FIRST LOOK

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‘People are Winning’ -- Oil Hub First in US to Ban Fossils: The Whatcom County Council in Washington state has unanimously passed permanent land-use policies that ban new fossil fuel infrastructure, becoming the first in the US to pass such a measure. The ordinance prohibits the construction of new refineries or coal facilities and places more restrictions on expansion of fossil fuel facilities at Cherry Point, such as requiring offsets for greenhouse gases emitted from any expansions and rigorous environmental review. Whatcom is currently polluted by two of Washington’s five oil refineries, and five years ago saw the cancellation of the country’s largest planned coal export facility due to concerns from the Lummi Tribe around fishing treaty rights. “What's been happening in Whatcom County for the last 10 years and in the state and Oregon is that people have been saying no to these new proposals coming forward one by one by one,” said Matt Krogh, director of the Safe Cities campaign for Stand.earth. “And people are winning.” (KNKX, Northern Light, Guardian, InsideClimate News)

Floods Devastate Rohingya Camps: Thousands of Rohingya refugees who escaped an ethnic cleansing campaign in Myanmar are once again forced to find new shelter after days of heavy rainfall caused landslides and flooding that destroyed dwellings and killed at least 14 people. The camps in Cox Bazaar, Bangladesh, which hosts more than 1 million Rohingya Muslims, experienced almost a foot of rain in just 24 hours -- nearly half the average July rainfall in one day. Deadly fire, disease and now floods are continuing to prolong the suffering of Rohingyas, as strict COVID-19 measures and vaccine inequality is further compounding the issue. “We are having a nightmarish life,” even after escaping to Bangladesh, said Mohammad Jubair, a Rohingya volunteer. (New York Times $, Associated Press, Guardian, Al Jazeera)

Infrastructure Deal Advances in Senate: The Senate voted (67-32) to begin debate on a nearly $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill yesterday, with about half of it dedicated to new federal funding that contains a significant chunk for “climate resilience”. The latest iteration is largely similar to a previous version on energy and climate spending, albeit significantly lower than the $2 trillion that President Biden once vowed. Among other things, the proposal allocates $73 billion to modernize the electric grid, $7.5 billion to build a federal network of EV charging stations, and $5 billion for electric and low-emission school buses. The new compromise has cut public transit investment down from $49 billion to $39 billion, removed allocation for an infrastructure bank in a move that cuts EV charging stations funding in half compared to previous versions, and it remains unclear if the additional $7.5 billion in low-cost financing has been included. “While this bill is a step forward ... on its own, it does not go far enough to meaningfully advance environmental justice and tackle the climate change crisis,” Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chairman Tom Carper (D-Del.) said in a statement. While Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) has indicated she would not support the current $3.5 budget reconciliation proposal that Democrats are using to fund significant climate action, other Democrats have indicated that they won’t support an infrastructure bill without a significant climate change push, which is currently included in the reconciliation bill. (Senate vote: NPR, CNN, Guardian, New York Times $, Politico, Wall Street Journal $; What’s in the bill: New York Times, The Hill, NBC News, Bloomberg, CNN, CNBC, USA Today, E&E News $; Bush & AOC on Diversity: The Hill; Reconciliation: E&E News $; Interviews: NPR with Pete Buttigieg, PBS with Sen. Tester.)

SEC Chief Suggests Mandatory Climate Disclosure Rule: Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Gary Gensler said Wednesday that he was asking staff to consider making companies disclose climate risks in their annual reports, noting that investors want more information on climate change and directing the SEC to develop a carbon-disclosure rule by the end of the year. This would open companies to fraud investigations should they disclose inaccurate or insufficient information, as without this step, companies will continue to play down climate-related risks and exaggerate their sustainability efforts, advocates argue. Gensler also suggested that new disclosure requirements could include the emissions associated with consuming a company’s products, for example the emissions produced by burning oil. (Wall Street Journal $, CNBC, Bloomberg, MarketWatch, Bloomberg Law)

(ENVIRONMENTAL) RACISM: Eviction ban's end could leave millions baking in heat waves (E&E $), Surge in environmental justice enforcement prompts intensified corporate attention to community issues (Reuters), As target warehouse opens on Little Village Hilco site, alderman celebrates new jobs — while activists vow to keep fighting (Block Club Chicago)

PROTESTS: Drought and water mismanagement spark deadly protests in Iran (Climate Home, Thomson Reuters Foundation)

RECYCLING MYTH: Big Oil’s solution for plastic waste littered with failure (Reuters)

CLIMATE LITIGATION: States urge court to block feds from using climate metric (Bloomberg Law)

DENIAL: Buddy Carter serves on the Select Committee on the Climate Crisis but believes there's no crisis (Savannah Morning News), TC Energy to switch to green power to run N. American energy pipelines (Reuters)

AGENCIES: U.S. studies plan to pay fishing industry for offshore wind impacts (Reuters)

FERCALICIOUS: Democrat [Casten] plugs 'hot FERC summer', sings to 'FERCalicious' on House floor (The Hill, PoliticoPro $)

