Climate Change

Axios reports: Monthly press calls featuring NOAA scientists detailing global climate conditions during the previous month have been suspended indefinitely, the agency told Axios. NOAA is the top weather and climate agency in the U.S. and among the foremost worldwide. The monthly U.S. and global climate calls typically feature climate scientists from NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) in …

Politico E&E reports: President Donald Trump has long rejected climate science. Now, his administration is grappling with how to assemble a body of federal climate research to show a warming world is benefiting humanity. The claims would be highly misleading and ignore decades of scientific research that shows climate change will have increasingly dire effects. But a federal report downplaying …

From the Nature Conservancy: We carefully review the implications of the multiple executive orders and instructions from the new administration to ensure we can continue to make progress for people and nature. The Nature Conservancy has been working in the Gulf for more than 40 years, through hurricanes and oil spills, in close partnership with private, state and federal partners. …

The Washington Post reports: Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin has privately urged the White House to strike down a scientific finding underpinning much of the federal government’s push to combat climate change. The 2009 “endangerment finding” cleared the way for regulating greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act by concluding that the planet-warming gases pose a threat to public …

Courthouse News reports: A trio of environmental groups sued the Department of Agriculture on Monday for removing all of its website landing pages focused on climate change after President Donald Trump returned to power in late January. Northeast Organic Farming Association of New York, the Natural Resources Defense Council and the D.C.-based Environmental Working Group claim in their civil complaint …

Via press release from Texas AG Ken Paxton: Attorney General Ken Paxton has successfully stopped a Biden Administration edict that would have forced Texas to adopt unlawful greenhouse gas reporting measures after the Trump Administration dismissed the Biden Administration’s appeal of a lower court’s decision in Texas’s favor. Under the rule, Texas would have been required to measure and report …

The New York Times reports: The Trump administration has warned more than 1,100 Environmental Protection Agency employees who work on climate change, reducing air pollution, enforcing environmental laws and other programs that they could be fired at any time. Many had been hired to work on programs that Congress created through two recent laws, doing things like helping communities replace …

Politico reports: Agriculture Department employees have been ordered to delete landing pages discussing climate change across agency websites and document climate change references for further review, according to an internal email obtained by POLITICO. The directive from USDA’s office of communications, whose authenticity was validated by three people, could affect information across dozens of programs including climate-smart agriculture initiatives, USDA …

USA Today reports: The Senate voted Wednesday to confirm former congressman Lee Zeldin as President Donald Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency administrator. Zeldin, who is expected to pursue a deregulation push at the EPA, was confirmed by a vote of 56 to 42. Trump wants to rollback environmental rules, declaring when he announced Zeldin as his choice for EPA administrator that …

CNN reports: Seventy-eight years ago, scientists created a unique sort of timepiece — named the Doomsday Clock — as a symbolic attempt to gauge how close humanity is to destroying the world. On Tuesday, the clock was set at 89 seconds to midnight — the closest the world has ever been to that marker, according to the Bulletin of the …

Courthouse News reports: The Supreme Court turned down an appeal from fossil fuel giants on Monday, rejecting an attempt to skirt a climate change lawsuit seeking to hold companies liable over claims of deceptive marketing about the effect of greenhouse gases. Companies such as Sunoco, Exxon Mobil, Chevron and BP said they are facing dozens of lawsuits, leaving a vital …

NOAA reports: Last year was a record-warm year for the U.S., as the nation was hit by numerous tornadoes and devastating hurricanes, according to scientists from NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information. The average annual temperature across the contiguous U.S. was 55.5 degrees F — 3.5 degrees above the 20th-century average — ranking as the nation’s warmest year in NOAA’s …

Axios reports: A fresh Los Angeles wildfire that ignited in the Hollywood Hills on Wednesday night is threatening homes and iconic L.A. landmarks, and it’s prompted authorities to issue expanding evacuation orders. The rapidly growing Sunset Fire that’s threatening Hollywood landmarks along with homes was one of multiple fires burning out of control across Los Angeles County into Thursday morning. …

ABC News reports: At least two people are dead and many more injured as several fires broke out across Southern California amid historically dry and windy conditions. Tens of thousands were evacuated as more than 15,000 acres burned in the Palisades Fire. At least 1,000 structures are estimated to have been destroyed in the fire. Meanwhile, the Eaton Fire — …

The New York Times reports: Gov. Kathy Hochul of New York on Thursday signed a law that requires companies that are big fossil fuel polluters to help pay to repair damage caused by extreme weather, which is becoming more common because of greenhouse gas emissions. The legislation, called the Climate Change Superfund Act, mandates that the companies responsible for the …

The Associated Press reports: Almost three dozen high-rise condos and luxury hotels along the beach in South Florida are sinking or settling in unexpected ways, in some cases because of nearby construction, according to a new study. The 35 buildings surveyed along an almost 12-mile (19 kilometer) stretch from Miami Beach to Sunny Isles Beach have sunk or settled by …

The Associated Press reports: Firefighters battled a wildfire early Tuesday in Malibu that prompted evacuations near Pepperdine University, where students sheltering at the school’s library watched as the fire intensified and the sky turn deep red. “Just seeing the flames grow and seeing that bright red color of fire just get brighter and brighter and brighter — it was so …

Axios reports: Three of the biggest investment firms in the world were sued by 11 states last week, in a case that not only could transform the way trillions of dollars is managed, but could also hobble global efforts to transition to a sustainable level of carbon emissions. Texas AG Ken Paxton, along with 10 of his colleagues, is attempting …

The Wall Street Journal reports: Donald Trump’s campaign-trail vow to end President Biden’s signature climate law is running into a cold reality: Too many Republican lawmakers want to keep it. The Inflation Reduction Act has channeled billions of dollars to renewable-energy projects across the country, with Republican-led states getting the lion’s share of the funding. Even though not a single …

Reuters reports: The FBI has been investigating a longtime Exxon Mobil consultant over the contractor’s alleged role in a hack-and-leak operation that targeted hundreds of the oil company’s biggest critics, according to three people familiar with the matter. The operation involved mercenary hackers who successfully breached the email accounts of environmental activists and others, the sources told Reuters. Some environmental …