Distributed Solar: The Democratizaton of Energy
Category Archives: carbon dioxide
What gives me hope … And it ain’t the small stuff
AS Arman Oganisian of Stable Markets writes “There are no solutions, only trade-offs.” That is a fundamentally engineering attitude. It is fundamentally about the economics, and, in particular, the dramatic drop in levelized cost of energy for wind and renewables, … Continue reading
Posted in Anthropocene, being carbon dioxide, biology, bridge to somewhere, Carbon Cycle, carbon dioxide, Carbon Worshipers, clean disruption, climate business, climate change, climate disruption, climate economics, climate justice, corporate litigation on damage from fossil fuel emissions, Cult of Carbon, decentralized electric power generation, decentralized energy, destructive economic development, disruption, distributed generation, ecological services, ecology, Ecology Action, economic trade, economics, engineering, environment, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuels, global warming, Green Tech Media, greenhouse gases, grid defection, Humans have a lot to answer for, Hyper Anthropocene, investing, investment in wind and solar energy, investments, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, local generation, local self reliance, Sankey diagram, smart data, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, Sonnen community, the energy of the people, the green century, the tragedy of our present civilization, the value of financial assets, tragedy of the horizon, wind energy, wind power, wishful environmentalism, zero carbon
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and Then There’s Physics does “Talking solutions and motivating action”
And Then There’s Physics does a fine post about scientists “talking about solutions and motivating action”. But I felt the figure from Dr Glen Peters needed to be updated a bit, with a status briefing. So, below: (Click on image … Continue reading
Uh, oh: Loss of control ahead …
In the technical summary from the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory based at the California Institute of Technology titled “Far northern permafrost may unleash Carbon within decades”, An excerpt: Permafrost in the coldest northern Arctic — formerly thought to be at … Continue reading
Posted in Anthropocene, bridge to nowhere, carbon dioxide, carbon dioxide capture, civilization, clear air capture of carbon dioxide, climate, climate change, climate disruption, climate economics, Cult of Carbon, destructive economic development, ecological services, environment, fermentation, fossil fuels, geoengineering, global blinding, Global Carbon Project, global warming, greenhouse gases, Humans have a lot to answer for, Hyper Anthropocene, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, liberal climate deniers, permafrost, wishful environmentalism, zero carbon
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Certainly not “clean coal”, but is zero emission natural gas combustion a key to a zero Carbon future?
Eli Rabett has a great idea over at Rabett Run. And I particularly like the directions which commentators Russell Seitz and John O’Neill are going with it. Hmmm, Dimethyl ether as a fuel? It’s been proposed. (Click on image for … Continue reading
Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, Anthropocene, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, bridge to somewhere, Buckminster Fuller, carbon dioxide, carbon dioxide capture, climate change, climate disruption, climate economics, dimethyl ether, global warming, Hyper Anthropocene, natural gas
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Will soils hang on to their Carbon?
This is essentially no analysis, simply an index to recent research on the the matter of the soils reservoir for Carbon, and a little reaction. To begin, here’s the part of the Carbon Cycle that’s involved: Should this production increase, … Continue reading
Posted in adaptation, American Association for the Advancement of Science, Anthropocene, argoecology, bacteria, being carbon dioxide, Carbon Cycle, carbon dioxide, Carl Safina, climate, climate change, climate disruption, Global Carbon Project, global warming, microbiomes, nonlinear, nonlinear systems
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The fate of Antarctica
That’s from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory at CalTech in Pasedena, CA. The source article is: A. S. Gardner, G. Moholdt, T. Scambos, M. Fahnstock, S. Ligtenberg, M. van den Broeke, J. Nilsson, “Increased West Antarctic and unchanged East Antarctic ice … Continue reading
“Carbon emissions and climate: Where do we stand, and what can be done if it all goes wrong?”
