by Paul Higgins, AMS Policy Program Director
In June, President Obama gave a long-anticipated speech laying out his vision for climate change risk management. The centerpiece of the approach is to use the EPA to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from power plants. What those regulations will look like remains unclear, but the President’s intent to reduce emissions significantly, particularly from coal-fired power plants, is clear.
By all accounts, this wasn’t the approach the president wanted to take for climate change. He has said repeatedly and throughout his presidency that he favors a bipartisan solution that comes from Congress. After nearly five years and with the end of his second term approaching, the president appears to have concluded that the political divisiveness surrounding climate change makes congressional action unlikely.
How well the president’s approach will work is hard to know, of course, but it will be particularly interesting to see how this unilateral effort affects the politics of climate change risk management. There is a chance that the president’s plan will ultimately reduce the political divisiveness surrounding climate change, in part, because the approach itself is politically divisive.
Using the EPA to regulate emissions will not go over well with many in Congress. His opponents will likely find it easy to criticize, and score political points in so doing, on both philosophical grounds (i.e., based on a preference for less intrusive federal intervention) and because unilateral executive action is less democratic than including Congress in the creation of a new law. But the very fact that substantive arguments can be made for different approaches may provide an incentive for his opponents to develop and offer those alternatives. That could create an important opening that’s been largely missing for climate change over the last few decades.
Prior to the 1990, Clean Air Act Republicans and Democrats could more easily agree on an environmental problem yet disagree on the solution. Republicans tended to prefer market-based solutions while Democrats tended to prefer command-and-control regulation. Conservative philosophy convincingly won that debate because the market-based approach used in the 1990 Clean Air Act proved far superior as a tool for protecting the environment and maximizing the economic benefits of doing so.
Perversely, that philosophical victory for conservatives has made it harder for the two parties to agree on climate change risk management. There isn’t an easy way for the parties to distinguish themselves if they agree on the basics of the solution. Instead, the political incentive has been to disagree about whether there is a problem in need of a solution in the first place. Once the champions of climate policy coalesced on a conservative approach for addressing climate change, the choice for everyone else became too stark: go along with that approach or oppose climate policies altogether. If there isn’t middle ground and your opponent is for it, then few options are more politically effective than being against it.
Of course, the politics of climate change are, and will likely continue to be, challenging for other reasons, most notably because of the competing and incompletely reconcilable interests of those affected by policy options. But there is a wide range of potential solutions for helping to manage climate change risks. Critically, there is a policy option for virtually any political philosophy out there. For example, Congress could use a market-based approach to reduce greenhouse gas emissions while simultaneously using every penny that the government raises through such an approach to reduce existing taxes on wages, corporate income, or capital gains. The reduction in taxes that would result would be a major victory for conservatives that many Democrats could plausibly go along with. Yet such options haven’t been developed or seriously considered.
That a broad range of potential risk management strategies hasn’t been developed and explored by policy makers is a major breakdown in our policy process. That policy deliberations (and public debates) about climate science are routinely at odds with the assessments of the relevant subject matter experts is a major failure of our national dialogue on the topic.
These failures have resulted, in part, because the political incentives for developing and exploring policy options have been too weak. By moving to circumvent the current political impasse to climate policy through a unilateral approach (particularly one likely to face sharp political opposition), the president may create a new opportunity for a broader consideration of options. If that happens, whether or not the president’s proposed solution is sufficient, he may help to depolarize the politics of climate change and spur the consideration of new and meaningful approaches to climate change risk management.
AMS Policy Program Director Paul Higgins’s perspectives, including this column, will be appearing regularly in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society.
Matt
The Moore Tornado from Above
The July issue of BAMS includes a feature on the new and improved imaging capabilities of the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS), one of the five instruments aboard the Suomi NPP satellite. The cover montage highlights VIIRS’s expanded spectral aptitude and microscale resolution by depicting 
three different perspectives on the tornado outbreak that swept across the Midwest on May 20, culminating in detailed nighttime evidence of the track of devastation in Moore, Oklahoma, as detected on May 21.
That month, the instruments on Suomi NPP were being calibrated by aircraft that in many cases flew directly under the path of the satellite. On May 20, one of these planes–an ER-2 flying above the cloud cover at approximately 65,000 feet–used the MODIS/ASTER Airborne Simulator (MASTER) to capture images of the storm that brought the EF5 tornado to Moore. The image below shows the tornado system minutes before it reached the city, and is overlaid on a Google Earth map to show the tornado location.
Annual Meeting Updates
Philip Ardanuy and Eileen Shea, the co-chairs of the 2014 AMS Annual Meeting, and AMS President J. Marshall Shepherd recently sent out this message with updates about the meeting:
Dear Colleagues and Friends of the AMS,
We are happy to announce that most of the conferences have decided to extend their abstract submission deadline. You can view all of the call for papers and updated abstract deadlines here.
