Climate Change/Mass Extinction Megathread

[Grey Fox]

What's Plug In Solar? That sounds great!

[crazy canuck]

The snow pack is so low that the prohibition on lawn watering goes into effect today.

[Crazy_Ivan80]

What's Plug In Solar? That sounds great!

A solar panel that you plug in via the regular plug.
A buddy of mine has those. Really nifty

[Syt]

https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/trump-administration-cites-national-security-halt-us-wind-farm-projects-ft-2026-05-03/

Trump administration cites national security to halt US wind farm projects, FT reports

May 3 (Reuters) - President Donald Trump's administration has brought U.S. onshore wind development to a halt, citing national security concerns, ‌the Financial Times reported on Sunday.

Approvals for about 165 onshore wind projects on private lands are being held up by the Pentagon, FT said, citing the American Clean Power Association and people close to the matter.

The affected projects ⁠include wind farms that were awaiting final sign-off, others in the middle of negotiations and some that typically would not require oversight by the Pentagon, the FT said.

Reuters could not immediately verify the report.

The American Clean Power Association and Pentagon did not immediately respond to requests for comment by Reuters.

Since August 2025, wind developers have faced a mix of setbacks, including a ‌lack ⁠of expected communication from the Pentagon, canceled meetings with no chance to reschedule, and being told that applications are no longer being processed, FT reported, citing people with knowledge of the situation.

Letters sent to ⁠developers in early April said the Pentagon was reviewing its processes for evaluating the impact of energy projects on national security, according to ⁠the newspaper.

The Trump administration has previously faced lawsuits after pausing wind projects after it cited new classified national security risks ⁠from radar interference.

Wind developers have faced repeated disruptions under Trump, who says wind turbines are ugly, expensive and inefficient.

Everything is national security now.

[Valmy]

Right as oil and gas prices are spiking and data centers are raising loads, let's reduce energy production. Brilliant.

[Zanza]

The reactionary German conservatives want to remove a law that would basically have forced all new installations for heating to be heat pumps or similar fossil free solutions.

But as our energy minister used to work as a gas lobbyists before, she wants to keep Germany dependent on fossil fuels. After sabotaging renewables, phasing out nuclear or sabotaging fibre networks it's just another fail by them.

This time supported by the Social Democrats (who approved the previous law in the last government). Their track record also has Nordstream or selling off our power grid.

Depressing to see when there are other better solutions in our neighbouring countries.

[Valmy]

The reactionary German conservatives want to remove a law that would basically have forced all new installations for heating to be heat pumps or similar fossil free solutions.

But as our energy minister used to work as a gas lobbyists before, she wants to keep Germany dependent on fossil fuels. After sabotaging renewables, phasing out nuclear or sabotaging fibre networks it's just another fail by them.

This time supported by the Social Democrats (who approved the previous law in the last government). Their track record also has Nordstream or selling off our power grid.

Depressing to see when there are other better solutions in our neighbouring countries.

Are they aware that Germany has no fossil fuel resources? Do they think eventually they will be able to just siphon natural gas out of the air?

[Zanza]

The energy minister wants to start fracking in Germany. Then we could produce some das ourselves.

And they always pretend that they can somehow make much more biofuels at commercially viable prices.

[Baron von Schtinkenbutt]

Everything is national security now.

Everything has been national/"homeland" security for 25 years.

[Tonitrus]

One of my acts as fantasy POTUS would be to purge the term "homeland" from the government lexicon.

[Valmy]

One of my acts as fantasy POTUS would be to purge the term "homeland" from the government lexicon.

Yeah that came out of nowhere after 9/11. Freaking hate that term.

[Syt]

One of my acts as fantasy POTUS would be to purge the term "homeland" from the government lexicon.

I mean, German removed quite a few previously inoccuous words from its generally accepted vocabulary after 1945. E.g. "völkisch" which was a normal word in the sense of "of the common people" or "folk", as in folk tales, has become completely poisoned.

[The Brain]

One of my acts as fantasy POTUS would be to purge the term "homeland" from the government lexicon.

I mean, German removed quite a few previously inoccuous words from its generally accepted vocabulary after 1945. E.g. "völkisch" which was a normal word in the sense of "of the common people" or "folk", as in folk tales, has become completely poisoned.

What about Beobachter?

[Syt]

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/01/climate/ocean-observatories-initiative.html

Trump Administration to Dismantle Ocean Monitoring System
The $368 million network of instruments collecting data in both the Atlantic and Pacific has been critical to climate and ocean research.

network. The Trump administration repeatedly tried to shutter it, proposing to cut its funding by 80 percent in both 2025 and again in 2026. Congress pushed back, restoring the money.

To try to reduce costs, managers turned off some of the instruments and collected less data, according to a December 2025 presentation about the observatories at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union, a nonprofit organization of scientists.

Still, the science foundation moved ahead to decommission the observatory network.

Hilary Palevsky, professor of earth and environmental sciences at Boston College, has been using data from the Irminger instruments for the past decade to better understand how the ocean absorbs carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

Scientists have benefited from downloading data from remote ocean instruments, rather than making difficult, dangerous and expensive trips to sea each year. Pulling up the instruments without a plan to store them or to continue collecting data "is very hasty," she said.

"One of the real tragedies here is that collecting data effectively at this site was a huge engineering challenge, and it's not the kind of thing where you can just leave your notes for the next person who comes in," Dr. Palevsky said. "There's a lot of expertise that has the potential to be lost."

The $48 million annual budget for the observation network was small compared with the value of the data it collected for understanding the oceans and the climate, Dr. McLean said.

The observation station off Cape Hatteras, N.C., collected data about coastal currents that influence the weather and commercial fisheries along the U.S. East Coast.

Mike Muglia, professor of coastal studies at East Carolina University, used the data to understand waves, currents and sea life for a marine renewable energy test site in Nags Head, N.C., that was funded by the Energy Department.

Moorings that stretch west off the coast of Newport, Ore., and Grays Harbor, Wash., captured temperature, acidity, and oxygen content data that is key to predicting climate-related environmental changes as well as the health of the region's commercial fishing industry. Another station is anchored 620 miles offshore in the central Gulf of Alaska.

[crazy canuck]

Don't look up