climate change

Think climate change is too serious to joke about? Consider this.

With each new scientific report, the situation seems more dire. But the social and political will to address the issue has lagged.

Author Bina Venkataraman understands very well the temptation to keep doing what we’ve always done, even if we’re pretty sure it’s not the best approach. She’s done it herself.

A few years ago, she was hiking in the Hudson Valley in New York just north of New York City, a place she knew was loaded with Lyme disease. She didn’t wear tick repellent. And even when she found a rash on the back of her leg, she didn’t do anything about it.

“It didn't look like the telltale bulls eye you associate with a tick bite,” she said.

There are musicals about our founding fathers, cute orphans, the French Revolution... And now? There’s a musical about climate change. The Cape Cod Theater Company in Harwich is debuting the world premiere of “Crude: The Climate Change Musical.”  

A U.N. special report on the impacts of climate change on the ocean sparked dire headlines such as UN report on world’ oceans is damning: We’re all in big trouble. Or, from the New York Times: The World’s Oceans are in Danger.

While true, those headlines don’t tell the whole story.

Two-thirds of coves, inlets and similar water bodies known as embayments, and one-third of ponds on the Cape, have unacceptably low water quality, according to a new report from the Association to Preserve Cape Cod (APCC). 

By Joshua Conrad Jackson, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Michele Gelfand, University of Maryland

Two trends have defined the past decade and both have been on display at this year’s session of the United Nations General Assembly.

Climate change is real, it’s human-caused, and it will affect everyone. But the impacts will vary from place to place and person to person. And, already, there are major disparities in climate impacts. Women are disproportionately impacted, as are those with limited financial resources.

The four Catholic bishops of Massachusetts co-signed a letter calling for immediate and wide-ranging action against climate change.

The leaders are urging parishioners, businesses, and schools to take what they call "meaningful steps to protect the environment” and “take better care of our common home” by curbing the impact of toxic pollution and climate change.

Methane is a powerful greenhouse gas--many times more powerful than carbon dioxide. It is also the main ingredient in the natural gas that we use for heating and cooking.

EPA officials have known for some time that leaks from natural gas pipelines and other infrastructure are a major source of methane emissions.

Hurricanes that stall are becoming more common. They can dump more rain than a faster-moving hurricane and often follow a less predictable path.

Dorian is just the latest example. One study found that over the past 70 years Atlantic hurricanes have gotten more likely to stall.

Scientists from the Woods Hole Research Center and IPAM-Amazonia say the amount of carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere by fires burning in the Amazon rainforest could hasten the effects of climate change. 

New estimates suggest the fires have produced as much as 140 million metric tons of carbon dioxide. That’s the equivalent to the annual emissions from about 30 million cars.  

Heading east on Surf Drive in Falmouth, a postcard-ready vista unfolds: a mile-and-a-half-long stretch of sandy beach with narrow dunes, osprey nests, the Shining Sea Bike Path, and the landmark town bathhouse that’s survived every hurricane since 1930.

How an issue is portrayed in the media can have a huge effect on how it is perceived by the public. When it comes to climate change, a lot of attention has been dedicated to how much the issue is covered. And whether that coverage is scientifically accurate.