Additionally, registration rates have been posted on the AMS 94th Annual Meeting web page and links to register for the conference are now active.
The preregistration (discounted registration) deadline this year is:
2 December 2013
Please remember that ALL attendees must register in order to attend and present at the conference. Registration is separate from the abstract submission fee.
Hotel reservation blocks will open and links to make those arrangements will be available on 5 August.
Thank you in advance for booking at an AMS-contracted hotel, since revenue from sleeping rooms helps offset other meeting costs and is passed down to attendees in keeping registration rates to a minimum.
Thank you and see you in Atlanta!
Phil Ardanuy and Eileen Shea
Co-Chairs, 2014 AMS Annual Meeting
J. Marshall Shepherd
AMS President
Annual Meeting Abstract Deadline Is August 1
Philip Ardanuy and Eileen Shea, the co-chairs of the 2014 AMS Annual Meeting, and AMS President J. Marshall Shepherd recently sent out this message about submitting abstracts for the meeting:
Dear AMS Colleagues,
It’s hard to believe that we’re already actively gearing up for the 2014 AMS Annual Meeting, to take place 2-6 February 2014 in Atlanta, Georgia! With this year’s theme: “Extreme Weather—Climate and the Built Environment: New Perspectives, Opportunities and Tools,” we’re confident that you’ll find lots of interesting, thought-provoking, professionally rewarding, and personally satisfying interactions. Recent events like Superstorm Sandy, the Oklahoma Tornadoes, and flooding in Calgary highlight the importance of the meeting theme, which is increasingly relevant to the science and operational communities, and society as a whole. The theme combines scientific inquiry, technological advances, societal implications, and public awareness through the lens of past, current, and future extreme weather and climate events.
This note is to remind you that the deadline to submit an abstract is fast approaching: 1 August 2013. Check out the AMS 94th Annual Meeting Web Page: http://annual.ametsoc.org/2014/. Here, you can find more details on the Annual Meeting theme as well as links to the Call for Papers for each participating conference, and links to submit your abstract online. All other information pertinent to the meeting will be posted to that page as it becomes available.
An abstract fee of $95 (payable by credit card or purchase order) is charged at the time of submission (refundable only if the abstract is not accepted). The abstract fee includes the submission of your abstract, the posting of your extended abstract, and the uploading and recording of your presentation to be archived on the AMS website. For poster presenters, you will also be able to submit a PDF file of your poster presentation for online viewing. Authors will be notified of acceptance by the beginning of October.
Even if you choose not to submit an abstract for the 94th AMS Annual Meeting, we hope you will come to listen, discuss, learn, and connect with colleagues. Continue to check out the AMS Annual Meeting website for new information on themed joint sessions, scientific and technological presentations, opportunities for social interactions, short courses, exhibiting details, registration, hotel and local area information, and much more.
Be sure to also follow Annual Meeting developments on The Front Page.
See you in Atlanta!
Philip Ardanuy and Eileen Shea
Co-Chairs, 2014 AMS Annual Meeting
J. Marshall Shepherd
AMS President
New Map Peeks Under Antarctic Ice
With data compiled from a number of satellite, aircraft, and surface-based surveys, the recently completed Bedmap2 project comprises three datasets to map the ice-covered continent of Antarctica: surface elevation, ice thickness, and bedrock topography. The new dataset updates 2001’s original Bedmap compilation with tighter grid spacing, millions of additional data points, and extensive use of GPS data—enhancements that have improved the dataset’s resolution, coverage, and precision. For example, it depicts many surface and sub-ice features that were too small to be visible in the original Bedmap. Data from Bedmap2 reveal that Antarctica’s average bedrock depth, deepest point, and ice thickness estimates are all greater than that recorded in the original Bedmap.
As outlined in the NASA video below, the updated information obtained from Bedmap2 should enhance currently limited data on the continent’s ice thickness and what is beneath the ice, which could help researchers better understand how Antarctica will respond to a changing climate. It also “will be an important resource for the next generation of ice sheet modelers, physical oceanographers, and structural geologists,” according to the British Antarctic Survey’s Peter Fretwell, lead author of a recently published article on Bedmap2 that appeared in The Cryosphere. The article and Bedmap2’s data can be accessed here.
