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Australia Inundated By Floods, Swarming Spiders: Extreme rain in Australia's New South Wales is causing life-threatening flooding that has so far forced the evacuation of at least 18,000 people. About 10 million people over an area the size of Alaska are at risk for excessive rainfall. The mid-north coast, an area of coastline between Sydney and Byron Bay, has been deluged by 35 inches of water in the past week, in some cases five times the average March rainfall in just four days. Weather patterns shifting the rain inland caused some areas to resemble "inland seas." Australian PM Scott Morrison said Sydney's largest dam would overflow for at least a week, inundating populated areas with a deluge of water equivalent to Sydney Harbor. The flooding comes about a year after massive bushfires — which killed hundreds of people and killed or harmed approximately 3 billion animals (not including arachnids and insects) — devastated the same region. “I don’t know any time in state history where we have had these extreme weather conditions in such quick succession in the middle of a pandemic,” New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian told reporters. Rising floodwaters generated Ron Weasley's and Indiana Jones's collective nightmares as spiders and snakes swarmed anything (relatively) dry, from trees, to houses, to "your legs … if you're not careful." (Extreme rainfall and flooding: BBC, CNN, Washington Post $, 9News, Earther; Record rainfall: The Guardian; Spiders and snakes: The Guardian, CNN, BBC, HuffPost; Climate Signals background: Extreme precipitation, Wildfires)

Polluter Sponsorships Are 'Sports-Washing,' Report Says: Major climate polluters are spending hundreds of millions of dollars on sports sponsorship to obfuscate their role in perpetrating the climate crisis, the Guardian reports. According to a new report published by the New Weather Institute, polluters from oil and gas companies to airlines are attempting to "sports-wash" across multiple sports. Those companies, NWI co-director and co-author of the report Andrew Simms told the Guardian, are seeking "to appear as friends of healthy activity, when in fact they’re pumping lethal pollution into the very air that athletes have to breathe." Auto and airline companies are the most prolific sponsors, followed by oil and gas companies, including Ineos, the sponsor of one of professional cycling's highest-profile teams. “Sport is in the frontline of the climate emergency but floats on a sea of sponsorship deals with the major polluters," Simms said. "It makes the crisis worse by normalising high-carbon, polluting lifestyles and reducing the pressure for climate action." (The Guardian)

Proposed Coal Mines Could Produce Huge Methane Pollution Increase — Report: Methane emissions from proposed coal mines could heat the planet more than the carbon dioxide emissions from all current U.S. coal plants, E&E reports. The Global Energy Monitor report, published last week, says going ahead with 432 proposed coal mines worldwide – including 13 in the United States – would yield a 30% increase in coal mine methane emissions equivalent to 1,135 million tons of CO2 annually (based on a 20-year horizon). Though it lingers in the atmosphere for a shorter period of time than CO2, methane — the main component in "natural gas" — is a far more potent greenhouse gas. Multiple proposed mines in the U.S., including in West Virginia, Alabama, and Colorado, could emit so much methane it would account for close to half their total greenhouse gas pollution, according to the report. (E&E $)

(ENVIRONMENTAL) RACISM: EPA deal with Alabama polluter undercuts Biden equity pledge (E&E $), the rising threat of eco-fascism: far right co-opting environmentalism to justify anti-immigration and anti-Semitic views (The Independent)

LEGACIES: The ‘old American dream,’ a trap as the floods keep coming (New York Times $), the coal plant next door (ProPublica and Georgia Health News), 

INFRASTRUCTURE: Climate tensions drive scope, strategy for infrastructure plan (E&E $), Biden team prepares $3 trillion in new spending for the economy (New York Times $, Washington Post $, AP), infrastructure plan seeks to address climate and equality as well as roads (New York Times $), White House eyes tax increases on companies and the wealthy to fund infrastructure, setting up clash with GOP (Washington Post $)

ACTIVISM: Youth climate activists are back with new, sharper demands for countries and corporations (Vox), indigenous anti-dam activist killed in Honduras (AP)

AGENCIES: Can FEMA save the ‘poorest town in America’ from drowning in its own poop? (Grist), buildings as batteries? DOE eyes fix for renewable grid (E&E $), FEMA disaster-mitigation program attracts record demand (E&E $), Interior reverses course on tribal ownership of portion of Missouri river (The Hill), NASA set to fire up its climate science (Politico Pro $), Trump ‘booby trap’ threatens FAA upgrades, Biden emission plans (Bloomberg $)

