[GWSG] PJM on wind; RWE shift; C costs; 1/3 by 2025; reef rebound; resiliency order; int. EPA; urgency; hot water; ignorance

[Tilley, Al]

1.  Research by PJM, a large independent grid operator, shows that using wind energy greatly reduces energy costs and emissions.  Increasing the share of wind on the grid would require only 6-8% of the value of the wind power.  http://ecowatch.com/2013/10/30/research-wind-energy-decreases-emissions-electricity-costs/

2.  RWE, a large German utility, is moving “from being a centralized energy provider into a decentralized energy provider.”   http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2013/10/major-european-utility-set-for-dramatic-transformation?cmpid=WNL-Friday-November1-2013

3.  Al Gore suggests that part of the costs of extreme weather be accounted among the costs of burning fossil fuels, and that investors lessen their risks if we are to have “sustainable capitalism.”  The carbon bubble constitutes a significant portion of that risk.   http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/nov/01/gore-warns-carbon-bubble

4.  Risk consultancy Maplecroft estimates that about a third of the global economy will be at high or extreme risk by 2025 due to climate disruption.  http://www.cnbc.com/id/101151488

5.  Intensive management has restored the coral reefs around Little Cayman Island.  http://www.sciencemag.org/content/342/6158/535.1.short

6.  President Obama has signed an executive order ensuring that climate change is included in the planning for disaster recovery and setting up a task force on resiliency to plan for disasters, including those attendant on climate disruption.  Building codes will need to anticipate approaching as well as current conditions.  http://www.boston.com/2013/11/01/obama-signs-order-response-climate-change/IVPUH3yyLSnEd3IczvpqiL/story.html

7.  The EPA restrictions on new coal plants have been extended to those anywhere in which the US is involved, essentially ending US support through multi-lateral development banks such as the World Bank for construction of coal plants (with a hedge probably intended to allow some current projects to continue in poorer countries).  http://ecowatch.com/2013/11/01/end-of-public-money-for-coal-power/

8.  Naomi Klein reports on recent scientific opinion that only disruptive change gives us a chance of avoiding dangerous climate disruption.  http://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/10/29-4

9.  Deep waters in the Greenland Sea have been warming at 10 times the rate of the general oceans with implications for changes in currents and general circulation.  http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-11-02/deep-greenland-sea-is-warming-ten-times-faster-than-global-ocean/5065856

10.  In a recent poll 44% of Americans consider that humans are the cause of recent warming, though 54% know that scientists generally agree that is the case.   Tea party Republicans constitute the only group to deny that the earth is warming.  http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2013/11/01/only-tea-party-members-believe-climate-change-is-not-happening-new-pew-poll-finds/?tid=hpModule_ba0d4c2a-86a2-11e2-9d71-f0feafdd1394
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