Latest news with #KatharineHayhoe
Yahoo
29-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
'It's a huge loss': Trump administration dismisses scientists preparing climate report
The Trump administration this week summarily dismissed more than 400 scientists and other experts who had begun to write the latest National Climate Assessment report, informing them by email that the scope of the report was being reevaluated. The report, mandated by Congress, is prepared every four years under a 1990 law. It details the latest science on climate change, and also reports on progress in addressing global warming. Scientists said they fear the Trump administration could seek to shut down the effort or enlist other authors to write a very different report that seeks to attack climate science — a path they say would leave the country ill-prepared for worsening disasters intensified by humanity's warming of the planet, including more intense heat waves, wildfires, droughts, floods and sea-level rise. 'Climate change puts us all at risk, and we all need this vital information to help prepare,' said Katharine Hayhoe, a climate scientist at Texas Tech University who was an author of four previous versions of the report, including three times as a lead author. 'Without it, the future will be much more dangerous.' She noted that although the assessment is required by law, there aren't specific requirements about who exactly should write the report or the form it should take. 'It could end up being a collection of long-debunked myths and disinformation about climate change,' Hayhoe said. 'It could end up being a document that is just not useful, does not serve the purpose of providing information to the American people on the risks of climate change and the best ways to mitigate or adapt to those risks.' Trump administration officials didn't respond to requests for comments. Participants in the latest study, set for release in late 2027 or early 2028, received an email Monday informing them they were being dismissed. 'At this time, the scope of the [report] is currently being reevaluated,' said the email from Heidi Roop, deputy director for services of the U.S. Global Change Research Program. 'We are now releasing all current assessment participants from their roles.' It thanked them for participating and said that 'as plans develop for the assessment, there may be future opportunities to contribute or engage.' Read more: Trump makes sweeping move to undercut state climate laws, including California's The report is prepared by scientists and experts who volunteer their time. They were working on what would be the sixth assessment since the first report came out in 2000. 'The National Climate Assessment is a national treasure,' said Costa Samaras, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at Carnegie Mellon University who had been working as the lead author of the chapter on climate change mitigation prior to Monday's announcement. "It is accessible, supported by the highest levels of scientific integrity, and represents the best available science to the American people on how their communities are changing because of climate change, and how they can respond.' The report's update comes at a critical time, as the burning of fossil fuels and rising greenhouse gases put the Earth on a trajectory for a climate that is warmer and more volatile than humans have experienced. The most recent National Climate Assessment, released in 2023, detailed the latest science on more extreme heat waves, wildfires and other disasters, and said that without deeper cuts in emissions and faster adaptation efforts, 'severe climate risks to the United States will continue to grow.' Last year, the United States experienced 27 weather and climate-related disasters that each measured at least $1 billion dollars in losses — costing the country $185 billion in total, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Over the last five years, there have been 115 separate events that cost communities more than $750 billion. 'The National Climate Assessment helps communities understand how climate affects their population, their ecosystem, their infrastructure, and helps them prepare and adapt to these changes,' Samaras said. He said his team had been making good progress on their chapter, which is meant to take stock of how well and in what sectors the United States is reducing the greenhouse gas emissions that drive global warming, as well as what innovation opportunities exist for the country to grow industries that will help produce clean energy. They had already onboarded all of their authors — which included federal government employees and researchers from academia and nonprofits — and submitted a preliminary draft for review. 'It's a huge loss,' Samaras said. 'It's a loss for taxpayers, it's a loss for communities, it's a loss for the environment. Not producing the report saves us basically nothing and costs us maybe everything.' Ladd Keith, an associate professor of planning and director of the University of Arizona's Heat Resilience Initiative, also received the email. Keith said he and other contributors were carefully selected to ensure a range of scientific expertise and regions were represented. 'If a report is provided to fulfill the Congressional mandate without the expertise of the contributors and a rigorous and transparent peer review process, it will further erode the credibility of this administration's ability to address our nation's most serious and pressing challenges,' Keith said. 'The hottest ten years on record were all in the last decade, and the U.S. is experiencing increases in extreme heat, drought, wildfire and flooding,' Keith said. 