Free Republic

America’s biggest problem right now is that “We’ve got people in charge of important shit who don’t believe in science.” Well, at least it is if you believe that world-renowned expert Harrison Ford. Ford was speaking at an environmental awards ceremony in Culver City, California, where he was fêted for his work as executive vice chair of Conservation International. According to Hollywood Reporter: “We face an unprecedented moment in this country. Today’s greatest threat is not climate change, not pollution, not flood or fire,” Ford said during his acceptance speech of the Founders’ Award. “It’s that we’ve got people in...

VATICAN CITY Gov. Jerry Brown challenged the world’s religious leaders to further engage as he minimized the negative effects of President Donald Trump on meeting the climate-change challenge. “The Trump factor is very small, very small indeed,” in comparison to the commitments taking place around the world, Brown said to a burst of applause Saturday at an event organized by the Vatican’s Pontifical Academy of Sciences. “That’s nothing to cheer about, because if it was only Trump that was a problem, we’d have it solved. But that’s not our only problem. “The problem … is us. It’s our whole way...

Plans by the Trump administration to promote coal as a solution to climate change at a major UN meeting have angered environmentalists. An adviser to the president is expected to take part in a pro-coal presentation in Bonn next week. Separately, a group of governors will say that the US is still committed to climate action despite Mr Trump's rejection of the Paris agreement. The talks begin on Monday and aim to flesh out the rules for the Paris pact This meeting, officially known as COP23, will be the first full gathering of climate negotiators since President Trump vowed to...

Humans are likely responsible for 93 - 123% of Earth’s net global warming after 1950, says a blockbuster climate report issued on Friday. The Climate Science Special Report is the first product released by the Fourth National Climate Assessment (NCA); the core assessment itself, focusing on impacts, will be released in 2018. The NCA is an congressionally mandated quadrennial effort by hundreds of U.S. scientists to assess how the climate is changing in the United States. The project is carried out by the U.S. Global Change Research Program. Preparation of the report included workshops around the nation, a public-comment period...

WASHINGTON — Directly contradicting much of the Trump administration’s position on climate change, 13 federal agencies unveiled an exhaustive scientific report on Friday that says humans are the dominant cause of the global temperature rise that has created the warmest period in the history of civilization.

The newly-released National Climate Assessment (NCA) has sparked a tidal wave of media coverage, with a particular focus on how it contradicts the Trump administration’s stance on global warming. Read pretty much any publication, and you’d also read that Americans are “already” feeling the effects of unchecked global warming. The NCA reviews and summarizes the state of global warming and how it may be impacting the U.S., attributing all current warming to human activities. The NCA is the work of scientists, but the report’s media messengers are embellishing some of the report’s key findings with respect to current U.S. weather...

Concentrations of CO2 in the Earth's atmosphere surged to a record high in 2016, according to the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). Last year's increase was 50% higher than the average of the past 10 years. Researchers say a combination of human activities and the El Niño weather phenomenon drove CO2 to a level not seen in 800,000 years. Scientists say this risks making global temperature targets largely unattainable. This year's greenhouse gas bulletin produced by the WMO, is based on measurements taken in 51 countries. Research stations dotted around the globe measure concentrations of warming gases including carbon dioxide, methane...

The White House has sought to downplay a major climate change report, which was compiled by 13 US federal agencies. The study is at odds with assertions from President Donald Trump and several members of his administration. It says it is "extremely likely" human activity is the "dominant cause" of global warming. A spokesman for the White House said it supported "rigorous scientific analysis and debate" but added that the climate was "always changing". White House principal deputy press secretary Raj Shah said it was not certain how sensitive the Earth's climate was to greenhouse gas emissions. Mr Trump, who...

The White House has sought to downplay a major climate change report, which was compiled by 13 US federal agencies. The study is at odds with assertions from President Donald Trump and several members of his administration. It says it is "extremely likely" human activity is the "dominant cause" of global warming. A spokesman for the White House said it supported "rigorous scientific analysis and debate" but added that the climate was "always changing". White House principal deputy press secretary Raj Shah said it was not certain how sensitive the Earth's climate was to greenhouse gas emissions. Mr Trump, who...

The United Nations has officially confirmed what many of us, including President Trump, knew already: the Paris climate accord was a complete waste of space. As UN Environment admits in its latest Emissions Shortfall report, even when you add up all the CO2 reduction pledges made by all the signatory nations at Paris, it still comes to only a third of what is supposedly necessary to stop the world warming by more than 2 degrees C by the end of this century. According to UN Environment’s head Eric Solheim, the world is heading for disaster: “One year after the Paris Agreement entered...

