Maine clammers are already feeling the consequences of climate change. The Gulf of Maine’s warming spurred invasions from green crabs – vicious clam predators – damaging Maine’s soft-shell clam populations and leading to the proposition of clam farming (“As clam harvesting declines, could farming be the answer?” June 3). Though clam farming specifically helps conserve clams, it overlooks the true issue: climate change. To truly protect Maine’s soft-shell clams, the jobs of Maine’s 1,700 soft-shell clam harvesters and the fried clam baskets I’ve loved to eat since I was 2, we must recognize this link to climate change and work together to mitigate it. Today's Letters Grocery stores need to give edible unsold food to charityEqual Rights Amendment seems dated, raises issues'Affordable' shouldn't mean taller Munjoy Hill housingScenarios involving Bee, Barr differ markedlyCongress, not president, must declare military action The … [Read more...] about Letter to the editor: Clammers’ real enemy? Climate change, not green crabs
Climate change
Not just heat: Climate change signs can be seen all around
WASHINGTON (AP) — You don't just feel the heat of global warming, you can see it in action all around. Some examples of where climate change's effects have been measured: —Glaciers across the globe are melting and retreating, with 279 billion tons of ice lost since 2002, according to NASA's GRACE … [Read more...] about Not just heat: Climate change signs can be seen all around
Washington warmed slowest of all states over past 30 years — but what does it mean for climate change?
Thirty years ago this week, NASA climate expert James Hansen gave groundbreaking testimony before Congress. He told them that human-caused global warming was already happening. Time has proved him right, according to a new analysis of National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) data by The Associated Press (AP). The average yearly temperature in the continental U.S. is nearly 1.6 degrees warmer today than it was 30 years ago, the analysis shows. And in that period, the average yearly temperature has increased by more than one degree in all but one state. The lone exception? Washington. Temperatures have gone up here, too, in the past 30 years, but by only a little more than half a degree. Oregon had the second smallest increase, at just over one degree, and North Dakota’s was third. Alaska has had the most dramatic temperature change, a jump of about 2.4 degrees. After Alaska, Vermont and New Jersey warmed the most, in that order. In the Lower 48 states, there are 344 … [Read more...] about Washington warmed slowest of all states over past 30 years — but what does it mean for climate change?
N.J. flounder, sea bass pushed north because of climate change, say scientists
Continued ocean warming could cause habitats of many species of fish, including flounder and black sea bass, regularly found off New Jersey’s coast, to move much farther north with the potential to alter fisheries and challenge commercial fishing operations, new research has found. “Our study suggests that climate change will force hundreds of marine animals to shift north, including some of the species most important right here in the Mid-Atlantic,” said Malin Pinsky, a biologist and Rutgers University professor in the department of ecology, evolution, and natural resources. He is a co-author of the Rutgers-led study, published last week in the journal PLOS ONE. The study was supported by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Pinsky said the habitat for black sea bass already is moving north. But, he said, it is projected to migrate 300 miles farther north by 2100, according to the study. The black sea bass has a … [Read more...] about N.J. flounder, sea bass pushed north because of climate change, say scientists
Two Scholars Awarded Tang Prize for Sounding the Alarm on Climate Change and Impact of Air Pollution
Taipei, Taiwan, June 18, 2018 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Dr. James E. Hansen, former Director of the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Goddard Institute for Space Studies, and Professor Veerabhadran Ramanathan, Council of Pontifical Academy of Sciences are co-recipients of the 2018 Tang Prize in Sustainable Development for their pioneering work on climate change and its impact on the sustainability of the earth. Their works lay the scientific foundation for international actions as the Paris Climate Agreement and the new global development-Agenda 2030. Dr. Hansen is a pioneer on numerous fronts related to sustainability. In 1970s, he developed one of the first two global three-dimensional climate models, GISS, in the world, and was first to analyze and quantitatively explained the climate system's global temperature response in terms of specific changes caused by water vapor, cloud, surface-albedo feedback interactions. Dr. Hansen was the first to compile temperature … [Read more...] about Two Scholars Awarded Tang Prize for Sounding the Alarm on Climate Change and Impact of Air Pollution