WHITE HOUSE: Biden faces ‘moment of truth’ as he weighs key U.S. climate promise (Washington Post $), Biden climate chief to meet oil leaders wary of crackdown (Bloomberg $) (Politico Pro $), oil industry titans vow climate collaboration with White House (Bloomberg $)

THE HILL: Bipartisan T&I leaders ask GAO to study sustainable aviation fuels (Politico Pro $), Brockovich to headline hearing on PFAS risks, cleanups (E&E $), lawmakers to review drought-busting innovations (E&E $), committees line up climate, sustainability hearings (E&E $), public lands, infrastructure hearings set to turn political (E&E $)

HOUSE: House lawmakers to grill Texas grid officials over blackouts (E&E $)

SENATE: California senators calling on Biden to set date for phasing out gasoline cars (The Hill, Reuters)

POLITICS: Killing the filibuster becomes new ‘litmus test’ for Democratic candidates (Politico Pro $), Democratic oil and gas ally [Rep. Filemón Vela] announces retirement (E&E $), Sunrise Movement endorses [Jennifer Caroll Foy] in Virginia gubernatorial race (E&E $)

NOMINEES & CONFIRMATIONS. [Senate EPW] Committee to vote on CEQ chair, EPA deputy picks (E&E $), vote set on OMB and DOE nominees, business relief program (E&E $), White House pulls nomination of Elizabeth Klein to Interior amid Murkowski opposition (Politico)

CLIMATE DIPLOMACY: The fraught US-China climate relationship (Axios), the US wants the EU to delay imposing trade penalties on carbon-intensive imports, but is considering imposing its own (InsideClimate News), Climate envoy Kerry to take part in summit co-hosted by China (Bloomberg $, Reuters)

TRANSITION, PERSONNEL: Biden's climate deputy has fossil fuel ties (E&E $), Kerry enters climate arena as U.S. relations with China sour (Politico Pro $)

SCOTUS: Supreme Court declines to hear challenge to Obama marine monument designation (The Hill), SCOTUS eyes curbs on presidential monument powers (Politico Pro $)

CITIES AND STATES: Critics warn Massachusetts’ climate progress is headed for traffic jam (Energy News Network), Pennsylvania seeks to boost solar with new state power contract (Politico Pro $), NYC’s purchase of school buses should supercharge transition to electric fleet: advocates (NY Daily News), state lawmakers quash Georgia cities' efforts to be green (Savannah Now)

CALIFORNIA: [California Public Utilities Commission] reliability proposal skimps on demand response while doubling down on gas, parties say (Utility Dive)

TEXAS: Texas Supreme Court plunges blackout lawsuits into uncertainty (E&E $)

IMPACTS: Migrants are heading north because Central America never recovered from last year’s hurricanes (Vox), history shows central Europe could face megadroughts as earth warms (Bloomberg $), crisis in the Himalayas: climate change and unsustainable development (FT $)

WILDFIRES: Arizona officials warn of bad 2021 wildfire season (AP), deadly Zogg Fire started when tree fell on PG&E wires, Cal Fire says (San Francisco Chronicle, Sacramento Bee, AP)

EXTREME WEATHER: US weather model upgraded to better forecast extreme events (AP)

RENEWABLES: FOIA docs raise questions about interference in wind project (E&E $), Global spending on renewables is quickly catching up to oil and gas (Quartz)

EFFICIENCY: Vermont city considers mandatory weatherization for apartment buildings (Energy News Network)

OIL & GAS: Philly’s gas utility is fighting the city on climate policy (Sludge/Nexus Media News), Donald Trump’s parting gift to the people of St. Croix: the reopening of one of America’s largest oil refineries (InsideClimate News)

PIPELINES: Another Line 3 battleground: free speech (Drilled)

COAL: Kentucky Democrat relaunches effort to halt mountain[top removal] mining (E&E $), study says coal is still a major player in WV economy (West Virginia Metro News)

HYDROGEN: Is the world’s most controversial pipeline about to pivot to hydrogen? (OilPrice)

UTILITIES: ‘The stakes are very high’: In North Carolina, more interest than ever in Duke Energy’s long-range plans (Energy News Network), Southern Company identifies 'likely' nuclear construction delay on Vogtle unit (Utility Dive), study of utility shutoffs during COVID-19 finds disproportionate impact in southeastern states (Utility Dive)

