Climate 411

This post is by Andy Darrell, vice president for Living Cities at Environmental Defense Fund.

The high cost of gas has pushed retail gas purchases down 2 to 3 percent. What are people doing instead? Taking public transportation!

The first quarter report from the American Public Transportation Association (APTA) found that use of public transportation is skyrocketing in tandem with gas prices. Last year 10.3 billion trips were taken on U.S. public transportation — the highest in 50 years. Ridership on streetcars, trolleys, commuter rails, subways, and buses are all up. Even Amtrak ridership is soaring.

This shift presents an historic opportunity.

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This post is by Sheryl Canter, an online writer and editorial manager at Environmental Defense Fund.

According to a poll conducted in June by the Pew Research Center, soaring gas prices have caused a significant shift in American attitudes in just four months. American priorities, they say, have shifted strongly towards energy exploration and drilling, and away from conservation.

Is environmentalism dead, or is this result mainly due to how Pew framed the survey questions? I think the latter.

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This post is by Carol Andress, who manages outreach to the U.S. House of Representatives at Environmental Defense Fund.

Two new cap-and-trade bills were introduced in the House in June:

• Investing in Climate Action & Protection Act (Markey, D-MA, H.R. 6186)
• Climate MATTERS Act (Doggett/Blumenauer/Van Hollen, H.R. 6316)

They aren’t the first cap-and-trade bills to be introduced in this Congress, but they bring the discussion to a new level.

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This post is by Sheryl Canter, an online writer and editorial manager at Environmental Defense Fund.

Compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs) use 75 percent less electricity than incandescent light bulbs for the same amount of light. (For why, see Bill’s post "Why Switch to Compact Fluorescents".) But some people fear CFLs because of the tiny amount of mercury they contain. The risk from a broken CFL is extremely small, but CFLs should be disposed of properly so landfills aren’t polluted. Sealing used bulbs in plastic bags before placing them in the trash can slow the release of mercury if the bulb breaks. But recycling is ideal.

The problem, until now, has been that recycling CFLs was inconvenient for post people. That’s about to change, thanks to Home Depot. The New York Times reported this week that Home Depot will offer CFL recycling at all of its nearly 2000 U.S. stores. That puts 75 percent of Americans within 10 miles of a CFL recycling location.

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This post is by Lisa Moore, Ph.D., a scientist in the Climate and Air program at Environmental Defense Fund.

IPCC scientists have been saying for years that man-made global warming is likely to increase extreme weather events. A new report ("Weather and Climate Extremes in a Changing Climate") from U.S. government scientists confirms these findings, and focuses specifically on the U.S.

It’s certainly timely, considering the devastating floods in the Midwest.

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This post is by James Wang, Ph.D., a climate scientist at Environmental Defense.

The record floodwaters in Iowa and other parts of the Midwest are claiming lives, destroying homes and crops, contaminating drinking water, and – as the AP puts it – spreading "a noxious brew of sewage, farm chemicals, and fuel that could sicken anyone who wades in." The cost in human anguish is incalculable.

But why is it happening? Is it just a freak of nature? One causal element, as reported in today’s Washington Post, may be human reengineering of the landscape. Mary Kelly, who heads up EDF’s rivers and deltas program, gives a good overview of these issues.

Another element may be global warming, which increases the probability of extreme weather events like torrential rain.

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