James Hansen, Uncensored

Terry Gross interviewed NASA climate scientist James Hansen and author Mark Bowen about Bowen's new book Censoring Science: Inside the Political Attack on Dr. James Hansen and the Truth of Global Warming. Listen to the interview here.

Read the intro to the program below:

James Hansen, who's widely described as being NASA's leading climate scientists; he's been studying the topic for more than three decades, and he began speaking publicly about the threat of global warming almost 20 years ago.
Just over a year ago, he went public with a charge that made headlines around the world: The Bush administration, Hansen said, had been trying to silence his warnings about the urgency of the need to address global warming.
Now, writer and scientist Mark Bowen has literally written the book on the affair. It's called Censoring Science: Inside the Political Attack on Dr. James Hansen and the Truth of Global Warming.

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Clean Water Setback

In a blow to the Clean Water Act, the EPA has changed the requirements for protection of a body of water, according to Time:

The Bush administration made it harder Tuesday for non-permanent streams and nearby wetlands to be protected under the federal Clean Water Act.
The new guidance issued by the Environmental Protection Agency and the Army Corps of Engineers requires that for such waters to be protected there must be a "significant nexus" shown between the intermittent stream or wetland and a traditional waterway.
And the guidance says a determination will be made on a case-by-case basis, analyzing flow and other issues. Environmentalist argued that would negate the broader regional importance of many such waterways in the aggregate on water bodies downstream.
Assistant EPA Administrator Benjamin Grumbles said the new guidance to regional offices and enforcement officials "sends a clear signal we'll use our regulatory tools" to meet President Bush's promise of no net loss of wetlands.
He said it "maintains ... the Bush administration's strong commitment to wetlands conservation."
Environmentalists said the new rules will put in jeopardy many of the intermittent streams and headwaters that now fall under the Clean Water Act, and result in less protection of wetlands.
"This guidance adds unnecessary and unintended hurdles for agencies and citizens trying to protect our wasters," said Jan Goldman-Carter, an attorney for the National Wildlife Federation, and she called it a "retreat from protecting many important headwaters streams and wetlands."

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Bush Orders New Greenhouse Gas Limits

According to a story in the Environment News Service,

After resisting the regulation of greenhouse gases since he took office in 2001, President George W. Bush today signed an Executive Order directing four federal agencies to develop regulations limiting greenhouse gas emissions from new mobile sources. Greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide emitted by the combustion of fossil fuels, contribute to global climate change.
The President directed the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, the Department of Transportation, the Department of Energy, and the Department of Agriculture to work together "to protect the environment with respect to greenhouse gas emissions from motor vehicles, nonroad vehicles, and nonroad engines, in a manner consistent with sound science, analysis of benefits and costs, public safety, and economic growth," the Executive Order states.

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Bush, States Split on Emissions

According to a story in the New York Times, President Bush is satisfied with the progress his administration has made on reducing greenhouse gas emissions, while several states have opted to enact their own, stricter standards.

A day after the Supreme Court ruled that the federal government had the authority to regulate heat-trapping gases, President Bush said he thought that the measures he had taken so far were sufficient.

But the court’s ruling was being welcomed by Congress and the states, which are already using the decision to speed their own efforts to regulate the gases that contribute to global climate change. As a result, Congress and state legislatures are almost certain to be the arenas for far-reaching and bruising lobbying battles.

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Religious Leaders Urge Climate Action

In this editorial in Oregon's Statesman Journal, Jenny Holmes and Gary Langenwalter urge Congress and the White House to act on Climate Change.

Across the religious spectrum, religious leaders are calling for national action to address global warming. Faith-based organizations and church councils in places that are most affected by global warming, particularly the nations of Africa and the Pacific Islands, have compelled America’s faith community, including Ecumenical Ministries of Oregon, to address global warming.

It is time for the Bush Administration and Congress to take responsible action to address global warming. We need energy policies that guarantee emissions will decrease. This can be done by instituting mandatory caps on global warming pollution, promoting renewable energy and energy efficiency and instituting higher fuel economy standards. It is time to listen to the scientists and to those most affected by global warming. To love our neighbors, both local and global, it is imperative.
Meanwhile, the World Council of Churches has endorsed the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Report, according to The Christian Post. The Rev. Dr. Martin Robra, WCC program executive for Justice Peace & Creation, said the debate on whether global warming is caused by human activities or not must now shift from denial and delays to responsibility and remedies.
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Chirac to Bush: Sign Kyoto or Else!

French President Chirac has reportedly warned US President Bush that the US must sign on to the Kyoto Protocol and the successor agreement (Kyoto expires in 2012), or face paying carbon taxes, according to the International Herald Tribune.

Chirac repeated his call for the creation of a global environment organization that would centralize about 500 international agreements on the environment and 18 international bodies and departments whose remit is environmental.

"The system is not efficient; it's a fragmented system," Chirac said. "We must have a UNOE — a UN organization for the environment — which would in some sense be the environmental conscience of the world and which would be capable of coordinated action."

He said such an organization would have the power to impose sanctions on member states and could be modeled on the World Health Organization.

Chirac spoke as scientists from around the world gathered in Paris to discuss an authoritative international report on climate change, portions of which will be released on Friday.

Critics of Chirac say that despite his environmental rhetoric, his record as president is far from green. Chirac angered environmentalists when he conducted nuclear tests in a Pacific atoll within months of coming into office in 1995. He has been a loyal ally of French farmers and their highly polluting sector, blocking several proposed Europewide reforms. Most recently, Brussels rejected a French national plan for allocating carbon-emission credits to businesses for being too generous.

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White House: (Mis)leaders on Climate Change

According to an article in today's Chicago Tribune, US Congressional Representative Henry Waxman (D, Calif.) accused the Bush Administration of trying to "mislead the public by injecting doubt into the science of global warming."
In an article in today's New York Times, scientists testifying at a US Congressional hearing claimed that the results of their research about climate had been distorted or watered down.

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