When climate change combines with systemic racism it is Black and Latino communities that suffer more significant consequences.
...The roots of systemic racism run so stubbornly deep in the US, recent research has revealed, that global heating harms Black and Latino children before they are even born, as well as in the first years of their lives.
“Unfortunately many children will be marked for life because of what their mothers are exposed to, affecting the brain, lungs, pancreas, everything,” said Susan Pacheco, an associate professor at the University of Texas Health Science Center who co-authored research released last summer that found that pregnant women exposed to heat and air pollution are at heightened risk of adverse pregnancy outcomes.
The climate crisis is shaping the lives of Black children and children of color before they take their first breath, but it doesn’t stop there. Once a Black or Latino child is born, there is a good chance they will live in a neighborhood that gets even hotter than nearby, whiter suburbs. Researchers have found that in US cities including New York, Dallas and Miami, poorer areas with more residents of color can be get up to 20F hotter in summer than wealthier, whiter districts in the same city.
We Need More Women In Science - We Can't Depend On Men to Save the Planet
Women represent 50% of the world’s population, and therefore half of its potential. But did you know that, at present, less than 30% of researchers worldwide are women? According to recent data provided by the UN: “Globally, female students’ enrolment is particularly low in computer technology (3%), natural science, mathematics and statistics (5%) and in engineering, manufacturing and construction (8%).”Here's some good advice from a woman scientist:
Even in this day and age, entrenched biases and gender stereotypes are steering women and girls away from scientific fields. But given the current challenges of climate change, nature loss and COVID-19, it’s more important than ever to harness all the talent and innovation we have at our disposal. To do so, we need to promote the participation of all sections of society.
“I would tell them to pursue their dreams, face the barriers that society imposes and be the best version of themselves every day. The world is facing increasingly complex global challenges and we cannot afford to go without half of the population when solving them. The absence of women in science means giving up all the knowledge, talent and potential that this group can generate.”
End of the World Or We Can All Be Heroes - Does the Climate Change Message Matter?
Which message regarding climate change has the most impact - doomsday or it's time for heroes?
Studies have come to wildly different conclusions. One paper will proclaim that “Fear Won’t Do It” for motivating action on climate change; another will say the exact opposite. The research about hope is similarly mixed. Some studies have suggested that optimistic messages could prod people to behave in more climate-friendly ways and increase support for climate policies, but others found that hopeful appeals actually lowered people’s motivation to reduce emissions.
“It’s really cut down the middle,” said Joshua Ettinger, a PhD student studying public support for climate action at the University of Oxford. “You have study after study finding conflicting results.”
Some research suggests that while fear can prompt us to spring into action, hope actually gives us something to do. In other words, alarming and optimistic messages could simply be two sides of the same coin.
Margaret Klein Salamon, the founder of The Climate Mobilization, argues that “telling the whole, frightening truth” is a powerful asset for the climate movement that could unlock “tremendous potential for transformation” — provided that it’s paired with an ambitious, heroic solution. Her organization calls for “an all-hands-on-deck effort to eliminate greenhouse gas emissions and safely draw down excess carbon from the atmosphere at emergency speed.”
Who Turned the Lights Out in Texas?
Texas operates its own power grid independent from the rest of the nation. And, Texas Republicans have resisted any effort to add resiliency to their grid or to make the improvement necessary to connect to the national power grid.
The reason people in Texas are currently experiencing the collapse of a badly overloaded system, leading to extended outages lasting for hours, is simply because that’s the way the system is designed to work. The incentive in Texas is to provide for exactly as much power as is needed, and not one hamster-wheel-driven watt more. Because in a system that never reached 100% of capacity, power would always be cheap. It’s fighting over the difference between 99.9% demand and 100.1% demand that drives the system and generates profits.
“If you were sitting at home in the cold because you have no power and are sitting there waiting for someone to come rescue you because your [sic] lazy is direct result of your raising! Only the strong will survive and the week [sic] will perish,” he wrote.On the other hand, another local leader in Texas puts the blame for frozen natural gas pipelines where it belongs.
The mayor ranted “I’ll be damned if I’m going to provide for anyone that is capable of doing it themselves!”
“Bottom line, quit crying and looking for a handout!” he wrote.
Judge Clay Jenkins, the chief executive of Dallas County, explained that the problems in Texas could have been avoided. Extreme weather isn't unheard of in Texas and Judge Jenkins explained that ten years of GOP governors have turned the state into one that can't even count on their power grid.
"What went wrong here was the last two governors had policies, the current governor and the one that was before him, had policies that valued rock-bottom prices for commercial large users over all else, including protecting residential customers when there is an extreme weather event," he explained. "And so what you see in Oklahoma they're not seeing that problem because they have regulatory requirements that require you to winterize your equipment if you're a generator, require you to either use a certain material or bury it at a certain depth if you're a gas pipeline company."
That’s why three tribal organizations — UTBB, Bristol Bay Native Association, and Bristol Bay Economic Development Corporation — and many supporters are championing a much more sweeping approach to protections. In addition to calling for EPA action, the coalition wants Congress to declare the broader Bristol Bay region a national fisheries area, says Newman. This legislative proposal, inspired by the fisheries regulations of the Magnuson-Stevens Act, would establish a first-of-its-kind onshore fisheries area. In this case, Newman says, the legislation would reflect similar restrictions on hardrock mining as Section 404(c), but across all of Bristol Bay’s nine major river basins.
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