Environment

It’s so good to see some climate scientists at last starting to speak up about the awful over the top things Extinction Rebellion activists are saying, though I wish more would speak up and speak up more strongly. Rupert Read is a philosophy professor. Don’t watch his video if you are like the children and adults I help who get terrified of climate change. Yes we do need to act on climate change. But we need to be informed by science. He is surely well grounded in philosophy. However, what he says in the video about climate science is mistaken. A happy Child - with text: Extinction Rebellion…

Polystyrene, one of the world's most common plastics (one popular product is Styrofoam), degrades in decades when exposed to sunlight, rather than thousands of years as previously claimed.  Polystyrene has been routinely detected in the world's oceans since the 1970s., though at nowhere near levels it should be. In fact, only 1 percent of the plastic that should be found is detectable. Chemistry may be why. The idea that sunlight degrades plastics is nothing new, but the new study shows sunlight doesn't just cause the plastics to physically break down--it also causes them to degrade…

We often get scary stories saying that Arctic methane emissions are increasing. Recently many are panicking about a story in NewsWeek which has been widely retweeted. When you drill down to the details is about a tiny patch of Arctic methane bubbles in the sea, four or five square meters in area. Sea "boiling" with methane discovered in Siberia: "No one has ever recorded anything like this before" This is the original Russian text, as auto translated: On the right side of the Keldysh, they saw a spot of emerald color against the background of dark water. Approaching it, scientists were able…

This is another scary headline that doesn’t mean what it seems to mean from the titles. We do not risk a world without the conker tree and there is no way it can go extinct. After all it is easy to cultivate. Here is an example story to debunk: 'Alarming' extinction threat to Europe's trees (BBC) They say Ravaged by moths and disease, the horse chestnut is now classified as vulnerable to extinction. The tree is among more than 400 native European tree species assessed for their risk of extinction by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN). About half face disappearing…

     Habitat loss, climate change, unregulated harvest and pollution have all contributed to severe ecological challenges encompassing countless species around the world. The inordinate focus on species extinction has, ironically, led to an under appreciation of the environmental dangers caused by the loss of abundance within still common species. Indeed, these significant declines can degrade ecosystem integrity, reducing vital ecological, evolutionary, economic and social services that various organisms provide to their environment.      Birds are excellent…

As young children worldwide protest over climate change, I thought I'd do a post about Bernie Sanders' Green Climate Change plan. (click to watch on Youtube) Bernie Sanders' idea is one of many ideas but one of the ones that promises the most radical action most quickly. He plans to spend $16 trillion on it, and claims that all of this will be recovered, that it will pay for itself. It doesn't have to be done this way. The UK and California are already committed to zero emissions by 2050 - and some countries have 100% renewables already, without having to do massive government programs…

This is another study that has hit the news, this time scaring people with the idea that the whole of the US may lose all its birds rapidly in the near future. Short summary - studies like this are hard to do and the 3 billion figure should be treated cautiously - there can be observer effects. If accurate, the reductions are mainly in the most common birds, and some of them nuisance species such as the starlings. There is no possibility of the most common birds in the US going extinct. We have had several reports published recently that got lots of media attention that were low quality such…

This is a story that is scaring some people. New research that is suggesting that perhaps the climate is more sensitive to CO2 than previously thought - but this is way jumping the gun. We get many results like this sometimes running too hot, sometimes too cold. Only the ones that go too hot hit the headlines. But the IPCC will look at all the evidence with their next high level review in 2021. Meanwhile we should use the values for the high level review in 2018 which remains our best estimate to date. This is another article I'm writing to support people we help in the Facebook Doomsday…

It's only 0.11% of UK greenhouse gas emissions and there are replacements already in use industrially as we ramp down to zero emissions by 2050. This is a known problem, the technology to solve it has been in development since 2016 and in commercial use since 2016. Although it's only a fraction of a percent of emissions, it is important for the future as we ramp down to zero emissions. There is nothing here to be scared of, and we can still use renewables. This is another click bait article by the BBC that’s being shared widely on twitter today. Dozens of shares. It's the most powerful…

The final results of of the latest annual Pesticide Residue Monitoring Program found that samples are again below the tolerance levels set by the EPA. The FDA evaluates foods annually for pesticide residues. Final results from the surveys are released after they have undergone a thorough quality assurance review. But organic pesticides are not separated out. However, there is no reason to believe organic farmers are under any less cost pressure than regular farmers. Both have to maximize yields while minimizing costs and for farmers that often means real-time data on soil conditions and…