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The Theory of Relativity – Albert Einstein

by Myrna Posted on December 11, 2018

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The Theory of Relativity
And Other Essays
Albert Einstein

Genre: Physics

Price: $9.99

Publish Date: September 27, 2011

Publisher: Philosophical Library/Open Road

Seller: OpenRoad Integrated Media, LLC


The Authorized Albert Einstein Archived Edition: E=mc2 may be Einstein’s most well-known contribution to modern science. Now, on the one-hundredth annivesary of the theory of general relativity, discover the thought process and physics behind this famous equation. In this collection of his seven most important essays on physics, Einstein guides his reader step-by-step through the many layers of scientific theory that formed a starting point for his discoveries. By both supporting and refuting the theories and scientific efforts of his predecessors, Einstein reveals in a clear voice the origins and meaning of such significant topics as physics and reality, the fundamentals of theoretical physics, the common language of science, the laws of science and of ethics, and an elementary derivation of the equivalence of mass and energy. This remarkable collection allows the general reader to understand not only the significance of Einstein’s masterpiece, but also the brilliant mind behind it. This authorized ebook features a new introduction by Neil Berger and an illustrated biography of Albert Einstein, which includes rare photos and never-before-seen documents from the Albert Einstein Archives at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. “The ‘principle of relativity’ in its widest sense is contained in the statement: The totality of physical phenomena is of such a character that it gives no basis for the introduction of the concept of “absolute motion;” or shorter but less precise: There is no absolute motion.” —Albert Einstein, “The Theory of Relativity” Albert Einstein (1879–1955) was born in Germany and became an American citizen in 1934. A world-famous theoretical physicist, he was awarded the 1921 Nobel Prize for Physics and is renowned for his Theory of Relativity. In addition to his scientific work, Einstein was an influential humanist who spoke widely about politics, ethics, and social causes. After leaving Europe, Einstein taught at Princeton University. His theories were instrumental in shaping the atomic age. Neil Berger, an associate professor emeritus of mathematics, taught at the University of Illinois at Chicago in the Mathematics, Statistics, and Computer Science department from 1968 until his retirement in 2001. He was the recipient of the first Monroe H. Martin Prize (1975), which is now awarded by the University of Maryland every five years for a singly authored outstanding applied mathematics research paper. He has published numerous papers and reviews in his fields of expertise, which include elasticity, tensor analysis, scattering theory, and fluid mechanics.

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The Theory of Relativity – Albert Einstein

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What’s the Environmental Impact of Flying Cross-Country?

by AnaBruxner Posted on December 3, 2018

With millions traversing the globe to reach their loved ones for the holidays, travel (particularly air travel) is top of mind.?How can I avoid the lines??Will I be able to fit all these gifts in my carry-on??But one more question arises in the environmentally conscious: What’s this going to do to my carbon footprint?

Aviation is, at its core, a fossil fuel industry, one which guzzles a shocking 5 million barrels of oil every single day. Burning this fuel to get you to your grandma’s place in Wisconsin or that winter getaway in Hawaii currently contributes to close to 2.5 percent of total carbon emissions. Experts expect this figure to rise to 22 percent by 2050, even as other sectors start cutting.

Additionally, we are flying more than ever. Demand for flights increases daily, to the point that demand from new and existing travelers is supposed to double by 2035. With?the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warning us that we have just 12 years to avoid apocalyptic climate change disaster, this rising trend in air travel is certainly bleak.

The third problem? While aircraft is becoming more fuel efficient, electric planes are still decades away. We have yet to invent a battery that can deliver as much power as jet fuel and, so far, the technology is cost prohibitive.

Most of us are ignorant of how our flying behavior contributes to climate change, largely because it just isn’t communicated to us very often. Think about it…when was the last time you saw an advertisement mentioning the environmental impact of flying? New cars, appliances, even houses are required to disclose energy efficiency. Planes and airlines? Not so.

So what’s to be done? We won’t be shutting down cheap air travel anytime soon (aviation was purposefully excluded from the Kyoto and Paris climate change agreements) and regulatory organizations are dragging their feet, avoiding any plan that might have negative economic implications.

Here’s what you can do about this.

Your government, your favorite airline, the companies that control global wealth…they won’t do a thing as long as citizens remain blissfully unaware of the impact of aviation emissions. Want a carbon tax on flights? Speak up.

Connect with your peers. Encourage everyone to use their voice to make change. Maybe then, we will be able to find a less damaging solution, while still retaining access to global travel and that vacay you always dreamed of in Hawaii.

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.

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What’s the Environmental Impact of Flying Cross-Country?

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The science of self-care: How climate researchers are coping with the U.N. report

by LinnieCouncil Posted on November 18, 2018

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The phrase “point of no return” may sound hyperbolic. But one month after the IPCC’s blockbuster report awakened the world to the urgency of climate change, the mood among top climate scientists has become increasingly restless.

I spoke with more than a dozen scientists about how their lives have changed since the release of the report in October. That report, assembled with input from thousands of scientists and signed off by representatives of every nation on Earth, reached a stark conclusion: We have to cut emissions in half by 2030 or risk a Mad Max-esque planet.

Their responses reflect the same internal tensions many of us have felt: relief that the true stakes of climate change are finally out there, grief and fear over our lack of action, impatience with leaders who continue to shirk their responsibilities, and excitement to get to work on a problem that affects us all.

Take Georgia Tech’s Kim Cobb, a climate scientist who studies corals near small island states. The IPCC report found that without a radical shift, those nations could disappear beneath the waves in our lifetimes. Cobb sees the findings putting into stark terms how much we need to step up: “Isn’t it so wonderful that science isn’t giving us a pass?”

