Month: April 2017

Uncategorized 28 Apr 2017

Up to 2 feet of snow to hit Rockies – in late April!

A WINTER storm moving across Colorado will bring heavy snow and gusty winds from Friday evening into Saturday night.

National Weather Service Pueblo CO Apr 27 2017 –

WINTER STORM WATCH FROM FRIDAY EVENING THROUGH LATE SATURDAY NIGHT…

* LOCATION…Lake county, western Chaffee county Between 9000 and 11000 feet, Sangre de Cristo mountains, western Mosquito Range and eastern Chaffee County above 9000 feet, La Garita mountains, eastern San Juan Mountains, northwestern Fremont county above 8500 feet, Wet Mountain Valley below 8500 feet, Wet Mountains, Teller county, Rampart Range and Pike`s Peak region, northern El Paso county, the upper Huerfano River Basin below 7500 Feet and western Las Animas County below 7500 Feet.

* SNOW ACCUMULATION…Total snow accumulation in excess of 8 inches will be possible, with the potential for 1 to 2 feet over the higher elevations of the the eastern mountains.

* WIND…North to northeast winds 15 to 25 mph with locally
higher wind gusts.

* IMPACT…Snow and blowing snow at times is expected to create hazardous weather and travel conditions in the watch area. In addition, heavy wet snow will be capable of producing tree and powerline damage.

Includes:
Leadville Vicinity/Lake County Below 11000 Ft-
Western Chaffee County Between 9000 and 11000 Ft-
Western Mosquito Range/East Chaffee County above 9000Ft-
La Garita Mountains Above 10000 Ft-
Eastern San Juan Mountains Above 10000 Ft-
Northern Sangre de Cristo Mountains Between 8500 And 11000 Ft-
Northern Sangre de Cristo Mountains above 11000 Ft-
Southern Sangre de Cristo Mountains Between 7500 and 11000 Ft-
Southern Sangre de Cristo Mountains Above 11000 Ft-
Northwestern Fremont County Above 8500Ft-
Wet Mountain Valley Below 8500 Ft-
Wet Mountains between 6300 and 10000Ft-
Wet Mountains above 10000 Ft-
Teller County/Rampart Range above 7500fT/Pike`s Peak Between
7500 And 11000 Ft-Pikes Peak above 11000 Ft-
Northern El Paso County/Monument Ridge/Rampart Range Below 7500 Ft-
Walsenburg Vicinity/Upper Huerfano River Basin Below 7500 Ft-
Trinidad Vicinity/Western Las Animas County Below 7500 Ft-
Eastern Las Animas County-
INCLUDING Leadville, Alpine, Granite, St Elmo, North Pass,
Cumbres Pass, Wolf Creek Pass, La Veta Pass, Poncha Pass,
Blanca Peak, Cuchara, Stonewall, Weston, Spanish Peaks,
Silver Cliff, Westcliffe, Rye, Woodland Park, Pikes Peak,
Black Forest, Walsenburg, Trinidad, Branson, and Kim

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Thanks to Kenneth Lund for these links

The post Up to 2 feet of snow to hit Rockies – in late April! appeared first on Ice Age Now.

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April 27, 2017 at 05:26PM

Uncategorized 28 Apr 2017

A Climate Hysteric’s Fake Enemies List

via The Global Warming Policy Forum (GWPF)
http://www.thegwpf.com

Who really has the power in the climate-change debate?

In a widely cited 2014 study, the sociologist Robert Brulle purportedly exposed a network of nonprofit groups executing “a deliberate and organized effort to misdirect the public discussion and distort the public’s understanding of climate change.” He provided scant evidence of the public’s ignorance but lots of numbers supposedly exposing its source: center-right groups that form a “climate change counter-movement.”

Mr. Brulle’s smoking-gun statistic—call it the Brulle Number—was the combined annual income of 91 alleged conspirators. He calculated that from 2003 to 2010, these groups’ revenues averaged “just over $900 million” annually. The media twisted that into an even more extreme claim: “Conservative groups spend $1bn a year to fight action on climate change,” as a Guardian headline put it.