'Losing this vital source of information will ultimately harm our nation's ability to address the impacts of climate change.' Read more: We used to agree on Earth Day. Political division has changed environmental priorities Trump and his administration have repeatedly criticized, undermined and defunded science on climate change. While seeking to boost oil and gas drilling and production, the Trump administration has fired thousands of government scientists and canceled many grants that had supported climate research. Federal scientists recently were ordered not to attend a meeting of the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. And in early April, the administration terminated a contract with a consulting firm that had supported technical staff at the U.S. Global Change Research Program, which coordinates federal research and the writing of the National Climate Assessment. Project 2025, the conservative blueprint written by Trump's allies last year, advised the president to review and possibly reject the program's assessments. "The next President should critically analyze and, if required, refuse to accept any [U.S. Global Change Research Program] assessment prepared under the Biden Administration," the document says. It argues that the National Climate Assessment and other climate change research programs reduce the scope of the president's decision-making powers and that of federal agencies. It also says the process should include more diverse viewpoints. Both are themes that have played out repeatedly in the first 100 days of the second Trump administration, which has focused on rolling back environmental regulations and reducing bureaucratic red tape in the name of cost savings and greater U.S. energy independence. 'Everything we've seen in their first 100 days is just cause for alarm when it comes to climate science,' said Rachel Cleetus, an economist and policy director of the Union of Concerned Scientists' climate and energy program. 'The motivations are clearly to privilege fossil fuel interests over the interests of the public. This report is entirely in the public interest, and they're just trying to bury the facts.' Cleetus had been among the authors of a chapter on how climate change is affecting U.S. coasts. Edward Carr, senior scientist and director of the Stockholm Environment Institute's center in the U.S., said the report's cancellation is 'another effort to erase the evidence on which serious policy debate can be constructed.' The Trump administration also recently canceled the writing of a major scientific report called the National Nature Assessment, which began under the Biden administration. 'The pattern that I'm seeing across the federal government is acting as if eliminating all mention of climate change will make climate change go away, which is certainly not correct,' said Chris Field, director of Stanford University's Woods Institute for the Environment. Field was an author of the nature assessment report before it was shelved, and has also been an author of previous versions of the climate assessment. Read more: 'Every bit matters': Six key takeaways from the latest U.S. climate report He said if the next version of the report is scrapped, the country would lose up-to-date and authoritative information from the federal government, which has been widely used to inform local decisions by cities, states, planning agencies, flood control authorities, coastal commissions, and agriculture agencies, among others. Without such information, the country will be less prepared for the effects of climate change that are ongoing and increasing, he said. 'It's as if, when you're driving your car, you have half the window blocked out, or your headlights don't work,' Field said. 'The ability to make good decisions about the future really depends a lot on the best available information, and cutting off access to that information, making it more difficult to get, makes life more challenging, uncertain and expensive.' This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Los Angeles Times
29-04-2025
- Politics
- Los Angeles Times
‘It's a huge loss': Trump administration dismisses scientists preparing climate report
The Trump administration this week summarily dismissed more than 400 scientists and other experts who had begun to write the latest National Climate Assessment report, informing them by email that the scope of the report was being reevaluated. The report, mandated by Congress, is prepared every four years under a 1990 law. It details the latest science on climate change, and also reports on progress in addressing global warming. Scientists said they fear the Trump administration could seek to shut down the effort or enlist other authors to write a very different report that seeks to attack climate science — a path they say would leave the country ill-prepared for worsening disasters intensified by humanity's warming of the planet, including more intense heat waves, wildfires, droughts, floods and sea-level rise. 'Climate change puts us all at risk, and we all need this vital information to help prepare,' said Katharine Hayhoe, a climate scientist at Texas Tech University who was an author of four previous versions of the report, including three times as a lead author. 'Without it, the future will be much more dangerous.' She noted that although the assessment is required by law, there aren't specific requirements about who exactly should write the report or the form it should take. 'It could end up being a collection of long-debunked myths and disinformation about climate change,' Hayhoe said. 'It could end up being a document that is just not useful, does not serve the purpose of providing information to the American people on the risks of climate change and the best ways to mitigate or adapt to those risks.' Trump administration officials didn't respond to requests for comments. Participants in the latest study, set for release in late 2027 or early 2028, received an email Monday informing them they were being dismissed. 'At this time, the scope of the [report] is currently being reevaluated,' said the email from Heidi Roop, deputy director for services of the U.S. Global Change Research Program. 'We are now releasing all current assessment participants from their roles.' It thanked them for participating and said that 'as plans develop for the assessment, there may be future opportunities to contribute or engage.' The report is prepared by scientists and experts who volunteer their time. They were working on what would be the sixth assessment since the first report came out in 2000. 'The National Climate Assessment is a national treasure,' said Costa Samaras, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at Carnegie Mellon University who had been working as the lead author of the chapter on climate change mitigation prior to Monday's announcement. 