Earlier this year, she pledged to sharply reduce her air travel. Cobb bikes to work in all kinds of weather, and recently trekked to Atlanta City Hall to advocate for bike and pedestrian-friendly infrastructure. Before the midterm elections, she spent a weekend campaigning for environmentally friendly politicians. Cobb is a testament to what she calls an “all-of-the-above” approach to bring about radical change.

Climate scientists like Cobb live in a world that’s still caught between where we are and where we need to be. Watching how they’re responding to the IPCC report is a good barometer for how thinking, feeling people with full knowledge of our society’s existential problem are coping with being alive at a moment when we’ve got 12 years to remake everything.

Ryan Jacobson

The scientists I talked to are doing more biking, meditating, wine drinking, and worrying about their children’s futures. They’ve tuned out the news, they’ve tweeted, and they’ve campaigned. They’ve purchased electric cars and talked from the heart about the stakes our civilization finds itself in. In short, they’re handling this new reality a lot like the rest of us.

Here are some of the (lightly edited and condensed) email responses I got:

Diana Liverman, University of Arizona (and a co-author of the IPCC report)

I’m still in full IPCC outreach mode, giving talks locally and in Europe as well. Things won’t wind down until Thanksgiving. I am refining my message and getting better at talking about the report and making its findings relevant for where I live.

Teaching my large undergrad class (160 students) is helpful at keeping things positive as they seem engaged and interested. I feel the need to give them hope.

Kate Marvel, NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies

I don’t think we should give in to despair. There’s no scientific support for the notion that we’re inevitably doomed and should just give up. There’s a lot of bad news, but look at the good news, too: new congresspeople who take climate change seriously, a very engaged and well-informed youth, new ways to talk about climate that link it to other issues people care deeply about.

I’m not saying this to minimize the terrifying reality. I miss California like I miss a person, and it’s devastating to see my beloved home burning.

Andrea Dutton, University of Florida

It is easier to ignore the problem than to take on the emotional burden of accepting something that seems quite scary at times.

The fundamental message has remained the same. The reason why it sounded so much more urgent this time is three-fold: (1) We are now several years further along, and each year makes a significant difference in calculating how much we would need to decrease our emissions to reach any target; (2) the 1.5 C target is lower than 2 C, so obviously trying to reach it means even more rapid and deep cuts to our emissions; and (3) the backwards progress on policies to address this in the U.S. makes the outlook even worse now.

So, what has changed for me? If anything I am working even more frantically than before. I devote even more time to public engagement on this issue.

I hope that we (meaning both scientists and journalists) can encourage others not to get stuck in despair, but to use their concern over climate change as fuel to take us to the next step on this journey to adapt, mitigate, and create a more sustainable and resilient society.

Kerry Emanuel, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

When things started going downhill a few years ago, I started planning for a temporary escape from the U.S. and am now happily in Paris for the fall. One cannot, of course, escape from all the bad news so easily, and it is hard to develop a positive outlook when almost nothing is actually happening to combat all the problems we face, including especially climate change.

Devaraju Narayanappa, Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin (France)

I certainly think the report is shouting out loud across the Earth; more and more people are getting alerted. I hope the transformations, discussed in the IPCC report, might at least start to happen in some part of the world. Personally I’m trying my best to be eco-friendly and balancing the time for research, exercise, and for the family and friends.

Sarah Perkins-Kirkpatrick, University of New South Wales (Australia)

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The stakes are very different for me. I’m expecting my second daughter in three short months and the latest report is sobering about the future my children will have. I find myself constantly thinking about what the planet will look like in 50 or 100 years’ time when we haven’t curbed our emissions, at least enough to limit global warming to 1.5-2 C. And I don’t like what I see. However, I cannot (and will not) give up hope that changes will be made, at least in my lifetime, and if not that of my children. I’d be drinking (more) wine too if I could, but that’s not advised at 28 weeks pregnant 😉

Jeremy Shakun, Boston College

Everything climate is a long-term story, so I tend/try not to get too worked up/down by any particular moment. I increasingly think the public isn’t going to push for much action, at least on the scale needed, until they see a bunch more climate disruption/impacts. It’s just too theoretical otherwise and can’t compete with other issues.

I haven’t had much hope for 1.5 or 2 C for a while. I tend to think of this in 3 vs 6 C terms. So, bad news in some ways is good news, as it perhaps helps move public perception forward and increase chances of less than 3 C. I’ve been struck by how many people in my everyday life have been commenting this year on how bizarre the weather is. They don’t necessarily connect it to climate change yet, but I think it’s an important step.

Adam Sobel, Columbia University

At this point, I am most terrified by the failure of the United States’ system of democratic government. Of course that is not an entirely separate issue from global warming and the various other environmental catastrophes.

Since the 2016 election, I have had to limit my intake of news to a lower level than before.

Deke Arndt, NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information

I’m trying to talk with as many people as I can about climate. The solutions lay in the people who haven’t yet acted.

Abigail Swann, University of Washington

The Brazilian election has left a much more unexpected pit in my stomach because it wasn’t really on my radar until this fall. I’d also add to your list of difficult-to-stomach news the ongoing revelations about various academic and STEM #MeToo incidents, and some extremely disappointing responses to them.

The everyday of being a professor is hard, but also involves a lot of busy tasks with deadlines this time of year, so some of my coping is just to keep making sure that I don’t let other people down. I also have a toddler. The mundane sometimes feels like a respite, but with both students and family, it also feels really important, and therefore restorative (at least most of the time when dinner doesn’t get thrown all over the room).

Maskot / Getty Images

Valerie Trouet, University of Arizona

I admit that in the context of what we know, at times I find it hard to keep motivated to do my job. I focus more and more on aspects that seem more achievable and that I feel have a bigger chance of getting solved, such as diversity and equality in STEM fields and in academia.