(ALLEGED) UTILITY CORRUPTION: FirstEnergy refusing to return subsidy cash to customers (AP)

GRID: California looks to EVs for grid stability (E&E $)

BUSINESS: These companies’ deforestation promises went up in flames (Grist)

CARBON PRICING: Oil company leaders support carbon pricing plan (Wall Street Journal $)

CARBON CAPTURE: Biden and CCS: plans, politics, pitfalls (E&E $)

DIVESTMENT: Students find obscure law that could make university fossil fuel investments illegal (Grist)

FINANCE: 'They're like arsonists': Barclays shareholders fight back over climate strategy (Telegraph), banks’ climate pledges suffer from water scarcity (Reuters), investors with $54 trillion say net zero requires drastic action (Bloomberg $, FT $), why the hot new shade for green bonds could be blue (Bloomberg $)

RELIGION: Why some Christians are participating in a 'carbon fast' for Lent (Yale Climate Connections)

INTERNATIONAL: EU to offer gas plants a green finance label under certain conditions: draft (Reuters), European COVID recovery so far failing to ‘build back better’ (Energy Monitor), three-quarters of Somali families found lacking water as drought looms (Thomson Reuters Foundation), Total’s play for Ugandan oil tests the climate commitment of international banks (Climate Home), UK may include shipping in new emissions trading platform (Bloomberg $), UK faces ‘colossal’ task to modify homes under green plans, MPs warn (FT $), world's top emitters a long way from aligning with climate goals (Reuters)

• Better transportation systems are necessary to reverse the systemic racism driving through Black communities (Blavity, Rev. Lennox Yearwood Jr op-ed)
• Reforming capacity markets to meet clean energy goals and support the grid of the future (Utility Dive, Jeff Dennis op-ed)
• Climate anxiety is an overwhelmingly white phenomenon (Scientific American, Sarah Jaquette Ray op-ed)
• Don’t be fooled by ‘net zero’ pledges (Washington Post, Rachel Kyte op-ed $)

Sky News Starting First Daily Climate News Show, But Still Platforms Plenty Of Deniers

Starting on April 7th, there will be a daily prime time news program about climate change on Sky News. With extreme weather like floods being worsened by climate change, and denier politicians rerunning debunked old conspiracy theories in its former owner Rupert Murdoch’s native Australia, it’s not a moment too soon!  

Because just like in the US where broadcast TV news largely fails to cover climate change like it deserves (with some exceptions) and Fox News propped up by cable subscription fees because it’s so toxic with advertisers, things in Australia aren’t much better, according to Wendy Bacon and Arunn Jegan’s analysis of Rupert Murdoch’s Australian news outlets. 

They examined four News Corp publications over the course of a year (starting April 2019) and found that the Daily Telegraph, Herald Sun, Courier Mail and Australian all “produce substantial amounts of material” in denial of climate science, with 45% of the news, features and opinion pieces published by those outlets either rejecting or doubting the consensus. 

The opinion sections stand out as being responsible for a bulk of the denial, with two-thirds of them being skeptical, compared to 89% of the reporting being accurate. 

And as usual, it’s just a handful of disinformation specialists that produce the bulk of the content, with 44% of the 2,309 opinion pieces coming from just the top ten opinion writers, all of whom are deniers. 

Importantly for Sky News’s new television program, all of the top five, “Andrew Bolt, Tim Blair, Peta Credlin, Peter Gleeson and Chris Keeny… are occasional or regular Sky news presenters.” 

Andrew Bolt alone produced 405 opinion pieces, 12% of the entire sample, and one-third of the Herald Sun’s climate content. Bolt also has a nightly show on Sky News, as does Chris Kenny, The Australian’s most-published climate denier. The same goes for Peta Credlin, former advisor to Prime Minister Tony Abbott, and who was responsible for a respectable 4% of all the opinion pieces in the sample. And then denier columnist Peter Gleeson, responsible for 11% of Courier Mail’s opinion pieces, is also a Sky news host. 

So it’s great to see Sky News decide to dedicate time every day to climate news. Having been sold off by Murdoch in late 2018, it’s still home to plenty of Murdoch’s brand of denial, as the fact that leading deniers are given such prominent platforms on the channel. 

Maybe they could clear up some funds for more new climate reporters by firing some lying deniers?

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