A new United Nations report says the Trudeau government is so far behind meeting the greenhouse gas reduction targets it agreed to in the Paris climate accord, it will likely have to buy billions of dollars worth of carbon offsets to meet its international commitments. The problem, as even the report concedes, is that global carbon offset markets are riddled with fraud, meaning that buying them may not actually lower emissions. The UN’s Emissions Gap Report 2017, identifies Canada as one of several countries, “likely to require further action and/or to have to purchase offsets in order to meet their...

How sick do you have to be to downplay a terror attack in the name of climate science? Eight people are dead after a terrorist plowed a truck into pedestrians on a lower Manhattan bike path. The suspect, identified by law enforcement officials as 29-year-old Sayfullo Saipov, reportedly screamed “Allahu akbar” as he exited the vehicle waving guns after crashing into a school bus. He was shot by a uniformed police officer and is now in custody. New York Police Commissioner James O'Neill said a paintball gun and pellet gun were recovered at the scene. Saipov is reportedly an Uzbek...

Maybe the biggest of all the lies put out by the global warming scaremongers is that the science is on their side. No it isn’t. And if you’re in any doubt at all you should read this interview with the brilliant scientist István Markó. It tells you all you need to know about the science of global warming. Dr. Markó, who sadly died earlier this year aged only 61, was a professor and researcher in organic chemistry at the Université Catholique de Louvain, Belgium’s largest French-speaking university. More importantly for the purposes of this interview, he was one of the...

Cassini might have gotten a very emotional send-off at the close of its 20-year journey, but it's not the only long-term space mission being retired this season. Today, the joint NASA-German Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) has ended operations after 15 years, three times longer than expected. Its mission: Precisely measure Earth's gravitational field from a pair of satellites. Both satellites were needed for GRACE to perform its mission, so when yet another of GRACE-2's batteries failed and contact was lost in September, the writing seemed to be on the wall. The mission team worked heroically to bring it...

The Pontifical Academy of Sciences has invited California governor Jerry Brown to deliver a keynote address in their upcoming meeting on climate change to be held in the Vatican. The Nov. 2-4 Vatican workshop titled “Health of People, Health of Planet and our Responsibility: Climate Change, Air Pollution and Health” will attempt to link up the health risks posed by air pollution with anthropogenic climate change driven by carbon emissions. This is not the first time the Vatican has offered a platform to the contentious California governor from which to proclaim his views on global warming. Invited to speak at...

The Pontifical Academy of Sciences has invited California governor Jerry Brown to deliver a keynote address in their upcoming meeting on climate change to be held in the Vatican. This is not the first time the Vatican has offered a platform to the contentious California governor from which to proclaim his views on global warming. Invited to speak at a similar Vatican event in 2015, Jerry Brown, a darling of Planned Parenthood, railed against climate-change skeptics, calling them well-financed “troglodytes” who are determined to “bamboozle” the gullible. The Vatican hosted 10 U.S. Democrat mayors as well as Governor Jerry Brown...

Houston is barely beginning to dry out from Hurricane Harvey, and Florida faces a massive rebuilding effort after the Irma catastrophe. So why isn’t the public heeding scientists and demanding climate action by politicians that could help deal with these destructive extremes? You can point fingers at the influence of fossil fuel companies, at misinformation from climate deniers and at political obstructionism, notably from a fragmented Republican party. But a much deeper force is also at work: the way our brains function. Humans aren’t well-wired to act on complex statistical risks. We put a lot more emphasis on the tangible...

GAO report reveals that by 2039, climate change will cost U.S. taxpayers more than $1 trillion Click HERE to watch Senator Collins’ floor remarks on the GAO reportNote to assignment editors and news directors: Click HERE for high-quality video of Senator Collins’ floor remarks on the GAO reportWashington, D.C. - In the wake of Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, Maria, and Nate; the multi-year drought across the west; and the wildfires in the nine western states, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) published a new report requested by Senators Susan Collins (R-ME) and Maria Cantwell (D-WA) on the economic impacts of climate change....

And then there were two: the US and Syria. As Nicaragua signs on to the Paris Agreement, the United States and Syria are now the only two nations in the world who have refused to be members of the climate pact. The Central American country held out on signing the deal for two years, based on criticisms that it was "insufficient" in addressing climate change. On Monday, however, the Nicaraguan government announced its intent to join the accord. Vice President and first lady Rosario Murillo said they sent a "document of adhesion" to the United Nations, according to Nicaragua's state-run...

Bill Nye “the Science Guy” said his efforts to convince the public of the dangers of global warming have failed, largely due to a misinformation campaign by the fossil fuel industry.“I am a failure,” Nye told Salon in an interview ahead of a documentary on the Science Guy’s rise to fame.“The United States has now got the head of the EPA who wants to close the EPA,” Nye said, adding his decades-long effort to convince people of the dangers of man-made global warming has been “completely ineffective.”Earlier this year, Nye aired a documentary series on Netflix aimed at adults. The...