I make more time to meditate, and make sure that I exercise and spend time with the people that I love. I also find that trying to find ways to further reduce my footprint, even in little ways, helps to give me a feeling of being in control.

Sara Vicca, University of Antwerp (Belgium)

Moments like these, when we are strongly reminded that a turbulent future may be ahead of us, do upset me and make me angry. When I put my kids in bed at night, I often catch myself thinking: “Oh dear, what will their life be like when they are adults?” (They are 6 and 9 now.)

On the other hand, news like this also stimulates me to contribute (more) to the solutions where I can. I think it’s really important not to lose hope and to keep on doing all we can to move to a sustainable future in a still friendly climate.

Mark Eakin, NOAA’s Coral Reef Watch

The years 2014-2017 have all been among the warmest years on record, and along with the high temperatures came the longest, most widespread global coral bleaching event on record. At NOAA’s Coral Reef Watch, we’re right at the center of these events and received frequent reports from scientists and resource managers all over the world who reported coral bleaching as it was happening. There were many days I’d just walk away from the computer and look out the window when an especially devastating report of reef damage came in. I think it led to more self-medication as the bad news would literally drive me to drink (fortunately, not too much).

Terry Hughes, James Cook University (Australia)

The IPCC report singled out coral reefs as a vulnerable ecosystem. My worst fear is the growing likelihood of another extreme summer in Australia early next year that could damage the Reef again. Yet, Australian governments still promote the expansion of coal and gas. My personal response – publish our data as quickly as we can, to inform the voting public.

Eric Rignot, University of California-Irvine

Sea-level rise and flooding is one thing, people get wet, immigrate, and create huge problems. Loss of biodiversity means the human species as a whole is threatened to disappear. No joke. This is not discussed enough in the media. My uttermost concern goes to biodiversity more than ice sheets.

Now a lot of countries are pointing the finger at the U.S. but we are doing more in California than in any other country that signed the Paris agreement. I see an increasing concern from the public to do the right thing, so I am more hopeful now than 10 years ago when only visionary people cared and the rest did not.

skynesher / Getty Images

Richard Alley, Pennsylvania State University

Next week, if the rains hold off, I should hit 2,500 miles for the year on my bicycle. A lot of those miles have been down the Spring Creek Canyon, watching the eagles and osprey and mink as the seasons turn, enjoying the beauty that still surrounds us.

In my public presentations, I now generally start with cellphones. Many of our fellow citizens do accuse scientists of not knowing what we’re doing. But, they do so by using cellphones, which are just a little sand, a little oil, and the right rocks, plus science and engineering, design and marketing. The cellphones rely on relativity and quantum mechanics. I think most of our fellow citizens really do know that they couldn’t build a cellphone from the sand, oil, and rocks, and that scientists really do have useful insights, including discovering medicines and medical procedures and devices that save lives and ease suffering. And that knowledge really does mean that there are ways back to using our knowledge more broadly to help us.

If we use our knowledge on energy and environment more efficiently, we will get a larger economy with more jobs, improved health, and greater national security in a cleaner environment more consistent with the Golden Rule.

Not a bad goal, is it?

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The science of self-care: How climate researchers are coping with the U.N. report

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Here’s what 3 Newark residents had to say about the city’s lead crisis

by PhilDrechsler Posted on November 14, 2018

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Four years after lead was discovered in Flint’s drinking water, a similar public health crisis is playing out in New Jersey’s most populous city, Newark.

Residents of Newark say over the past year and a half, top city and state officials assured them that their water supply was safe. But as early as 2016, state-run tests that showed elevated lead levels at local schools.

The Natural Resources Defense Council, together with the Newark Education Workers’ Caucus, filed a lawsuit against the city in June, accusing it of violating federal safe drinking water laws. The suit alleges Newark both failed to treat its water properly to prevent lead from leaching off old service pipes into residents’ drinking water and failed to notify residents about the elevated lead levels.

For most of 2018, Newark’s website read: “NEWARK’S WATER IS ABSOLUTELY SAFE TO DRINK,” according to the New York Times. Since the lawsuit was filed, the city has sprung into action, giving away 40,000 water filters across the city of 285,000 people and telling parents their children should not drink the water.

The situation has drawn parallels to the Flint water crisis. “The actual facts of what happened in Flint may not be the exact same, but the overall arc of what happened is,” Mae Wu, an attorney and water expert at the NRDC, told Grist.

The revelation of this potentially widening public health crisis has angered many Newark residents. Here are three community members’ experiences, as told to Grist reporter Paola Rosa-Aquino. Their statements have been edited for length and clarity.

Though the city of Newark is distributing water filters, like these, for residents to mitigate lead levels in their homes, residents say there are not enough for those who need them. Image courtesy of Shakima Thomas

Debra Salters, community activist

I live in a building in the East Ward. We didn’t get water filters. The people who had something to say about it — the activists — we were turned away. We’re actually meeting with our building’s owners next week to find out what the situation is and if they can get the water tested.

Even now, not everyone who lives here knows about the lead in the water. More and more people are finding out, from family members out of state and other cities. Not only are we drinking the water, we’re bathing in it. We’re brushing our teeth in it. We’re washing our hair with it. It’s affecting our entire life here and no one seems to care, until the lawsuit, until they were made to care.

None of the top officials have really done anything to make the public aware of the public health crisis. They denied there was a problem when we, the citizens, were digging up information and bringing it to them to make sure. First, we found out about the lead in schools, and they tried to tell us the water was OK to drink at home. If you’re saying the water is not good in the schools, then how is it fine in our homes, if it’s all coming from the same source? We were shooed away like gnats at a barbecue.