'It is accessible, supported by the highest levels of scientific integrity, and represents the best available science to the American people on how their communities are changing because of climate change, and how they can respond.' The report's update comes at a critical time, as the burning of fossil fuels and rising greenhouse gases put the Earth on a trajectory for a climate that is warmer and more volatile than humans have experienced. The most recent National Climate Assessment, released in 2023, detailed the latest science on more extreme heat waves, wildfires and other disasters, and said that without deeper cuts in emissions and faster adaptation efforts, 'severe climate risks to the United States will continue to grow.' Last year, the United States experienced 27 weather and climate-related disasters that each measured at least $1 billion dollars in losses — costing the country $185 billion in total, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Over the last five years, there have been 115 separate events that cost communities more than $750 billion. 'The National Climate Assessment helps communities understand how climate affects their population, their ecosystem, their infrastructure, and helps them prepare and adapt to these changes,' Samaras said. He said his team had been making good progress on their chapter, which is meant to take stock of how well and in what sectors the United States is reducing the greenhouse gas emissions that drive global warming, as well as what innovation opportunities exist for the country to grow industries that will help produce clean energy. They had already onboarded all of their authors — which included federal government employees and researchers from academia and nonprofits — and submitted a preliminary draft for review. 'It's a huge loss,' Samaras said. 'It's a loss for taxpayers, it's a loss for communities, it's a loss for the environment. Not producing the report saves us basically nothing and costs us maybe everything.' Ladd Keith, an associate professor of planning and director of the University of Arizona's Heat Resilience Initiative, also received the email. Keith said he and other contributors were carefully selected to ensure a range of scientific expertise and regions were represented. 'If a report is provided to fulfill the Congressional mandate without the expertise of the contributors and a rigorous and transparent peer review process, it will further erode the credibility of this administration's ability to address our nation's most serious and pressing challenges,' Keith said. 'The hottest ten years on record were all in the last decade, and the U.S. is experiencing increases in extreme heat, drought, wildfire and flooding,' Keith said. 'Losing this vital source of information will ultimately harm our nation's ability to address the impacts of climate change.' Trump and his administration have repeatedly criticized, undermined and defunded science on climate change. While seeking to boost oil and gas drilling and production, the Trump administration has fired thousands of government scientists and canceled many grants that had supported climate research. Federal scientists recently were ordered not to attend a meeting of the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. And in early April, the administration terminated a contract with a consulting firm that had supported technical staff at the U.S. Global Change Research Program, which coordinates federal research and the writing of the National Climate Assessment. Project 2025, the conservative blueprint written by Trump's allies last year, advised the president to review and possibly reject the program's assessments. 'The next President should critically analyze and, if required, refuse to accept any [U.S. Global Change Research Program] assessment prepared under the Biden Administration,' the document says. It argues that the National Climate Assessment and other climate change research programs reduce the scope of the president's decision-making powers and that of federal agencies. It also says the process should include more diverse viewpoints. Both are themes that have played out repeatedly in the first 100 days of the second Trump administration, which has focused on rolling back environmental regulations and reducing bureaucratic red tape in the name of cost savings and greater U.S. energy independence. 'Everything we've seen in their first 100 days is just cause for alarm when it comes to climate science,' said Rachel Cleetus, an economist and policy director of the Union of Concerned Scientists' climate and energy program. 'The motivations are clearly to privilege fossil fuel interests over the interests of the public. This report is entirely in the public interest, and they're just trying to bury the facts.' Cleetus had been among the authors of a chapter on how climate change is affecting U.S. coasts. Edward Carr, senior scientist and director of the Stockholm Environment Institute's center in the U.S., said the report's cancellation is 'another effort to erase the evidence on which serious policy debate can be constructed.' The Trump administration also recently canceled the writing of a major scientific report called the National Nature Assessment, which began under the Biden administration. 'The pattern that I'm seeing across the federal government is acting as if eliminating all mention of climate change will make climate change go away, which is certainly not correct,' said Chris Field, director of Stanford University's Woods Institute for the Environment. Field was an author of the nature assessment report before it was shelved, and has also been an author of previous versions of the climate assessment. He said if the next version of the report is scrapped, the country would lose up-to-date and authoritative information from the federal government, which has been widely used to inform local decisions by cities, states, planning agencies, flood control authorities, coastal commissions, and agriculture agencies, among others. Without such information, the country will be less prepared for the effects of climate change that are ongoing and increasing, he said. 'It's as if, when you're driving your car, you have half the window blocked out, or your headlights don't work,' Field said. 'The ability to make good decisions about the future really depends a lot on the best available information, and cutting off access to that information, making it more difficult to get, makes life more challenging, uncertain and expensive.'
