Climate Change

Exxon Mobil Corp. is leading a parade of energy companies that will confront the issue of the so-called “carbon bubble” – the idea that fossil-fuel assets such as Canada’s oil sands are overvalued and risky for investors in a world that must reduce its greenhouse gas emissions. In an agreement with institutional shareholders, Exxon has agreed to disclosure by the end of March of how climate change regulations could affect the value of its worldwide assets, including its major holdings in Alberta’s oil sands.

When faced with intractable problems, we often make up stories to console ourselves. The boat’s not really sinking, we say: We’re just going through a rough patch. We’re not headed for disaster; we’ve just been blown off course. Better to keep a bright outlook on things, we presume, than to acknowledge our desperate situation.

The American Association for the Advancement of Science came as close as such a respectable institution can to screaming an alarm last week. "As scientists, it is not our role to tell people what they should do," it said as it began one of those sentences that you know will build to a "but".

Last year BP projected global climate pollution would "most likely" surge 26% by 2030. As I reported at the time, this would crank up the Earth's thermostat a disastrous +4C according to the International Energy Agency (IEA). That is twice the +2C threshold for "dangerous climate change" that all major nations have promised to stay below.

Air pollution over Asia, most of which is coming from China, is affecting the world’s weather.

This article is the second in a series that will analyze Gallup's latest March update on Americans' views on climate change and examine how these views have changed over time. The series will explore public opinion on the severity and importance of climate change, its causes and effects, the extent of Americans' understanding of the issue, and much more.

US Secretary of State John Kerry claims "the United States is committed to doing its part" to fight the "clear and present danger" of the climate crisis. But a high-profile, eleven-volume, multi-year study from his own department says to expect only rising carbon emissions and broken climate promises from America.

As the San Francisco bureaucrats on the dais murmured about why they weren’t getting anywhere near what we in the audience passionately hoped for, asked for, and worked for, my mind began to wander. I began to think of another sunny day on the other side of the country 13 years earlier, when nothing happened the way anyone expected. I had met a survivor of that day who told me his story.

The Senate was headed into another all-nighter Monday evening as 26 Democrats who call themselves the “climate caucus” planned to speak nonstop about climate change from about 6:30 p.m. until 9 a.m. on Tuesday. The talkathon is the latest effort by the group, which is working with a parallel House caucus, to elevate the issue of global warming.

From roads and bridges to power plants and gas pipelines, American infrastructure is vulnerable to the effects of climate change, according to a pair of government reports released Thursday. The reports are technical documents supporting the National Climate Assessment, a major review compiled by 13 government agencies that the U.S. Global Change Research Program <http://ncadac.globalchange.gov/>  is expected to release in April.