Newark Mayor Ras Baraka (left) looks on as Senior Aide Andrea Mason (center) speaks to residents at a town hall concerning the city’s lead problem.Image courtesy of Shakima Thomas

Yvette Jordan, teacher and member of Newark Education Workers Caucus

My concern as well as other educators who I have spoken with, of course, is our students as well as small children and those most vulnerable, including elderly and women who are pregnant. We felt we represented a cross-section of our city and especially of those who would be impacted. A couple of us who were homeowners or parents of small children — we felt emotional about this. We could really speak to it with some credibility. My own home’s water was found to be 42.2 parts per billion which is over the federal threshold for lead.

Our teachers’ group was approached by the Natural Resource Defense Council and they asked if we could join them in a lawsuit against the City of Newark. We asked, “Why?” They said, “Well, your water actually rivals Flint, Michigan.” We were alarmed. We said we’d join them.

I mentioned it in my classroom with my students. Some students have heard something and others don’t know what I’m talking about. I feel it’s a failure of public trust in coming forward and saying exactly what is happening.

I think a lot of times people who are affiliated with those who are in power try to downplay what is going on. They try to say to those who are speaking out about it are being irresponsible, that we shouldn’t say anything because it will scare the public. Well, guess what? They should be scared.

Shakima Thomas’s son, 4, bathes in water in Newark, New Jersey.Image courtesy of Shakima Thomas

Shakima Thomas, social worker

I pay for water and it’s really confusing for me that I have to pay for toxic water. What I’m paying is not adding up to the service that I’m getting. I don’t appreciate it, especially as a hard working person. Even as a mom, I have to protect my son, who’s a four-year-old. He’s okay and doesn’t have any elevated levels of lead in his bloodstream, but this still is a public health disaster.

It’s people’s lives. Who wants to have lead in your bloodstream? Who wants that? None of us. We were just exposed to this toxic water. It’s horrible. I think it should be a federal class action lawsuit against this city. That’s what I would think. And I think that we should be reimbursed from the time that administration knew about the lead in the water up until now. From 2016 to now, I feel as though my fees for water should be waived, because I was buying poison, and it wasn’t even consensual. I’m not just going to go out there willingly purchasing poison. I’m just not gonna do that. So, that’s what makes this even more of a scandal.

The mayor keeps saying that this isn’t like Flint. It is the same as Flint in the way that they tried to cover it up. It’s the same thing. We were victimized by this administration. They gamble with our health. They put politics first before justice.

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Here’s what 3 Newark residents had to say about the city’s lead crisis

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Typhoon Yutu spurs disaster in a remote U.S. territory

by Greg36271607917 Posted on October 26, 2018

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Far away from the mainland, American citizens are reeling from a direct hit by Super Typhoon Yutu.

During its landfall on Thursday, Yutu lashed the Mariana Islands with more than a foot of rain, coastal flooding in excess of 15 feet, waves the size of five-story apartment buildings, and winds of 180 mph.

Saipan and Tinian are the two most-populated islands of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. territory in the central Pacific Ocean about 8,000 miles from Washington, D.C. — nearly twice as far away as Honolulu. Both islands took a direct hit. About 50,000 people live in the Commonwealth, and after Yutu, they’re fighting for survival.

Most structures have lost their roofs, and even the leaves have been stripped from trees and bushes, local lawmaker Edwin Propst told the Associated Press. Closed circuit video from near the point of landfall showed an entire hotel lobby destroyed in seconds.

Just hours after landfall, local news reports said that food, drinking water, and fuel were already in short supply. “This damage is just horrendous, it’s going to take months and months for us to recover,” Propst said.

If recent history holds, he’ll be right. Yutu is the third tropical cyclone (the scientific term for typhoons and hurricanes) in just over a year to plunge a remote U.S. territory into humanitarian crisis. Last year, Hurricane Irma’s devastation in the U.S. Virgin Islands was eclipsed just days later when Hurricane Maria made a direct hit in Puerto Rico.

In historical context, Yutu is an exceedingly rare disaster, though storms like Yutu are coming with a worrying frequency these days. According to preliminary weather data, Yutu is tied for the fifth-strongest tropical cyclone ever to hit land. Six of the 10 strongest landfalls in world history have occurred this decade.

The United States has borne a particularly damaging share of horrific storms lately. Yutu is the fifth Category 4 or 5 tropical cyclone to make landfall in the past 15 months on U.S. soil. No previous decade has had more than four such strikes on American shorelines, making this an outbreak unseen in nearly 170 years of recorded weather history.

Like so many recent hurricanes, Yutu rapidly strengthened just before landfall, going from a Category 1 to a Category 5 in just 36 hours. Waters near Yutu were 2 to 3 degrees Fahrenheit warmer than normal, consistent with the effects of climate change and a key factor in rapidly strengthening storms.

Despite signing an emergency declaration to help speed the flow of federal aid to the islands, a routine task for a storm of this magnitude, President Trump has yet to publicly comment on the disaster. Mainstream media coverage has also been sparse; The New York Times’ initial story ran on page 16.

“It’s been tough seeing the lack of mainstream coverage for this,” said Steven Johnson, a native of Saipan and marine biologist now studying climate change at Oregon State University, wrote in an email interview with Grist.

Johnson pointed to the round-the-clock coverage of the mail bombs sent to Trump critics in comparison. It “hurts to know that +50K people living on U.S. soil deserve a fraction of the attention of Robert de Niro,” he said.

