US students are taught climate change badly, temporary control of California gas leak, & more
News
Two-thirds of US students are taught climate change badly, study finds
The first national survey of classroom science teachers in the US has found schoolchildren are being sold short when it comes to climate change, with only 38% taught about the link between rising global temperatures and fossil fuels. Pupils are spending only an hour or two each year learning about climate change in middle and high school, say the study’s authors, with some 7% of teachers incorrectly attributing recent warming to natural causes and a further 4% avoiding talking about the cause altogether. The findings shed light on the source of confusion and climate denial woven into American public life, says The Guardian. The survey of 1,500 teachers attracted widespread coverage, with InsideClimate News, Climate Home, The New York Times, The Washington Post, New Scientist, Scientific American and Time all covering the story.
SoCal Gas says it has “temporarily controlled” massive natural gas leak
A last-ditch attempt to stem the flow of gas from a well just north of Los Angeles appears to have been successful after Southern California Gas Company (SoCal Gas) announced that it has the leak temporarily under control. The leak saw gas gush uncontrollably for 16 weeks and drove thousands of residents from their Los Angeles homes, reports The Guardian. Carbon Brief took a look at how bad the Aliso Canyon leak was, in graphical form. The company will now have to permanently shut down the well by sealing it with cement, a process that could take a few more days.
Land water storage slowed sea level rise – study
New satellite data shows that extra rain falling on continents in the last decade slowed the pace of sea level rise by about 22%. Between 2002-2014, sea levels rose by an average 2.4 millimetres a year but without the extra water stored by land, this would have been 3.2mm/yr, a new study calculates. While the researchers don’t yet know the reasons for the extra land storage, they say that if its down to natural variability and those patterns reverse, we could see a swing back to faster sea level rise in the coming decades. Carbon Brief also covered the new study.
Obama: ‘Don’t despair’ over Supreme Court halting climate rule
President Obama has reassured supporters that he is confident in the legality of the Clean Power Plan, after the Supreme Court temporarily halted its implementation this week. Though he conceded it was “unusual” the president refuted claims the plan had been struck down, adding: “We are very firm in terms of the legal footing here.” The move to cleaner power is carrying on regardless of the court ruling, reports the The Washington Post, with major utility companies reacting to the move “with a collective shrug”.
La Niña expected in next months for the first time since 2012
As the El Niño weather phenomenon thats affected world temperature and rainfall patterns continues to dissipate, a US government forecaster expects its cooler counterpart, La Niña, to emerge in the coming months. The monthly forecast from the National Weather Prediction Center says scientists are not on official La Niña watch yet but the probability is trending towards one. La Niña tends to be less damaging than El Niño but is still linked to floods, droughts and hurricanes, the piece explains.
Comment
Climate torture: UN’s IPCC science panel must deliver clearer message
If you’ve ever struggled to make sense of the hefty tomes the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change puts out every five or six years, you’re almost certainly not alone. Former BBC correspondent and now director of the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit, Richard Black, summarises a meeting the IPCC held in Oslo earlier this week, aimed at brainstorming ways to improve its communication to policymakers, the media and the public. Let the English language go forth un-tortured, says Black, and let every scientist involved in the next IPCC assessment begin by recalling Einstein’s famous dictum that “if you can’t explain it to a six-year-old, you don’t understand it yourself”.
What will the green business environment be like in six years’ time?
Former energy and climate change secretary, Ed Davey, is broadly optimistic about green business driving change, highlighting the staggering reduction in the cost of solar as the most significant development of this century. But policies implemented since the election suggest it will be a rough ride, he says, with the UK set to lose its lead as other countries forge ahead. He sees hope, however, in community energy and offshore wind, an industry for which he says the door to greater investment has thankfully been “left ajar.” The article begins a new series asking leading figures what they think the UK’s green economy will look like in the coming years.
Science
Frequency of marine heatwaves in the North Atlantic and North Pacific since 1950
A new study examines the intensity, duration and frequency of extreme warming events in the North Atlantic and North Pacific Oceans between 1950-2014, dubbed marine heatwaves. The authors find that small-area anomalies in sea surface temperature occur more frequently than large area anomalies, and that the relative frequency of the two types of event is modulated by natural climate variability and anthropogenic warming.
Other stories
- Welsh village to sue government over ‘alarmist’ rising sea level claim (The Telegraph)
- Arctic Sea Ice Hits New January Low (Scientific American via ClimateWire)
- Met Office fears Brexit would damage its climate models (Climate Home)
- Lord Bourne: UK can lead clean energy revolution (BusinessGreen)
- Greenhouse gases could destroy the possibility of extraterrestrial life (The Daily Mail)
- Australia’s greenest city: Adelaide pulls ahead of Sydney and Melbourne (The Guardian Sustainable Business)
- UN asks the world: What does the Paris Agreement mean for you? (BusinessGreen)
- Carbon Capture and (no) Storage? (BusinessGreen)