Tweet

It is a well-known fact that the unconventional gas industry is involved in an inherently toxic business, particularly through hydraulic fracturing ("fracking"), which the EPA just confirmed has contaminated groundwater in Wyoming. The documentary film "Gasland," DeSmogBlog's report "Fracking the Future: How Unconventional Gas Threatens our Water, Health, and Climate," and numerous other investigations, reports, and scientific studies have echoed the myriad problems with unconventional oil and gas around the globe.

Tweet

It’s only early January, and already we’re witnessing what could be the most devastating climate change story of the year.  A new study in Nature Geoscience this week shows that even if we go to zero emissions and completely halt our wholesale burning of fossil fuels, climate change will continue for the next 1,000 years. 

If only we could take solace in saying, “I told you so” to climate change deniers and the fossil fuel lobby fighting to confuse the public about climate change.  Such proclamations seem trite and trivial, however, when we’re faced with the burning reality that our dirty oil addiction is cooking the planet in an irreversible way. 

The study, conducted by University of Calgary and Environment Canada’s climate centre at the University of Victoria is the first full climate model simulation to make predictions 1,000 years into the future.  Dr. Shawn Marshall and his team explore the question: “What if we completely stopped using fossil fuels and put no more CO2 in the atmosphere?  How long would it then take to reverse current climate change trends and will things first become worse?”  Using simulations with the Canadian Earth System Model, the research team exploredzero-emissions scenarios if humans completely stop burning fossil fuels in 2010 and 2100.  

The article shows, devastatingly, that climate change will continue even if we stop our use of fossil fuels immediately.  We’ve had that much of an impact.  With this news, Canada’s head-in-sand approach to climate issues just won’t cut it. 

Tweet

After virtually abandoning the issue for three decades, the environmental movement got a bold reality check this week from a new book highlighting relentless human population growth as a driving force behind global warming.

This wouldn’t have raised eyebrows in the 1970s, when the modern environmental movement had its genesis and Paul Erlich’s “The Population Bomb” was on just about everybody’s bookshelf.

Since then, however, overpopulation has dropped from the vocabulary of most environmentalists despite a near doubling of the world’s numbers to an estimated 6.8 billion people today.

Tweet

A special series in The Lancet medical journal says if people eat fewer steaks and hamburgers it would cut the methane flatulence from cows, sheep and goats, which accounts for nearly a quarter of all emissions worldwide.

Tweet

Britain’s chief scientific adviser says global warming poses a greater threat than world terrorism and agreement must be reached within two years to mitigate global warming and minimize environmental catastrophe.

Tweet

A UN report has issued a desertification warning saying tens of millions of people could be driven from their homes, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa and Central Asia.

Without action, 50 million people could be displaced within 10 years.