A lack of media and federal attention could prove deadly in the Marianas, as it did in the aftermath of Maria in Puerto Rico. Despite convincing evidence of a humanitarian catastrophe in Puerto Rico, the federal response was slow. That official neglect, plus logistical bottlenecks, lead to a nearly total breakdown in medical services and contributed to the storm’s outsized death toll, according to an independent study.

Johnson has been trying to bring attention to the storm by tweeting to celebrities like Leonardo DiCaprio. He said that communicating with friends and family over social media had turned into a full-time job.

“Growing up on Saipan and Tinian, you go through storms all the time,” Johnson said. “This was the first time I’ve heard family and friends say they feared for their lives.”

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Some displaced Puerto Ricans face homelessness after FEMA stops paying for hotels

by TheronHeidenrei Posted on September 21, 2018

This story was originally published by HuffPost and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.

It’s been a year since Hurricane Maria upended Jennyfer Ortiz’s life. The single mother fled Puerto Rico with her two children after their house in the mountain town of Orocovis lost power. They have been using a government-funded program to pay for a hotel in the Bronx, but that ended last week, forcing Ortiz, her 20-year-old son, and 14-year-old daughter into a homeless shelter.

“Maria changed our lives ― ruined our lives ― and left us with nothing. After 18 hours of horror, we woke up the next day and had lost everything,” Ortiz said. The 46-year-old hasn’t been able to work since they’ve been in New York City ― she has diabetes and hypertension, takes 14 medications a day, and uses a walker. Her son works full time at a grocery store but doesn’t make enough to pay for their own place.

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“We’re working. We’re not just waiting for the government to pay everything,” she said. “We’re trying to get ahead ― but it’s hard.”

Ortiz is one of 2,436 displaced Puerto Ricans on the U.S. mainland who, as of last month, were still in hotels paid for by the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Transitional Sheltering Assistance program.

After repeated extensions of the program in response to a lawsuit from the advocacy group Latino Justice, a federal judge ruled late last month to end it, forcing people still using the program to check out by September 14.

There were few good options for the people still in hotels: accept the government’s offer to pay for a plane ticket back to Puerto Rico or stay on the mainland and either secure their own place, stay with friends, or go to a shelter.

Many relying on FEMA’s housing funds are in precarious financial situations, said Peter Gudaitis, executive director of the nonprofit New York Disaster Interfaith Services, which has been helping Maria evacuees. Some have medical conditions, others have young kids and haven’t been able to afford daycare, which has prevented them from finding a job. Even evacuees who have found work struggle to save enough for a security deposit and first month’s rent.

“I don’t have anybody here. I don’t know what to do,” Myrna Reyes, another Maria evacuee, who suffers from diabetes, asthma, and high blood pressure, told HuffPost on Monday. “I’ve lost hope.”

After Reyes left the hotel that FEMA was paying for in Brooklyn on Friday, she ended up at a New York shelter. But she didn’t feel safe there. She saw people outside injecting drugs, she said, and her room was up four flights of stairs with no elevator, and she has limited mobility. She went to a friend’s home nearby, but that friend is moving to Florida next week, and Reyes will have to find somewhere else to go.

“They’ve left us practically in the street,” Reyes said. “They’re not treating us like the U.S. citizens that we are.”

Jennyfer’s daughter, 14, painting at the table in their room at the Bronx shelter. HuffPost.

When U.S. District Judge Timothy Hillman in Massachusetts ruled to end the FEMA hotel program earlier this month, he urged the government to find longer-term housing solutions for Maria evacuees. Latino Justice alleges that FEMA hasn’t.

FEMA told HuffPost on Tuesday that since Maria hit, it had assisted more than 7,000 families who had survived the storm with temporary hotel rooms in 40 states, costing more than $100 million.

“While FEMA and other forms of government assistance can never make a disaster survivor whole, the assistance is meant to help survivors begin their recovery process,” FEMA spokesperson Lenisha Smith wrote by email. “FEMA will continue to work with survivors in their long-term housing plans.”

Gudaitis, whose group has been helping Maria survivors in New York, said that of the 34 families it assisted who were still in hotels paid by FEMA as of last week, over two-thirds are now in the New York City shelter system. The rest are staying with family, and a “small number” have found their own place, he said.

In central Florida, Vamos4PR, a group assisting Maria evacuees there, said of about 100 families it knew of that were using the FEMA program, about half are now doubled up with friends, a “handful” returned to Puerto Rico, and a few had secured their own place. For the remaining, the group is now trying to assist with cash or by negotiating low hotel rates. They were told in recent months that there was no more capacity in the central Florida shelter system. Amneris Ortíz (no relation to Jennyfer) is a single mom who had been using the FEMA program to pay for a hotel on the outskirts of Orlando until Friday, along with her elderly mother and three children, ages 17, 10, and 8. A local church helped her pay a deposit and the first month’s rent to secure an apartment, but she doesn’t know how she’ll make rent next month.

She had been working at a Wawa gas station, but after her car broke down in July, she lost that job because it was too far to walk there. She then got a job closer to the hotel, working as a part-time teacher in a daycare, but the apartment they were able to line up is too far from that job. When HuffPost spoke to her Monday, she hadn’t been able to make it to work that day.

“I don’t know how I’m going to do it,” said Amneris Ortíz. Her kids have asthma, and her mother also has health issues. She has a college degree, but her current job pays only $9 an hour. “I’m trying to make enough to help my kids get by, but it’s really hard.”

Amneris Ortíz, her mother and three kids in their rental apartment.

Huffpost.

FEMA noted that one of the options it offered evacuees was free plane tickets to return to Puerto Rico. About 500 people have taken them up on that.

But for many of the most vulnerable families, returning to the island is not a viable option. Experts say Puerto Rico’s recovery process will take years. Repeated power outages still plague the island, and the health care system has not fully recovered.

