Saturday, February 16, 2013

Another Day, Another Warning

The American Association for the Advancement of Science annual convention is underway in Boston and climate change seems to be what everyone is talking about.

Heat waves have become more frequent across the United States, with western regions setting records for the number of such events in the 2000s, said Donald Wuebbles, a geoscientist with the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

But the Midwest and Northeast have experienced a 45 percent and 74 percent increase, respectively, in the heaviest rainfalls those regions have seen since 1950.

The extreme drought that plagued Texas in 2011 has spread to New Mexico, Louisiana, Oklahoma, and northern Mexico, said John Nielsen-Gammon, Texas State's climatologist at Texas A&M University in College Station.

"The science is clear and convincing that climate change is happening and it's happening rapidly. There's no debate within the science community ... about the changes occurring in the Earth's climate and the fact that these changes are occurring in response to human activities," said Wuebbles. 

Meanwhile, Harper enviroshill, Peter Kent, says it won't take much work to boost Canada's credibility on climate change with the Americans.

"Certainly, I don't think we have to go very far to build that credibility," Kent said in response to a reporter's question.

"We're doing a lot. Our American friends know that."

Canada, he added, has worked closely with the U.S. on many joint projects, including international initiatives.

"We work aggressively with the United States on climate change to encourage some of the foot-draggers, the major emitters in the developing world, to step up to their responsibilities," Kent said.
Canada has also been regulating sector by sector, like in the U.S., he said.

"We're deep into finalizing new regulations for the oil and gas industry, including the oilsands, which is an area of particular misrepresented and exaggerated impact in the United States," Kent said.

Is there anything, anything at all, Peter Kent won't say?

 

4 comments:

Owen Gray said...

One gets the impression, Mound, that when Peter opens his mouth he empties his head.

Anonymous said...

The pollution in China, should scare the hell out of everyone. Farmers have had to leave their farms. The land is polluted with heavy metals and cancer causing agents. Their clean drinking water is dwindling too. China's horrendous pollution is drifting into other country's. China's pollution index, is off the charts.

Weather extremes in, Australia, Africa, the U.S. India, China, are endangered country's. We can expect a severe global shortage of food, and clean drinking water.

It's as they say. Man is the most destructive animal of this earth and, the most stupid one at that.

Anonymous said...

Joe Hall kinda figured it out decades ago....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LWmvL6b5G6k

Anonymous said...

What he won't say? I quit.