That’s false twice over. Mr. Brulle didn’t measure spending but income. Nor did he isolate the amount spent on climate issues, although most of the groups he studied had many policy interests.

Mr. Brulle’s wide net snared groups like the Intermountain Rural Electric Association, which provides electricity to Coloradans. He counted every penny of the nonprofit’s annual income as though it were a K Street powerhouse.

A new Capital Research Center study cuts Mr. Brulle’s calculations down to size. He claimed that the 91 “conspirators” had a combined income of $1.51 billion in 2010. Simply by counting income rather than spending he inflated their efforts by $169 million.

By speaking to the organizations, examining itemized IRS filings, tallying media mentions and webpages, and reading annual reports, we found that no more than 6% of their 2010 spending engaged the public on climate science. That knocks $1.24 billion off the $1.51 billion Brulle Number for that year.

Once corrected, the 2010 Brulle Number shrinks by 93% to only $100 million. That’s an imperfect estimate, but we’ve posted our data online at ClimateDollars.org. Unlike Mr. Brulle, we welcome debate.

Full post

via The Global Warming Policy Forum (GWPF) http://www.thegwpf.com

April 27, 2017 at 05:23PM

Uncategorized 28 Apr 2017

Top Trump Aides Clash on Legal Risks of Paris Climate Accord

via The Global Warming Policy Forum (GWPF)
http://www.thegwpf.com

Senior advisers to Donald Trump were divided over the Paris climate accord in a meeting Thursday, as Cabinet members and staffers considered whether staying in the pact could legally jeopardize the president’s regulatory rollbacks, according to people familiar with the high-level gathering.

The split means Trump’s staff could end up giving the president dueling advice, with one camp of advisers urging the U.S. to stay in the treaty and another urging an exit. The White House has said a decision on whether to remain in the pact will be made by the end of next month, when world leaders gather for the Group of Seven summit in Italy.

The question has divided top administration officials. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has said the U.S. should keep its seat at the table, while EPA chief Scott Pruitt wants the U.S. to get out. Energy Secretary Rick Perry says the U.S. should remain in the deal, but renegotiate.

All three were in the roughly hour-long meeting at the White House on Thursday, that also included Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin; White House advisers Jared Kushner, Steve Bannon and Ivanka Trump; and Attorney General Jeff Sessions, according to administration officials.

Under the accord, signed by more than 190 countries, the U.S. set a target of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 26 percent by 2025 from 2005 levels. It’s one of former President Barack Obama’s signature achievements on climate change, but Trump vowed on the campaign trail he would seek to end U.S. involvement in it, calling it a bad deal.

A draft three-page internal State Department memo circulated in advance of the meeting said the accord imposes few obligations on the U.S., noting that “legal obligations are relatively few and are generally process-oriented.”

That was the one area of emerging consensus Thursday, according to people familiar with the meeting, who declined to be identified because it was an internal discussion. The top-level officials seemed to agree that there is no legal mechanism for the United Nations to punish the U.S. for flouting its commitment.

But there are potential domestic legal implications of staying in the deal anyway, representatives from the White House counsel’s office told the group. There is some risk that if the U.S. stays in the agreement and doesn’t take actions to cut emissions, it could surface in legal challenges to Trump’s moves to roll back environmental regulations, they said.

Full story

via The Global Warming Policy Forum (GWPF) http://www.thegwpf.com

April 27, 2017 at 05:23PM

Uncategorized 28 Apr 2017

How Team Trump Plans To Kill Obama’s Paris Climate Deal By Declaring It A Treaty

via The Global Warming Policy Forum (GWPF)
http://www.thegwpf.com

As President Trump’s top advisers prepare to hash out a final policy on the Paris climate agreement dumped onto their laps by President Obama, another option has hit the table: Declare the deal a treaty and send it to the Senate to be killed.

