[GWSG] S FL coping; slr on the E Coast; 2/3 renewable; English storage; indoor farms; RMI on oil prices; fast transition

[Tilley, Al]

1.  Abandoned by state and national Republican leaders, South Florida's local officials of both parties are undertaking efforts to cope with sea level rise.  The story is an unusually straightforward account of the situation in South Florida (and, by extension, of other coastal communities in the region).  http://www.newsweek.com/2016/02/05/marco-rubio-climate-change-denier-south-florida-flood-crisis-420326.html



2.  Sea level rise along parts of the US East Coast are 3-4 times higher than the global average.  A new study finds causes in both the operation of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation and its slowing under the influence of high carbon emissions.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2016/02/01/why-the-u-s-east-coast-could-be-a-major-hotspot-for-sea-level-rise/



3.   68% of the generating capacity added in the US last year was renewable.  It was the second straight year that renewables topped fossil fuel.  http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-02-04/renewables-top-fossil-fuels-as-biggest-source-of-new-u-s-power



4.  New energy storage facilities in England include air compressed to a liquid and a system of home batteries.  http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/feb/04/from-liquid-air-to-supercapacitators-energy-storage-is-finally-poised-for-a-breakthrough



5.  Indoor farming offers superior flexibility for growing vegetables.  Every former industrial city has a startup greenhouse business.  Grist profiles Agrilyst, a greenhouse software developer.  While greenhouse agriculture may be energy inefficient, as the writer says, it could prove a lifesaver to regions with poor soil and mounting heat problems such as, for example, my own North Florida, due before too long to be savannah and scrub.  http://grist.org/food/will-climate-change-move-agriculture-indoors-and-will-that-be-a-good-thing/?utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&utm_campaign=daily-horizon



6.  The Rocky Mountain Institute sensibly observes (as have others) that oil prices have no natural reason to swing the stock market about as they seem to be doing, and that underlying factors favor renewables.  http://blog.rmi.org/blog_2016_02_01_as_oil_prices_gyrate_underlying_trends_are_shifting_to_oils_disadvantage



7.  The energy transition is proceeding more rapidly than we had hoped.  In the US, the economy is growing but energy use has remained flat since 2007, thanks to efficiency gains.  Africa is leap-frogging fossil fuels and going straight to renewables, which could well supply 80% of the continent's power by 2030 and 100% of the power for most countries in the world by 2050, according to a Stanford-UC study.  http://climatecrocks.com/2016/02/05/fade-to-black-bad-news-for-fossil-fuels/  ?

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