An Appeals Court Just Pressed Pause On The Much-Watched Youth Climate Lawsuit Against Trump

Washington Post - Chelsea Harvey

The Trump administration has filed a petition that calls for an appeals court to step in and independently review a decision made by a federal judge last year to allow a climate lawsuit to move to trial. (Andrew Harnik/AP)

A landmark climate change lawsuit, brought against the federal government by 21 children, has encountered yet another hurdle on its way to trial. A higher court has just stepped in and ordered a temporary stay on the proceedings while it considers an unusual petition from the Trump administration that could prevent from the case from moving forward at all.
The petition, filed last month by the Justice Department with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit, requests a rarely invoked legal procedure known as a writ of mandamus, which allows higher courts to independently review — and potentially overturn — decisions made by lower courts before they have even held a trial. In this case, the petition calls for the appeals court to step in and independently review a decision made by a federal judge last year to allow the climate lawsuit to move to trial. The Trump administration has also requested a stay on the lawsuit’s proceedings until the 9th Circuit makes a decision on its petition.
On Tuesday, the Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit ordered a temporary stay until it can make a decision on whether to consider the Trump administration’s requests. According to Julia Olson, chief counsel for the plaintiffs and director of advocacy organization Our Children’s Trust, the 9th Circuit has not actually honored any of the Justice Department’s motions yet. The stay, she said, was enacted “on the court’s own initiative,” and the order notes that “the petition for a writ of mandamus and all other pending motions will be addressed by separate order.”
The Justice Department declined to comment on the new development in the case.
The order comes just three weeks after U.S. Magistrate Judge Thomas Coffin set an official trial date of Feb. 5 for the case. Should the lawsuit get to that point, the plaintiffs — 21 youths now between the ages of 9 and 21 — will argue that the federal government has violated their constitutional rights by promoting the production of greenhouse gases through the use of fossil fuels and damaging the climate system. The case was initially filed during the Obama administration and has since been inherited by President Trump.
But the federal government has been steadily working to stop the case from progressing. The petition for a writ of mandamus is the latest of several measures taken by the Justice Department, including a motion under the Obama administration to have the case dismissed, denied by a federal judge in November, and a subsequent motion under the Trump administration to have this ruling overturned, also denied.
The petition for writ of mandamus, widely considered the “Hail Mary” of legal procedures, is the last measure that could potentially stop the case from going to trial. The request is an “extraordinary” move, according to James May, a law professor and chief sustainability officer at Widener University who is not involved with the lawsuit, and even considering it would be an unusual decision on the part of the 9th Circuit.
In fact, ordering a stay on the lawsuit’s proceedings is a rare move in and of itself, he said. Courts of appeal typically don’t get involved in lower courts’ affairs until the proceedings have progressed to trial, or at least “to a point where there’s something to review,” he told The Washington Post. While he noted that it’s impossible to predict what the Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit will decide to do next, he added that he doesn’t feel the order is a “positive development” for the plaintiffs.
But Olson remains optimistic.
“I don’t think it’s a setback at all,” she said. “And all it means is that they are preparing an order on the Department of Justice’s request for the court to take up this writ of mandamus and motion for a stay. The court has a duty to consider these motions and decide them, and that’s what it’s doing right now.”
And May added that “given the novelty and importance of the claims, it’s possible — but unlikely — that the 9th Circuit needs more time and wants the lower court to take a breath and not do anything that is irreversible in the meantime.”

Links

• These 21 Kids Taking On Trump Could Be Our Best Hope For Climate Action
• Kids Suing Trump Over Climate Change Get A Boost From Grandpa
• A Landmark Climate Lawsuit Against Trump Is Scheduled For Trial Next Year. Here’s What To Expect.
• Climate Kids To Get Their Day In Court Against The Trump Administration
• White House Effort To Stop Youth Climate Lawsuit Is 'Drastic And Extraordinary'

Does Doom And Gloom Convince Anyone About Climate Change?

Science News - Erika Engelhaupt

New York magazine article brings teachable moment on communicating climate change science

An apocalyptic message about climate change might motivate some people to act but make others feel hopeless, science communication experts say. draco-zlat/iStockphoto

