Tuesday, November 10, 2015

Soaking Rains Tonight as Winds Reach 40 MPH - A Real Cold Front Brewing in 7-10 Days?

61 F. high temperature Tuesday in the Twin Cities.
69 F. record high on November 10, set in 2012.
45 F. average high on November 10.
31 F. high on November 10, 2014.

November 11, 1940: The Great Armistice Day Blizzard kills 49 people in Minnesota. Food dropped by Pilot Max Conrad saved stranded hunters. The barometer fell to 28.66 inches at Duluth. Some roads were so badly blocked with snow they weren't opened until Nov. 22.


How Weather Forecasting Is Like Fantasy Football
Much-Needed Soaking Tonight

So, how's your fantasy football team doing? (crickets). Not quite working out the way you thought? Wait, you weren't able to predict injuries or trades weeks in advance? Welcome to my world.

The physics that powers our weather models isn't perfect. Neither is the data, the fuel, that fuels the models. It's a little like putting old gasoline into a 1968 Dodge; wondering why you can't get good fuel mileage. Junk in - junk out. The winter forecast for Minnesota depends on El Nino, snow depth in Siberia, and wobbles in the general circulation we can't even track today.

A year ago MSP was digging out from over 3 inches of snow. The storm that slushed up the metro November 10-11 dumped a foot on central Minnesota. The first 9 days of November, 2015 were 11.6F warmer than average - more typical of Topeka, Kansas.

1-2 inches of badly needed rain is about to recharge soil moisture; the heaviest rains come tonight. By time time it's cold enough to snow the moisture will be gone; a few flakes on Thursday, a dull reminder that it's mid-November.

I'm betting on a pale-green Thanksiving.
Heaviest Rain Bands Just South and East of MSP? Here is the 4 KM NAM solution, showing a half inch for the west metro, closer to 1 to 1.5" for St. Paul, with as much as 2 to 2.5" of rain forecast closer to Hastings and Red Wing, most of that falling tonight. Source: NOAA and AerisWeather.
High Wind Warning Southwestern Minnesota. Winds will be howling late tonight and early Thursday, with the strongest winds south and west of MSP. Details from the Twin Cities National Weather Service:

...POWERFUL STORM SYSTEM TO BRING HIGH WINDS TO SOUTHERN MINNESOTA...

.A HIGH WIND WARNING HAS BEEN ISSUED FOR A PORTION OF SOUTHWEST
AND SOUTH CENTRAL MINNESOTA FOR WEDNESDAY NIGHT DUE TO STRONG
WINDS DEVELOPING IN THE WAKE OF A POWERFUL STORM SYSTEM. SUSTAINED
WINDS OF 35 TO 40 MPH WITH GUSTS NEAR 60 MPH WILL BE POSSIBLE IN
THE WARNING AREA. THE HIGH WIND WARNING IS LOCATED SOUTHWEST OF A
LINE FROM REDWOOD FALLS TO MANKATO...AND THEN SOUTH TO THE IOWA
BORDER.

STRONG WINDS WILL ALSO DEVELOP OVER MUCH OF SOUTHERN MINNESOTA
LATE WEDNESDAY NIGHT AND CONTINUING THROUGH THE DAY THURSDAY.
SUSTAINED WINDS OF 30 TO 35 MPH WITH GUSTS AROUND 45 MPH WILL BE
POSSIBLE. A WIND ADVISORY HAS BEEN ISSUED AND IS LOCATED MAINLY
SOUTH OF A LINE FROM WILLMAR...LE CENTER AND OWATONNA.

THIS POWERFUL STORM SYSTEM WILL DEVELOP IN THE PLAINS LATE
TONIGHT AND DEEPEN RAPIDLY ACROSS IOWA AND INTO WISCONSIN THROUGH
WEDNESDAY NIGHT.