POLITICS: Joe Manchin makes $500k a year from one of the dirtiest coal plants in West Virginia (Vice), New Mexico Democrats call on Congress to fund climate change jobs in federal budget bill (Carlsbad Current Argus)

NOMINEES & CONFIRMATIONS: White House nominates Jainey Bavishi, climate adaptation expert, to key NOAA post (Washington Post $)

CARBON COST: Study: Cost of carbon emissions measured in lives lost is high (Axios, New York Times $

LOBBYING: Washington’s most powerful oil lobby faces reckoning on climate change (Wall Street Journal $)

REGULATION: The unraveling of the Trump era (The Atlantic)

INTERNATIONAL: Is Russia finally ready to tackle climate change? (Moscow Times), Why the Paris climate agreement might be doomed to fail (InsideClimate News), NSW coal mine approvals could undo work on net-zero emissions targets, analysis suggests (ABC AU)

IMPACTS: Historic floods fuel misery, rage in Detroit (E&E, Greenwire $), Extreme weather is upending lives in the West. 'You walk around with this vague sense of terror.' (CNN), ‘Climate change has become real’: extreme weather sinks prime US tourism site (The Guardian)

HEAT: Western heatwave highlights need for better farmworker protections (POLITICO)

DROUGHT: As drought in the West worsens, the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe in Colorado faces a dwindling water supply (The Colorado Sun), ‘Adapt or we’ll break’: a water expert lays out the West’s risky future in the megadrought era (Gizmodo)

WILDFIRES:California, Nevada governors tour site of huge wildfire (AP), Wildfires in West cause air pollution (ABC), Artificial intelligence could be the latest tool in fighting wildfires (NBC), Meet the people burning California to save it (New York Times $)

MORE WILDFIRES: Wildfire rages for 2nd day in Lebanon, spreads to Syria (AP), Wildfires in southern Turkey leave 3 dead, 58 hospitalized (AP)

FLOODING: Belgium and Germany deal with ‘unimaginable’ piles of post-flood trash (Politico), Record funding for flood defences in England as climate crisis worsens risks (The Guardian)

BRAZIL: The Amazon Is Fast Approaching a Point of No Return (Bloomberg $)

BATTERIES: Why is a big oil company investing huge amounts of money in Wyoming wind? (The Guardian, Business Insider), How drones help workers inspect wind turbines (Bloomberg $)

ENERGY TRANSMISSION: Unfortunately, I care about power lines now (The Atlantic)

METHANE: Mexican methane leak rate 'alarming' for climate change, report says (Reuters)

CALIFORNIA POWER: California Renews Power-Conservation Plea Amid Heat, Fires (Bloomberg $)

OIL & GAS: Power plants forced to report emissions cut carbon exhaust, study finds (Houston Chronicle)

POLLUTION: Less than half of Seattle homes have air conditioning. After a deadly heat wave, ‘Everybody’ wants it. (New York Times $)

PIPELINES: Critical pipelines have reported more than 220 cyber incidents since May TSA directive (CNN)

COAL: Susan Sarandon shows support for striking Alabama coal miners in NYC (Al.com)

SO GASSY: Gassy coal mines can be environmental commodities. CNX shows how (The Gazette)

TAR SANDS: We love you, Alberta—just not your tar sands (The New Yorker $)

TIDAL: The ‘world’s most powerful tidal turbine’ starts to export power to the grid (CNBC)

EVs: DOE says new building codes to cut energy costs by $138B, but EV backers see failure to advance charging (Utility Dive)

ACTIVISM: The activists sabotaging railways in solidarity with Indigenous people (The Guardian)

GARDENING: He wrote a gardening column. He ended up documenting climate change. (New York Times $)

EXXON: Exxon sting ensnares think tanks with climate credentials (ClimateWire $)

CORPS: Climate change: Huawei and ZTE dial into China’s carbon neutrality call with low-emission technology using renewable energy (South China Morning Post), Shell raises dividend by almost 40% amid soaring oil prices (The Guardian, Reuters)

FINANCE: The private climate finance surge (Axios)

INSURANCE: Lloyd's of London plans electric vehicle, hydrogen insurance in climate change fight (Reuters), Why sea-level rise will wipe out billions in waterfront Silicon Valley tech properties (The Independent)

BATS: Here’s what climate change will mean for bats (The Revelator)

LANDOWNER: Queen secretly lobbied Scottish ministers for climate law exemption (The Guardian, Gizmodo)

SUMMERTIME SADNESS: The imaginary summer (New York Times $), Is extreme weather changing your summer activities? Tell us how (NPR)

BIODIVERSITY: A new ‘green status of species’ will measure the recovery of threatened plants and animals (Washington Post $)

MOVIES: Parable of the Sower is finally becoming a feature film (Gizmodo), ‘Never Gonna Snow Again’ review: You’re getting warmer (New York Times $)

INTERNATIONAL: Colombia's Medellin plants 'green corridors' to beat rising heat (Thomson Reuters Foundation), Climate change is a global threat demanding national solutions (FT $)