The treaty option could emerge as the middle ground in the increasingly tense battle between “remainers” on the one hand, who say the president should abide by Mr. Obama’s global warming deal, and the Paris agreement’s detractors, who say Mr. Trump would be breaking a key campaign promise if he doesn’t withdraw from the pact.

Mr. Trump’s principal advisers are slated to meet Thursday to hash out a final set of recommendations for the president, with several deadlines looming next month.

At an initial meeting of top staffers Tuesday, several memos and letters that were circulated laid out the options, including the treaty proposal put forth by Christopher C. Horner and Marlo Lewis Jr., senior fellows at the Competitive Enterprise Institute.

Under their vision, Mr. Trump could toss out Mr. Obama’s decision that the Paris accord was an executive agreement, declare it a treaty and send it to the Senate, where it would need a two-thirds vote for ratification.

Given Republican control of the chamber, the agreement’s opponents say senators would either shelve the deal or outright defeat it. Either option would derail the deal, the memo suggested.

“That option affirms that we are a nation of laws, not men and, importantly, discourages both our negotiating partners and future U.S. officials against attempting to circumvent our system,” the memo says.

A briefing paper circulated among Republican senators this week said the deal should have been sent to Capitol Hill by Mr. Obama, but he “knew that Congress would never approve such a flawed deal, so he refused to seek the Senate’s advice and consent.”

Supporters of the Paris accord have their own memo drafted by lawyers in the State Department. That memo says that by sending the agreement to the Senate, the president would be giving up important powers and leave Mr. Trump and his successors open to congressional meddling.

“Because the large majority of international agreements concluded by the United States are concluded as executive agreements, this could have far-reaching implications for our conduct of foreign affairs,” the State Department document says.

The Paris agreement is the main international vehicle for trying to combat climate change. Mr. Obama committed the U.S. to the deal in 2015 but never submitted it for ratification, saying it was an extension of a U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, which the Senate ratified in 1992.

The State Department memo says there are few risks to remaining part of the Paris deal. It says the “legal obligations are relatively few and are generally process-oriented [and] discretionary in their application or repeat existing obligations already contained in the Framework Convention.”

Michael McKenna, a Republican energy strategist, said anything short of withdrawal would leave the U.S. open to legal challenges, with judges potentially attempting to enforce strict climate limits based on the commitments.

“The president is being asked to travel a path that leads him — ultimately — to continue the Obama administration policies on climate change,” said Mr. McKenna, who has authored his own memo calling for withdrawal.

He blamed Obama administration “holdovers” at the State Department for trying to preserve their former boss’ plans.

Mr. Obama committed the U.S. to cutting greenhouse gas emissions at least 26 percent below 2005 levels by 2025. The former president tried to enforce the commitment through a series of executive and administration actions, imposing tight limits on power plants and auto emissions.

Federal courts have halted some of those plans, and Mr. Trump and Congress have nixed others, easing the pressure on American industry. During the campaign, Mr. Trump also pledged to cancel the Paris deal.

As a decision nears, the sides among Mr. Trump’s top advisers have become clear.

Energy Secretary Rick Perry on Tuesday appeared to join the remainers, though he said the deal should be renegotiated.

“I’m not going to tell the president of the United States to walk away from the Paris accord,” Mr. Perry said at a conference sponsored by Bloomberg. “I will say that we need to renegotiate it.”

Mr. Perry said other countries are breaking their self-imposed commitments, giving the U.S. an opportunity to insist on changes.

Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson is a remainer, as are perhaps Mr. Trump’s closest advisers, son-in-law Jared Kushner and daughter Ivanka Trump. The White House general counsel’s office also appears to be leaning toward remain, sources familiar with the negotiations said.

Environmental Protection Agency chief Scott Pruitt is pushing for withdrawal, and he is joined by U.N. Ambassador Nikki R. Haley, analysts said. Top presidential strategist Stephen K. Bannon is also a withdrawal advocate.