On Sunday, 11th February 2018, I presented an Abstract of a 3 hour talk on the subject, “Carbon emissions and climate: Where do we stand, and what can be done if it all goes wrong?” at the Needham Lyceum, hosted … Continue reading
Posted in Anthropocene, being carbon dioxide, Carbon Cycle, carbon dioxide, carbon dioxide capture, carbon dioxide sequestration, Carbon Tax, civilization, clear air capture of carbon dioxide, climate, climate change, climate disruption, COP21, Cult of Carbon, differential equations, dynamical systems, ecology, emissions, environment, exponential growth, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuel infrastructure, fossil fuels, geoengineering, geophysics, Glen Peters, Global Carbon Project, global warming, greenhouse gases, Humans have a lot to answer for, Hyper Anthropocene, investments, James Hansen, Kerry Emanuel, liberal climate deniers, Mark Carney, Michael Bloomberg, Minsky moment, mitigation, nonlinear, nonlinear systems, oceanography, phytoplankton, population biology, population dynamics, precipitation, Principles of Planetary Climate, quantitative biology, quantitative ecology, radiative forcing, rationality, Ray Pierrehumbert, risk, sea level rise, sociology, stranded assets, supply chains, sustainability, T'kun Olam, the right to be and act stupid, the right to know, the tragedy of our present civilization, the value of financial assets, thermohaline circulation, tragedy of the horizon, unreason, UU, UU Needham, Wally Broecker, zero carbon
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Klaus Lackner: brilliant mind with a good idea
Wally Broecker‘s “hat tip” of Lackner’s work:
Posted in Anthropocene, carbon dioxide, clean disruption, clear air capture of carbon dioxide, climate disruption, climate economics, climate justice, economics, emissions, evidence, fossil fuel divestment, global warming, greenhouse gases, Hyper Anthropocene, investment in wind and solar energy, investments, klaus lackner, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, Spaceship Earth, zero carbon
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490+ ppm CO2e
Former Secretary of Energy Stephen Chu at Climate One in 2016. We’ve made progress, but it is nowhere near fast enough. The internal combustion engine is on life support. Fossil fuel energy sources and companies are stranded assets and dead … Continue reading
A lesson for Boston
And, from the Harvard Business Review: There was a time a decade or two ago when society could have made a choice to write off our massive investment in a fossil fuel-based economy and begin a policy driven shift towards … Continue reading
Posted in Anthropocene, bollocks, bridge to nowhere, carbon dioxide, Carbon Worshipers, climate change, climate disruption, climate economics, coastal communities, coasts, Cult of Carbon, Daniel Kahneman, environment, flooding, floods, Florida, global blinding, global warming, greenhouse gases, hydrology, Hyper Anthropocene, John Englander, living shorelines, Mark Carney, nor'easters, oceanic eddies, oceanography, Our Children's Trust, rate of return regulation, rationality, reasonableness, sea level rise, seawalls, selfishness, shorelines, solar energy, the right to be and act stupid, water
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Defying technology, trends … nay, defying Mathematics!
The creatures from Trumpland are planning an Energy Week in the upcoming, probably to lead up to the Fourth of July celebrations. Our Orange Leader … will tout surging U.S. exports of oil and natural gas during a week of … Continue reading
Posted in American Petroleum Institute, American Solar Energy Society, Anthropocene, being carbon dioxide, Bloomberg, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, BNEF, bridge to nowhere, bridge to somewhere, carbon dioxide, Carbon Worshipers, clean disruption, climate business, climate economics, corporate litigation on damage from fossil fuel emissions, corporations, destructive economic development, Donald Trump, economics, electricity markets, energy, energy utilities, evidence, explosive methane, exponential growth, extended supply chains, false advertising, FERC, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuel infrastructure, fossil fuels, fracking, global blinding, greenhouse gases, Humans have a lot to answer for, Hyper Anthropocene, investing, investment in wind and solar energy, investments, Joseph Schumpeter, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, military inferiority, Minsky moment, pipelines, politics, pollution, rights of the inhabitants of the Commonwealth, risk, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, the energy of the people, the green century, the problem of evil, the right to be and act stupid, the stack of lies, the tragedy of our present civilization, the value of financial assets, tragedy of the horizon, United States, utility company death spiral, wind energy, wind power
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Disney’s Robert Iger resigns from Trump advisory panel over the Trumpistas’ decision to quit COP
“Protecting our planet and driving economic growth are critical to our future, and they aren’t mutually exclusive,” he said in a statement. “I deeply disagree with the decision to withdraw from the Paris Agreement and, as a matter of principle, … Continue reading
Posted in Anthropocene, Buckminster Fuller, carbon dioxide, citizenship, climate business, climate change, climate disruption, climate economics, COP21, destructive economic development, Disney, Donald Trump, environment, Florida, global warming, Hyper Anthropocene, Robert Iger, Walt Disney Company
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Why we sold our Disney Vacation Club timeshares
Hat tip to Climate Denial Crock of the Week, in their “Florida slowly confronting sea level nightmare.”