THE POTENTIAL IMPACTS INCLUDE...LOOSE OBJECTS THAT CAN BE EASILY
BLOWN ABOUT BY THE STRONG WINDS AND SOME LIGHT STRUCTURAL DAMAGE.
PLUS...SOME COMMERCIAL POWER INTERRUPTION WILL ALSO BE POSSIBLE
DUE TO DOWNED POWER LINES.
Heavier Rains East of the Mississippi River. We talk about the "Twin Cities" as one, giant, amorphous blob, but there can be big variations, just across the metropolitan area. Some of the models print out .2 to .5" more rain for downtown St. Paul than downtown Minneapolis. 12 miles doesn't sound like much, but even in a rain storm there can be big variations over relatively small distances. Source: Aeris Enterprise.
Window-Rattling Winds. It may sound a little like Tropical Storm Bubba out there tonight, with windswept rain, falling heavily at times, and sustained winds forecast to peak between 26 and 33 mph during the wee hours of the morning Thursday. Expect gusts over 40 mph, enough to make the house shudder and groan.
Snow Lovers Just Woke Up. No, I don't see accumulating snow for the metro area, not yet, but NOAA's GFS model shows a smear of wet snow late next week over parts of central and northern Minnesota. I wouldn't schedule a play-date with your favorite snowmobile just yet - let's see what future model runs show.
Over a Cliff? When it's this nice, for this long, I start to get nervous. Previous model runs have shown big drops in temperature (which never quite materialized) so I'm still skeptical, but at some point the other shoe (boot) will drop. GFS guidance shows a wind chill of 7F by 5 am Saturday, November 21.
Still Not Persistently Polar. Peering into my (dirty) crystal ball, looking 2 weeks into the future, GFS guidance shows a big cut-off low at 500 mb north of New England, but a persistent Pacific flow for much of the lower 48 states; Minnesota's winds aloft blowing from the Bay Area, not northern Canada.
AerisWeather Briefings: Issued Tuesday evening, November 10, 2015.

* Significant severe storm scenario brewing for Midwest Wednesday afternoon and evening hours; primary risk is violent straight-line winds over 70 mph in a few cases. Isolated tornadoes can't be ruled out.

* Band of heavy rain north and west of the severe threat may create minor urban flooding issues late Wednesday into early Thursday.

Enhanced Risk. NOAA SPC has outlined the area that is under the gun, which includes Springfield, Peoria, Decatur, Bloomington and Des Moines. The enhanced risk (which implies a high threat of violent thunderstorm winds and large 2"+ hail) includes northern Missouri, western and central Illinois and southern Iowa. I do expect watches and warnings by the PM hours tomorrow. Map: NOAA SPC.
Smear of Heavy Rain. High-resolution models print out 1-2" rains from near Sioux City to Mankato, the Twin Cities, Eau Claire and Superior, Wisconsin, with a few isolated 2-3" amounts. The result will be minor urban flooding - especially Wednesday night, when the heaviest rains are forecast to fall. Map credit: WeatherBell.

The pattern is becoming more volatile, and models show much of the central and eastern USA pushing into a colder, stormier pattern over the next 7-10 days - capable of spinning up more significant rain and snow storms. We'll keep you posted.

Paul Douglas
Senior Meteorologist, AerisWeather

The Norwegian Secret to Enjoying a Long Winter. It's all in your mind. If you tell yourself you're miserable - you will be. Here's an excerpt of a (helpful) article at Fast Company: "...This is easy enough to change; simply refuse to participate in the Misery Olympics. Talk about how the cold gives you a chance to drink tea or hot chocolate all day. Talk about ice skating, or building snowmen. Bundle up and go for a walk outside, knowing that you’ll likely feel warmer and happier after a few minutes. Better yet, go with a friend. Social plans are a great reason to haul yourself out from under the covers. But overall, mindset research is increasingly finding that it doesn’t take much to shift one’s thinking. "It doesn’t have to be this huge complicated thing," says Leibowitz. "You can just consciously try to have a positive wintertime mindset and that might be enough to induce it."
Record Siberian Snow Could Bode Ill for Northeast. Is there a teleconnection between early (heavy) snows in Siberia and the potential for major storms, weeks later, downwind - especially Mid Atlantic and New England? Here's an excerpt from USA TODAY: "There is a theory about snow in Siberia during the month of October: If there is a lot, it can mean a particularly wicked winter in the northeast United States. Last month, Siberia experienced record snowfall and the worst blizzard in a decade. Above-average snow cover in Siberia is believed to affect the now-famous polar vortex and send bitterly cold temperatures to the Northeast. This happens when the Arctic Oscillation, a climate pattern, shifts..."