AUSTRALIA: Climate crisis cuts Australian farm profits by a quarter over past 20 years (The Guardian)

• Coal country cleanup: Biden plan sketches out possible future for former miners (Reuters, Dane Rhys and Timothy Gardner analysis)
• We can’t tackle the climate crisis without a strong US left (Jacobin, Thea Riofrancos interview)
• Investing in public transit is a climate imperative (The Hill, Katherine Garcia op-ed)
• Human rights can't be a sacrificial lamb for climate action (The Hill, Danielle Butcher op-ed)
• Biden should reject the infrastructure plan written by Exxon and invest in saving the climate instead (MarketWatch, Basav Sen op-ed)
• National legislation on climate springs from local actions (LA Times, Bob Taylor op-ed $)
• How California can lead the way on climate-protecting technologies (Mercury News, David G. Victor & Ryan Hanna op-ed)
• What the climate movement can teach us about ending modern slavery (Thomson Reuters Foundation, Nick Grono op-ed)
• Congress should strengthen bonding requirements for abandoned oil and gas wells (The Colorado Sun, Dale McCall op-ed)
• Polarizing the climate debate is a good way to never achieve climate policy (The Colorado Sun, Kelsey Grant op-ed)
• No, shaming us for washing dishes won’t fix climate change – finally holding corporations accountable will (The Press and Journal, Megan Roberts op-ed)
• It's not the heat, it's the jet stream (Star Tribune Ned Kleiner op-ed $)
• How the US could help Australia develop climate action (The Hill, David Shearman op-ed)
• Why a price is right for carbon (The Hill, Former U.S. Rep. Bob Inglis op-ed)

Is it Climate Denial? Or Is It Some Other Rightwing Disinformation? Play Now To Find Out!

Hello and welcome to a very special edition of the Climate Denier Roundup! Today we’re playing a fun game of “Who Said It?” Because while climate deniers and conservatives would have you believe their opposition to climate policy is based on the uncertainty of the science, or reliability of renewable energy, or any number of other wonky objections, their arguments are often indistinguishable from corporate public relations brand management, tin-foil conspiracy theories, or general rightwing grievance-mongering.

Here are three quotes we came across, presented with limited context to see how good you are at spotting the difference between climate denial and other bad faith lies! 

The first comes from a personal blog about how “Twitter is cancelling Science”- is it a climate denier like Tony Heller or Willie Soon complaining about being banned, exposed as corrupt, or some other type of conspiracy theorist peddling dangerous disinformation? 

“The global implementation of the Orwellian ‘Ministry of Truth’ has led to the fact that this much-needed dialogue is labelled as betrayal and disdain for humanity… Even though I have done nothing wrong and act purely on moral grounds, I am consistently discredited on the internet by disciples of the alarmists and fact-checkers… Every time I submit scientific publications myself, however, the respective journals are contacted by the woke ‘skeptics’, and I am accused of untenable conflicts of interest…” 

While it may well be cribbed from a climate denier, that’s actually from a crank who thinks the cure to COVID-19 is Vitamin D!

Next up is an entry in our Corporate category. See if you can tell if this is an effort by the oil industry to greenwash its gas and hydrogen operations, or if it’s doublespeak from another famously dishonest source of disinformation. 

The head of a company “looks to stop selling [their product] within 10 years”, according to a Washington Examiner headline. The executive said he wants to “solve the problem of [product’s use]", but that if consumers are too dependent on the product to “quit” then in that case the “second best choice is to let them switch to the better alternatives… a noncombustible, scientifically substantiated, ideally regulated product.”  

Hmm, is it a coal or oil company supposedly accepting climate science? Nope! It’s tobacco executives describing how they’re going to fight smoking by getting people to vape instead, which is a pretty perfect metaphor for the fossil fuel industry’s promotion of itself as wanting to be part of the solution to climate change. 

Okay, last one! Is this a scientist complaining about how their climate denial is actually much more widespread among their colleagues than the 97% consensus suggests, or a conservative ranting about how normal people don’t appreciate the rank bigotry fueling the right’s culture wars?

“They hate you in academia. They hate you in the media. They hate you on the sports field, in the movies, on Facebook and Twitter. Your boss hates you. Your colleagues hate you — or at least have been told they should. They hate you because you think the wrong way…. I always warn those who aren’t prepared for blowback not to associate with me publicly… You are the majority. It’s not that everybody hates you. It’s that millions of Americans are afraid to say that they agree with you. We have been silenced.”

Is that supposed silencing, written in a published book and excerpted in a New York Post op-ed, a climate denier, or an outraged auteur ginning up book sales from angry conservatives? 

Both, actually! It’s Ben Shapiro, who’s made his whole brand whining about liberals, and of course runs a website founded with a billionaire fracker’s money, where, shocker, Tuesday’s top story was a piece about his book.  

Well, there you have it! Hope you enjoyed playing this little game of “climate denial or disinformation?” and came away with the understanding that there’s no difference between the two.

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