Sustainability
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Sustainability
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Rocky Mountain residents brace for massive snow dump | The Intermountain West is anticipating such massive snowfall over the next couple days that airlines have begun alerting passengers that may need to rebook their travels. |
© AP Photo/David Zalubowski |
Denver International Airport, as well as the entire Denver and Boulder, Colo., metropolitan areas, could see up to 16 inches of snow, according to a National Weather Service (NWS) Winter Storm Warning.
“One minute, we have 60-degree weather; the next, a significant snowstorm. Sounds like Colorado,” Gov. Jared Polis (D) posted Wednesday morning on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter.
“Parts of the Denver Metro area could see a foot or more of snow due to an upslope storm. Please stay off the roads if possible,” the governor warned. And airlines are urging passengers to stay alert, as planes may also need to stay off the runways if the storm ends up as bad as anticipated.
United Airlines issued an alert about possible travel impacts through Friday not only in Denver, but also in Aspen, Colorado Springs, Vail/Eagle, Gunnison and Steamboat Springs in Colorado, as well as Casper, Cheyenne and Laramie in Wyoming.
Southwest, meanwhile, warned of potential disruptions, delays, diversions or cancellations in Denver, Colorado Springs and Steamboat Springs. “Travel may become impossible late tonight through Thursday night,” the NWS’s Denver/Boulder branch stressed on Wednesday.
The agency warned of 2 to 4 feet of snow in some Rocky Mountain foothill locations, as well as possible power outages across the Front Range — the north-south zone that stretches from Casper, Wyo., to Pueblo, Colo.
The meteorologists warned that snowfall rates of up to 2 to 3 inches per hour could be possible.
“It would not be wise to attempt to drive in the foothills or Front Range mountains starting late this afternoon or evening as heavier precipitation develops,” they concluded. |
Welcome to The Hill’s Sustainability newsletter, I’m Sharon Udasin — every week we follow the latest moves in the growing battle over sustainability in the U.S. and around the world. |
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Latest news impacting sustainability this week and beyond: |
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Texas faces a brutal climate and development paradox heading deeper into the 21st century, a state climate scientist said. “Everything is bigger in Texas, including our climate challenges,” said Jay Banner, a geologist at the University of Texas at Austin. “Texas sees synergistic issue more than anyplace else,” Banner said. The state is trapped between two difficult realities, Banner told audiences at South By Southwest, Austin’s … |
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The impacts of climate change in central California’s agriculture hub are causing such drastic increases in irrigation demands that annual water use over the past decade now matches the volume of the region’s biggest reservoir, a new study has found. California’s San Joaquin Valley — among the most productive farming regions in the world — has in recent years endured both excessive heat and multiyear droughts, leading … |
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| Autonomous car companies need to do a better job of working with cities to avoid costly failures, Austin Mayor Kirk Watson said Monday. Watson added that moves last year by the state of Texas to preempt local control had hurt the city’s ability to guarantee safety. Last week, Waymo, an affiliate of Google parent company Alphabet, began field testing its autonomous taxis without drivers in Austin — the first such initiative … |
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Monday marked a key cutoff time by which Colorado River states had been tasked with proposing a consensus-based plant for long-term water conservation in the overtaxed system. But with the arrival of that deadline, set by the Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Reclamation, no such agreement was on the table. Instead, the river system’s two main contingents — the Upper and Lower basins — submitted their … |
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Climate change may torpedo global skiing sector |
© Peter Morning/Mammoth Mountain Ski Area via AP |
Annual snow cover across the globe’s popular ski resorts will likely plunge over the next century thanks to climate change, a new study has found. One in 8 such areas could lose all-natural snow cover by that point if greenhouse gas emissions stay high, according to the study, published on Wednesday in PLOS ONE. No turning back: “Within all major skiing regions, snow cover days are projected to decrease substantially under every assessed climate change scenario,” wrote the authors, from Germany’s University of Bayreuth. A global problem: The researchers explored climate impacts on annual snow cover in seven areas: the European Alps, Andes Mountains, Appalachian Mountains, Australian Alps, Japanese Alps, New Zealand’s Southern Alps and the Rocky Mountains. - They identified specific locations within these regions using data from OpenStreetMap.
- The European Alps accounted for 69 percent of these areas, as the largest global ski region.
- The authors also used a public climate database known as “CHELSA,” to predict annual snow cover under different carbon emissions scenarios.
Drastic declines: They found that under a high emissions scenario, 13 percent of ski areas could lose all-natural snow cover by 2071-2100, relative to historic baselines.
The highest to lowest likely declines, by region: - Australian Alps: 78 percent
- Southern Alps: 51 percent
- Japanese Alps: 50 percent
- Andes: 43 percent
- European Alps: 42 percent
- Appalachians: 37 percent
- Rocky Mountains: 23 percent
Economics, animal impacts: Although resorts may increasingly rely on artificial snowmaking, the authors warned that the economic profitability of the industry would likely plunge.
And foreseeing the possible upward expansion of ski territories, they also expressed concern about mountain biodiversity, with an eye on “vulnerable high-altitude species.” |
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Upcoming news themes and events we’re watching: |
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California Assembly Member Jesse Gabriel (D) on Tuesday introduced a first-of-its-kind bill that seeks to ban seven artificial dyes from foods served in schools, citing behavioral and health impacts in children. While the bill would expand upon legislation passed last year — which outlawed certain “dangerous additives” in California foods — it remains to be seen whether this stricter measure will become law.
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Branch out with different reads from The Hill: |
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Nine states this week sued the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) over a rule that requires publicly traded companies to disclose some climate-related information to potential investors. |
Fossil fuel emissions from methane, which are more potent than those from carbon dioxide, are projected to decline after increasing last year, according to a report released Wednesday by the International Energy Agency (IEA). |
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Local and state headlines on sustainability issues: |
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Coming Soon to Manhattan, a Brand-New Tiny Forest (The New York Times)
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Alabamians Want Public Officials to Mitigate Landslide Risk as Climate Change Makes Extreme Precipitation More Frequent (Inside Climate News)
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Red flag warnings across US south as more heat and drought threaten to kick up Texas Panhandle fire (The Independent)
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Sustainability news we’ve flagged from other outlets: |
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More stories on The Hill right now: |
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The sausage may be contaminated with foreign materials like rubber pieces. Read more |
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Story at a glance New Gallup poll findings show that 57 percent of Americans believe the country would be better run if more women held political office. Gallup began tracking Americans’ attitudes about women in politics in 1999 when the percentage of Americans who thought the country would be better off with more women in office … Read more |
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Opinions related to sustainability submitted to The Hill: |
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You’re all caught up. See you next week! |
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