NASA cuts off international climate science support

By -
By Paul Voosen, Science. 

Excerpt: The world’s nations convened this week in Hangzhou, China, to plan the next major international assessment of climate science—but without the United States. Late last week, President Donald Trump’s administration denied officials permission to travel to the meeting and cut off a technical support contract for the report, the seventh assessment of the United Nations’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The decision, first reported by Axios, is the first time the administration has targeted international climate science. The news caught climate scientists off guard. During the first Trump administration there was no interference with IPCC .... The U.S. has long been a leader of IPCC, which for decades has brought volunteer scientists together, unpaid, to produce influential reports every seven or so years. Katherine Calvin, NASA’s chief scientist, was set to co-lead IPCC’s third working group, focused on climate mitigation, for its seventh assessment, due near the end of the decade. Former President Joe Biden’s administration committed roughly $1.5 million for a technical support unit (TSU), a small team that would help with creating graphics and websites, running meetings, and editing the group’s report....

Popular posts from this blog

2024 was the hottest year on record, breaching a critical climate goal and capping 10 years of unprecedented heat

By -
By Laura Paddison , CNN.  Excerpt: It’s official: 2024 was the hottest year on record, breaking the  previous record  set in 2023 and pushing the world over a critical climate threshold, according to new data from Europe’s climate monitoring agency Copernicus [ https://climate.copernicus.eu/copernicus-2024-first-year-exceed-15degc-above-pre-industrial-level ]. Last year was 1.6 degrees hotter than the period before humans began burning large amounts of fossil fuels, Copernicus found. It makes 2024 the first calendar year to breach  the 1.5-degree limit  countries agreed to avoid under the Paris climate agreement in 2015. Scientists are much more concerned about breaches over decades, rather than single years — as above that threshold humans and ecosystems may struggle to adapt — but 2024’s   record   “does mean we’re getting dangerously close,” said Joeri Rogelj, a climate professor at Imperial College London....  Full article at https://www.cnn.c...
Read more

Where Glaciers Melt, the Rivers Run Red

By -
By Mitra Taj , The New York Times.  Excerpt: As the glaciers of South America retreat, the supply of freshwater is dwindling and its quality is getting worse. Dionisia Moreno, a 70-year-old Indigenous farmer, still remembers when Shallap River, nearly 13,000 feet up in the Cordillera Blanca, brought crystal clear water brimming with trout to her village, Jancu. “People and animals alike could drink the water without suffering,” she said. “Now the water is red. No one can drink it.”....  Full article at https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/19/science/peru-glaciers-water-pollution.html . 
Read more

Warmer, more crowded cities bring out the rats

By -
By Elizabeth Pennisi , Science.  Excerpt: Climate change  emerged as a driving factor behind urban rat swarms , the researchers report today in  Science Advances . As temperatures rise, they conclude, and people flock to urban areas and convert formerly “green” spaces into neighborhoods and shopping centers, they created a perfect storm for rat populations to explode. And the city that’s fared the worst over the past decade? Washington, D.C.....  Full article at https://www.science.org/content/article/warmer-more-crowded-cities-bring-out-rats . 
Read more