Image credit: U.S. National Ice Center, Naval Ice Center.
Complicated Tangle of Factors Raising Temperatures in Pacific Ocean. The Columbus Dispatch has an interesting article that outlines the myriad of factors leading to record warmth for portions of the Pacific Ocean; here's an excerpt: "...At the moment, the world’s largest ocean is a troublesome place, creating storms and causing problems for people and marine life across the Pacific Rim and beyond. A partial list includes the strong El Nino system that has formed along the equator, and another unusually persistent zone of warm water that has been sitting off the North American coast, wryly called “the Blob.” And a longer-term cycle of heating and cooling known as the Pacific Decadal Oscillation may be switching from a cooling phase to a warming phase. On top of all that is the grinding progress of climate change, caused by accumulation of greenhouse gases generated by human activity..."

Image credit: earth.nullschool.net.
Greenhouse Gases Hit New Milestone, Fueling Worries About Climate Change. Here's a clip from The Washington Post: "...The World Meteorological Organization, in an annual accounting of greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere, reported that average levels of carbon dioxide exceeded 400 parts per million in the early months of 2015, a rise of 43 percent over pre-industrial levels. And, in a separate report hours later, the Met Office and Climatic Research Unit at Britain’s University of East Anglia reported that the Earth’s average temperature has crossed the symbolically important 1-degree C (1.8 F) mark, with temperatures over the first nine months of the year exceeding historic norms by exactly 1.02 degrees C..."

Image credit: University of North Carolina, Charlotte.
8 Western States Have Warmest Year So Far. Based on NOAA NCDC data it appears Minnesota is experiencing the 16th warmest year, to date, in the last 121 years. Here's an excerpt from Climate Central: "For eight western U.S. states, this has been the warmest year on record through October, according to new temperature data released Friday, and several of those states are likely to continue that record to year’s end. The Lower 48 as a whole is also trending hot, and could see the year end up among the 10 warmest in more than 120 years of records. “I think that it is more likely than not that we will see a Top 10 warm year for the contiguous United States,” Jake Crouch, a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration climate scientist, said in an email..."

Map credit above: "Where temperatures for each state ranked for the period from January to October 2015." Credit: NOAA.

On Weather Satellites, Congressional Outlook Should Not be Clouded. Yes, keeping a fleet of operational weather satellites is optimal - if they begin to blink out we'll be flying blind. Here's an excerpt from TheHill: "...Congress' reluctance to fund these programs could have catastrophic consequences. For instance, the JPSS and Polar Follow-On satellites promise to shrink a storm's "cone of uncertainty" -- in other words, where and when a storm will strike -- by up to 75 percent when compared to weather forecasting systems without this technology. If the JPSS/PFO system had been online during 2005's Hurricane Rita, projections about the storm's path could have been narrowed by roughly 875 miles. This, in turn, would have made the evacuation effort far more effective and less costly, and non-impact areas could have maintained normal operations..." (Image credit: NOAA).
Flurry of Hawaiian Hurricanes Shows Climate Fingerprints. Paradise may be within striking distance of more numerous and intense hurricanes in the years to come as the Pacific continues to warm and patterns shift northward. Here's an excerpt from Climate Central: "...The research, published in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society’s annual attribution report, specifically links the three 2014 storms that came within striking distance of the island chain — including Iselle, which grazed the Big Island as a tropical storm — to climate change. This year’s nine hurricanes in the central Pacific are also reinforcing the idea that climate change could mean more active hurricane seasons around Hawaii in the future. Hawaii has a quiet history of hurricanes, in part because it’s surrounded by relatively cool water that acts as a moat keeping most strong storms out or weakening them before they make landfall. Wind patterns also tend to steer storms away or tear them apart..."

