Climate Change - Rockaway

CLICK HERE - A speech by HRH The Prince of Wales at a Reception for Commonwealth Foreign Ministers, Clarence House, London

princeofwales.gov.uk - July 11, 2019

. . . The next 18 months will see critical meetings that will collectively determine the global agenda for the coming decade. And these, again, as you know better than I, range from the UNSG’s Climate Action Summit this September, to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity Conference of Parties in China next October, to the UNFCCC Conference of Parties to be held, I hope, in London that Autumn. Next year’s Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting stands of course at a pivotal point in the middle of these events and will be an absolutely vital moment to consolidate consensus on the way forward, not least of which, will be the deliberations on how to increase the amount of private sector finance flowing towards supporting sustainable development throughout the Commonwealth.

The San Gorgonio wind farm near Rancho Mirage in California. The falling cost of renewables and gas causing coal to be dislodged as a favored energy source for utilities. Photograph: Xinhua/Barcroft Media

In April, renewables provided 23% compared to coal’s 20% - ‘The fate of coal has been sealed. The market has spoken’

theguardian.com - by Oliver Milman - June 26, 2019

The US generated more electricity from renewable sources than coal for the first time ever in April, new federal government data has shown.

Clean energy such as solar and wind provided 23% of US electricity generation during the month, compared with coal’s 20%, according to the Energy Information Administration.

This represents the first time coal has been surpassed by energy sources that do not release pollution such as planet-heating gases.

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Lower Manhattan is vulnerable to flooding from storm surges and sea level rise.  John Taggart for The New York Times

CLICK HERE - RESEARCH - High Tide Tax - The Price to Protect Coastal Communities from Rising Seas (27 page .PDF report)

nytimes.com - by Christopher Flavelle - June 19, 2019

As disaster costs keep rising nationwide, a troubling new debate has become urgent: If there’s not enough money to protect every coastal community from the effects of human-caused global warming, how should we decide which ones to save first?

After three years of brutal flooding and hurricanes in the United States, there is growing consensus among policymakers and scientists that coastal areas will require significant spending to ride out future storms and rising sea levels — not in decades, but now and in the very near future. There is also a growing realization that some communities, even sizable ones, will be left behind.

Solar panels on the roof of South Miami Mayor Philip Stoddard’s energy-efficient home in South Miami on Saturday, April 13, 2019. Stoddard went off the grid for seven days to test the house’s readiness for hurricane season and used only solar panels and two Tesla wall batteries to power his home. Daniel A. Varela ***@***.***

miamiherald.com - by Linda Robertson - April 15, 2019

Hurricane season is coming and Philip Stoddard is ready . . .

. . . Stoddard, a champion of solar energy and green living, took his family on a trial run in preparation for the next Irma or Andrew . . .

. . . He turned off the main power switch located in a panel on the side of his house . . . For the next seven days, he and his family were able to operate the central air-conditioning unit during an unseasonably hot March week, all appliances, computers, lights, TV, solar water heater with an electric on-demand booster, and backyard pond pump, and charge the car without once running out of juice.

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