Climate / Climate Change
Accelerating Response

Companies acknowledge the problem / The Pope takes an active interest / The temperature at record levels in 2017

Burgess COMMENTARY

Peter Burgess

Zoya Teirstein 2 hours ago

DROPPING LIKE FLIES


William West/Getty Images

This major coal company is done with climate denial. One of the world’s largest mining companies, BHP Billiton, wants to pull out of the World Coal Association. It plans to leave the major international lobby group because of substantive differences in climate policy.

In a report on Tuesday, BHP said it accepts that “the warming of the climate is unequivocal, the human influence is clear, and physical impacts are unavoidable.” The World Coal Association said it was “disappointed.” Aw. Sad!

The British-Australian mining company also plans to revisit its relationship with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce because of President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Paris climate agreement. More than 100 companies have left the Chamber in recent years because of its extreme position on climate change.

BHP won’t officially leave the industry group or the Chamber until both bodies have provided responses to the company’s decision.

It’s not the first energy giant to put its foot down when it comes to climate change. Earlier this year, ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips expressed commitment to the Paris Agreement, whether or not Trump chose to withdraw (spoiler alert: he did).

Zoya Teirstein 1 day ago

HOLY HEADLINE, VATICAN


REUTERS/Andreas Solaro

The Vatican is holding a contest for climate change startups. The 2,000-year-old church agreed to host the challenge at the behest of Silicon Valley venture capitalists, who just named a first round of finalists, Bloomberg reports.

The nine winning startups (out of 300 applicants) received $100,000 grants to pursue their ideas, which range from apps to help communities clean up waste to solar light bulbs.

The money comes from investors, not the Vatican, but the program is named Laudato Si after Pope Francis’ 2015 encyclical addressing climate change. Program advisors include Google’s Chade-Meng Tan and Twitter’s Biz Stone. The Vatican does provide the location for the startup hub and the mentorship of Francis’ chief environmental advisor, Cardinal Peter Turkson.

Pope Francis has not been seen to use a mobile phone, but he is pretty active on Twitter. “May social media always be spaces that are rich in humanity,” he wished his 15 million followers earlier this month. And now he’s helping to drive innovation in high-tech, high-impact startups. All of this suggests the pope may be the only person on Earth with a healthy approach to technology.

Amelia Urry 1 day ago

THIS IS FINE

2017 will be the warmest year in history without an El Niño. Data released separately by NASA and NOAA on Monday show that on every continent and in every ocean basin, remarkable warmth has lingered planet-wide from last year’s record-breaking heights.

No matter what December might reasonably bring, 2017 will almost certainly end up as either the second or third warmest year since humans began keeping close track more than 120 years ago. Every major independent assessment of global temperatures confirms 2017’s lofty warmth. This year will fall short of only 2016 and possibly 2015, both of which were affected by a strong El Niño (which tends to boost global temperatures).


Gavin Schmidt ✔ @ClimateOfGavin GISTEMP 2017 annual mean will almost certainly (>98%) be the second warmest on record.

12:34 PM - Dec 18, 2017 14 14 Replies 215 215 Retweets 133 133 likes Twitter Ads info and privacy

The United States is on track for its third warmest year on record, with eight southern states from Arizona to Virginia on pace for their hottest years. Only a tiny section of eastern Washington state is on pace to record a cooler-than-average year.

Last month’s formation of a La Niña in the Pacific Ocean will likely lead to slightly cooler global temperatures in 2018. Regardless, next year is still likely to rank among the top 10 warmest years on record.

Eric Holthaus Dec 18, 2017