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TORNADO ALLEY BECOMES THE PLACE FOR CLIMATE CONFUSION AND POLITICS: Climate scientists and meteorologists have been struggling to lend some balance in the last week to claims by politicians and others that climate change and weather are the same thing — they’re not.
Victor Gensini, an assistant professor for climatology at Northern Illinois University, said he has been swamped by interview requests in the wake of record tornado activity in the Midwest.
He tweeted that reporters want to discuss climate change and the recent severe weather, responding in a long thread that explained why the connection between weather and global warming isn’t so clear.
“No, climate change did not cause the recent rash of US tornadoes,” Gensini said. “Climate change does not cause any given extreme weather event,” but it does “alter background probabilities” across a curve, he added in an eight-part thread that the Washington Post’s weather team called “Great.”
Gensini led PBS NewsHour on Wednesday night in an interview explaining how conventional weather patterns are at play here rather than climate change.
“Weather isn’t climate change” is a rule of thumb in writing about global warming. But it’s one that often gets buried when politics enter the mix.
It started with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., tweeting last week that “casual tornadoes” are the new normal in a world facing climate change, appearing surprised that Washington was under a tornado warning.
But it didn’t stop with Ocasio-Cortez. Soon it could be seen on the road to the White House.
Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts took a tour through flood-ravaged Iowa, making a video in which she called attention to the results of the climate crisis.
“The consequences of climate change are severe, and they are already affecting places like Burlington, Iowa. We have a moral responsibility to act—now,” Warren tweeted, with a video diary of her experiences campaigning in the state.
Warren did say that it’s not like floods and tornadoes have never happened in the Midwest, but they are increasing in number and severity. “People who want to deny climate change, they’re putting us all at risk,” she said while looking into the rain.
Presidential candidate Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, also on the campaign trail in Iowa, pointed out a similar reality in his own video diary, saying the flood waters are going to keep coming until someone in the White House takes climate change seriously.
Record-breaking week: The United States has experienced over 100 tornadoes in the last two weeks, which many meteorologists say broke a record on Tuesday with at least 8 tornadoes per day for 12 consecutive days. The record was previously held by 11 consecutive days of tornadoes on June 7, 1980.
President Trump began approving disaster relief for states in the last week, including Louisiana, Oklahoma, Montana, and Kansas.
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ENERGY DEPARTMENT BOASTS OF PROMOTING ‘FREEDOM GAS’ AND ‘FREEDOM MOLECULES’: The Energy Department has coined the terms “freedom gas” and “freedom molecules” to describe its energy export agenda, eliciting derision from critics.
Undersecretary of Energy Mark Menezes said in a press release Tuesday that a permit to export more liquefied natural gas from the Freeport LNG Terminal located in Quintana Island, Texas, “is critical to spreading freedom gas throughout the world.”
Steven Winberg, the Energy Department’s assistant secretary for fossil energy who signed the export order, used similar language in the press release, saying the agency is enabling “U.S. freedom to be exported to the world.”
Inslee was among those who mocked the Trump administration for its framing.
“Freedom gas? Freedom is generally good, but freedom from glaciers, freedom from clean air, freedom from healthy forests that aren’t on fire, and freedom from the world we know and cherish is not what we seek,” Inslee said on Twitter Wednesday.
EXXON, CHEVRON SHAREHOLDERS REJECT CLIMATE CHANGE MEASURES: Shareholders of U.S. oil and gas giants Exxon Mobil and Chevron rejected resolutions Wednesday that would have demanded more reporting and transparency about climate change.
At Exxon, a resolution to create an independent board chairman failed, a measure pushed by activist groups to ensure greater accountability over the company’s commitment to combating climate change. Shareholders also defeated measures to install a special climate change committee and report the public health risks climate change poses to Exxon’s expanding Gulf Coast petrochemical infrastructure.
Chevron’s shareholders, meanwhile, easily voted down proposals to create a special committee on climate change and produce a report on how it would cut emissions in alignment with the Paris agreement.
