Climate Change

"Scott Pruitt, the head of the Environmental Protection Agency, plans to convene a team of researchers to test the scientific premise of human-caused climate change, he told coal industry executives on Thursday."

"A year ago, the U.S. House tried to block the military from preparing for climate change. Now, several GOP members have voted to support studying the security risks."

"In forceful remarks before Germany’s Parliament on Thursday, Chancellor Angela Merkel vowed to defend the ­international climate agreement spurned by the Trump administration, anticipating a difficult meeting of the leaders of the world’s major economies next week in Hamburg."

"Fourteen states — including Oregon and Washington — are threatening to sue the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for violating the Clean Air Act. In a letter to the EPA sent Thursday, the group argues Director Scott Pruitt broke the law when he ordered his agency to halt part of the rule-making process for regulating methane and other air pollution from oil and gas facilities."

"About 10 per cent of Alberta’s 1,500 abandoned oil and gas wells in urban areas are leaking methane, in some cases at levels that create the risk of health damage and explosions, according to an unreleased 2016 report."

"A federal appeals court said the Environmental Protection Agency should not have been ordered by a lower court judge to assess how its air regulations affect coal industry jobs, in a defeat for Murray Energy Corp, a large coal miner."

"Without effective action to bend the upward curve of greenhouse gas emissions, parts of the American South could experience more than a 20 percent drop in economic activity due to global warming by the end of the century, according to a new analysis of the regional economic risks of climate change."

"In the aftermath of Britain's departure from the European Union and the U.S.'s withdrawal from the Paris climate pact, the bloc's remaining members must take greater responsibility for 'existential' challenges the world faces, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said."

"CAPE GRIM, Tasmania — On the best days, the wind howling across this rugged promontory has not touched land for thousands of miles, and the arriving air seems as if it should be the cleanest in the world. But on a cliff above the sea, inside a low-slung government building, a bank of sophisticated machines sniffs that air day and night, revealing telltale indicators of the way human activity is altering the planet on a major scale."