New York Times
17-02-2025
- Climate
- New York Times
Praise Song for a False Spring
Last month, while the rest of the world was burning up during the hottest January on record, it was unseasonably cold here in Middle Tennessee. I walked around my yard exulting at the sharpness in the air, at the cold blue of the daytime sky and the starry brightness at night. After a fall that lingered and lingered, winter was here at last. A real winter. In the natural order of things, winter keeps trees and woody shrubs in dormancy, their fall-set buds still tightly furled. Winter's dry air brings a squinting new clarity to the light. From time to time, snow turns every winter-bare branch into a chandelier. But we can't count on snow anymore. Some years it pours out of the sky and settles in drifts that last for days. Some years there's none at all. I rejoice when the natural world is working more or less as it ought, if only in this little pocket of the natural world. It happens so rarely now. Mostly our temperatures run higher than average, sometimes much higher than average. Then a random cold spell, sometimes much colder than average, will have me digging around in the back seat for the coat I haven't needed in weeks. This kind of boomerang weather is one reason many scientists have stopped referring to 'global warming' and adopted 'global weirding' in its place. (The atmospheric scientist Katharine Hayhoe has a video series explaining how it works.) After an unseasonably cold January, February began with highs that were 20 degrees warmer than average. A few days later, we were back to normal February temperatures again. This kind of boomerang weather is called false spring — a day or two of warmth bracketed on either end by cold — and it is a normal phenomenon of winter. Overnight, winter turns into spring, and overnight it turns right back into winter again. This year false spring blew in on a gust of warmth and birdsong, offering an unexpected chance to dawdle in the mild light. I sat on the back steps and closed my eyes, listening. The birds were singing as if it were April, their songs overlapping, coming from every corner of the yard. I opened Merlin, a free app from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology that identifies birds by their songs, and it picked up no fewer than 12 bird species, all singing at once. Robins and crows and flickers were stalking around the yard, gobbling up the insects stirring in the leaf litter. The resident bluebirds, who had spent all winter sticking close together in large extended families, began to quarrel again, preparing to establish territories. One male took up his post on top of the bluebird box and tried very hard to entice his mate, who was watching from the bare branch of a bare maple tree, to look inside. Historically, false springs were transitory. Now climate change seems to be increasing their frequency and severity, with sometimes disastrous effects for plants and wildlife — and farmers. If a false spring goes on for days and days, the sap will begin to rise in trees and woody shrubs, buds will begin to open, and sleeping perennials will begin to wake. The return of winter will blast into blackness anything that has already begun to bloom. Some of those plants will try again next year. Some will be gone forever. When a false spring drags on, birds may begin to nest too early, only to have winter come crashing back again. Nestlings need protein, so their diet consists primarily of invertebrates. When a long false spring finally ends and the hard freeze comes, it takes the insects with it, leaving nothing for the birds to feed their babies. (Note to property managers and homeowners: 'Mosquito control' services do the same thing: When you use insecticides to kill mosquitoes, you're killing all other insects nearby, too, and starving — or poisoning — baby birds.) But worse than a false spring is an actual spring that comes far too early. Our wild neighbors evolved to behave according to seasonal cues, when astronomical spring and meteorological spring are in sync. Migrating birds and butterflies evolved to arrive in ecosystems filled with food. Bees evolved to wake into a world filled with flowers. Birds evolved to nest in a season filled with insects. I was relieved that this year's false spring was brief. I was relieved, too, when I checked my bluebird box and found only signs that a family had been taking shelter there on cold nights. The male will once again lay claim to it when true spring arrives, just as he always does, and the female will build a nest while he watches over her, just as she always does. For now, for the first time in a long while, the seasons are holding, keeping everyone safe. The natural world is under assault — by human beings living thoughtlessly, demanding too little of politicians and businesses; by corporations prizing profits over sustainability, even when climate inaction imperils their own future profits; by 'leaders' who claim that nothing is happening and work to suppress all evidence that it is. In this context a breath of spring, not too long and not too short, is a welcome idyll — necessary and necessarily fleeting. What's happening in my yard doesn't say anything about what's happening in the rest of the country, of course, much less what's happening in the rest of the world. But I am grateful for it nonetheless. Any sign that nature is working as it ought, however circumscribed and however brief, reminds me to keep faith in the future. Sitting on my back steps in the sunshine on that first warm day in early February, not sure yet whether it was false spring or a real spring arriving dangerously early, I thought of what a wise friend said when I was panicking about the election: 'No matter what happens, it's not the end of the story.' False spring isn't meant to last. Perhaps it isn't meant to do anything. But to me it has always been a welcome reminder, deep in winter, of the promise of new life. As bad as things are, as bad as they might yet get, this is not the end of the story. We don't know what will happen, but we know this: Even the bitterest winter doesn't last forever. Spring is coming.
