03 May Digest 5/3: Dallas, Earth Day, Tweets that Matter, and Paul Revere

My blogs digest this month: Dallas (land of dangers?), Earth Day (wasn't that like two weeks ago?), Tweets that Matter (as in Twitter), and The Paul Revere of Ecology (hails from Texas) — collectively indicate a pretty dark assessment of today's environmental situation. But perhaps if we know more about the scale of the problems humans face we'll make smarter purchasing and political decisions…

Dallas
DTX has registered 75 tornados since 1953, but last month's "doozy" was truly remarkable. Certainly the largest and most expensive the region has ever seen, but also the weirdest. This blog traces some of Dallas' tornado history and looks at how the most recent event fits climate science projections. Read my full post here.

Earth Day
Austin really did itself proud this Earth Day. Great events, great fun, and an incredible "Beyond Coal" photo. But in 2007 we were told by the head of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that 2010 was the last stop for mitigating global climate change. Since we've missed that date, what now? Read my full post here.

Tweets that Matter
What do: nerdy taxonomists, a $13 Billion gas leak, Texas's water pollution, North Dakota's world oil dominance, an increase in US earthquakes, and BP's Gulf of Mexico aftershocks all have in common? … These little tweets remind us of huge stories our mainstream media keeps forgetting to cover. Read my full post here.

The Paul Revere of Ecology
Speaking of tweets that matter, Walter Cronkite got serious about protecting the environment after reading Rachel Carson's Silent Spring. He spent a good deal of the 70's educating the public about environmental concerns, including global warming, and helping to launch the first Earth Day from his post at the CBS Evening News. How are we doing today, 40+ years later? Read my full post here.

See previous digest here.

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Tweet of the Week
Are we doing anything at a scale the planet will "notice"? http://www.gwagner.com/planet/

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