A couple of weeks ago, an article in New York magazine laid out a horrific scenario of global warming. The photo at the top summed up the tone: A fossilized human skull, jaw gaping beneath aviator sunglasses, hovered over a caption warning that people could be "cooked to death from both inside and out" in a hotter climate.
If that's not doom and gloom, I don't know what is. Yet despite being a complete downer, the article quickly became New York magazine's most-read story ever.
The article also reignites a debate over how best to communicate the science of climate change. Scientists and others who hope to inform the public or spur action have long struggled with how to convey the high stakes of global warming without making people feel helpless or fueling deniers by coming across as alarmist.
"Certainly a lot of people paid attention to it, and it sparked a very good conversation about what we're up against," says Anthony Leiserowitz, director of the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication. But its message of impending doom can have very different effects on people, he notes. "There are different audiences in this country, and they're affected by extreme scenarios differently."
That became clear as soon as the article was published, when just about everyone with an opinion on climate change jumped on it. Scientists questioned its accuracy — we don't know that it will be that bad, many said. Breitbart News, aiming from the right, proclaimed that New York had "broken the world record for the scariest, most catastrophic, hysterical exercise in extravagant climate doom-mongering in the history of the universe."
Others suggested it was just the kick in the pants that America needs. In fact, Slate said, the article isn't too alarmist; the rest of us just haven't been alarmist enough.
The real question now, though, is what the article's impact will be, measured not only by how many people read it but, more importantly, by whether it will change anything. In 2015, when Kathryn Schulz wrote a chilling Pulitzer Prize‒winning article for the New Yorker about the inevitability of an earthquake destroying much of the Pacific Northwest, droves of people ran out to buy earthquake preparation kits.
But there's no preparation kit for climate change, and it seems unlikely that a news story will change U.S. policy on climate change. So it remains to be seen whether this article, or others that might copy its doom-and-gloom tack, might change any minds or spur the public to act.
But perhaps it holds a lesson for anyone who is concerned about climate change and doesn't know how to talk to friends and family who aren't.
First, it depends who you're talking to. Leiserowitz's research has shown that there are six Americas, on a scale from "dismissive" to "alarmed" about global warming. Those groups interpret the same information differently based on the community they identify with. For instance, those who think climate change is a hoax will probably continue to think so. People in the middle, who don't know much about the issue, might become more concerned by a vivid account of how bad things could get.
And those who are most concerned about climate change may accept a gloomy message as vindication of their views — but there's always the chance they might lose hope about fixing the problem, Leiserowitz says.
"And that's the critique some scientists have put forward," he says, "that it's not enough to just totally scare the bejesus out of people." Indeed, as a science journalist who has covered climate change, I can vouch that scientists and the media have been told over and over that the public will ignore a message that's too depressing. As paleoclimatologist Michael Mann of Penn State University said of the New York article, overstating the severity of climate change could feed a "paralyzing narrative of doom and hopelessness."
This concern about public paralysis came out of communication studies years ago, when most reporters were still focused on a relentless drumbeat of bad news, Leiserowitz says. "It's more complicated than that. We weren't saying every piece of journalism has to present solutions."
So maybe there's a place for a little gloominess in talking about climate change. "The scientists should just tell us what they know and not worry too much about whether there's too much gloom and doom in it," says Dan Kahan, a Yale law and psychology professor who leads the Cultural Cognition Project, studying public perceptions of risk.​
What's more, most people don't form their opinions based on the news they read, he says. "They get the memo from their communities." His work has shown that people's cultural identity, not their knowledge of science, drives their opinion on climate change.
"What we need isn't more evidence, but people seeing other people who they identify with acting on the basis of the evidence," he says.
So while it looks like there's an audience out there for gloomy words, ultimately it's actions that speak loudest of all.

Links

• The Uninhabitable Earth
• The Climate Change Scare Campaign Most Politicians Won't Go Near
• Climate Change Doomsday Warning Of 'Rolling Death Smog' And 'Perpetual War' Criticised By Scientists
• Earth Could Become 'Practically Ungovernable' If Sea Levels Keep Rising, Says Former NASA Climate Chief
• Backlash Against Doomsday Article That Predicts A Climate Change Induced Apocalypse
• 'The Models Are Too Conservative': Paleontologist Peter Ward on What Past Mass Extinctions Can Teach Us About Climate Change Today
• Climate Change Is Killing Us Right No
• The World May Have Less Time To Address Climate Change Than Scientists Thought

Paw Power: China Plans 100 Panda-Shaped Solar Plants On New Silk Road

Reuters

In a country with everything from chopsticks to slippers designed to look like pandas, one Chinese energy company is going a step further

An aerial view shows panda-shaped solar plants built by Panda Green Energy Group in Datong, Shanxi province, China in this still image taken from a video footage, courtesy of Panda Green Energy Group, shot July 21, 2017. Panda Green Energy Group/Handout via REUTERS

BEIJING/HONG KONG - In a country where you can find everything from chopsticks to slippers designed to look like pandas, one Chinese energy company is going a step further by building 100 solar farms shaped like the bears along the route of the ambitious Belt and Road initiative.
Panda Green Energy Group has already connected one such 50-megawatt (MW) plant to the grid in the northern province of Shanxi, the first step in a public relations stunt that emphasises the cuddly side of the world's No.2 economy.
Built with darker crystalline silicon and lighter-coloured thin film solar cells, the plant resembles a cartoon giant panda from the air.
"The plant required an investment of 350 million yuan ($52 million), and it would require investment of $3 billion for 100 such plants," Panda Green Energy's Chief Executive Li Yuan told Reuters.
Li did not say where the longer-term investment would come from.
The Hong Kong-based firm is currently in talks with Canada, Australia, Germany and Italy to launch more panda-shaped power stations.
The Belt and Road initiative is a plan to emulate the ancient Silk Road by opening new trade corridors across the globe using roads, power lines, ports and energy pipelines.
A 100-MW panda power plant would be expected to generate 3.2 billion kilowatt-hours (kWh) of energy over 25 years, according to the company, capable of supplying power to over 10,000 households annually.
Panda Green Energy is currently constructing its second panda power plant in Shanxi, which accounts for a quarter of China's coal reserves.
Utilisation of one panda solar power plant will save the equivalent of a total 1.06 million tonnes of coal and cut emissions of greenhouse gases by 2.74 million tonnes in 25 years, the company said.
The firm has been investing in and running solar power plants in China's major solar hubs such as Xinjiang and Qinghai province, as well as some solar projects in Britain.
Shanxi aims to install 12 gigawatts of solar capacity by 2020 versus 1.13 GW installed in 2015.

Links

• Scientists dim sunlight, suck up carbon dioxide to cool planet
• Doctor Gustavo Zuniga holds up an Antarctic plant that has molecules that filter the solar radiation and could be used to prevent human DNA damage in Santiago
• Caribbean life "as we know it" at serious risk - expert
• Scientists dim sunlight, suck up carbon dioxide to cool planet
• Scientists find sunscreen potential in Antarctic plants