In the wake of the storm, the schools Amneris Ortíz’s kids had attended had closed. In Florida, they’re getting a good education, at least. The principal at her son’s school even paid for his soccer cleats so he could join the team.

Jennyfer Ortiz says she’s undergoing treatment in New York for her medical conditions. She has knee surgery scheduled. Without power in the wake of Maria, she couldn’t keep her insulin refrigerated. The family would line up for hours for ice only to have half of it melt by the time they got home. She doesn’t see how she can return to an island where she has no place to stay ― their home that flooded was a rental ― and where there’s still a shortage of doctors.

“Without health, we have nothing,” Jennyfer Ortiz said. “They wanted to pay me a ticket to go back to an island where I lost everything. And to return where? To the street?”

FEMA also pointed to a rental assistance program it offers to provide two-months’ rent to survivors. The agency said it had provided it to 3,833 families who had previously stayed in FEMA-paid hotels stateside.

But Gudaitis said that, to his knowledge, none of the families his group serves in New York had been able to get rental assistance through that program. Vamos4PR echoed that in central Florida: None of the families it had assisted received additional longer-term housing assistance from FEMA.

“I honestly feel lost,” said Amneris Ortíz. She applied for rental assistance from FEMA a couple of weeks ago and sent further documentation last week. She has not heard anything so far.

“I’m getting panic attacks. I’m scared of ending up in the street with my kids,” she said, in tears. “Not being able to provide them with what they need ― they ask me for things and I can’t. I’m feeling very depressed. I don’t see the light at the end of the tunnel.”

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Some displaced Puerto Ricans face homelessness after FEMA stops paying for hotels

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Hurricane Florence’s catastrophic flooding is a sign of what’s to come

by Robbie4639 Posted on September 14, 2018

Since barreling into North Carolina on Friday morning with gusts of up to 112 mph, Hurricane Florence has already submerged homes, left nearly 700,000 households without power, and killed at least five people. More than 200 people were rescued in Bern, North Carolina, where a 10-foot storm surge flooded town.

The hurricane is massive: at 400 miles wide, its hurricane-force winds stretch across a 160-mile span, as ABC reported.

Yet the long-ranging, torrential winds are not the primary concern. It’s the sheer volume of water, in the form of tidal surges, rain, and anticipated flash flooding that make this Category 1 storm unusually dangerous. As meteorologist Janice Dean put it, “The legacy of the storm is not going to be the winds. It’s going to be the rain.”

Florence may drench the Carolinas with an unthinkable amount of water this weekend: 18 trillion gallons, or enough to fill the Chesapeake Bay. As of early Friday afternoon, 20 inches of rain had already fallen in parts of North Carolina — and some resolution models are predicting that by Sunday, the southeastern part of the state could see 50 inches of rain.

We’ve seen a slow-moving storm like Hurricane Florence before. Last year, Hurricane Harvey brought record-breaking rains to Southeast Texas. “Slower forward movement means a hurricane has more time to inundate a region with rain and storm surge,” an article in Vox explains. “It’s a longer time to blow dangerous, power line-snapping winds.”

The extreme level of rain from Florence and Harvey shouldn’t be chalked up to coincidence. Researchers at Stony Brook University and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory estimate that 50 percent of the rainfall from Hurricane Florence can be attributed to climate change.

Though Florence is a Category 1 storm, the risks from the staggering levels of water should not be underestimated. As an article in Time noted, “Hurricane Florence’s rapid downgrade from a Category 4 to a Category 1 underscores a potential public safety issue with the way hurricanes are measured and discussed.”

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Hurricane Florence’s catastrophic flooding is a sign of what’s to come

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How to trick Scott Pruitt into reading about environmentalism

by ArnoldoOGF Posted on July 3, 2018

Scott Pruitt runs a “factory of bad ideas.” All five feet and eight inches of him are fully submerged in a scandal bog of his own making, he’s cut staffing levels at the EPA to below Reagan-era levels, and the dude thinks climate change could help “humans flourish.”

Evidently, good samaritans have tried to help Pruitt become a better EPA administrator by sending him a few crucial works of environmental literature. In all, the rumor-ridden science-denier has received 11 books from concerned citizens, including: Pope Francis’ 2015 climate encyclical Laudato Si, Rachel Carson’s game-changing Silent Spring, Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth, and two copies of Global Warming for Dummies.

Alas, like that old dude who wouldn’t eat his green eggs and ham, Scott Pruitt won’t read his green literature. At least one of the people who sent in a book reported that it had been returned. But what would happen if Pruitt read up on climate change? And, more importantly, how could we trick him into getting a well-rounded education? Glad you asked! We have a few ideas.

Tactically slip a copy of Silent Spring into his tactical pants. What better book to carry around in the back pocket of your $1,500 sneaky pants than a seminal work about the chemicals silently killing America’s treasured wildlife?
Print excerpts from An Inconvenient Truth on the back of that Ritz-Carlton lotion he loves so much. Yeah, sending your aides all over Washington, D.C., to track down your favorite lotion is inconvenient, but Pruitt could deal with scaly elbows AND the planet’s dry patches at the same time. Talk about convenience!
Add Pope Francis’ Laudato Si to a Chick-Fil-A menu. Is that a new chicken nugget combo? No, Scotty! It’s “On Care for Our Common Home.” You might be trying to get your wife a job at the Home of the Original Chicken Sandwich, but we’re trying to save the planet: Home of the Original Human Race.
Two copies of Climate Change for Dummies? No problem. We’ll put one copy in the front-seat pocket of his seat on a first class flight, and we’ll use the other to tastefully wallpaper the bathroom in the energy lobbyist’s condo he was staying in.

