The heat and humidity backed off, making Tuesday a pleasant summer day. Ambient temperature got up to the mid eighties, yet a lack of high humidity made everything outdoors tolerable. I spent a good amount of time there.
Like many, I’m not happy the U.S. Senate passed the budget reconciliation bill. It apparantly came down to Alaska’s Senator Lisa Murkowski who, fearing retribution for a no vote, changed her mind and provided the 50th yes vote. That enabled the vice president to break the tie and deliver a win for Republicans. It is now up to the House to concur… or do what they will.
There is a lot to deal with. Senator Adam Schiff pointed this out in the bill:
If it passes, this will be a setback for environmental quality. Many environmental advocates may feel like the U.S. is back to square one. Me? I can’t give up.
For now, we have perfect summer weather. For how long is hard to say.
I decided to call my morning exercise a hike instead of a walk. That’s mostly because when my sneakers wore out, I replaced them with a pair of hiking shoes. I don’t know if this will persist, but I’m trying it on for size, to wit:
Here are some photos from my morning hike.
Sunrise on the trail.The trail goes on forever.Reflections in the state park lake.A neighbor’s bush.Bur Oak tree leaves.
There is a golden spring season from the appearance of first buds to full leafing out of deciduous trees, flowers, and bushes. Later in May, insects descend upon us and start spoiling the pure beauty of trees especially, but every living plant in our yard. A gardener does the best they can to keep them away from the good stuff. The fragrance and beauty of lilacs is a fleeting spring pleasure.
Spring shows us where nature is if we have the eyes and mind to see it. Our Autumn Blaze maple tree was damaged in the 2020 derecho, and the years since then have taken their toll.The bark is shedding around the main trunk, and there are cracks in the trunk where the derecho twisted the tree around in high winds. I suppose insects crawled into the cracks. The tree can sense something is wrong and this spring grew many more seeds than used to be normal. Their presence indicates the trauma of the derecho and that something is wrong so it needs to propagate. While I may have to climb up on the roof to clean the windblown seeds out of the gutter, the true meaning is that the time left for this tree is limited.
Autumn Blaze Maple tree with seeds on May 5, 2025.
I planted two Green Ash trees before the Emerald Ash Borer was known in popular media to be a threat. The first one succumbed last year and the second did not leaf out this spring. I examined the tree trunks and branches and the tell-tale boring holes where the insects enter underneath the bark are evident everywhere. Luckily the trees are small enough I can remove them myself.
We enjoy the lilac flowers while we can. They are truly a spring blessing.
While in high school, Earth Day served a pressing purpose. NASA astronaut Bill Anders had taken the famous Earthrise photograph on Dec. 24, 1968, Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring, describing the impact of use of the pesticide DDT, was published in 1962, and there were no legal or regulatory mechanisms to protect our environment. Teenage me was inspired to take action and we did the best we knew how to support the effort. Mostly that meant selling Earth Day buttons like the one in the photograph to raise funds.
Earthrise Dec. 24, 1968
Word from Washington, D.C. is the president is planning to note Earth Day 2025 by signing executive orders that would strip some environmental nonprofits of their tax-exempt status, setting up a possible Earth Day strike against organizations seen as standing in the way of the president’s push for more domestic oil, gas and coal production, according to Bloomberg News. How the worm has turned.
The trouble is that to address the climate crisis, governments must be involved. While this administration is temporary, the harms from doing little or nothing for the remaining time could do permanent harm. That is to say, Earth will be fine. It’s the people who live on it who are in harm’s way.
Now is the time to find like minded people who support the science behind climate change and band together to do something. What is possible is an open question.
Pear Blossoms, April 19, 2025.
Editor’s note: The president signing these executive orders did not make news today.
It snowed overnight on March 20, leading into spring.
The year we moved to Indiana’s Calumet Region in 1988 marked the onset of the worst U.S. drought since the Dust Bowl. The 1988-1990 North American Drought covered a smaller amount of geography compared to the 1930s Dust Bowl yet it was the most expensive extreme weather event in terms of monetary damages in U.S. history until that time.