Posted in Anthropocene, being carbon dioxide, Bloomberg, carbon dioxide, climate, climate change, climate disruption, climate economics, coastal communities, coasts, Disney, Disney Vacation Club, environmental law, flooding, Florida, global warming, greenhouse gases, Hyper Anthropocene, Joe Romm, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, living shorelines, science education, shorelines, sustainability, the right to be and act stupid, the tragedy of our present civilization, the value of financial assets
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`Letter to Lamar Smith’
On Ed Hawkins’ blog. The Committee on Science, Space & Technology of the US House of Representatives conducts regular evidence hearings on various science topics. On Wednesday 29th March, there is a hearing on “Climate science: assumptions, policy implications, and … Continue reading
Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Meteorological Association, American Statistical Association, AMETSOC, anemic data, anomaly detection, Anthropocene, Ben Santer, Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature project, BEST, carbon dioxide, changepoint detection, climate, climate change, climate data, climate disruption, Climate Lab Book, climate zombies, dependent data, environment, fossil fuel divestment, geophysics, global warming, greenhouse gases, Humans have a lot to answer for, Hyper Anthropocene, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, meteorology, MIchael Mann, Our Children's Trust, physics, science, smoothing, statistical dependence, the right to be and act stupid, the right to know, the tragedy of our present civilization, the value of financial assets, time series
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“Oh no, not again” (from ATTP)
Response to a paper by Hermann Harde, from Ken Rice at … And Then There’s Physics. Dr Rice cites two other responses as well: One by Gavin Schmidt at RealClimate. One from 2011 by Gavin Cawley from the University of … Continue reading
Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Meteorological Association, American Statistical Association, AMETSOC, atmosphere, being carbon dioxide, Carbon Cycle, carbon dioxide, chemistry, climate, climate disruption, climate education, Climate Lab Book, David Archer, diffusion, diffusion processes, fossil fuels, geophysics, Global Carbon Project, greenhouse gases, ignorance, physics, Principles of Planetary Climate, Ray Pierrehumbert, science, science education
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Ductless Minisplits in Blizzard, 2017-02-09
(Updated, 11th February 2017, 16:15 EST) We heat and cool our home with Fujitsu `ductless minisplit` air source heat pumps. But this is New England, and it’s winter. A common question is how do they do under winter conditions? Well, … Continue reading
Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Meteorological Association, American Statistical Association, AMETSOC, Anthropocene, atmosphere, attribution, being carbon dioxide, carbon dioxide, CleanTechnica, climate, climate change, climate disruption, demand-side solutions, efficiency, global warming, Hyper Anthropocene, marginal energy sources, Massachusetts Clean Energy Center, meteorological models, meteorology, National Center for Atmospheric Research, NCAR, New England, NOAA, nor'easters, oceanic eddies, oceanography, open data, open source scientific software, risk, the right to know, water vapor
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Greenwashing
Painted signage on the side of a delivery truck parked outside a neighbor’s home deliverying oil made me curious about this, so I checked out their Web site. Here is what I found: (To see larger figure, click on image … Continue reading
Posted in Anthropocene, being carbon dioxide, biofuels, bridge to nowhere, carbon dioxide, clean disruption, CleanTechnica, climate business, climate change, climate disruption, climate economics, economics, energy, environment, false advertising, fossil fuels, global warming, greenhouse gases, greenwashing, Hyper Anthropocene, regulatory capture, rhetoric, sociology, supply chains, the tragedy of our present civilization
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You really can’t go home again: An update of “Getting back to 350 ppm CO2 …”
I have made an important update to an earlier post here, Getting back to 350 ppm CO2: You can’t go home again. The message, essentially based upon recent work Tokarska and Zickfield on one hand, and by The Global Carbon … Continue reading
Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, Anthropocene, bridge to nowhere, Buckminster Fuller, Carbon Cycle, carbon dioxide, carbon dioxide capture, Carbon Worshipers, clear air capture of carbon dioxide, climate, climate business, climate change, climate data, climate disruption, climate economics, David Archer, diffusion, diffusion processes, ecological services, Eli Rabett, engineering, environment, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuel infrastructure, fossil fuels, games of chance, geoengineering, geophysics, Glen Peters, Global Carbon Project, global warming, greenhouse gases, Hyper Anthropocene, Principles of Planetary Climate, Ray Pierrehumbert, science, Spaceship Earth, Susan Solomon, Svante Arrhenius, the tragedy of our present civilization, Tokarska and Zickfield, Wordpress, zero carbon
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`Moving forward on climate change and sustainability`
From WGBH, and hat tip to Environmental Justice TV, includes Dr Gavin Schmidt speaking, who I was especially interested in, and whose talk begins here: Interesting that Dr Schmidt has some gentle criticism of the PBS program NOVA. Whole talk … Continue reading
Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Meteorological Association, AMETSOC, Anthropocene, bridge to nowhere, Buckminster Fuller, carbon dioxide, climate, climate change, climate data, climate disruption, Ecology Action, environment, Equiterre, fossil fuel divestment, Gavin Schmidt, geophysics, greenhouse gases, Hyper Anthropocene, investment in wind and solar energy, Kevin Anderson, moral leadership, NASA, physics, science, Spaceship Earth, sustainability, the tragedy of our present civilization, the value of financial assets, zero carbon
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Okay, Jan, so what’s your view on climate change?