Look, Sam-I-Am got that guy to eat green eggs and ham in the end — he even ate them in a boat and with a goat. We know Scott Pruitt won’t be reading books about climate change in the rain or on a train anytime soon. But if, as he’s lying on his old Trump hotel mattress one night, Little Scotty P does happen to pull a stack of climate change encyclicals out from under his pillow, we say to him:

“YOU DO NOT LIKE THEM. SO YOU SAY. TRY THEM! TRY THEM! AND YOU MAY.”

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How to trick Scott Pruitt into reading about environmentalism

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What does Puerto Rico’s utility privatization mean for solar?

by ArnoldXMLW Posted on June 29, 2018

It’s official: Puerto Rico’s beleaguered, bankrupt, and possibly corrupt power utility is being privatized. The U.S. territory was battered by Hurricane Maria nine months ago, and many homes remain without power amid a deeply flawed recovery effort.

Puerto Rico gets an enormous percentage of its electricity from fossil fuels. In 2016, the territory pulled just 2 percent of its power from renewables and a whopping 98 percent from fossil fuels. These fuels have to be imported, since Puerto Rico has no on-island sources for coal, petroleum, or natural gas, which raises their cost considerably.

It seems like the perfect opportunity to rebuild with cleaner sources of power. And after the storm, communities and companies stepped in with solar arrays and even a solar microgrid. So, what does privatization mean for the territory’s burgeoning installments of solar energy?

Selling the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority (PREPA) could be beneficial for solar, says Masaō Ashtine, who researches energy systems in the Caribbean. The change “will give more power to the industry to plan for renewable energy,” Ashtine says. Privatization could remove the red tape associated with public utility companies, he argues, and thus streamline the energy delivery process.

But others say that it has the potential to make things worse. PREPA’s workers’ union has protested that privatization will likely lead to higher energy prices with few improved services. Puerto Rican customers already pay some of the highest electricity rates in the country and experience an enormous number of service outages.

And, with more influence and control, the industry could leave some of the most promising community energy projects behind. “There’s no talk of community solar in the privatization bill,” says Frederico de Jesus, an affiliate of the advocacy coalition Power4PuertoRico. “They’re putting all their faith in the private companies.”

Arturo Massol-Deyá, the director of community organization at solar hub Casa Pueblo, is doubtful that the newly privatized utility will engage with community groups or with citizens more broadly. “Decisions by PREPA have been made with limited participation of the public, and I think with privatization that’s going to get worse,” he says.

The new bill also weakens the role of Puerto Rico’s Energy Commission, which for the past four years has served as a check on PREPA’s profligate spending and poor management. Without an independent regulatory board like the commission, de Jesus told me, Puerto Ricans face an uncertain future — both in terms of energy pricing and the future of renewables.

But advocates say they will continue to push forward with microgrids and renewables, with or without government support. Although Puerto Rico officials have proposed modest energy goals — 20 percent renewables by 2035 — recent projections from researchers at University of Puerto Rico Mayagüez say that the island has enough solar, wind, biomass, and hydropower potential to generate 200 percent of its needed electricity. And solar is on the front lines.

“Privatization is almost a false choice,” says de Jesus. “There can be a public monopoly or private monopoly. But a decentralized system with microgrids would do a lot to solve these problems.”

Massol-Deyá agrees. Casa Pueblo, he points out, has been running on solar since 1999, and an increasing number of businesses and other community centers are following suit. “Whether it’s in public or private hands, we need to move away from fossil fuel dependency,” he argues. “It’s a matter of changing our obsolete energy system.”

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What does Puerto Rico’s utility privatization mean for solar?

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James Hansen’s legacy: Scientists reflect on climate change in 1988, 2018, and 2048

by VirgilioHam3 Posted on June 22, 2018

Thirty years ago this week, NASA scientist James Hansen testified to Congress that the age of climate change had arrived.

The announcement shook the political establishment in 1988. George H. W. Bush, in the middle of a heated presidential campaign, vowed to use the “White House effect” to battle the “greenhouse effect.” Four years later, with then-President Bush in attendance, the United States became a founding member of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change — which still guides global climate action today.

Of course, it was not enough. Bush’s actions at the time were perceived as weakening the treaty — a missed opportunity. Since 1988, global carbon dioxide emissions have risen 68 percent. At the time of Hansen’s speech, fossil fuels provided about 79 percent of the world’s energy needs. Now, despite every wind turbine and solar panel that’s been installed since, it’s actually worse — 81 percent.

Hansen’s warning was prescient and his predictions were scarily accurate. Every county in every U.S. state has warmed significantly since then. Sea-level rise is accelerating, heavier rains are falling, countless species of plants and animals are struggling to adapt.

Thirty years after Hansen testified, the world still isn’t even close to solving the problem. In fact, for every year we wait, we are making the problem much, much harder.

On our current path, emissions will still be rising 30 years from now, and the world will have long ago left behind all reasonable chances of preventing the irreversible tipping points in the climate system that Hansen predicted.

If climate change was an urgent problem in 1988, it’s now an emergency.

Looking back on what’s happened in an interview with the Associated Press this week, Hansen expressed regret that his words weren’t “clear enough.” At times, Hansen and his colleagues have been down on themselves for not doing more, as if some perfectly worded sentence, or some arrestingly compelling chart would be enough to inspire a global mass-movement of action.

Thankfully, a new generation of climate scientists is starting to understand that perfect knowledge of the problem is no longer enough. Grounded in the missteps and failures of the past, scientists these days seem much more modest with their expectations for the next 30 years — but much more confident in their roles as citizens first, scientists second, just as Hansen has been.

