We Dont Know for Sure, and the Death Toll is Still Climbing The 2018 hurricane season is now upon us, even while millions of people residing in hurricane alley the large swath of ocean stretching from Africa to North America are still recovering from the hyperactive, catastrophic 2017 hurricane season. Last year we [...]
Nearly three dozen nuclear power plants are inadequately protected against major flooding guaranteed to occur after an upstream dam failure – flooding that could easily lead to an accident or meltdown on the scale of the 2011 nuclear power disaster in Fukushima, Japan. Yet, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) – the federal agency responsible for [...]
By Anne Polansky and Michael Termini More than one full year into a Donald Trump presidency, we are taking stock of the new political landscape, already marked by turmoil and volatility. Never before in modern US history have we seen such instability and unreliability in basic governance at the federal level. Here in the nation’s [...]
The U.S. Global Change Research Program released three major reports this afternoon: the final Climate Science Special Report (CCSR), the public review draft of the Fourth National Climate Assessment (NCA4) and the public review draft of the 2nd State of the Carbon Cycle Report (SOCCR-2).
By Anne Polansky CSPW Sr. Climate Policy Analyst Federal whistleblower Joel Clement charged both Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke and President Donald Trump with “poor leadership, waste, and … failures on climate change” in a fiercely critical letter of resignation submitted yesterday, effective tomorrow. In the letter, Clement accused President Trump and top Department of Interior [...]
ExxonMobil, which refuses to acknowledge risks associated with climate change impacts, owns two large refineries in Texas that are poorly prepared for sea level rise, storm surges, extreme flooding, and so on, and now Hurricane Harvey has caused damage to oil facilities and interrupted operations for weeks. Will ExxonMobil now begin to disclose these climate-related risks to shareholders?
By Anne Polansky Source: https://go.nasa.gov/2vXO0Vm Covering the year 2013, this is our latest installment in a timeline series addressing how the Exxon Mobil Corporation has characterized risks to its business operations associated with climate change (in its annual 10-K reports to shareholders), in light of what corporate leadership knew, or reasonably could have [...]
Troubled and opaque Administration review process is a harbinger of problems for the Fourth National Climate Assessment By Nicky Sundt CSPW Senior Fellow A final draft of a key federal report on the science behind climate change has been leaked to the New York Times and made public. The Climate Science Special Report (CSSR), produced [...]
By Anne Polansky and Nicky Sundt Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt, Department of Energy Secretary Rick Perry, and others are calling for a red-team/blue-team (RT/BT) exercise to resolve differences of opinion regarding the science of global climate change. The approach is meant to resolve conflict through a structured debate. It is typically employed by [...]
By Nicky Sundt Nicky Sundt has joined the Government Accountability Project (GAP) as a Senior Fellow for GAP’s Climate Science & Policy Watch (CSPW) program. She is an expert on energy and climate change with over 35 years of experience and accomplishment in government, non-governmental organizations, and the private sector. During the four-month fellowship, Nicky [...]