Remembering the Battle . . . and the Weather
As Gettysburg National Military Park commemorates the 150th anniversary of the momentous and bloody battle fought there (it took place July 1-3, 1863), we can look back and examine the role weather played in those three days of conflict (and AccuWeather already has, in this interesting post). This is possible thanks in large part to a local man, Rev. Dr. Michael Jacobs, who took weather observations three times a day, even as the fighting raged on around him. His notes, which can be seen here, show that temperatures were slightly below average for all three days, and that cloud cover was considerate much of the time. This benefited the soldiers, who would have been most uncomfortable in their wool uniforms during extreme heat and/or humidity. Late on July 3, a thunderstorm broke out, and it is testament to the ferocity of the battle that Jacobs noted the thunder “seemed tame” after the nonstop cacophony of gunfire that echoed throughout that afternoon.
As the battle wound down, the weather intensified, with rain falling throughout the day (a total of 1.39 inches, according to Jacobs) on July 4, the day after the combat had ended. The inclement weather turned out to be significant, as some wounded soldiers were still lying on the battlefield; tragically, those who were in low-lying areas drowned when the rainfall caused the Plum Run Creek to overrun its banks. The rains also added insult to injury for the retreating Confederate army–the dirt roads they traveled on rapidly became treacherous, and as they moved southward they were trapped for a period of time on the north side of the Potomac after the river swelled, making it temporarily impassible. They weren’t able to cross until July 13th.
Pubs Department Gets the Word(s) Out
At last month’s meeting of the AMS Publications Commission–which mostly comprises the Chief Editors of the Society’s scientific journals–many of the attendees were concerned that their fellow AMS members may not be aware of the many recent notable achievements by AMS Publications. So with that in mind, here’s a quick list of some of the accomplishments over the past year:
- elimination of charges for full-color figures;
- release of the web-based version of the Glossary of Meteorology;
- complete consolidation and standardization of field editorial support;
- the launch of a mobile version of the Journals Online site;
- creation of new Publications web pages (including an updated online Authors’ Guide);
- increased support for LaTeX authors;
- distribution of AMS eBooks through Springer;
Of course, all of this was done in addition to the continued publication of AMS’s journals, 6 of which were ranked in the top 20 for impact factor in the most recent edition of the Thompson-ISI rankings.
And out of everything discussed at the meeting, the Publications Commission was perhaps most adamant about publicizing the rapidly improving production time of those journals. Production times for AMS journals (the number of days between when a paper is accepted and when it is published in final form) have been declining for years, and in May of this year the average production time for all journals was just over 150 days. In January of 2008, it was around 280 days. That improvement has been accomplished despite a continuing rise in article submissions, which reached an all-time high of 2,999 in 2012. AMS journals published almost 27,000 pages last year.
“Publishing in AMS journals now is much faster, more efficient, and streamlined than even just a few years ago, and the word seems to be getting out; submissions are at an all-time high and continuing to increase,” says AMS Director of Publications Ken Heideman. “Our goal is not just to get you to publish with us but to keep you publishing with us!”
At the meeting, Heideman underscored the ongoing commitment of his staff to continually reduce production times, and highlighted a number of initiatives for the department in the upcoming year.
Keep an eye out for an article in BAMS later this year with more detailed highlights from the Publications Commission meeting.
A Scientist's Scientist
Joseph Farman–the man who found the ozone hole–had a very straightforward, unglamorous way of describing the work of a scientist:
Science is thinking you know how things work and so you make something work and it either works as you think it does or it doesn’t work as you think it does and now you move on.
Farman, who passed away last month at the age of 82, reported the existence of the ozone hole in a 1985 paper based on in situ measurements made with Brian Gardiner and Joe Shanklin in Antarctica. Despite the renown that followed this discovery, Farman’s legacy will stand–as he wished–on a dogged ability to follow his simple model of research at the highest level.
An employee of the British Antarctic Survey from 1956 until his retirement in 1990, Farman ventured to Antarctica at the beginning of his career and studied the atmosphere over that continent for 25 years, assigning other scientists to continue measurements after he returned to Britain in 1959. His superiors questioned his indefatigable efforts to compile ground-based ozone readings–after all, NASA satellites were already monitoring the ozone over Antarctica. Farman told the BBC:
The long-term monitoring of the environment is a very difficult subject. There are so many things you can monitor. And basically it’s quite expensive to do it. And, when nothing much was happening in the environmental field, all the politicians and funding agencies completely lost interest in it. And there was a huge struggle to keep going. And in fact we could have been closed down with our ozone measurements the year before we actually published our paper.
But Farman was a strict proponent of the simple scientific act of collecting data–“just doing a little job, and persevering at it,” as described by Sharon Roan, author of Ozone Crises: The 15-Year Evolution of a Sudden Global Emergency. This commitment to scientific principles made him “a model scientist,” according to Roan.
Faithful dedication to the scientific process yielded momentous results. Isn’t that how it’s supposed to work?
