Sea level rises of just eight inches produce devastating flooding effects from storms.
Credit: John G Wilbanks/Alamy

Sea levels could rise twice what was previously anticipated during the 21st century, according to a new study that factors in emerging research about the unstable Antarctic Ice Sheet.

The study, published in the open access journal Earth’s Future, addresses newly prominent worries, like the disintegration of floating ice shelves and widespread ice-cliff failure, which could lead to the sudden collapse of parts of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet. If the ice sheet were to collapse and melt completely, which had previously seemed highly unlikely, it would cause sea levels worldwide to rise almost 200 feet.

The study goes on to lay out new projections for sea levels city by city around the world, which could be far more dire than originally predicted.

The U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) projects a median sea level rise of two feet and five inches by 2100 under a high emissions scenario. By contrast, the new Earth’s Future study, as […]

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The Reynolds Creek Wildland Fire burns in Glacier National Park, Montana in this photo.
Credit: Erin Conwell/Reuters

Bigger, hotter wildfires are ravaging forests and burning them to the ground more frequently as the climate gets hotter and drier. Now a new study shows that in some places in the U.S., those forests may never grow back. (emphasis added)

That adds to evidence that amid climate change, some forest landscapes — including those in Canada — can change dramatically after being burned.

The new U.S. study looked at 1,500 forest sites affected by 52 wildfires in five states in the U.S. Rockies between 1985 and 2015. It found overall decreases in the amount of tree regrowth since 2000 compared to before 2000 due to warmer, drier conditions.

After 2000, no seedlings were growing back at about one third of sites, compared to 15 per cent of sites that burned before 2000, said Camille Stevens-Rumann, lead author of the study published today in the journal Ecology Letters.

That complete lack of regrowth happened most frequently at lower-elevation sites that have become measurably […]

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Scott Pruitt, the head of the Environmental Protection Agency,
Credit: Saul Loeb / AFP

Using taxpayer dollars, the Environmental Protection Agency has hired a cutting-edge Republican PR firm that specializes in digging up opposition research to help Administrator Scott Pruitt’s office track and shape press coverage of the agency.

According to federal contracting records, earlier this month Pruitt’s office inked a no-bid $120,000 contract with Definers Corp., a Virginia-based public relations firm founded by Matt Rhoades, who managed Mitt Romney’s 2012 presidential campaign. Following Romney’s defeat, Rhoades established America Rising, an ostensibly independent political action committee that works closely with the Republican National Committee and Republican candidates to mine damning information on opponents. Other higher-ups at Definers include former RNC research director Joe Pounder, who’s been described as “a master of opposition research,” and senior vice president Colin Reed, an oppo-research guru billed as “among the leaders of the war on [Sen. Elizabeth] Warren.”

This for-profit consulting firm offers a variety of public relations services such as digital strategy, political consulting, and media relations. According to its website, Definers’ clients include […]

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Pollution from fracking in Pennsylvania may harm the health of developing babies who live nearby.
Credit: REUTERS/Les Stone

The extraordinary growth in fracking—the hydraulic fracturing of deeply buried shale rock to extract natural gas—has transformed the United States over the past 15 years, boosting energy stocks, cutting pollution from conventional coal-power plants, and creating new jobs. But this boom may have come at a cost. According to the first large-scale study of babies born before and after natural gas extraction began in Pennsylvania, those living near fracking sites had significantly lower birth weights—and worse health—than other babies.

Concerns about the health effects of fracking aren’t new. Absent solid evidence, some states, including Maryland and New York, have even banned the practice altogether. Now, a growing number of studies suggests that living near oil and gas developments is associated with a wide range of negative outcomes, from higher rates of asthma and migraines to more hospitalizations for cardiovascular disease, neurological disorders, and cancer. Earlier studies have also found associations with low–birth weight babies, but those […]

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Republican Speaker of the House Paul Ryan and trash novelist Ayn Rand.

If you have any doubts that the phenomenon of Donald Trump was a long time a’coming, you have only to read a piece that Gore Vidal wrote for Esquire magazine in July 1961, when the conservative movement was just beginning and even Barry Goldwater was hardly a glint in Republicans’ eyes.