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TODAY'S CLIMATE AND ENERGY HEADLINES

Briefing date 10.10.2018
Trump questions UN global warming report

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News.

Trump questions UN global warming report
Mail Online Read Article

President Donald Trump has said he plans to review the UN report that warns of global warming-caused chaos unless drastic action is taken, but that he is skeptical of its authors, the Mail Online reports. “It was given to me and I want to look at who drew it, which group drew it,” Trump told reporters at the White House on Tuesday. “Because I can give you reports that are fabulous and I can give you reports that aren’t so good,” he said. “But I’ll be looking at it, absolutely.” Grist, the HillThinkProgress and the Guardian also report on Trump’s comments. Think Progress also reports on new analysis that showed the majority of the top 50 US newspapers did not feature any homepage coverage of the landmark UN climate change report. Just 22 out of the 50 papers had a prominent story about the report on their homepage. DeSmog UK similarly looked at the British press coverage of the report, adding: “It seems like western media just can’t cope with the magnitude of the situation.”

UK fracking rules on earthquakes could be relaxed, says minister
The Guardian Read Article

Rules designed to halt fracking operations if they trigger minor earthquakes could be relaxed in the future, UK energy minister Claire Perry has said, the Guardian reports in an exclusive. Perry told a fellow Conservative MP in a letter that the monitoring system was “set at an explicitly cautious level” and that “as we gain experience in applying these measures, the trigger levels can be adjusted upwards without compromising the effectiveness of the controls”. The Daily Telegraph also has the story. Meanwhile, the Independent reports the government warned over “unacceptable” proposals that could slash foreign aid spending, in particular a proposal to include investment profits in measures of aid. This would make it less likely to ensure that money is spent in a way that tackles climate change, said Christine Allen, director of policy and public affairs at Christian Aid.

Dutch appeals court upholds landmark climate change ruling
The Guardian Read Article

A court in The Hague has upheld a legal order on the Dutch government to accelerate carbon emissions cuts, the Guardian reports. “Appeal court judges ruled that the severity and scope of the climate crisis demanded greenhouse gas reductions of at least 25% by 2020,” it notes. This is higher than the 17% drop planned by Mark Rutte’s liberal administration. Climate Home and BusinessGreen also have the story. The Guardian also reports that a Minnesota judge has dismissed charges against three climate change activists, saying prosecutors had failed to prove their attempts to shut down two Enbridge Energy oil pipelines caused any damage.

Shell’s green plan to save the world
The Times Read Article

Ben van Beurden, the boss of Royal Dutch Shell has suggested that planting forests covering an area the size of Brazil may hold the key to preventing dangerous extremes of global warming, the Times reports. van Beurden said shell’s analysis showed temperature rises could not be limited to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels simply by switching to green energy. The Guardian also has the story. Carbon Brief today published a map of where afforestation projects are already taking place around the world. The Daily Telegraph meanwhile focuses on quotes from van Beurden, who was speaking at a London conference, that people would be wrong to think Shell has “gone soft” on the future of oil and gas. Shell still ‘means business” on oil and gas, he added. Meanwhile, oil major Exxonhas said it is giving $1m to support a US campaign to address the threat of climate change by introducing a carbon tax and dividend. The partisan campaign wants to put a relatively high price on carbon, with revenues returned to the public in dividend payments. However, existing regulations on greenhouse gas emissions would be abolished. The Washington Post and Reuters also have the story.

Comment.

Let’s stop kidding ourselves about politics
Daniel Finkelstein, The Times Read Article

“I want to talk to you about climate change, Brexit, Jeremy Corbyn and fake news,” writes Daniel Finkelstein, weekly political columnist for the Times. Finkelstein links the fact that Republicans overwhelmingly believed Brett Kavanaugh when he argued he had not sexually assaulted Christine Blasey Ford. “It’s tempting but wrong to dismiss this as nothing more than political tribalism, writes Finkelstein. He links this to a recent article on the website of the journal Behavioural Public Policy, which noted that people are motivated to deny problems and scientific evidence supporting them “when they are averse to the solutions”. “On climate change, the more that people believe there are palatable solutions, the more they will accept the science,” says Finkelstein. “And once they accept the science, it may be possible to nudge them towards more radical policies. Because they will be on board.”

UN climate change report: 4 big takeaways
Umair Irfan, Vox Read Article

In continuing coverage of the new report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) on limiting global warming to 1.5C, Vox outlines four key takeaways, from the report, noting that “even the best-case scenario involves drastic changes to the world as we know it”. Meanwhile Emily Atkin at the New Republic outlines the “case for climate pessimism”, arguing it’s “folly to rely on hope that is demonstrably false”. Meanwhile, Chelsea Harvey argues in Scientific American that a firm timeline is needed to get to a zero carbon world. “Some experts suggest that, although scientifically useful, the carbon budget may not actually be promoting climate action among policymakers,” writes Harvey. Carbon Brief’s coverage of the report included a piece on why it expanded the carbon budget. Grist meanwhile sums up “three unpopular ideas [the 1.5C] report says we’ll need to embrace”, including “less stuff” and nuclear power.

Science.

Tracking arctic marine mammal resilience in an era of rapid ecosystem alteration
PLOS Biology Read Article

PLOS Biology published a special issue on Tuesday titled “Confronting Climate Change in the Age of Denial” – which explores the challenges and pitfalls of using stories to communicate scientific evidence around climate change. The collection features one article by marine mammal experts who “set the record straight on the likely impacts of climate change on Arctic wildlife” and twoarticles by social scientists who offer “different perspectives on enlisting narratives to convey climate change science,” according to the journal.

Historical and potential future importance of large whales as food for polar bears
Frontiers in Ecology and Environment Read Article

New research explores whether polar bears could turn to scavenging on large whale carcasses as climate change makes its more difficult for them to access their preferred prey, seals. Warming is leading to the disappearance of Arctic sea ice, which polar bears use as a platform to hunt seals. “We concluded that scavenging on large whale carcasses likely facilitated survival of polar bears in past interglacial periods when access to seals was reduced,” the researchers say. However, “in a future, ice‐impoverished Arctic, whale carcasses are less likely to provide nutritional refuge for polar bears because overharvesting by humans has greatly reduced large whale populations, carcass availability is geographically limited, and climate-induced sea-ice loss is projected to occur at a more rapid pace than polar bears have experienced at any previous time in their evolutionary history,” they add.

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