This New York Times obituary tells a more complete story of Farman’s achievements, and for those who really want to delve into his life and sometimes controversial views, there is this interview collected by the British Library (audio version available here).
Crowdsourcing the Search for Carbon Dioxide Emissions
According to Arizona State University (ASU) Professor Kevin Gurney, there are approximately 30,000 power plants throughout the world, and collectively they account for close to half of all fossil-fuel CO2 emissions. As a modeler of these emissions, Gurney is trying to learn as much as possible about every one of the plants. Where are they? What kind of fuel does each plant use? How much CO2 does each one release into the atmosphere?
Obtaining this kind of data, however, is a monumental task. There is no worldwide database with all of the power plant information Gurney is looking for, and even after enlisting a number of undergraduate students in his lab to scour Google Earth for the locations of the largest plants, in six months they were able to identify the locations of only 500 across the globe. Realizing that the effort was “like looking for 25,000 needles in a giant haystack,” as Gurney described it, he has now taken another approach by creating an online game that utilizes contributions from the general public to pinpoint the locations of power plants and hopefully quantify the amount of CO2 each releases into the atmosphere.
The project is called Ventus, which is Latin for “wind.” In the game, players are asked for four pieces of information: the location of the power plant (within a few hundred meters), the type of fuel used at the plant, the amount of electricity the plant generates, and the amount of CO2 that is emitted from the plant. Participants in the game can contribute as much information as they have by placing pins on a Google map at the location(s) of the plants. When the game is completed in 2014, the person who contributed the largest amount of useable information will be declared “Supreme Power Plant Emissions GURU!” and will receive a trophy, as well as be a coauthor on a scientific paper about crowd-sourcing in scientific research.
“Our logic is that for every power plant in the world, there are probably at least a dozen people who live near it, work at it, or know someone who works at it” explained ASU’s Darragh O’Keefe, who built the website. “With the proliferation of phones and GPS, it makes it pretty easy to locate things.”
Early response to the game was enthusiastic, with Gurney reporting that people had logged on from almost every country in the world within a day of its mid-May launch.
“I’m always surprised by how fast this type of thing moves around the planet,” he told the Los Angeles Times.
AMS Names New Policy Program Director
Beginning this month, Paul Higgins has succeeded Bill Hooke as director of the AMS Policy Program. Hooke will move into a senior policy fellow position and also more fully embrace the position of associate executive director of the AMS that he has nominally held for several years (he will also continue writing his blog on science, climate, and policy, Living on the Real World).
“I have big shoes to fill,” Higgins said, “but the fact that those big shoes will be standing with me will be a great help.”
After spending a year on Capitol Hill learning about the policy process as an AMS-UCAR Congressional Science Fellow, Higgins joined the Policy Program staff in 2006 as senior policy fellow, and was named associate director of the program in 2010. In these roles he has coordinated the AMS Climate Briefing Series, supervised the AMS-UCAR Congressional Science Fellowship Program, and helped train Earth scientists to engage the federal policy process at the AMS Summer Policy Colloquium. He also studies climate policy options and conducts scientific research on the causes and consequences of climate change. His scientific research involves the study of the two-way interaction between the atmosphere and the land surface, and his policy research involves analyzing existing legislative approaches and developing risk-management strategies that can overcome contentious political obstacles to climate policy.
In 2011, he was selected as a Google Science Communication Fellows–one of twenty-one early- to mid-career Ph.D. scientists across the United States chosen to participate in a workshop that included hands-on training and brainstorming on topics of technology and science communication.
In looking forward, Higgins cites two primary challenges the Policy Program faces: 1) ensuring that policy choices take full advantage of the knowledge and understanding made possible by Earth observations, science, and services; and 2) making sure that policy makers understand how much the nation’s welfare depends on those observations, science, and services.
“Meeting these two grand challenges,” Higgins said, “will strengthen the AMS community and, more importantly, help the nation and the world avoid risks and realize opportunities related to the Earth system.”
Hooke joined the Policy Program (which was then called the Atmospheric Policy Program) in 2000 and had been its director since 2001 while also serving as a senior policy fellow. In that time he directed the AMS policy education programs, including the Summer Policy Colloquium and the Congressional Science Fellowship Program. His research interests include natural disaster reduction, historical precedents as they illuminate present-day policy, and the nature and implications of changing national requirements for weather and climate science and services.
“Serving as AMS associate executive director is a high honor,” Hooke said of his new role. “I hope to serve our community well.”
“This transition acknowledges that Bill has been very active in a variety of AMS initiatives, and allows him to more visibly represent the entire AMS,” said AMS Executive Director Keith Seitter. “Meanwhile, Paul brings new ideas and a fresh leadership to the Policy Program while becoming a member of the Society’s management team.”