Climate and energy

New study traces how climate change has gradually changed the timing of the seasons. During spring in North America, 89 plant species have started flowering earlier in the spring, and bird breeding and migration patterns have moved earlier as well. With the seasonal change of food supplies and sea ice, polar bears have turned to cannibalism and their population has declined (Reuters). Quotable from the lead researcher:

The link between human-caused global warming — generated by industrial and vehicle emissions of carbon dioxide to produce a temperature-boosting greenhouse effect — and observed biological and physical changes is very strong, she said.

On a global scale, the correlation is more than 99 percent between the two factors; on a continental scale, she said, the correlation if very likely between 90 and 99 percent.

Building on IPCC research, this mega study combined 30,000 data sets from case studies of biological and physical changes around the world. It matched the results with a detailed database of global temperature change, dating from 1970-2004.

Department of Interior lists polar bear listed as threatened species. DOI made the decision based on the dramatic loss of polar bear habitat, the melting of Arctic sea ice, that has occurred over the past three decades. However, they warned that the decision should not be seen as related to global warming, and that above it all it shouldn’t change any economic development initiatives like building power plants (Wash. Post). Interesting quotable:

Interior spokeswoman Tina Kreisher said the ruling will still allow energy exploration in Alaska and will not affect power plants and other greenhouse gas emitters in the contiguous United States, but that the department would establish a management plan for polar bears and monitor their populations.

“There isn’t a power plant right next to these bears,” Kreisher said. “That’s the quandary here.”

CEP analysis: Climate change messes with how we traditionally analyze risk. Risk is much easier to understand on a small scale – when you can point to a substance or an action that leads to an easily quantifiable, immediate impact.

But when that risk involves many separate causes and it affects an entire atmosphere, an entire planet – it’s a lot harder to wrap your head and even your science around. And the risk may be even too big for puny human efforts to completely quantify.

Which leaves us… where?

Cool story about strange bedfellows. Sort of related to climate and energy. I’m mostly posting it because I love it when politics don’t line up like they’re supposed to. Increasingly, environmental issues make this happen a lot.

Such as in Colorado, where hunters and environmentalists are joining forces in the fight against expanded oil and gas drilling (CSMonitor). This particular fight is over the Roan Plateau. Quotable:

The coalition’s fight is part of a rising opposition of sportsmen to the effects of energy development – a force reshaping Colorado politics and altering environmental politics across the West.

“We started organizing and speaking out, loud and clear,” says David Peterson, co-chair of Colorado Backcountry Hunters and Anglers and state field director for Trout Unlimited’s public lands initiative. “It was really Bush’s arrogance that created today’s conservation movement among disgruntled sportsmen, mostly traditional-values Republicans – ‘Roosevelt Republicans,’ I call them.”

How is this happening? In part because the terms of the debate are changing. In this case, both sportsmen and environmentalists are in favor of moderation and limits when it comes to industrial development.

… Sportsmen involved in the dispute say they do not oppose drilling outright. They just want to see it done right.

“We have never encountered something like this on this scale – there is no precedent,” says Bob Elderkin, president of the Rifle chapter of the Colorado Mule Deer Association, recently retired from overseeing oil and gas leasing for the BLM. He says he understands the need for energy development, but adds: “I’ve been around the oil patch long enough to know that when this is played out, this entire area will look like an industrial zone.”

Keith Goddard of Rifle, an outfitter who leads hunting and fishing trips on the Roan, has been one of the most vocal opponents of drilling on the plateau. Early on in the fight, he joined with environmental groups. From behind his bushy cowboy mustache, Mr. Goddard says, “Years ago, I never thought I would sit at the same table as environmentalists. Now I am proud to have worked with these people.”

The feeling is mutual, as environmentalists, who have felt marginalized in public lands planning under the Bush administration, have found powerful new partners.

Kind of funny, isn’t it? Today’s bipartisan politics pretty much depends on keeping so-called gun-toting rednecks/ NASCAR types, and so-called anti-gun hippies, completely separate.

Hmm, what does happen to the politicians if these two groups get together?

— Maril Hazlett, www.climateandenergy.org