This week, I asked 10 climate scientists to describe how Hansen’s work has affected them, and where they think the world’s response to climate change will go from here.

Ploy Achakulwisut, George Washington University
Suzana Camargo, Columbia University
Christine Chen, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Andrew Dessler, Texas A&M University
Peter Kalmus, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (and Grist 50 member)
Kate Marvel, NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies
Kimberly Nicholas, Lund University
Michael Oppenheimer, Princeton University
Eric Rignot, University of California-Irvine
Farhana Sultana, Syracuse University

Answers have been edited and condensed for clarity.

Q. What has James Hansen — the advocate — meant to you personally and professionally as you wrestle with how to respond to climate change?

Kalmus: Simply put, Hansen is a personal hero of mine. Not only was he a pioneer in recognizing the scientific reality of climate change, he also realized this knowledge carries an obligation to sound the alarm.

Achakulwisut: As a PhD student in climate science, I wasn’t taught or incentivized to engage in advocacy. But Hansen’s actions helped me realize that the climate crisis is far too serious and urgent for me to contribute solely by publishing peer-reviewed papers. He’s inspired me to challenge academic norms and engage in grassroots activism.

Chen: I was born in the early ‘90s, which means that James Hansen’s testimony happened literally a lifetime — my lifetime — ago. Sometimes it’s hard not to feel hopeless about the situation when a NASA scientist has been trying to convince the world to mobilize for longer than I’ve been alive.

Camargo: I admire his courage to be such a strong public advocate. Unfortunately, other scientists can be discouraged from doing this type of advocacy, given the level of public attack that they could suffer.

Marvel: I think it’s important to note that there are now many diverse voices speaking up about the implications of climate change, and that there’s no “right” way to engage the public with the science. I admire James Hansen immensely as a scientist, and I respect his advocacy choices. But he’s not the only role model out there.

Oppenheimer: Jim became a symbol for the movement to push governments to act on climate change. I disagree with him on some of his specific proposals – like supporting a revival of nuclear power, and sometimes I disagree with him on the science. But it’s good to see a scientist who can articulate his concerns to governments, to the media, and other people based on the facts. We need more scientists who do so.

Q. Looking back on how scientists responded to climate change over the past 30 years — what was the single biggest mistake, in your opinion?

Camargo: If scientists had worked on a communication strategy from the start, there could have been a better chance for support of climate change policies by the public. The media had a big role in our current issues as well — by trying to give equal weight to the small minorities of skeptics and the other 95 percent of scientists.

Oppenheimer: We never found a way to make the issue tangible to the average person. That’s changing now as the impacts become more apparent. But for this problem, action before impacts was necessary. Now we are stuck with the inevitability of some unpleasant climate changes as we play catch-up.

Achakulwisut: When climate change first emerged in public consciousness, it somehow got filed under “environmental issue” with far-off impacts. (Polar bears are still the face of climate change.) But its major culprit — fossil fuel combustion — also causes many immediate impacts to our health and well-being. I think we missed an opportunity to connect these dots.

Q. And the single biggest success?

Dessler: The only encouraging thing happening today is the staggering drop in the price of renewable energy. I consider this our main hope to avoid catastrophic climate change — prices drop so much that emissions decrease without government policies.

Rignot: The biggest success was the banning of [ozone-destroying] CFCs with the Montréal protocol in 1986. It was the single biggest event where science and policy came together to take action and literally save the world. Now it should serve as a reference in time, where the world demonstrated that environmental changes can be solved for the better, with no economic setback.

Nicholas: The climate leadership void at the federal level has inspired so many state, city, business, finance, university, neighborhood, household, faith, youth, civil society, and other leaders to step forward and find ways to cut their climate pollution. People want to create solutions that work for them and their communities. They want a future without relying on fossil fuels.

Sultana: A positive outcome is that today a number of young people understand and care about the impacts of climate change … with a greater focus on issues of equity and justice.

Q. Where do you hope we will be 30 years from now? Where do you think we will be realistically?

Marvel: I hope we will take this seriously. I like humans, and I think we’re capable of great things. We (mostly) fixed the ozone hole. We signed the Paris agreement. I have optimism that we can do more in the future. But I fear that we will respond to the adversity that climate change brings with hate, fear, and unreason.

Dessler: I don’t think a serious carbon tax or other policy will happen. The best-case I see is that renewables become cheap enough that the economy switches by itself. As for what should happen: As a citizen and father, I think we should get our asses in gear and start reducing emissions as fast as we can.

Kalmus: I hope that we reach a cultural tipping point, where people finally vote with climate urgency, and elect leaders who enact sensible policies like a revenue-neutral carbon fee. Emissions ramp down, innovation ramps up. This is also what I think will happen – it’s only a question of when, and how bad we’ll let things get.

Rignot: Most likely we will only take a slow course of action. We will experience the consequences of climate change in full swing in the later part of the century. At that point, we will have technologies in place to avoid the most disastrous consequences. But the world should take a much more aggressive course of action. We also need to bring morality into the debate. The most deprived people on the planet will suffer the most from climate change.

Oppenheimer: Human history suggest that we may eventually wise up and move to cut emissions deeply – but only after significant losses emerge in such a way that action can’t be avoided. We do this sort of thing repeatedly but never seem to learn. Sometimes the catastrophe actually happens (like World War I and World War II), but often it’s averted, just barely (like the Cuban missile crisis).

Governments shouldn’t move blindly toward the precipice, mindlessly continuing behavior that is bound to end badly for everyone. There’s still time if we get going immediately to reduce our looming losses and come out the other side more or less OK. There’s still time, just barely.

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James Hansen’s legacy: Scientists reflect on climate change in 1988, 2018, and 2048

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