Oklahoma, where the denial comes right before the drought

I lived in Oklahoma, a half-hour’s commute from Tinker Air Force Base, where I was assigned, for nearly three years in the 80s. When I saw and read this article, I just had to share it here. So read it and then remember that Oklahoma is represented by denier-in-chief James Inhofe in the U.S. Senate. Whatta champ. Well isn’t he?

NASA: Ice sheet decline at both poles increasing

An international team of experts supported by NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) has combined data from multiple satellites and aircraft to produce the most comprehensive and accurate assessment to date of ice sheet losses in Greenland and Antarctica and their contributions to sea level rise.

In a landmark study published Thursday in the journal Science, 47 researchers from 26 laboratories report the combined rate of melting for the ice sheets covering Greenland and Antarctica has increased during the last 20 years. Together, these ice sheets are losing more than three times as much ice each year (equivalent to sea level rise of 0.04 inches or 0.95 millimeters) as they were in the 1990s (equivalent to 0.01 inches or 0.27 millimeters). About two-thirds of the loss is coming from Greenland, with the rest from Antarctica.

To me, these findings spell big trouble, especially for folks living on that once-beautiful oceanfront spread. Think: Miami, Fla., Virginia Beach, Va., Wilmington, Del., Portland, Maine, and many, many other places in North America alone. You can read all of NASA’s release.

Stand still for the apocalypse

Is columnist Chris Hedges pushing the envelope in this piece? Or is he on the mark? I’d bet that NASA’s James Hansen would agree with Hedges’s points.

What warming climate will flood

Folks who go gaw gaw at the prospect of a summer weekend at, say, Rehoboth Beach or Assateague Island, or any one of hundreds of other coastal spots will be out of luck before not too long. But their descendants will find things even wetter. Planning a trip to Miami Beach, Fla.? Better go now as it is among the places that will someday be inundated due to rising sea levels. Take a look at these maps.

The idiots who don’t believe global warming, or climate change, or any other slice of science

My friend conservation columnist Ted Williams offers this insightful look at the deniers. Whatta crew.

Global disaster? Climate change not on today’s media agenda

According to the National Climatic Data Center, July 211 to June 2012 was the hottest 12-month stretch on human record. But even as the devastation resulting from humanity’s ongoing alteration of the Earth’s atmosphere became more and more obvious, coverage of the 2012 presidential election campaign seemed completely impervious to the effects of climate change,”the media watchdog organization FAIR reported. You can read about FAIR’s findings right here. The conservation impact of what we humans are doing to our fish and wildlife heritage by burning fossil fuels goes well beyond the crisis faced by one or two species.

Let the coal burn! And China and India are doing just that

Amazing the amount of press time/coverage a lousy rock, aka “coal,” gets around the world. And never mind the carbon dioxide emitted whenever a supply of those rocks are burned – for heat, for electricity, for steam, etc. What would the Molly Maguires think today? Read here to learn about the role of coal in China and India. Not good.

No talk about climate and guns in presidential talkfests

So, one of the biggest factors ever in the world of conservation goes on without any bluster at all from presidential wannabe Mitt Romney and already-President Barack Obama. This article has the numbers that support the headline above. So, in any case, vote Romney for dog catcher and give Paul Ryan a big boost to becoming the municipal sanitary engineer.

‘Stop the War on Coal Act’ passes

This is more evidence, for those who care about Earth, of who not to vote for in November.

A farm bill tat helps the planet, not just crops