By Glynn Wilson –

WASHINGTON, D.C. – What a difference a respect for science makes.

After four years of being gutted and corrupted by the influence of polluting industry insiders with their heads all stuck up the hole in Donald Trump’s cult of personality backside, the Environmental Protection Agency is back in the Biden administration.

“For years, President Donald Trump and his deputies played down the impact of greenhouse gas emissions from burning fossil fuels,” as The Washington Post first reported it, and not just delaying the release of an EPA report detailing climate-related damage, but totally squashing it. “But on Wednesday, the EPA released a detailed and disturbing account of the startling changes that Earth’s warming had on parts of the United States during Trump’s presidency.”

The summary of the report, published on the federal regulatory agency’s website, begins with five words never uttered for four years by any officials in the Trump administration, since they were banned by the president and commander in chief himself.

“The Earth’s climate is changing.”

“Temperatures are rising, snow and rainfall patterns are shifting, and more extreme climate events – like heavy rainstorms and record high temperatures – are already happening,” the agency leads off its report. “Many of these observed changes are linked to the rising levels of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases in our atmosphere, caused by human activities.”

Boom! Facts and science are back in the United States government again, while the Republican Party implodes in on itself by ousting Rep. Lynne Cheney of Wyoming as Chair of the House Republican Conference on a cowardly voice vote, a move that threatened to splinter the party into two. Threats are already being made about starting a new party to move away from the negative and anti-democratic influence of Trump.

“EPA partners with more than 50 data contributors from various government agencies, academic institutions, and other organizations to compile a key set of indicators related to the causes and effects of climate change,” the report says. “These indicators also provide important input to the National Climate Assessment and other efforts to understand and track the science and impacts of climate change.”

We are back on the right track, and the damage is all around us for anyone with an eye to see. It’s not clear simply putting out good information will be enough to save us, but it’s certainly a first key step.

EPA Administrator Michael Regan indicated he wants to make clear to the entire country the dangers of rising temperatures.

“We want to reach people in every corner of this country because there is no small town, big city or rural community that’s unaffected by the climate crisis,” Regan told reporters Wednesday. “Americans are seeing and feeling the impacts up close with increasing regularity.”

According to the report, heat trapping greenhouse gas emissions continue to climb even as some countries and industries begin to make changes to try to slow the trend.

“Greenhouse gases from human activities are the most significant driver of observed climate change since the mid-20th century,” the report concludes authoritatively. “The indicators … characterize emissions of the major greenhouse gases resulting from human activities, the concentrations of these gases in the atmosphere, and how emissions and concentrations have changed over time.”

Greenhouse Gases

“Rising global average temperature is associated with widespread changes in weather patterns,” the report indicates. “Scientific studies indicate that extreme weather events such as heat waves and large storms are likely to become more frequent or more intense with human-induced climate change.”

The EPA report summarizes the observed changes in temperature, precipitation, storms, floods and droughts.

Weather and Climate

“As greenhouse gases trap more energy from the sun, the oceans are absorbing more heat, resulting in an increase in sea surface temperatures and rising sea level,” the report goes on. “Changes in ocean temperatures and currents brought about by climate change will lead to alterations in climate patterns around the world.”

For example, warmer waters may promote the development of stronger storms in the tropics, which can cause property damage and loss of life. The impacts associated with sea level rise and stronger storm surges are especially relevant to the future of coastal communities.

Oceans

“Reduced snowfall and less snow cover on the ground could diminish the beneficial insulating effects of snow for vegetation and wildlife, while also affecting water supplies, transportation, cultural practices, travel, and recreation for millions of people,” the report says. “For communities in Arctic regions, reduced sea ice could increase coastal erosion and exposure to storms, threatening homes and property, while thawing ground could damage roads and buildings and accelerate erosion.”

Such changing climate conditions can have worldwide implications because snow and ice influence air temperatures, sea level, ocean currents and storm patterns.

Snow and Ice

“Changes in the Earth’s climate can affect public health, agriculture, water supplies, energy production and use, land use and development, and recreation,” the report concludes. “The nature and extent of these effects … will vary regionally and over time.”

The EPA looks at the ways climate change is affecting human health and society, including changes in Lyme disease, West Nile virus, ragweed pollen season, heat- and cold-related deaths and hospitalizations, heating and cooling needs, and the agricultural growing season across the country.

Health and Society

“Changes in the Earth’s climate can affect ecosystems by altering the water cycle, habitats, animal behavior — such as nesting and migration patterns — and the timing of natural processes such as flower blooms. Changes that disrupt the functioning of ecosystems may increase the risk of harm or even extinction for some species,” the report says. “While wildfires occur naturally, more frequent and more intense fires can significantly disrupt ecosystems, damage property, put people and communities at risk, and create air pollution problems even far away from the source.”

While plants and animals have adapted to environmental change for millions of years, the climate changes being experienced now could require adaptation on larger and faster scales than current species have successfully achieved in the past, thus increasing the risk of extinction or severe disruption for many species.

Ecosystems

The report highlights a few key troubling trends.

Ocean heat reached its highest level in recorded history in 2020, fueling marine heat waves and coral bleaching. Arctic sea ice has continued to melt at an unprecedented rate, and wildfire and pollen seasons are starting earlier and lasting longer.

“The newly compiled data illustrate the chasm between the current administration and Trump’s when it comes to climate policy,” The Post reports in its version of the story. “President Biden has identified cutting greenhouse gas emissions linked to rising global temperatures as one of his top priorities, insisting that a shift away from fossil fuels and to cleaner forms of energy also could create needed U.S. jobs.”

The Biden administration relaunched a spare version of the EPA’s website on climate change in March, a site which went dark under Trump’s first EPA administrator, Scott Pruitt.

In a prime example of how corrupt the Trump administration was, by July 2018, Pruitt was under at least 14 separate federal investigations by the Government Accountability Office, the EPA inspector general, the White House Office of Management and Budget, the U.S. Office of Special Counsel, and two House committees over his spending habits, conflicts of interest, extreme secrecy and management practices. Pruitt made frequent use of first-class travel as well as frequent charter and military flights. As EPA administrator, Pruitt leased a condo in Washington, D.C., at a deeply discounted rate from a lobbyist whose clients were regulated by the EPA.

Pruitt further caused ethics concerns by circumventing the White House and using a narrow provision of the Safe Drinking Water Act to autonomously give raises to his two closest aides of approximately $28,000 and $57,000 each, which were substantially higher than salaries paid to those in similar positions in the Obama administration, and which allowed both to avoid signing conflicts of interest pledges. Amid a steady succession of revelations of misconduct, a growing chorus of conservatives had begun suggesting that Pruitt should resign. On July 5, 2018, Pruitt announced he would resign from office on July 9, leaving Andrew R. Wheeler as the acting head of the agency

Kristina Dahl, a senior climate scientist at the Union of Concerned Scientists quoted by The Post, noted that the report draws on data published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

“This site does a great job of compiling a lot of indicators from a lot of different sources,” she said. “So it’s a really important clearinghouse of this kind of information.”

Now the people in the U.S. have the tools again to begin tackling this most important of problems facing the future of humanity on planet Earth. Will it be enough to save us front extinction? We will see.