faulker083

Accountability depends on how you see it. Being held accountable, or responsible, depends on whether you accept responsibility, or if a more powerful agent (like your government) holds you liable. You can’t get blood from a stone. The strange reversal of environmental accountability since our recent elections, where polluters got their champions to head our government and our lead environmental agencies, highlights this conundrum.  War on the EPA How Scott Pruitt went from fighting the Environmental Protection Agency to running it and rolling back years of policy. (October 11, 2017, PBS Frontline) Dreary as it seems at the moment, it isn’t likely that the polluters will win anything but a little more time for them to make more money. Renewable energy is burying coal economically along with natural gas—which, despite its “clean” reputation, is a polluting fossil fuel also. However, physics still trumps politics on this planet and because the accumulation of manmade greenhouse gas e...

Is it possible that much of the Climate Change news that optimists characterize as pessimism is simply realism? Independent of human sentiment, the Arctic is melting, the parts-per-million of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere is steadily going up, and our oceans are absorbing much of the human-caused heat buildup —causing rising seas and more acidity. As scientists monitor and study the effects of greenhouse gas emissions being pumped into our climate system, the experts are finding that it is increasingly likely that our everyday weather, extreme weather events, our ecosystems, wildlife, and humanity itself are being negatively influenced by Climate Change. Scientists aren’t being pessimistic when they seek to unravel the consequences of Climate Change; they are reporting to humanity about a vital issue. According to Google, optimism is “hopefulness and confidence about the future or the successful outcome of something” and pessimism is its antonym. That is to say, both optimism a...

As we go further into Climate Change, a wormhole of environmental impacts from which we may not emerge, our priorities are going to change. However, ultimately, we will be striving for a sustainable future. The Holy Grail, as it were, for addressing Climate Change is to quickly change our collective behavior towards our planet so that life for our species goes on as long as possible. Along the way through the wormhole, we will continually have to adjust our priorities and cut our losses to achieve our ultimate goal. I don’t know if all people agree with this goal, but they should. Life loves life and does what it must to keep on living. Even when we develop artificial intelligence (AI), we are finding that if self-survival is not programed into the software it will either develop a form of self-preservation itself or we must do it if the artificial entity is going to achieve our goals. You cannot achieve any goals if you and those who were supposed to come after you are dead. On the m...

Local impacts of Climate Change One of the ways a community gathers information about how Climate Change will impact them and how they will address the consequences is through a Climate Action Plan (CAP). It takes years of data gathering and collaboration to produce a CAP that diverse groups can sign on to. But it’s all worth it. The disaster occurring now in Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria highlights why Climate Action Plans are critical. In major extreme weather disasters, public health, insurance issues, infrastructure (transportation, water, wastewater, telecommunications) all reach a tipping point if communities are not ready for the worse. You really understand the vital connections between our infrastructures and Climate Change when you consider Puerto Rico’s power grid plight.    Why Puerto Rico faces a monumental recovery effort Almost a week after Hurricane Maria pounded its way across Puerto Rico as a Category 4 storm with sustained winds of 155 mph, t...

While not labeled a climate indicator by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the steady increase in the number of lakes in our Rochester, NY region getting nailed by blue-green algae blooms spells Climate Change. More nutrients mixing with warmer waters, and heavy precipitation (which is on the EPA’s indicator list) are a likely sign  of Climate Change in our region. Over the last few years, there’s been an astonishing increase in blue-green algae blooms and this problem isn’t going to go away by ignoring Climate Change.   Blue-green algae blooms reported in 7 Finger Lakes, including Skaneateles  It's been a bad week for the Finger Lakes and blue-green algae — a very bad week indeed. Canandaigua, Keuka, Cayuga, Conesus, Honeoye and Owasco, all Finger Lakes, appear on the NYS DEC harmful algal bloom notification list that was updated this afternoon. Joining them is a real eye-opener: Skaneateles Lake, which reported a bloom this week for the first time...

When is the best time to talk about Climate Change? Now, after record-breaking hurricanes, before our elections, in elementary school where we start to learn about the sciences, at Thanksgiving or Christmas family gatherings, at community gatherings, over a drink at the local tavern, on social media, while driving and connected to our Smartphones, only when taking a college course on Climate Change, at a meeting where people already agree on addressing this crisis, while on a vacation or a long bike ride, at a bus stop while waiting for a bus, during a doctor visit, while walking the dog, on a date, jogging down the street with a friend, intermission at a movie or basketball game, or after every environmental emergency, every appointment, while watching a sports event, TV show, or only after every other thing has been exhausted and there’s nothing left to talk about (and even then just keeping quiet about Climate Change would be preferable)? My guess, after watching this issue unfold o...

Climate Change is complicated. It can and does contain so many consequences (some known and who knows how many unknowns?) that we won’t be able to prepare for all of them. This tragic case is further exasperated by the climate denial meme that turns our innate ability to imagine adaptation solutions upside-down. Instead of doing what our species does best, adapt to changing conditions, and maybe in the process become a better and more just species, we are still pushing back against the very science that proves Climate Change. What’s been normal for humanity is to try and understand the nature of disasters and plan for avoiding or dealing with them. To do so in this worldwide crisis, we need as much information as possible and many minds engaged in working out just what this man-made climate change means.   Climate Change is more than protecting ourselves against the most striking forms of this change, flooding, and wildfires. It is the infinite vicissitudes that come with the inter...