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Princeton University researchers have found that the climate models scientists use to project future conditions on our planet underestimate the cooling effect that clouds have on a daily — and even hourly — basis, particularly over land. The researchers report in the journal Nature Communications that models tend to factor in too much of the sun’s daily heat, which results in warmer, drier conditions than might actually occur. The researchers found that inaccuracies in accounting for the diurnal, or daily, cloud cycle did not seem to invalidate climate projections, but they did increase the margin of error for a crucial...

On Sept. 23, 2016, a group of protesters blocked a Burlington Northern Santa Fe freight train carrying coal in Spokane, WA, to prevent the earth from warming up. From a scientific standpoint, the action was absurd. As a piece of a political theater, it may have been more effective. The blockage by Rev. George Taylor and other members of groups called Veterans for Peace and Raging Grannies garnered widespread press coverage. And the protest may trigger a legal revolution as well. In a hearing tomorrow, a judge in Spokane is expected to hand down a written ruling allowing Taylor to...

MOSCOW -- Increasingly frequent snowfalls in the Sahara Deseret are evidence of the much talked about global warming trend, just like the unusually warm winters in Russia, bitter cold spells in the US and floods in Europe, Head of Russia’s Federal Service for Hydrometeorology and Environmental Monitoring Roman Vilfand told TASS. On January 7, snow blanketed the Sahara Desert north of Algeria’s city of Ain Sefra. The snow cover was about 40cm deep but melted by night. A year earlier, in December 2016, snow fell in the region for the first time since 1979. "Such situations, including snowfalls in Sahara,...

In November, as delegates from all over the world gathered in the former German capital of Bonn for the annual UN climate summit, their hosts were feeling a bit embarrassed. Germany likes to champion itself as a climate leader. But when delivering her headline speech to the summit, Chancellor Angela Merkel was unable to make any new climate commitments. That’s because she was locked in difficult coalition negotiations with the free-market liberals and the environmentalist Greens. Germany is still 40 percent reliant on coal, a reality Merkel acknowledged in her speech. Because of strong economic growth and Merkel’s decision to...

Green sea turtles do not develop into males or females due to sex chromosomes, like humans and most other mammals do. Instead, the temperature outside a turtle egg influences the sex of the growing embryo. And this unusual biological quirk, scientists say, endangers their future in a warmer world. Already, some sea turtle populations are so skewed by heat that the young reptiles are almost entirely female, according to a new report in the journal Current Biology. “This is one of the most important conservation papers of the decade,” said biologist David Owens, a professor emeritus at the College of...

The impacts of climate change are among the environmental challenges facing Iran that helped spark protests in dozens of cities across the Islamic republic. At least 20 people have died in the uprising, driven by the sudden collapse of financial institutions, low wages and mistrust of national leaders. Rising temperatures are seen by some experts as an underlying condition for the economic hardships that led to the unrest. A severe drought, mismanaged water resources and dust storms diminished Iran's economy in recent years, according to experts who study the region. While the protests are largely driven by resistance to the...

The challenge of a possible cholera outbreak is facing Bangladesh as the climate-induced warming of the earth induces the growth for algae and bacteria, experts have observed. The temperature rise in Bangladesh will make possible the growth for various algae and bacteria, leading to more cholera cases in the country, said Dr Md Sirajul Islam, emeritus scientist of International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh. Global warming caused by climate change might influence the transmission dynamic of cholera, he added. The environmental microbiologist came up with the observation during his presentation on water treatment as an adaptation option to climate...

It’s when police officers mistakenly harm their fellow officers that we really see the problems with law enforcement narratives. Last September, St. Louis police reportedly beat and arrested a fellow police officer who had gone undercover during a series of protests. The police claimed that their fellow officer, who was black, was resisting arrest. That seems implausible. By the time the officer is getting arrested, there would be little reason for him to resist to maintain his cover. He undoubtedly knew how the police operate. He undoubtedly knew that resisting would bring a beating and an arrest. That both happened...

Biting Arctic air — bringing wind chills as low as 30 below — will make the outdoors miserable for more than 130 million Americans in the Northeast, as well as parts of the Southeast and Great Plains this weekend, forecasters warn. But before folks file this cold snap away under "typical winter weather," scientists say the potentially record-breaking temperatures in store for Friday night through Sunday are being fed, at least in part, by a warming climate. Confused? A study published last year in the journal WIRES Climate Change, however, lays out how the warming Arctic and melting ice appear...

The Interior Department’s number-two official issued a secretarial order just before Christmas rescinding several climate change and conservation policies issued under the Obama administration, saying they were “inconsistent” with President Trump’s quest for energy independence. Secretarial Order 3360, signed Dec. 22 by Interior Deputy Secretary David Bernhardt, wipes away four separate directives and policy manuals aimed at showing departmental employees how to minimize the environmental impact of activities on federal land and in federal waters, and calls for the review of a fifth one that applies to the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska. Instead, it directs officials to reinstate and update guidance...