Nearby Milwaukee, Wisconsin, set a record 55 consecutive days without measurable precipitation. During summer heat waves, thousands of people and livestock died. The drought led to many wildfires in western North America, including record fires in Yellowstone National Park in 1988.
While living in the Calumet, I understood the region’s activities were adding carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, enhancing the greenhouse effect that causes planetary warming. This includes the enormous Amoco Oil Company refinery located 23 miles from our house.
In 1988, we were turned inward, living our family life. We also had air conditioning. I did not understand how prevalent the deleterious effects of climate change would become in our lifetimes. It was one of what became a series of extreme weather events leading through time to when I wrote this post. We understand now.
The United Nations suggests ten thing we can do to address climate change. They even have an app! It is not too late to begin addressing our contributions to global warming and environmental degradation. Click here to learn more about what you can do.
According to the sensor installed on the north side of the house, the ambient temperature was 13 degrees below zero Fahrenheit when I began writing this post. The sun is rising and it warmed up. We’re not at zero yet, although the high is forecast at 25 degrees. Today the weather is weird again.
Iowa is a leader in wind energy and has plenty of room to improve our solar capacity. There are environmental issues with every form of electricity production, yet burning fossil fuels is our most immediate danger because of the role of carbon dioxide in enhancing the greenhouse effect. Despite today’s low temperatures, Iowa is simply too darn hot.
The trend on the following chart is the right one. As a state, we need to move more quickly.
It seems obvious to me that to get to zero fossil fuels used to generate electricity Iowa needs to install many more solar panels. There are issues with both wind and solar generated electricity.
The wind doesn’t always blow and the sun doesn’t always shine. They can be addressed. One of the key strategies to deal with intermittency, which is what this is called, is to improve the forecasting and planning of renewable power generation and demand. Another strategy is to invest in storage and integration solutions that can balance the supply and demand. A third strategy is to foster innovation and adaptation. This involves developing and deploying new technologies, designs, and practices that can enhance the performance, efficiency, and resilience of renewables. We need the will to solve these problems.
So the news about electricity generation in Iowa is positive. We just need more renewables and technological solutions to deal with intermittency so we can replace fossil fuels altogether. To a reasonable mind, this can be accomplished. Now we just need our regulatory and governmental authorities to get on board.
With Al Gore and Company in Chicago 2013. This is about half the attendees. I’m in there somewhere.
The 29th Conference of the Parties was a disappointment. Fossil fuel interests hindered the ability to accomplish constructive things since the beginning of the process. Now, they stopped anything except the most minimal action at COP29. Former Vice President Al Gore summarized the situation in this statement:
November 23, 2024
While the agreement reached at COP29 avoids immediate failure, it is far from a success. On the key issues like climate finance and the transition away from fossil fuels, this is — yet again — the bare minimum.
We cannot continue to rely on last-minute half measures. Leaders today shirk their responsibility by focusing on long-term, aspirational goals that extend far beyond their own terms in office. To meet the challenge of our time, we need real action at the scale of months and years, not decades and quarter-centuries.
This experience in Baku illuminates deeper flaws in the COP process, including the outsized influence of fossil fuel interests that has hobbled this process since its inception. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has been particularly obstructive. Putting the future of humanity at severe risk in order to make more money is truly disgraceful behavior. Reforming this process so that the polluters are not in effective control must be a priority.
On climate finance, our primary task in the coming years must be to not only fulfill and build upon the financial commitments agreed to at COP29, but to unleash even larger flows of affordable and fair private capital for developing countries.
Ultimately, coming out of COP29, we must transform disappointment into determination. We can solve the climate crisis. Whether we do so in time to meet the goals of the Paris Agreement will depend on what comes next.
The climate is changing. Do humans have the capacity to protect all we hold dear from the ravages of the climate crisis? Time will tell. The Conference of the Parties is our last, best hope to stave off the worst impacts of human-caused climate change.
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