We Love Science!

Science is real, it is not opinion. Science can be proven, it isn’t an alternative fact. Business profits rule in this administration, and without help from science, business won’t thrive either.

Can you think of anything in our lives that does not deal with science?   Scientists have gotten us to where we are in civilization, and we still have a long way to go to cure cancer, Alzheimer’s, MS, ALS, heart disease….and the list goes on. Science research must be funded to keep us safe and healthy.

Saturday I marched with 40,000 other people in Chicago saying to this administration , “Science Is Important!” “Business profits don’t keep us healthy” “Fund science research”

Read more about the marches here.

 

 

 

 

Five Signs the Climate is Changing

Where I live the climate is clearly changing and impossible to deny.  See the video from Climate Reality on five indicators the climate is changing. View    here. 

Five Changes from Climate Reality:

  1. Air temperatures over land are rising.

It’s clear that weather stations on land show average air temperatures are rising, and as a result, the frequency and severity of droughts and heat waves are increasing. Intense droughts can lead to destructive wildfires, failed crops, and low water supplies, many of which are deeply affecting southern areas of the United States and other parts of the world.

  1. Air temperatures over oceans are rising.

Roughly 70 percent of the world is covered by oceans. So you can understand how hotter air over our oceans could make a big difference in the climate system.

It’s simple, as the air near the surface of the oceans gets warmer, more water evaporates. The result?  Potentially stronger tropical storms, more extreme precipitation events, and more flooding.

  1. Glaciers are melting.

The disappearance of glaciers is one of the clearest signs of climate change. People who rely on melting glaciers for water are facing shortages, and in many regions, the situation is only getting worse.

In a world unaffected by climate change, glacier mass stays balanced, meaning the ice that evaporates in the summer is fully replaced by snowfall in the winter. However, when more ice melts than is replaced, the glacier loses mass. And the people who depend on melting ice for water to support their farming and living needs are deeply affected.

>> Related: The Climate Crisis Deserves Our Attention Right Now <<

4. Arctic sea ice is shrinking.

Satellite images from space show that the area covered by sea ice in the Arctic is shrinking, continuing a downward trend for the past 30 years. As with glaciers, Satellite images from space show that the area covered by sea ice in the Arctic is shrinking, continuing a downward trend for the past 30 years. As with glaciers, there’s a seasonal rhythm (or supposed to be) at work. The Arctic ice cap grows each winter when there’s less sunlight, and shrinks each summer when days are longer and warmer, reaching its lowest point of the year in September.

Previously, this cycle of melting and freezing has more or less balanced out. But with temperatures rising, we’re seeing more ice melt in the summer than forms in the winter. The result is that some research suggests that the Arctic could lose almost all of its summer ice cover by later in the century.

5. Sea levels are rising.

Sea levels have been rising for the past century. And the pace has only increased in recent years, as glaciers melt faster and water temperatures increase (causing oceans to expand). You can imagine how this would affect the almost 40 percent of the US population that lives in a highly populated coastal area. Let’s not forget that eight of the 10 largest cities in the world are near a coast.

Consider how many millions of people are at risk as sea levels rise, storms intensify, and more extreme flooding occurs. Additionally, as sea levels rise, salt water begins intruding into freshwater aquifers, many of which support human communities and natural ecosystems.  From Climate Reality

Even in just the past ten years I have observed enormous changes.  First, it is scary that in ten years we have experience more than five hundred year storms. Second, it just doesn’t get really cold at night anymore. Ticks and other invasive bugs(emerald Ash Bore and others) survive the winters.  Third, we are constantly going from drought to inundation. Fourth, the trees and plants are moving north. Fifth, sadly the wildlife is disappearing. We have fewer song birds, the moose and deer are struggling with disease.

What changes do you see as the climate warms?

Storm Lake Wins a Pulitzer

Our polluted lakes and rivers!

We love an underdog, and when a small town Iowa newspaper takes on the industry that dominates its state you pay attention! The Storm Lake Times has just won a Pulitzer Prize for editorials on Iowa’s water problems caused by agriculture. To me this is a story about justice and fairness.  Why should an industry be allowed to pollute, and harm the health of surrounding communities? Why has it become such an expensive struggle in farm country for communities to provide clean water for their residents? Because I live in Minnesota where agriculture has poisoned many of our lakes that are near Iowa, I have followed this story of Des Moines Water Works suing the surrounding Iowa counties.  The Storm Lake Times and Art Cullen receive all my praise and congratulations for their year of editorials on this challenging issue.

Below is one of Art Cullen’s editorials:

“The public would appear to have made up its mind about the Des Moines Water Works lawsuit against Buena Vista, Calhoun and Sac counties over nitrate pollution of the Raccoon River. The Des Moines Register’s Iowa Poll reported Sunday that 60% of those surveyed believe the water works was right to sue drainage districts in the three counties for discharging polluted water into the river.

It is virtually the same result the poll found a year ago.

