WTF Climate Change News

[danielravennest]

Despite pressure from Trump, 2 TVA coal-fueled power plants to shutter in Kentucky, Tennessee

The Tennessee Valley Authority announced Thursday that it would close two coal plants, including one that buys its fuel from one of Donald Trump's campaign contributors, despite public pressure from the president to keep it open.

In a 5-2 vote, the public utility's board of directors chose to shutter Kentucky's Paradise Fossil plant in 2020 and Tennessee's Bull Run plant in 2023. The Kentucky plant buys much of its fuel from Murray Energy, which is owned by Robert Murray, a generous supporter of Trump. The two dissenting votes came from Trump administration appointees.

The board met Thursday to discuss the potential shuttering of the plants that are 50 years old after a series of TVA assessments deemed them to be obsolescent and wasteful of energy. The independent federal agency said earlier in the week that the facilities produced a steady, inflexible amount of power and could not bend to “the increased volatility in energy consumption” of its customer base.

 

[Brenda Archer]

Highly Unusual Upward Trends in Rapidly Intensifying Atlantic Hurricanes Blamed on Global Warming by Dr. Jeff Masters | Category 6

 

[Tigger]

This is a kids strike and protest against climate change.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

 

[Tigger]

If you look at a lot of the comments about the kids strike and climate protest it is very dismissive and full of whataboutery (I hope they all WALKED to the protest and didn't use and cars, eh)

 

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

Joke's on him, what future generations?

 

[Free]

Um, future generations will look back in a few years time?

Are these future generations time travellers, and why aren't they travelling way further back in time to solve the issue of climate change before it's even a thing?!

 

[detrius]

This is a kids strike and protest against climate change.

Fun fact: this year marks the 200th anniversary of the Peterloo Massacre.

 

[Beebo Brink]

detrius - Sweet potato curry?

 

[Tigger]

Well if he posted the curry recipe by mistake, did he have a massacre for dinner ?

 

[detrius]

detrius - Sweet potato curry?

Made it when I visited my parents two weeks ago.

It was delicious. (recipe)


(also, link fixed)

 

[Free]

Well if he posted the curry recipe by mistake, did he have a massacre for dinner ?

I just chalk it up to an unexpected Monty Python moment.

 

[Beebo Brink]

Florida is drowning. Condos are still being built. Can't humans see the writing on the wall?

Humans tend to respond to immediate threats and financial consequences – and coastal real estate, especially in Florida, may be on the cusp of delivering that harsh wake-up call. The peninsula has outsized exposure: nearly 2 million people live in coastal cities. On the list of the 20 urban areas in America that will suffer the most from rising seas, Florida has five: St Petersburg, Tampa, Miami, Miami Beach and Panama City. In 2016, Zillow predicted that one out of eight homes in Florida would be underwater by 2100, a loss of $413bn in property.

 

[danielravennest]

Florida is drowning. Condos are still being built. Can't humans see the writing on the wall?

On the plus side, Floridians out of necessity will develop the first floating cities.

 

[Kara Spengler]

Florida is drowning. Condos are still being built. Can't humans see the writing on the wall?

Floridians are ..... strange.

If most people see they are living on a flat area and a huge storm is coming right at them they will get out ASAP (unless they have a pretty good shelter). How many of us have that one friend/relative in Florida who decided to ride out a storm though .... even having taken storm damage with a smaller storm before?

 

[Beebo Brink]

Floridians are ..... strange.

Not really. All jokes about Florida aside, the reactions there are aligned with human behavior in the face of a known danger set in an unknown future timeline. There are hundreds of thousands of people living under the shadow of volcanos that will someday erupt again; present day benefits seem to outweigh the fuzzy prospect of danger "someday".

The article itself points to these all too human responses:

I sought input from the environmental community as well. “Real estate is a huge economic driver here,” Laura Geselbracht, a senior marine scientist with the Nature Conservancy, said. “And it’s at risk from sea level rise. People don’t want to believe it. That’s a normal human condition – suspension of belief.

She wonders why she doesn’t see more people of means in south Florida buying electric cars, getting solar panels and living more sustainably. “The quicker we take action, the better. We’ve got to be leaders so that we have a longer horizon of survival here,” she said. When she’s approached community leaders in the past, asking them to take steps toward sustainability, she often hears the same response: “Technology will solve it.”

Consider innovative mitigation in action: raising roads, shoring up sea walls, adding pumps and drainage upgrades, beginning dredging projects, offering complex insurance structures. Proximity to these short-term solutions are not always pluses in a home buyer’s column, but acute reminders of vulnerability.

 

[Kara Spengler]

Not really. All jokes about Florida aside, the reactions there are aligned with human behavior in the face of a known danger set in an unknown future timeline. There are hundreds of thousands of people living under the shadow of volcanos that will someday erupt again; present day benefits seem to outweigh the fuzzy prospect of danger "someday".

The article itself points to these all too human responses:

I was actually thinking of my brother and his family in that. Not only did he not bug out during the big storm last year but he had been complaining a prior one took out their fave tree and a good part of the roof with it.

 

[Tigger]

On the plus side, Floridians out of necessity will develop the first floating cities.

Floating houses aren't that unusual. Denmark has many, not the traditional concept of houseboats but just houses that float attached to dolphins

 

[danielravennest]

Floating houses aren't that unusual. Denmark has many, not the traditional concept of houseboats but just houses that float attached to dolphins

I'm talking about floating *cities*, not just individual houses.

 

[Sid]

How floating architecture could help save cities from rising seas.

The Netherlands is building entire neighborhoods that float on water