U.S. companies lag behind Europeans: So far, European oil and gas majors are moving faster than their American counterparts to adopt activist-driven climate resolutions. This month, BP agreed to disclose how its activities align with the Paris accord.
And Shell recently announced it is leaving a major industry lobbying group, American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers, because of the trade association’s inaction on climate policy.
PROTESTERS WANT TO MAKE EXXON PAY: A group of 100 protesters stood outside the Exxon shareholder meeting chanting and waving banners that read: “Climate Crisis // #ExxonKnew // Make Them Pay.”
The slogan references reports that the oil company covered up its own studies from the 1970s that showed climate change would harm its businesses. “Make Them Pay” refers to an investigation led by Democratic attorneys general that began nearly four years ago to build a case against the oil company. The case was meant to result in an award for damages by showing how Exxon lied to both its shareholders and the public about the climate threat.
Exxon adamantly opposes the notion that it lied or covered up information. It has managed to hold back attorneys general efforts in court.
The protesters at Wednesday’s shareholder meeting were led by the anti-fossil-fuel group 350.org, founded by environmentalist and climate activist Bill McKibben.
OHIO MOVES CLOSER TO NUCLEAR AND COAL BAILOUT: The Buckeye State’s House legislators passed a bill Wednesday in an effort to save uneconomic nuclear and coal plants while making things harder for renewables.
The bill passed the House 53 to 43 and is expected to pass the Senate in the next few weeks.
The oil and natural gas industry, a primary opponent of the bill, is urging the state’s senators not to approve the legislation.
“Ohio consumers will pay the price for today’s vote in the Ohio House,” said Chris Zeigler, executive director of the Ohio branch of the American Petroleum Institute. “We urge the Senate to protect Ohio taxpayers and reject this legislative bailout.”
Big Oil unites with climate activists in opposition: API opposes the bill because it would disadvantage natural gas power plants and other generators in the Ohio electricity market. Low natural gas prices have led utilities to build more gas-fired power plants to replace coal because of the increased efficiency and economic advantages.
“This vote essentially bails out the profitable Davis-Besse and Perry nuclear power plants owned by FirstEnergy Solutions, and subsidizes two coal plants — including one in Indiana,” Zeigler said. “Ultimately, this legislation hurts the Ohio consumer.”
The oil and gas group is joined in its opposition by environmental and climate change advocates who oppose the bill because of the harm it would cause to the state’s renewable and energy efficiency targets.
The bill would do away with the state’s renewable portfolio standard of 12.5% by 2027.
FEDERAL COURT DEALS DECISIVE BLOW TO OBAMA-ERA WATER RULE: A federal court dealt a decisive blow to the Obama administration’s Waters of the U.S. rule this week, bolstering the Trump administration’s deregulation agenda.
The U.S. District Court of the Southern District of Texas issued the strongly worded ruling late Tuesday, stating that the Environmental Protection Agency broke the law in issuing the landmark regulation governing waterways.
“The court finds that the final rule violated the notice-and-comment requirements of the [Administrative Procedure Act] and therefore grants summary judgment in favor of the plaintiffs on this ground,” the court ruled, siding with the American Farm Bureau Federation.
Read more from John’s story here.
The Rundown
Politico A climate debate could be risky for Dems, but they want it anyway
Reuters Saudi Arabia gathers Arab leaders over attacks on oil assets
Washington Post Extreme weather has made half of America look like Tornado Alley
Wall Street Journal Big Exxon-Total gas project jolted by Papua New Guinea leadership change
Calendar
THURSDAY | May 30
Congress in recess all week.
MONDAY | June 3
9 a.m., Omni Shoreham Hotel. The Nuclear Energy Institute holds the Nuclear Energy Assembly in Washington, June 3-5.
MONDAY | June 10
9 a.m., Philadelphia. The Edison Electric Institute, representing the investor-owned utility industry, holds its 2019 annual convention in Philadelphia, June 10-11.
TUESDAY | June 11
The House Energy and Commerce Committee’s Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee holds a hearing with former EPA administrators Lee Thomas, William Reilly, Christine Todd Whitman, and Gina McCarthy testifying.