Urban residents, small towners and even rural dwellers all show majority support for the water works position. This after a barrage of advertising in the Des Moines TV market sponsored by Farm Bureau, and a host of radio ads aiming to fire up rural residents against encroaching government.

Anyone can see how filthy Storm Lake is, how the Des Moines River near Humboldt is a mud flow, how shallow lakes in Northwest Iowa have eroded into duck marshes.

Anyone with eyes and a nose knows in his gut that Iowa has the dirtiest surface water in America. It is choking the waterworks and the Gulf of Mexico. It is causing oxygen deprivation in Northwest Iowa glacial lakes. It has caused us to spend millions upon millions trying to clean up Storm Lake, the victim of more than a century of explosive soil erosion.

Everyone knows it’s not the city sewer plant causing the problem. And most of us recognize that this is not just nature at work busily releasing nitrates into the water. Ninety-two percent of surface water pollution comes from row crop production — an incontroverted fact from the court case.” The entire editorial

And an excerpt from another Art Cullen editorial: “Which goes to show that nobody really knows what to do. The initial reaction to the lawsuit was to condemn the water works for interrupting our way of doing business. The second intuitive reaction was to throw a ton of money at the issue. The agri-industrial community has tried to convince us it will take $6 billion or $10 billion or $15 billion to protect Iowa’s surface water from nitrate pollution. It scares the bejeebers out of taxpayers, especially in defendant counties.” The entire essay

Read more about this story here.

The farming community should never have been exempt from the Clean Water Act. Agri-business has become too powerful and now there is no controlling them.  The reasons why regulations are so important for the health of us all!

It’s Reality

Climate Reality
Climate Reality

We don’t appear to have a government that will protect us from carbon pollution and our warming climate. Because of this, we all need to take more personal responsibility for our earth. It is amazing what we can do working together.  How can we all reduce our carbon footprint?  This week, try a car-free day, my car is put away for the week. Also, eliminate beef, and celebrate Meatless Mondays.  Pasta and spinach salad for dinner at my house tonight. From One Green Planet on meat consumption.

 

Ways to Complain

Donate today 

NO one has called, but the White House comment line is closed!
No one has made calls to Donald Trump complaining about his renewal of the Keystone and Dakota Access pipelines??? The White House comment line has been closed for a few weeks!  This is what he said this week, “As you know I approved two pipelines that were stuck in limbo forever. I don’t even think it was controversial. I approved them. I haven’t even had one call from anybody saying that was a terrible thing you did. I haven’t had one call … Then as you know I did the Dakota Pipeline and no one called up to complain.” Donald Trump
The telephone comment line to might be closed , but you can send a tweet @realDonaldTrump or send a post card. I hope you will do both. You can also call one of his businesses: https://whitehouseinc.org/  or contact him through this link: http://p2a.co/xdL9jbf

Some background:

  1. This is an excellent analysis from NRDC.
  2. More information from Ecowatch
  3. An idea for a postcard from NRDC “I am outraged that you have issued executive memoranda clearing the way for the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines with no input from the American public. I urge you to reverse course on these dangerous and dirty fossil fuel projects.
    These pipelines are not in our national interest and I, along with millions of others, will fight you every step of the way if your administration moves forward with them.” Idea from NRDC for postcard20170124_153543

 

 

A New Frozen Look

Lake Superior on February 3,
Lake Superior on February 3,

February 1st, Lake Superior waves were crashing and pounding the shore, and it was reported that only 5% of the big lake was covered with ice. I was surprised that early morning February 2, our bay became covered with ice. The waves look frozen in time, and the frozen landscape brings a new quiet peaceful reality. How long will it last? Probably not long. Lake ice today is fragile and depends on the winds and sudden whims of this living warming lake. The first big wind will probably break and send the ice onto the shore, or to another bay to continue the fascinating winter entertainment.

The Ticking Clock

Is everyone afraid?

Is everyone ashamed?

Smashing Pumpkins, Doomsday song

What would cause the clock to get closer to midnight?
What would cause the clock to get closer to midnight?

Doomsday Clock Now Two and a Half Minutes to Midnight, Thanks to Trump!

 

What a strange unprecedented week full of lies, “alternative facts” and being told we should all shut up and just listen for once. A week of show and chaos. Many are engaged, protesting, shaking their heads, and knowing this is not sustainable.

Because of Mr. Trump’s words in denial of climate change and his being close to the nuclear trigger we are now closer to Doomsday that we have been since the 1950’s. Thursday the experts moved the clock 30 minutes closer to midnight. Read about it here.

“The Doomsday Clock is a symbolic clock face that represents a countdown to possible global catastrophe. It has been maintained since 1947 by the members of The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists Science and Security Board,[1] who are in turn advised by the Governing Board and the Board of Sponsors, including 18 Nobel Laureates. The closer they set the Clock to midnight, the more vulnerable the scientists believe the world is to global disaster” Wikipedia

And finally, an environmental summary of the disaster of Trump’s first week from the NRDC.