Canada’s birds have stories to tell. The rise and fall of bird populations tells us how they, and by extension their habitats, are doing. Birds reflect our impact on the environment, tell us where conservation action is working, and show us where we need to focus more effort. This report is a partnership between Birds… Continue Reading
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Category Archives: Climate Change
Fact check: Debunking weather modification claims
As the southeastern United States reels from the impact of two historic hurricanes, a large amount of disinformation about nonexistent weather manipulation technology is spreading across the internet, particularly on social media platforms. Below, NOAA identifies some of the inaccurate claims circulating online and provides science-based facts and information in response. Continue Reading
SBA disaster assistance resources
Data is Plural: “Following a declared disaster,” the US Small Business Administration offers “disaster assistance in the form of low-interest, long-term disaster loans for damages not covered by insurance or other recoveries to businesses of all sizes, private nonprofit organizations, as well as homeowners and renters.” The SBA publishes anonymized data about each such loan… Continue Reading
A baseline structure inventory with critical attribution for the US and its territories
Data is Plural: “Leveraging high performance computing, remote sensing, geographic data science, machine learning, and computer vision,” Hsiuhan Lexie Yang et al., researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, have “partnered with Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to build a baseline structure inventory covering the US and its territories to support disaster preparedness, response, and recovery.”… Continue Reading
Global water crisis leaves half of world food production at risk in next 25 years
The Guardian: More than half the world’s food production will be at risk of failure within the next 25 years as a rapidly accelerating water crisis grips the planet, unless urgent action is taken to conserve water resources and end the destruction of the ecosystems on which our fresh water depends, experts have warned in… Continue Reading
The Individualization of Responsibility – Masterclass in Deception
The Climate Historian: “…In the mid-20th century, as evidence mounted linking smoking to lung cancer, the tobacco industry didn’t just fight back—they mastered the art of deflection. Instead of outright denying the dangers, they funded research to stir doubt, muddying the scientific waters.In the 1950s, the Tobacco Institute launched its “health reassurance” campaigns. These campaigns… Continue Reading
Where climate change poses the most and least risk to American homeowners
Washington Post – [unpaywalled] This article includes searchable databases as follows: Find your county’s climate risk. AlphaGeo, a climate modeling group, analyzed the risks in every county. Type in your county below to see which exist in your area. Figure out your state’s disclosure laws. More than one third of states don’t require sellers to… Continue Reading
‘Alarming’ decline of seed-dispersing animals threatens Europe’s plants
Science: “When hunters wiped out most fruiteating birds in the tropical forest of Lambir Hills National Park on western Borneo by the 1990s, the skies grew duller—and in a few years so did the forest. Without birds to spread their seeds, the diversity of fruit-producing plants declined, illuminating the critical importance of seed dispersal for… Continue Reading
What Do Climate Risk Indices Measure?
Liberty Street Economics, New York Fed, October 7, 2024: “As interest in understanding the economic impacts of climate change grows, the climate economics and finance literature has developed a number of indices to quantify climate risks. Various approaches have been employed, utilizing firm-level emissions data, financial market data (from equity and derivatives markets), or textual… Continue Reading
What’s happening in America today is something darker than a misinformation crisis.
The Atlantic [no paywall]: ” I’m Running Out of Ways to Explain How Bad This Is What’s happening in America today is something darker than a misinformation crisis. By Charlie Warzel. The truth is, it’s getting harder to describe the extent to which a meaningful percentage of Americans have dissociated from reality. As Hurricane Milton… Continue Reading
The 2024 state of the climate report: Perilous times on planet Earth
William J Ripple, Christopher Wolf, Jillian W Gregg, Johan Rockström, Michael E Mann, Naomi Oreskes, Timothy M Lenton, Stefan Rahmstorf, Thomas M Newsome, Chi Xu, Jens-Christian Svenning, Cássio Cardoso Pereira, Beverly E Law, Thomas W Crowther, The 2024 state of the climate report: Perilous times on planet Earth, BioScience, 2024;, biae087, https://doi.org/10.1093/biosci/biae087 “We are on… Continue Reading
The White House launches Reddit account
The Biden-Harris Administration has launched a Reddit account to provide accurate info on Hurricanes Helene and Milton. The White House will combat misinformation and share updates on federal response, recovery, and preparedness efforts across key sub-Reddits. TechCrunch: “On Tuesday, a White House official announced that the Biden-Harris administration has launched a White House account on… Continue Reading
