ClimateScienceWatch |
Promoting integrity in the use of climate science in government |
Climate Science Watch is a nonprofit public interest education and advocacy project dedicated to holding public officials accountable for the integrity and effectiveness with which they use climate science and related research in government policymaking, toward the goal of enabling society to respond effectively to the challenges posed by global warming and climate change. See Details |
House subcommittee hearing April 1 on FEMA toxic trailers and mistreatment of CDC whistleblower
Posted on Monday, March 31, 2008
Tomorrow (April 1) the House Science Investigations and Oversight Subcommittee will hold a hearing (“Toxic Trailers: Have the Centers for Disease Control Failed to Protect Public Health?”) to further investigate the belated discovery of high levels of formaldehyde in trailers that FEMA provided to displaced Katrina victims. The hearing (also webcast) will feature testimony by Dr. Christopher De Rosa, former toxicology director at the CDC’s Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, testifying after being unfairly demoted and placed on a termination track for fighting to tell the truth about formaldehyde’s toxicity. We applaud DeRosa’s public service, including his decision to be a whistleblower.
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FEMA’s toxic-trailer ineptitude in housing Katrina victims raises concern about climate preparedness
Posted on Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Better means for providing temporary living quarters for those whose homes are damaged or destroyed in natural disasters must be identified and implemented to avoid future mistakes and additional harm to victims of extreme weather events, projected to worsen with global climatic disruption. The Federal Energy Management Agency (FEMA) is facing accusations of negligence, dishonesty, and unaccountability in its task of providing safe, alternate housing for displaced victims of hurricanes Katrina and Rita, and is the target of Congressional investigations and a class action lawsuit for dispatching formaldehyde-laden “toxic trailers.” We are calling for a “lessons learned” case analysis to inform future disaster recovery efforts as part of a National Climate Change Preparedness Initiative.
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6,000 square mile Wilkins Ice Shelf on Antarctic Peninsula “hangs by a thread”
Posted on Tuesday, March 25, 2008
On March 25 the British Antarctic Survey reported that the Wilkins Ice Shelf, which covered an area of 16,000 km2 (larger than the state of Connecticut), appears to be on the verge of breaking away from the Antarctic Peninsula. The BAS says this is the largest ice shelf on the peninsula yet to be threatened, “another identifiable impact of climate change on the Antarctic environment.” Satellite images processed at the US National Snow and Ice Data Center reveal a disintegration “pattern that has become characteristic of climate-caused ice shelf retreats.”
“The alarm clock that all the plants and animals are listening to is running too fast.”
Posted on Saturday, March 22, 2008
"The fingerprints of human-driven climate change are evident in seasonal timing changes for thousands of species on Earth, according to dozens of studies and last year’s authoritative report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. More than 30 scientists told [science writer Seth Borenstein] of the Associated Press how global warming is affecting plants and animals at springtime across the country, in nearly every state....’It’s an early warning sign in that it’s an additional onslaught that a lot of our threatened species can’t handle,’ said Notre Dame biology professor Jessica Hellmann....’The alarm clock that all the plants and animals are listening to is running too fast.’ Stanford University biologist Terry Root said.” (See article here, and archived.)
“Homeland security will require readiness against climate change.”
Posted on Saturday, March 22, 2008
In his opinion article (archived) “Insecure About Climate Change” (Washington Post, March 22), Joshua W. Busby of the University of Texas at Austin presents ideas for action on risk reduction and adaptation, mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions, and institutional changes in the U.S. government to prepare the U.S. to deal with the threat posed by global climatic disruption. Busby’s report, Climate Change and National Security, was published by the Council on Foreign Relations.
National Climate Change Preparedness Initiative—Initial prospectus for review and comment
Posted on Friday, March 21, 2008
Climate Science Watch will call on the next President and Congress to undertake a National Climate Change Preparedness process to reduce the rate of global climatic disruption while improving our ability to adapt to its unavoidable impacts. We outline here our National Climate Change Preparedness Initiative prospectus for review and comment.