File Image credit above: "Satellite imagery of Iselle as it approaches the Big Island as a tropical storm in August 2014." Credit: NOAA

When The Sun Went Medieval on our Planet. Let's pray it doesn't happen again anytime soon - but it might not be a bad idea to adopt the motto of the Boy Scouts and be prepared (for anything). Here's an excerpt at Slate: "...We’ve known for a long time that the Sun is capable of producing huge magnetic explosions. In 2003 it let rip a series of solar storms so powerful that one of them set the record for the biggest flare seen in modern times. And the strongest known was also very first solar explosion ever seen — called the Carrington Event, after an astronomer who studied it — happened in 1859. It created aurora as far south as Mexico and Hawaii! Events like that can also create what are called geomagnetically induced currents (GICs): The Earth’s magnetic field shakes so violently that it induces currents in conductors on the ground. Telegraph operators reported being able to send messages even though the power was disconnected; enough electricity was flowing through the lines to work the devices..."

Image credit above: "An example of a powerful flare erupting on the Sun (from May 5, 2015). The NASA satellite SDO is one of many assets used to monitor solar activity." Photo by NASA/GSFC/SDO.
This Could Be The Biggest Sign Yet That The Battery Revolution Is Here. Energy storage is being implemented at large (utility) scale in California; here's an excerpt from The Washington Post: "...Bringing large batteries into this mix will allow the agency to pay less in so-called “demand charges,” which are assessed based on peak levels of electricity usage, says general manager Joseph Grindstaff, by powering up batteries from the solar panels or other sources and then drawing them down again at opportune times..."

Photo credit above: "The California Inland Empire Utility Agency’s solar panels, located at three of the Agency’s recycled water facilities and IERCF, generate 3.5 MW of clean solar power and will reduce electrical costs at its facilities — the single largest component of IEUA’s operating budget. The solar project is funded in part under the State’s Innovative California Solar Initiative." (Inland Empire Utilities Agency/John Mellin).
Nothing Can Compete With Renewable Energy, Says Top Climate Scientist. The Guardian has the interview; here's a clip: "...In July, Schellnhuber told a science conference in Paris that the world needed “an induced implosion of the carbon economy over the next 20-30 years. Otherwise we have no chance of avoiding dangerous, perhaps disastrous, climate change.” “The avalanche will start because ultimately nothing can compete with renewables,” he told the Guardian. “If you invest at [large] scale, inevitably we will end up with much cheaper, much more reliable, much safer technologies in the energy system: wind, solar, biomass, tidal, hydropower. It is really a no-brainer, if you take away all the ideological debris and lobbying...”

File photo credit above: "Climate scientist, Prof John Schellnhuber, has advised Angela Merkel and Pope Francis." Photograph: Patrick Pleul/Corbis.
Netflix Boss Blasts The Evening News. Will our kids and grandkids be watching news at a fixed schedule? I hope so, but others have their doubts. Here's an excerpt from The New York Post: "...No, the outspoken Hastings replied, adding: “The 6 p.m. newscast: that thing’s going away.” Well, that might have been news to any of the networks. The big three evening news broadcasts — on ABC, CBS and NBC — actually grew their audience in 2014, growing 5 percent, to 24 million viewers, from 2013, according to Pew Research Center. It’s unclear if Hastings was referring to the national broadcast news programs which typically air at 6:30 p.m., or the local evening news which usually airs in the preceding half hour. A spokesman for Netflix later clarified that Hastings was referring to any news broadcast at a fixed hour..."