It’s heading towards year’s end, so it’s natural to think about perspective. In a post from last July, Joseph Heath asks semi-rhetorically, “Why are [proposed] carbon taxes so low?” and, then, he and commenters go on and answer that, essentially, … Continue reading
Posted in adaptation, American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Meteorological Association, American Solar Energy Society, American Statistical Association, Anthropocene, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, Buckminster Fuller, carbon dioxide, clear air capture of carbon dioxide, climate change, climate disruption, decentralized electric power generation, distributed generation, ecological services, energy reduction, energy storage, environment, Equiterre, fossil fuel divestment, Gaylord Nelson, Glen Peters, greenhouse gases, Hermann Scheer, Hyper Anthropocene, investment in wind and solar energy, IPCC, James Hansen, Kevin Anderson, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, Mark Jacobson, Massachusetts, Minsky moment, Neill deGrasse Tyson, Our Children's Trust, population biology, quantitative ecology, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, Spaceship Earth, temporal myopia, the energy of the people, the green century, the right to be and act stupid, the tragedy of our present civilization, Walt Disney Company, wind energy, wind power, zero carbon
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It’s the technology, not the brand
Just about a year ago, our home in Westwood began a march towards zero Carbon consumption, with heating, hot water heating, and even lawn mowing all converted to high efficiency electricity. As indicated at the time, our main automobile, a … Continue reading
Posted in Anthropocene, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, BNEF, carbon dioxide, clean disruption, CleanTechnica, climate business, climate economics, decentralized electric power generation, decentralized energy, demand-side solutions, electricity, energy storage, energy utilities, engineering, fossil fuel divestment, green tech, Green Tech Media, grid defection, Hyper Anthropocene, investment in wind and solar energy, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, marginal energy sources, Massachusetts Clean Energy Center, public utility commissions, PUCs, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, the energy of the people, the green century, the value of financial assets, Tony Seba, Uncategorized, utility company death spiral, wind energy, wind power, zero carbon
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Climate Potpourri: Flooding and Solar (both from Ars)
And they who will not be ready, will suffer the economic consequences. Ready for flooding: Boston analyzes how to tackle climate change (That water is a foot deep, previously reported in a post here. Click on image to see larger … Continue reading
Posted in adaptation, American Meteorological Association, American Solar Energy Society, AMETSOC, Anthropocene, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, Boston, carbon dioxide, citizenship, civilization, CleanTechnica, climate, climate business, climate change, climate disruption, climate economics, coastal communities, environment, flooding, floods, fossil fuels, global warming, green tech, greenhouse gases, Hyper Anthropocene, ice sheet dynamics, investment in wind and solar energy, John Englander, Joseph Schumpeter, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, living shorelines, Massachusetts, Massachusetts Clean Energy Center, meteorology, oceanography, resiliency, shorelines, solar democracy, solar domination, solar energy, solar power, Spaceship Earth, sustainability, T'kun Olam, the energy of the people, the green century, the value of financial assets
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Global Carbon Dioxide in 3D
Your CO2, my CO2 doesn’t remain with you or me, but mixes broadly and thoroughly over the planet at large. So, we all share responsibility for the damage. Credit: NASA And brought to you by OCO-2.
Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Meteorological Association, AMETSOC, Anthropocene, atmosphere, carbon dioxide, Carbon Worshipers, civilization, climate, climate change, climate data, climate disruption, corporate litigation on damage from fossil fuel emissions, diffusion, diffusion processes, Donald Trump, dynamical systems, ecology, environment, fluid eddies, geophysics, global warming, greenhouse gases, Hyper Anthropocene, NASA, NCAR
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David Puttnam, in a moving appeal on climate
David Puttnum (yes, the producer-director) has a very moving appeal on climate: Hat tip to Tamino. President Lyndon Johnson was the first to receive a briefing regarding the looming crisis presented by abrupt climate change. That was in 1965. And … Continue reading
Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, Anthropocene, Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature project, bridge to nowhere, carbon dioxide, Carbon Worshipers, climate, climate change, climate disruption, Daniel Kahneman, differential equations, environment, fossil fuel infrastructure, fossil fuels, global warming, greenhouse gases, Hermann Scheer, Hyper Anthropocene, Joseph Schumpeter, liberal climate deniers, life purpose, Mathematics and Climate Research Network, Our Children's Trust, Principles of Planetary Climate, quantitative ecology, science, the right to be and act stupid, the tragedy of our present civilization, the value of financial assets
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Why smooth?
I’ve encountered a number of blog posts this week which seem not to understand the Bias-Variance Tradeoff in regard to Mean-Squared-Error. These arose in connection with smoothing splines, which I was studying in connection with multivariate adaptive regression splines, that … Continue reading
Posted in Akaike Information Criterion, American Statistical Association, Antarctica, carbon dioxide, climate change, denial, global warming, information theoretic statistics, likelihood-free, multivariate adaptive regression splines, non-parametric model, science denier, smoothing, splines, statistical dependence
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Getting back to 350 ppm CO2: You can’t go home again
(Update of this piece, included below.) (Major update of this piece included below.) You can’t. It’ll cost much more than 23 times 40 times the Gross World Product to do it. And, in any case, you need to go to … Continue reading
Posted in adaptation, American Association for the Advancement of Science, Anthropocene, atmosphere, bollocks, bridge to nowhere, Carbon Cycle, carbon dioxide, carbon dioxide capture, carbon dioxide sequestration, Carbon Worshipers, chemistry, clear air capture of carbon dioxide, climate, climate change, climate disruption, climate economics, corporate litigation on damage from fossil fuel emissions, David Archer, diffusion, diffusion processes, ecological services, ecology, economics, engineering, environment, environmental law, fossil fuels, geoengineering, global warming, greenhouse gases, Hyper Anthropocene, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, methane, Our Children's Trust, physics, rationality, reason, reasonableness, science, Spaceship Earth, the right to be and act stupid, Wally Broecker, zero carbon
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“Negative emissions” (from ATTP)
Originally posted on …and Then There's Physics:
I went to some Departmental talks recently and discovered that some of my colleagues are researchering possible carbon sequestration technologies. This could be very important, but appealing to negative emission technologies is…
Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Meteorological Association, AMETSOC, Anthropocene, carbon dioxide, carbon dioxide capture, carbon dioxide sequestration, Carbon Worshipers, clear air capture of carbon dioxide, climate, climate change, climate disruption, differential equations, environment, fossil fuels, geoengineering, geophysics, global warming, greenhouse gases, Hyper Anthropocene, land use to fight, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, liberal climate deniers, Principles of Planetary Climate, quantitative ecology, reason, reasonableness, science, sustainability, the tragedy of our present civilization, the value of financial assets, utility company death spiral, zero carbon
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Trump’s supporters cannot change natural reality, even through Trump; we can and should continue to act, in hope
I like his emphasis upon Remember residual damage, and that’s There’s no rewind button. That’s Alex Steffen, who has the most optimistic post-Trump spiel I’ve read. And there’s always the optimism that comes with China’s warning Trump about not taking … Continue reading
Posted in American Association for the Advancement of Science, Anthropocene, Bloomberg, Bloomberg New Energy Finance, BNEF, carbon dioxide, Carbon Worshipers, citizenship, civilization, climate change, climate disruption, denial, Donald Trump, Ecology Action, environment, environmental law, fossil fuel divestment, fossil fuels, geophysics, global warming, greenhouse gases, Hyper Anthropocene, Joseph Schumpeter
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XKCD tells it all
Alerted to the existence of the image by Tamino. The figure is due to the irrepressible Randall Munroe.
Posted in Anthropocene, bridge to nowhere, Carbon Cycle, carbon dioxide, Carbon Worshipers, civilization, climate, climate change, climate disruption, climate education, coastal communities, coasts, environment, evidence, fossil fuels, geophysics, glaciers, global warming, Hyper Anthropocene, icesheets, leaving fossil fuels in the ground, Massachusetts Interfaith Coalition for Climate Action, Mathematics and Climate Research Network, meteorology, Our Children's Trust, Principles of Planetary Climate, Randall Munroe, Ray Pierrehumbert, science, the right to know, XKCD
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