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GAP press release on stealth release of climate change transportation impacts report
Posted on Friday, March 14, 2008
A March 14 news release by the Government Accountability Project leads with: “This past Wednesday, March 12, the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) and the U.S. Climate Change Science Program quietly released a major assessment report on the likely impacts of global climate disruption on a wide range of transportation infrastructure in the Gulf Coast region. This report release was buried by the DOT, and officials have been blocking journalists from speaking with the report’s lead author.”
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Stealth release of major federal study of Gulf Coast climate change transportation impacts
Posted on Thursday, March 13, 2008
On March 12 the U.S. government released a major assessment report on the likely impacts of global climate disruption on a wide range of transportation systems and infrastructure in the U.S. Gulf Coast region. The report was released in a way that was clearly intended to minimize public attention to it, and our media sources say the Department of Transportation is blocking journalists from talking with the lead author at the agency about the findings in the report. Why? Read on....
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Waxman to EPA: Why is work on required greenhouse gas regulation being blocked?
Posted on Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Since the Environmental Protection Agency informed the White House in December 2007 of its finding that carbon dioxide emissions are a danger to the United States and proposed significant cuts in motor vehicle emissions, the agency’s regulatory efforts have been halted. In a March 12 letter to EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson, House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Henry Waxman cites information provided to the Committee by seven senior EPA officials on how a major effort to comply with the Supreme Court ruling in Massachusetts v. EPA has beeen blocked.
Nature editorial on EPA administrator’s “reckless disregard” for law and science on climate change
Posted on Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Nature, the international weekly science journal, criticized U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Stephen Johnson’s “reckless disregard for law, science or the agency’s own rules - or, it seems, the anguished protests of his own subordinates.” The March 6 editorial ("The EPA’s tailspin") focused on the Bush administration’s hostility to regulation of greenhouse gas emissions.
EPA unions charge Administrator Johnson violates agency’s Principles of Scientific Integrity
Posted on Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Four unions representing most of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s scientists, attorneys, and other specialists, citing what they consider to be repeated instances of broken pledges or bad faith on multiple issues by Administrator Stephen Johnson—including refusal to enforce the agency’s Principles of Scientific Integrity on the California greenhouse gas waiver decision and other environmental issues—served notice in a February 29 letter that was released by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility that they will secede from the agency’s labor-management cooperative forum.
Former IPCC chairman Robert Watson says world leaders “squandered” last 10 years on climate change
Posted on Wednesday, March 12, 2008
World leaders wasted a decade debating whether global warming is happening, and now need to act quickly to limit its effects, former Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Chairman Robert Watson said at the Oceanology International conference in London March 11. Watson, now chief scientific aviser at the UK environment ministry, said “If we don’t want to be faced with sea level rise for thousands of years, we have to act now to reduce CO2.’’ (Bloomberg, March 11)
Climate change, disinformation, and the failure of preparedness
Posted on Tuesday, March 11, 2008
"The aftermath in Iraq, the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina—failure of preparedness—and we’re doing the same thing on climate change, it’s just a more slow-rolling disaster.” CSW director Rick Piltz talks with the North Adams (MA) Transcript.
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Sen. McCain’s mockery of a significant federal scientific grizzly bear study
Posted on Monday, March 10, 2008
The Washington Post’s March 10 front page story, “McCain Sees Pork Where Scientists See Success—Candidate Criticizes Ambitious Bear Study,” illustrates two things to us once more: (1) the Senator is not always careful about how he uses, or misuses, scientific research; and (2) a complete rejection of appropriations earmarks makes no more sense than the politically cynical use of them.
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Environmental groups sue Bush administration to force polar bear protection
Posted on Monday, March 10, 2008
Today the Center for Biological Diversity, Greenpeace, and the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) sued the Bush administration for missing its legal deadline for issuing a final decision on whether to list the polar bear under the Endangered Species Act due to global warming. Faced with overwhelming scientific evidence, the Bush administration continues illegally to delay listing.
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