Graphic credit above: Pew Research Center, journalism.org. "November-to-November average rating per night for all three networks (NBC, CBS, ABC)". Nielson Media Research.
The World's Best and Worst Place to Live Are... Go Norway! Here's an excerpt from CNN.com: "For the seventh consecutive year, Norway topped the list as the most prosperous country in the world. It scored the highest in many variables including "trust in others," "satisfaction with freedom of choice," "civil liberty and free choice" and "satisfaction with standard of living." Denmark and Sweden came third and fifth. Finland and Iceland ranked ninth and 12th on the list. On the flip side, the research company says that the Nordics still have some catching up to do. Economy-wise, they haven't been doing as well as many other advanced countries..."
The Forgotten Kaleidoscope Craze in Victorian England. Pretty amazing - drawing a convincing link between kaleidoscopes and iPhones, how we adapt to new technology and how this impacts our interactions with each other and the world. Here's a clip from Atlas Obscura: "...Each time a new mobile technology is introduced to a culture, it redefines our understanding of what it means to be a social person in the world. Devices like the kaleidoscope and our iPhones are symbols of this shift. Right now, there is a lot of investment in getting us to put down our devices and experience “authentic” human connection..."

Image credit above: "Another popular 19th century optical device, a Phenakistoscope, in action." (Photo: JBarta/WikiCommons CC BY-SA 2.5).
This Man is Walking Across Antarctica All Alone. He must have pissed someone off. Wow. Here's an excerpt at National Geographic: "As summer dawns in the Southern Hemisphere, a seasoned Antarctic explorer is hoping to add his name to the Polar record books on the centennial of Sir Ernest Shackleton’s ill-fated Endurance Expedition. Henry Worsley, a 55-year-old British ex-army officer, is endeavoring to become the first person to cross the Antarctic continent alone, unsupported, and unassisted..."

Photo credit above: "British polar explorer Henry Worsley hopes to complete the first unassisted, unsupported, solo traverse of the continent." Photo: Henry Worsley.
Remarkable "Fall-Streak Hole" Appears in Skies Over Australia. Check this out, courtesy of The Australian: "...In the right conditions, a trigger can cause some of those supercooled droplets to freeze, and set off a similar chain reaction. The result is a “fallstreak hole”, pictured in a shot from the Bureau of Meteorology’s 2016 calendar (on sale now). And the trigger? It’s an aircraft. As the plane punches through the cloud, it seeds the first ice crystals and sets the whole thing in motion. As the crystals grow they literally drop out of the cloud (falling crystals are causing the rainbow effect in this shot). Circulating air currents around the edge of the hole feed into the chain reaction. Within an hour a fallstreak hole can grow to 50km across..."

Image credit above: "Weird: the fallstreak hole over Korumburra, Victoria." Picture: David Barton Source: News Corp Australia.

TODAY: Rain develops by afternoon. Winds: E 10-15. High: 54

WEDNESDAY NIGHT: Rain, heavy at times. Winds gust to 40+ mph. Low: 40

THURSDAY: Very windy, rain slowly tapers. Winds: NW 20-35+ High: 46

FRIDAY: More clouds than sun, brisk. Winds: NW 10-20. Wake-up: 33. High: 42

SATURDAY: More sun, a good leaf-raking day. Winds: S 10-15. Wake-up: 31. High: 54

SUNDAY: Mild sun, feels like early October. Winds: S 8-13. Wake-up: 40. High: 58

MONDAY: Still mild, PM showers possible. Wake-up: 43. High: 53

TUESDAY: Periods of rain - cooling off. Wake-up: 46. High: 49 (falling)

Climate Stories...

