College alumni associations could act as alma mater megaphones

Houston, we have a problem, in citizens' regard for science; but your local alumni association may have the power to solve it.  (Edited 03-30)

Seeking local classmate(s) -- "Open Climate 101" course from U. of Chicago for nonmajors, online

Folks, I'm still looking for someone to take this climate course with me - it's online, it's free, it has lectures and labs and quizzes, we can work at our own pace, and we get a certificate of completion when we finish.

KVMR Suggestion Box

What would you like to see KVMR offer?  Here's part of my wish list:

Question for Neil DeGrasse Tyson - what is science literacy?

Question submitted for Chris Mooney's Point of Inquiry interview with Neil DeGrasse Tyson:

Local biochar, biofuel, etc.?

Reinette's got a group and a plan; see this appeal on Yubanet for more.

Information resources still needed in this community:

1. An RSS feed for an events calendar that's not full of exercise classes and other "for the next N weeks" events; essentially, KVMR's Community Calendar, online.
2. A compilation of local projects seeking funding or other support.

(Edited 4pm Wed.)

Citizens Climate Lobby

This group looks good: Citizens Climate Lobby, "Political will for a livable world."  And I do like their "Ask Me How to Make $1,500 and Get Clean Air" tagline, which needs to be a bumper sticker.

"The fundamental problem of climate policy is on the political leadership and corporate power side", Rick Piltz of Climate Science Watch points out; so it's more effective to focus energy there, both on the "political will for climate action" part, and on the "reform politics to make it work better" part.

(Or at least that's my perspective du jour; stay tuned.)


(The other consideration is, what if you speak like Paul Graham but don't write like Paul Graham?  How do you weigh your strengths and preferences against the biggest needs in the "move America forward" ecosystem?)

Surveying the citizenry on climate change; or, Sierra Club members are the finest people

(Note to the literal: the title of this post is hyperbole, stemming from my astonished appreciation of the group's level of cooperation; to make it literal, it needs the word "among". Edits to intro and end, 3/21, and to this note, 3/22.)

On Friday night our community Sierra Club group met at Seaman's Lodge in Nevada City.  Many thanks to the speaker for an interesting and well attended presentation, and many thanks to the attendees for being astoundingly patient and cooperative when I burdened them with an inadequately tested two-page homegrown climate survey, aka climate literacy quiz.

Biofuel from wood chips gets closer

The "biofuel from wood chips" process gets a backer:  last September I had posted (h/t NYTimes) about a Pennsylvania-based company with a new process involving using supercritical water to turn cellulose into biofuel. A commenter was dubious, but it turns out that "the largest diversified chemical company in the world" (link) is not: back in January, BASF announced it was investing $30 million into the company, Renmatix.   (Added 3/18: Cheap sugars are the new oil, says the CEO of a competitor. (link))

Cartoon and heartbeat

Working with Photoshop.  (Blogpost edited Thurs eve: added RealClimate commentary on consequences.)

Some very short climate-related animations

Here's a compilation of short animations on climate science and climate change:

• Richard Alley's Milankovich dance, explaining the ice ages, CO2 and global warming (5 min.)
• 130 years of historical global temperature change (1880-2011, NASA); 26 seconds 
• Arctic sea ice retreat, 1980-2007, about 30 seconds 
• “Time history of atmospheric CO2?;  shows the earth “breathing” over 800 thousand years; about 3 minutes 
• Trend and Variation; “Human walking an active dog on leash” metaphor for signal vs. noise in climate change (“We’re looking at the dog, but we should be concentrating on the owner…”); about 1 minute
• It’s All About Carbon; a series of roughly 3-minute cartoon shorts from PBS, explaining greenhouse gas science.  (But as I recall, the "personal action" ending could have used refurbishing: it needs the POW pledge.)

In Joe Romm's footsteps, my biggest mistake

Edited 2012-03-09,14.
A week ago Joe Romm of ClimateProgress ran a blogpost titled Leap Day Special: My Biggest [blogging] Mistakes. Reassessments like this are good policy, so here's mine, singularplural.