
If you're a just a casual newsreader who keeps eyes peeled for news about climate change, it can be depressing. If you contemplate in any depth humanity's woeful response to the gathering crisis, it can make depressing seem like a sunny skip along the summery seashore. That's no fun, no way, not even with serotonin re-uptake inhibitors to blunt the blow. So, let's go a'lookin' for some good news about climate change -- even if we have to dig through the bad news to find it.
Perusing The New York Times over the last few days...oh dear, wildfires are going wild in California again. The Getty Museum is under fiery siege, an evacuated Lebron James and family roam the Santa Monica hellscape seeking lodging (wondering why he ever left Cleveland, twice) and the good news is...well, climate change is actually cited in the NYT article as a contributing reason for the conflagrations. A second piece goes into detail about winds and soil dryness. That's progress, right?
Okay, here's an interesting article about how several populated coastal cities will be inundated by global sea level rise by 2050. It's three times worse than previously believed, according to a study appearing in Climate Communications. So Mumbai, goodbye. That's 19 million people displaced. Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam, Alexandria in Egypt -- gone, too. We're not even talking about little cities washed away, like Miami and New Orleans. The really populated ones lead the underwater erasure list -- Shanghai, Bangkok, Basra in Iran. At least 150 million people "are now living on land that will be below the high-tide line by mid-century," according to the article. And the good news portion of this news nugget is...well, you've been warned! Sell high, move inland. And for those who are just scratching out a living -- most residents of most cities -- stock up on flotation devices. Sporty new models are available for the kids.
Perusing The New York Times over the last few days...oh dear, wildfires are going wild in California again. The Getty Museum is under fiery siege, an evacuated Lebron James and family roam the Santa Monica hellscape seeking lodging (wondering why he ever left Cleveland, twice) and the good news is...well, climate change is actually cited in the NYT article as a contributing reason for the conflagrations. A second piece goes into detail about winds and soil dryness. That's progress, right?
Okay, here's an interesting article about how several populated coastal cities will be inundated by global sea level rise by 2050. It's three times worse than previously believed, according to a study appearing in Climate Communications. So Mumbai, goodbye. That's 19 million people displaced. Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam, Alexandria in Egypt -- gone, too. We're not even talking about little cities washed away, like Miami and New Orleans. The really populated ones lead the underwater erasure list -- Shanghai, Bangkok, Basra in Iran. At least 150 million people "are now living on land that will be below the high-tide line by mid-century," according to the article. And the good news portion of this news nugget is...well, you've been warned! Sell high, move inland. And for those who are just scratching out a living -- most residents of most cities -- stock up on flotation devices. Sporty new models are available for the kids.

Sorry about the sarcasm. All righty, here's something uplifting: Rex Tillerson, former CEO of Exxon Mobil and Secretary of State/Whipping Boy #7 for President Trump, is testifying in a lawsuit against his former company. The charge: conspiring to hide the facts about climate change from shareholders and the public. Good news: the prospect of justice is always good news. Yes, it's about past misdeeds, what's done is done -- but on the other hand maybe a truly massive fine could induce Exxon Mobil to stop hunting for new sources of oil and pour money into renewable energy...and we wake up from our dreamy dream. We keep scanning...GM and Toyota side with Trump in fight to get California to lower its vehicle emission standards. Good news: Ford and Honda say screw you!
I'm stretching, I know. So let's be more direct, let's go to the Google! Siri, or Lexi, or Jeeves (remember him?), give me some honking good news about climate change. The first website up is Al Gore's Climate Reality Project. They've got a slick video praising humanity's response to climate change and it's kind of uplifting until you notice it was made five years ago, before President Trump started to actively dismantle U.S. contributions to the effort.
Okay, next up: goodnewsnetwork.org. Here we learn that Scotland is planting million of trees, someone developed a seaweed drink for cattle that reduces their methane emissions (burping, farting) by 99 percent, and a member of Pink Floyd has auctioned his guitar collection, raising $21 million for climate change. Okay that's more like it. Little stuff, granted, but good. (All in all another brick in the wall...) And off we go to the third curated item, dailyclimate.org/good-news/, for hopeful stories about rooftop meadows, a cleaner marine bio-fuel and Tesla's new solar roof that may actually work this time.
Excellent! Feels good, huh? Now go take a walk but first make sure you don't read this, unless you want to get back on that bummery bad-news train. (Hint: the climate techno-fix that the rich guys want to employ, and make us poor schmucks pay for, will probably just make things worse.)
I'm stretching, I know. So let's be more direct, let's go to the Google! Siri, or Lexi, or Jeeves (remember him?), give me some honking good news about climate change. The first website up is Al Gore's Climate Reality Project. They've got a slick video praising humanity's response to climate change and it's kind of uplifting until you notice it was made five years ago, before President Trump started to actively dismantle U.S. contributions to the effort.
Okay, next up: goodnewsnetwork.org. Here we learn that Scotland is planting million of trees, someone developed a seaweed drink for cattle that reduces their methane emissions (burping, farting) by 99 percent, and a member of Pink Floyd has auctioned his guitar collection, raising $21 million for climate change. Okay that's more like it. Little stuff, granted, but good. (All in all another brick in the wall...) And off we go to the third curated item, dailyclimate.org/good-news/, for hopeful stories about rooftop meadows, a cleaner marine bio-fuel and Tesla's new solar roof that may actually work this time.
Excellent! Feels good, huh? Now go take a walk but first make sure you don't read this, unless you want to get back on that bummery bad-news train. (Hint: the climate techno-fix that the rich guys want to employ, and make us poor schmucks pay for, will probably just make things worse.)