A Rising Tide. New Republic explains how Miami is sinking beneath the sea - but no without a fight. Here's an excerpt: "...And Miami Beach is just one small part of a region that’s in big trouble. If sea levels rise as projected, no major U.S. metropolitan area stands to rack up bigger losses than Miami-Dade County. Almost 60 percent of the county is less than six feet above sea level. Even before swelling of the seas is factored in, Miami has the greatest total value of assets exposed to flooding of any city in the world: more than $400 billion. Once you account for future sea-level rise and continued economic growth, Miami’s exposed property will far outstrip that of any other urban area, reaching almost $3.5 trillion by the 2070s..."
Can Miami Beach Survive Global Warming? Vanity Fair provides more perspective; here's an excerpt: "Compounding the city’s vulnerability to major weather events is the worldwide phenomenon of sea-level rise. Due to thermal expansion of the oceans and the melting of ice sheets and glaciers in the Earth’s far latitudes, the global mean sea level is rising. How fast and how much is a matter of debate, with such federal agencies as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, NASA, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration projecting, on the low end, eight inches of sea-level rise by the year 2100, and, on the high end, as much as six feet. But Miami Beach, a low-lying city to begin with, is already feeling the effects of sea-level rise. Every time there’s a heavy rain, the locals brace for flooding on Alton Road, the main north-south thoroughfare of the city’s west side, as well as on smaller roads in the area, such as Purdy Avenue, where Levine filmed his commercial..."

3 Lessons From That Antarctic Ice Study. Measuring Antarctic ice isn't easy, as this article at Christian Science Monitor highlights; here's an excerpt: "...Scientists agree that none of the data-gathering tools are perfect. What they don’t agree on is which measurement tool – GRACE or ICESat – provides the most accurate data. “You’re talking about a continental-size area and changes in centimeters and millimeters,” explains Thomas P. Wagner, a NASA climate scientist, in an interview with the Monitor. “It’s very, very difficult to do this from space with a satellite, but one of the only ways to do it is by satellite,” he explains. But scientists are constantly improving their tools and learning more about the ice sheets..."

Photo credit above: "In this Jan. 26, 2015 photo, pieces of thawing ice are scattered along the beachshore at Punta Hanna, Livingston Island, South Shetland Island archipelago, Antarctica. Water is eating away at the Antarctic ice, melting it where it hits the oceans. As the ice sheets slowly thaw, water pours into the sea, 130 billion tons of ice (118 billion metric tons) per year for the past decade, according to NASA satellite calculations." (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)
Why Can't Republicans Support a Carbon Tax? Here's an excerpt from The New Yorker that caught my eye: "...The E.U., New Zealand, Quebec, Tokyo, and parts of China (which plans to nationalize its carbon-pricing markets, in 2017), along with others, use a cap-and-trade system. British Columbia, Costa Rica, France, Japan, and the U.K., among other countries and regions, charge a fee or tax based on a unit of use, like that in the Whitehouse-Schatz pricing proposal. And a number of high-profile coalitions, including investment banks, oil companies, and heads of state, have formally requested that the international community price carbon. “In the context of international negotiations, there will be more and more pressure on the U.S. not to lead but just to catch up,” Aldy told me..."
Following The Law Isn't Exxon's Only Obligation. Here's a clip of an Op-Ed at Bloomberg View: "...The same principle requires companies to stay within the bounds of probity in discussing external factors that bear on the company’s prospects, such as coming regulatory requirements and relevant technological shifts -- and climate change. If a company is perceived to have misled the public, its economic prospects will suffer, and it will struggle mightily to show that it has served its shareholders. Finally, large corporations have social and political influence, and for that reason they have ethical obligations to the public as a whole..." (File photo: Jessica Rinaldi).
No, Climate Change Skepticism Isn't Really About Doubting Science. It's about the lingering confusion over the consensus. That 97-number keeps popping up. Here's a snippet from The Washington Post: "...So there's a big gap in Americans' understanding of the scientific community's consensus and the scientific community's actual consensus on climate change. Dana Nuccitelli, one of the authors of that 2013 review, thinks that misunderstanding correlates directly with Americans' belief in what causes climate change: If the scientists we trust are apparently unsure of whether climate change is happening, then why should we be? Of course, that's not the case among the scientific community..."

Climate Change is the "Mother of All Risk" to National Security. Here's an excerpt of an Op-Ed written by an Iraq war veteran and former Special Advisor to the U.S. Army on Energy at TIME: "...One of the U.S. military’s less-noticed findings, however, is that there is clear consensus that climate change poses an immediate risk to national security. Military leaders recognize that they must lead by example and address the threat of climate change, and they are actively pushing goals to dramatically scale up renewable energy. The U.S. must replicate this leadership and seize the opportunity when countries meet this December in Paris to finalize a global deal on climate change..."