Native American tribes, islanders and communities of color led the toughest environmental fights of 2017. Thenjiwe McHarris of the Movement for Black Lives leaned into the microphone and, with a finger pointed firmly at her audience, delivered a powerful message to the 200,000 people gathered in Washington, D.C., for the People's Climate March. "There is no climate justice without racial justice," McHarris boomed as the temperature reached 91 degrees, tying a record for late April. "There is no climate justice without gender justice. There is no climate justice without queer justice." For a movement historically led by white males who...

With a seeming rise in the occurrence of snow days, blizzards and icy travel, the common belief that climate change isn’t happening comes as no surprise. Scientists stress that locally wintry weather conditions are not indicators of changes in climate, and weather conditions in one part of the world are not representative of what’s occurring globally. “It’s like saying, 'if everyone around me is wealthy, then poverty is not a problem,'” Peter Frumhoff, the Union of Concerned Scientists science and policy director and chief climate scientist, told CNN. Scientists point to hard data, including temperature measurements on land and water...

The globe is set to start drying out dramatically if global warming isn't stopped. That's the message from a new environmental study published by the journal Nature Climate Change . Over 25% of Earth will start experiencing the effects of "aridificaiton" by the year 2050 if humans don't meet the changes proposed by the Paris climate agreement . The study claims that if the Earth's average temperature goes up by two degrees Celsius over the next 32 years, the planet will start to become a desert. “Our research predicts that aridification would emerge over about 20-30 percent of the world’s...

Over the last year, it seems as if more campus hate crimes turned out to be hoaxes than legitimate acts of hate. Schools tended to be fertile ground for overzealous students looking to prove there is hate where none exists. These 17 examples show 2017 continued to be a year in which hate-crime hoaxes are an epidemic with no end in sight. Some anecdotes are fallout from post-election antics spawned in late November 2016 in the wake of the Donald Trump presidency. The rest originated in apparent desperate attempts to push a progressive narrative. Student cries KKK — except it...

President Donald Trump’s golf resort will build two seawalls to protect three holes on the golf course from rising sea levels and water erosion. President Donald Trump will finally get the wall he's after. However, it won't be along the U.S.-Mexico border. An Irish council on Thursday granted approval for a wall to be built around part of Trump's golf course in Doonbeg, Ireland to protect it from water erosion. Trump International Golf Links & Hotel Ireland previously applied to the Clare County Council for a continuous 1.7-mile long wall, but withdrew the application last year. Now, the resort will...

Tens of thousands of people have evacuated their land in Bali as the nearby volcano Mount Agung angrily spits ash and its magma rises. Many Balinese hold the mountain sacred and accept its occasional outbursts as moral admonishments whereas geologists consider this activity a routine part of Earth’s behavior. But scientists have found another force - climate change - affects the frequency of eruptions. Now a new study shows even relatively minor climate variations may have such an influence. If they are right, today’s global warming could mean more and bigger volcanic eruptions in the future. The new study is...

A small, southwestern mosque was targeted last weekend by spelling-challenged vandals. Neighbors woke up Monday morning to find that someone with a can of red spray paint paid an unwelcome visit to the Golden Mosque in the City of Clovis, New Mexico. That spray paint reads: “Happy Birthday Jesus Christ! From a real Christain [sic]” On the front of the mosque, near the door, was the word “Trump” scrawled twice in blue. The vandal(s) misspelled “Christian” again on the mosque’s marquee. One such neighbor, Toni Pop, spoke with local KRQE News 13 about the incident. She said, “I pass by...

Europe is underestimating the primary cause of migration from sub-saharan Africa: climate change. Environmental changes have a particularly pronounced impact on migration from Africa for at least four reasons: the continent is highly dependent on natural resources and agriculture, which are the first assets to be undermined by climate change; it has poor infrastructure, such as flood defences; its states are often characterized by weak institutions, which are less able to adapt to climate change; and its high poverty rate undermines the resilience of local populations to climate shocks. Climate change is affecting stability and security, too. There are plenty...

The Arctic continued in 2017 to warm at double the rate of the global temperature increase, resulting in the second warmest air temperatures, above average ocean temperatures, loss of sea ice, and a range of human, ocean and ecosystem effects, according to the United Nations weather agency. “While 2017 saw fewer records shattered than in 2016, the Arctic shows no sign of returning to the reliably frozen region it was decades ago,” said the Arctic Report Card, a peer-reviewed study that brings together the work of 85 scientists from 12 nations. The UN World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said on Tuesday...

The city and county of Santa Cruz has joined a growing number of communities suing oil companies over climate change, alleging a Big Tobacco-like plot in which the fossil fuel industry long concealed the dangers of its products from consumers. The two lawsuits, filed Wednesday, blame the use and combustion of oil, gas and coal for accelerating sea level rise and threatening hundreds of millions of dollars of damage to the famously dramatic and much visited Santa Cruz County coast. While the challenge is similar to other suits recently filed by waterfront communities in California, including San Francisco, the new...