Letter From DC: Remembering Tom Lovejoy
Society of Environmental Journalists' Executive Director Meaghan Parker pays tribute to the late Thomas Lovejoy (pictured, left), famed conservation biologist known as the "Godfather of Biodiversity."
Society of Environmental Journalists' Executive Director Meaghan Parker pays tribute to the late Thomas Lovejoy (pictured, left), famed conservation biologist known as the "Godfather of Biodiversity."
"Scores of studies presented this week at the world’s largest climate science conference offered an unequivocal and unsettling message: Climate change is fundamentally altering what kind of weather is possible, and its fingerprint can be found in the rising number of disasters that have claimed lives and upended livelihoods around the world."
"Researchers found ads placed by Google on sites that falsely call global warming a hoax. The revenue those sites earn from the ads can fund further misinformation."
"Six environmental organizations on Tuesday called on the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to take more aggressive action in response to reports that an agency office manipulated assessments of chemical safety."
"The immense and forbidding Southern Ocean is famous for howling gales and devilish swells that have tested mariners for centuries. But its true strength lies beneath the waves." "Wilder winds are altering currents. The sea is releasing carbon dioxide. Ice is melting from below."
"Scientists have been able to draw links between a warming planet and hurricanes, heat waves and droughts, attributing the likelihood that climate change played a role in individual isolated events. The same can’t be said for tornadoes yet."
"The changes happening at the top of the planet could unfold elsewhere in the years to come, scientists report." "Across the icy dome that crowns the Earth, rising temperatures are turning the tundra greener and more lush. Beavers are expanding their range. Garbage from passing ships is fouling the shores. Wildfires are scorching the once permanently frozen lands of Siberia."
"Scientists have discovered a series of worrying weaknesses in the ice shelf holding back one of Antarctica’s most dangerous glaciers, suggesting that this important buttress against sea level rise could shatter within the next three to five years."
"Nasty winter tornadoes — like the deadly ones last week that hit five states — are likely to be stronger and stay on the ground longer with a wider swath of destruction in a warming world, a new study shows."
What does wildness mean when humans interfere with the lives of wild animals in order to protect them? A new volume, “Wild Souls,” explores that dilemma, whether arising through captive breeding programs to reintroduce the California condor and the gray wolf, by allowing hybridization or through the use of gene-editing tools. A review from BookShelf contributor Jenny Weeks.