Yahoo
10-02-2025
- Climate
- Yahoo
Moms create chilling Super Bowl ad to call attention to major issue threatening our children's futures: 'It may be too late'
With millions of eyes on Super Bowl LIX, a parent-led climate group sent a powerful message on Sunday by airing the first-ever climate advertisement from a nonprofit organization. Euronews reported that the Potential Energy Coalition for Science Moms ran a 30-second commercial, which was played for viewers in the Los Angeles market and on some streaming platforms. The clip features a montage of girls from infancy to the cusp of adulthood, using that timeline to track the progression of the changing climate and the devastating impacts it will have in the future. A voiceover states that there will be nine billion more tons of carbon pollution in the air by the time the baby draws her first breath and that wildfires will have already eviscerated "millions more acres she could have explored" when she learns how to walk. "By the time a child born today goes to college, it may be too late to leave them the world we promised," the voiceover continues. "Our window to act on climate change is like watching them grow up. We blink, and we miss it." The nonpartisan group concluded the video by calling on viewers to donate to LA wildfire survivors through its website. The blazes that swept through Southern California last month burned around 50,000 acres and destroyed more than 10,000 homes. Experts from the World Weather Attribution found that the hot, arid, and windy conditions that contributed to the severity of the wildfires were 35% more likely to happen because of rising global temperatures. Developments in clean energy technology and legislation have helped curtail the effects of Earth's overheating. Nonetheless, the increasing frequency and intensity of extreme weather events caused by anthropogenic activity made the timing and the messaging of the Super Bowl ad all the more important. According to a LinkedIn post from Dr. Katharine Hayhoe, a member of Science Moms and the chief scientist for The Nature Conservancy — as well as a periodic video contributor to The Cool Down — love served as the inspiration for the spot. "The video shines a light on the devastating impact climate change is having on the people and places we all love," she said in a separate post. Do you worry about air pollution in your town? All the time Often Only sometimes Never Click your choice to see results and speak your mind. "It's inspiring to see nonprofits stepping up to raise awareness at such a high-profile event. Real change begins through understanding and making informed decisions," one person wrote in the comment section. "This message needs to be everywhere," another user responded. Join our free newsletter for good news and useful tips, and don't miss this cool list of easy ways to help yourself while helping the planet.
Euronews
10-02-2025
- Science
- Euronews
‘Science Moms': The Super Bowl ad urging climate action for the next generation
Viewers in Los Angeles watching the Super Bowl this year were shown the first-ever climate advert from a nonprofit group. The Super Bowl advert was created by climate change marketing experts at the Potential Energy Coalition for Science Moms, a nonpartisan group of climate scientists who are also parents. This group includes Dr Katharine Hayhoe, chief scientist for The Nature Conservancy, Dr Melissa Burt, assistant professor in the Department of Atmospheric Science at Colorado State University (CSU), and D. Emily Fischer, Professor in the Department of Atmospheric Science at CSU. The 30-second regional advert was played to Super Bowl viewers in Los Angeles and on some streaming services during the famous American football game. It shines a light on the progress of climate change through the timeline of a young girl's life, from birth to the day she heads off to college. 'As a scientist, I know by the time she takes her first breath, 9 billion more tonnes of carbon pollution will be in the air,' a voiceover says. 'When she takes her first steps, wildfires will have burned millions more acres she could have explored. By the time a child born today goes to college, it may be too late to leave them the world we promised.' Encouraging climate action through love A spokesperson told advertising trade publication Adweek that the advert was a 'product of extensive research' into what message would have the biggest impact on the greatest number of people. 'Do you know what science shows is the top reason people care about climate change?' Dr Hayhoe asked in a post about the ad on LinkedIn. 'LOVE - especially for the next generation.' While several previous ads during the big game have drawn attention to climate change, these have usually come from companies with products to sell. This is the first to be created by a nonprofit group. The New York Times ranked it as one of the best ads shown during this year's Super Bowl. Climate ad raises funds for LA wildfire victims The advert comes not long after devastating wildfires ripped through Los Angeles. Last month more than 10,000 homes were destroyed in the region after high winds followed a dry period that left the city particularly susceptible to blazes. A recent study from researchers around the world found the hot, dry and windy conditions that fuelled the LA fires were about 35 per cent (1.35 times) more likely due to climate change. 'There's a very direct link between the fires that we're seeing now - for example, in Los Angeles, and the fires that we've seen in Texas recently and in Colorado - and climate change,' Fischer told Adweek. The Super Bowl ad provides a direct link to support the California Community Foundation in LA with its Wildfire Recovery Fund to help those recovering from the disaster.
