related tribes who rely on Jaba Tañiwashkaka, a historically sacred site, an aqueduct that provides access to water for crop irrigation and potable water for consumption is now in place. And thanks to a determined site restoration effort, alligators, nutria, and capybara are only a few of the animals now seen in a wetland previously largely devoid of wildlife.

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The Kogi people live on roughly 14.5 million acres in Colombia's northern Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta region. Around the margins of the Sierra Nevada is the Línea Negra, the “Black Line,” a chain of 54 pilgrimage sites sacred to the Kogi and once part of their ancestral territories. Most of the associated sites are not currently under Kogi ownership or control—the Kogi were forced to abandon them due to decades of colonization and violent civil conflict—and many are endangered by poorly planned development schemes, megaprojects, mining activity, and/or illicit crop cultivation.

To address this, in 2012, the Amazon Conservation Team (ACT) partnered with the Colombian Ministry of Culture and the Organización Gonawindúa Tayrona of the Kogi people to purchase the essential section of a coastal sacred site that the region's indigenous communities call Jaba Tañiwashkaka—an area of great environmental and cultural importance.

With the legal consolidation and traditional management of Jaba Tañiwashkaka well underway, thanks in part to additional land purchases, a pressing task has been the construction of a water supply system that allows for the continuous residence of Kogi families in their reclaimed territory and the establishment of small-scale subsistence agriculture on three hectares to sustain the families and authorities who live at or visit the site. Today, an aqueduct provides access to water for crop irrigation and potable water for consumption. Previously, any water supplied at the site of the Kogi's temples had to be carried in buckets from the Jerez River at a distance of about one kilometer, and this water was not suitable for human consumption.

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Now, solar panel energy powers the pump, three 2,000-liter reservoir tanks provide storage, and a filter supplies potable water, with the remainder used for agriculture. The system was designed as a low-maintenance and ecologically responsible project, and a fourth tank has now been sited at the nearby orchard. With assistance from the national government, this land was returned to the ownership and stewardship of the Kogi.

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Under the Kogi's care, and through joint efforts with ACT, their sacred territory is being restored through community monitoring, trash collection, and border enforcement. Local waters are decontaminating, as indicated by studies of the health and size of populations of crayfish, a good indicator of water quality. Littoral vegetation is rebounding, and bodies of water previously scattered with refuse are being restored to beautiful freshwater lagoons.

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The local population of crabs is increasing, and previously unseen semiaquatic animals such as nutrias and young alligators have been spotted. The alligators further indicate that that a recent prohibition from capturing their eggs has helped their reproduction and repopulation. Moreover, with around-the-clock control of fires, local flora is recovering across the local wetland, including propagation of marsh vegetation and young mangrove.

In addition to the return of its original state and beauty, the temple site can now fulfill its role as a gathering site for the Kogi's traditional practices—ritual offerings, internal meetings, and exchange gatherings—that strengthen their culture and advance the conservation and restoration of the local ecology.

ACT and the Kogi are grateful to a set of funders including the White Feather Foundation, March to the Top, LUSH Cosmetics, Dora Arts Janssen, and anonymous donors whose generosity made the aqueduct a reality and helped breathe new life into this ancient wetland.

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