In 2017 around 1.05 million deaths were avoidable by eliminating fossil fuel combustion, according to a study published in the science journal Nature Communications. The largest number of these deaths occurred in world’s two most populous countries - China and India. Air pollution caused due to combustion of coal alone contributed to half of these deaths. Residential, industry and energy sectors were other dominant global sources of fossil fuel emissions. The study indicates that replacing traditional energy sources will have substantial health benefits. - Forbes / Nature

Last year was hot. NASA declared that it tied 2016 for the hottest year on record, and the Met Office of the United Kingdom said it was the final year in the warmest 10-year period ever recorded. Temperatures were particularly high in Siberia, with some areas experiencing monthly averages more than 10°C above the 1981–2010 average. Overall, Siberia had the warmest January to June since records began; on 20 June, the town of Verkhoyansk, Russia, hit 38°C, the highest temperature ever recorded in the Arctic Circle.  Scientists showed that the prolonged heat in Siberia would have been almost impossible without human-induced climate change. Global warming made the heat wave at least 600 times more likely than in 1900, they found. - EOS

We want our cheap oil but we don't want the consequences, so we often put refineries in places where people without influence life and then tout all the jobs that are created.  Once again, a fossil fuel-related company walks away with the profits, leaves a mess for the taxpayer to clean up, and then whines about regulations, this time in the USVI.  - Washington Post

OU PROBABLY KNOW by now that when you wash a load of synthetic clothes, like yoga pants or moisture-wicking sweatshirts, tiny bits of them tear loose and flush out to a wastewater treatment facility, which then pumps them out to sea. A single load of laundry releases perhaps millions of these microfibers (technically a subspecies of microplastics, defined as bits smaller than 5 millimeters). So it’s no wonder that scientists are finding the particles everywhere they look, from the deepest seas to what’s no longer a pristine Arctic.  And now it turns out that your clothes are polluting the planet with microplastic before they’re even clothes.- Wired

Much of the American West , from parched Northern California through Arizona and New Mexico, is drying out at a record pace.
The onset of this severe drought was far quicker than previous ones — the result of a meager Sierra Nevada snowpack and early seasonal heat that evaporated the runoff needed to fill the reservoirs and rivers. “It’s difficult to point to one occurrence and say, ‘Hah, this is climate change,’’’ said John Yarbrough, the assistant deputy director for the State Water Project with the California Department of Water Resources.  But this year, the second consecutive that the nation’s most populous state will be in drought, has been different from previous ones. Yarbrough said that only 20 percent of the expected runoff from an already well-below average snowpack arrived in reservoirs. The rest evaporated during the unseasonably warm spring. - Washington Post


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Managers of some Arizona golf courses are fighting a plan that would cut water use at a time when the state is being forced to confront shrinking water supplies.  A group representing golf courses has been pushing back against a proposal by state officials that would reduce overall water use on courses, instead offering a plan that would entail less conservation.  Opposition to the state’s proposal for golf courses has emerged over the past several months, aired in sometimes-tense virtual meetings where representatives of courses have said they understand the need to conserve but are concerned the proposed reductions in water allotments would damage their businesses. - AZ Central

President Biden has a rare opportunity to act on climate with maximum political capital from the 2020 election, bipartisan support for a clean energy recovery from the COVID-induced economic crisis, and the imperative of meeting his announced goal of halving the United States’ greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. The upside of acting now is massive - $1.5 trillion in investment across every corner of the country.  Biden campaigned on a 100% clean electricity by 2035 pledge, included this target in his American Jobs Plan, and outlined the job-creation benefits of clean energy in his annual message to Congress in April. Biden can seize this opportunity by working with Congress to pass a clean electricity standard (CES) targeting 80% clean electricity by 2030, which new research shows is possible without increasing customer costs thanks to plummeting wind, solar, and battery costs. - Forbes

On Feb. 22, 2021, Lake Powell was 127.24 feet below 'Full Pool' or, by content, about 38% full. Based on water level elevations, these measurements do not account for years of sediment (clay, silt, and sand) accumulation—the millions of metric tons on the bottom. Geologist James L. Powell said, "The Colorado delivers enough sediment to Lake Powell to fill 1,400 ship cargo containers each day." In other words, Lake Powell is shrinking toward the middle from top and bottom. The lake is down over 30 feet from one year ago, and estimates suggest it could drop another 50 feet by 2026. - Lake Powell Chronicle

While some "news" channels and Facebook "experts" dispute the reality of human made climate change, those changes already are affecting Miami.  - NYTimes