Image credit: Partnership For a Secure America.

To the military, climate change acts as a threat multiplier, exacerbating threats in already unstable regions of the world.
Bill McKibbon on Keystone XL Rejection: "The Tide is Starting to Turn". Here's an excerpt of an interview at RollingStone: "...With the fight over Keystone finally over, McKibben reflected on its start: the moment he heard NASA's leading climate scientist, Jim Hansen, say that if the pipeline went through, and the world burnt through the oil located in the Alberta tar sands, it would be "game over" for the planet. "That was the first time for me, and I think for most people, there was this sudden realization that there were profound limits to business as usual, and we had run into them. And that's the message that, in the end, carried the day," McKibben says. "From Jim Hansen's lips to President Obama's ears — though it took four very long and difficult and magnificent years to get there..."

Photo credit above: "Gene Karpinski, left with microphone, president of the League of Conversation Voters, speaks during a gathering in front of the White House to celebrate President Barack Obama's rejection of the proposed Keystone XL pipeline Friday, Nov. 6, 2015, in Washington." (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
What Critics of the Keystone Campaign Misunderstand About Climate Activism. Here's an excerpt of a Dave Roberts article at Vox that helped me frame the Keystone decision in a much larger context: "...That's because Keystone was about more than climate; it was also about local pollution, political corruption, and corporate bullying. This helps explain why climate activism has primarily manifested as "Blockadia" — blocking and shutting down bad projects is easier to organize around than efficiency or carbon pricing. And maybe that's fine. Maybe it isn't the role of activists to imagine and bring about a new world. Maybe that's for policymakers, designers, engineers, artists, and entrepreneurs. Maybe the highest and best use of activism is just to make things uncomfortable, and more expensive, for the bad actors benefiting from the unsustainable status quo..."

Photo credit above: "A sign is posted in front of TransCanada's Keystone pipeline facilities in Hardisty, Alberta, Canada, on Friday, Nov. 6, 2015. Following the Obama administration’s rejection of the Keystone XL pipeline, the oil industry faces the tricky task of making sure the crude oil targeted for the pipeline still gets where it needs to go." (Jeff McIntosh/The Canadian Press via AP).
Kelly Ayotte and the Rise of Green Republicans. Here's another hopeful sign; highlighted in a story at New Republic: "There’s a powerful moment occurring on climate change right now in the GOP. As Greg Sargent writes in our latest issue, the party's solid wall of science-denial has begun to crack. In September, eleven House Republicans signed a resolution calling climate change a manmade problem that must be fixed. Then, last Thursday, in another sign of the shift, four senators—Kelly Ayotte, Mark Kirk, Lamar Alexander, and Lindsey Graham—announced their own energy and environment working group. So far, this is a trickle, not a flood, and it doesn’t mean the larger GOP will soon come around to a sensible climate platform. But it does say something hopeful about the state of America's climate politics..."

File photo: AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster.
Lamar Smith vs. NOAA. Due diligence or blatant harrassment of scientists trying to do their jobs and incorporate new (refined) data sets? Here's an excerpt at Medium: "...NOAA is right to resist, and the press is wrong to back burner this grotesque mockery of congressional oversight. The press will most likely cower indecently rather than tell the truth here, as they have done so much lately. It’s another chapter in the fake scandal horror show, and they’ll dutifully report “both sides”. Smith is being flagrantly and transparently abusive, and it would be good if the rest of society did not turn away. The image embedded in my tweet shown displays the original and updated NOAA NCEI global mean surface temperature. What I’d like you to take away from it is that the corrections are tiny, and that if anything the observed global warming is made smaller. The adjustments to the “hiatus” 1998–2013 period are almost invisible, and it is this which is driving the congressional witch hunt."
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