Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, August 19, 2024

https://thebulletin.org

MICHAEL E. MANN

The GOP threatens to weaponize a potential second Trump term against any and all domestic climate action. But what happens in the United States doesn’t stay in the United States.

Michael E. Mann, climate expert and director of the Center for Science, Sustainability and the Media at The University of Pennsylvania, writes on “two deceptively similar-sounding projects known as the fact-based ‘Agenda 2030’ [a UN plan to fight climate change] and the conspiracy-rife ‘Project 2025,’” which would “put an end to US climate action at this critical moment.” Read more.

FROM OUR ARCHIVES
‘We must do more’: A look at Kamala Harris’ climate record

Whether or not Project 2025 will be enforced isn’t the only climate action variable presented by the United States’ elections. What is Kamala Harris’ climate record? Read more.

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IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
Interview: Science historian Naomi Oreskes schools the Supreme Court on climate change

Even when elections and legislation spur on climate action, the Judicial Branch can bring it to a halt.

When the Clean Air Act was passed in 1970, scientists and lawmakers already knew that carbon dioxide was warming the planet, and that regulating emissions could have wide-ranging impacts. However, the Supreme Court made a 2022 ruling that claimed otherwise. Read more.

FROM OUR ARCHIVES
2024 Doomsday Clock Statement on Climate Change

What is the global state of climate change? In January, the Bulletin’s Science and Security Board released their Doomsday Clock announcement that we remain at 90 seconds to midnight.

In the accompanying climate spotlight, the Board wrote on the “massive wildfires, large-scale flooding, and prolonged heat waves” that impact the world today. Read more.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“By now the physics and the science have been done. What you need is good engineering [...] And [South Korea’s] really good in all aspects of engineering all things nuclear.”
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— Siegfried Hecker, former Director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory and chair of the Bulletin’s Board of Sponsors, “What if South Korea got a nuclear bomb?” The Economist