Emissions of the global warming gas methane are widely tracked through satellite sensors, despite some unexpected bumps in the data-gathering effort. But a big challenge is how to interpret and use the resulting insights in your coverage. The latest Reporter’s Toolbox points out several important methane datasets and offers useful insights into how to turn them into stories.
The population of Siberian tigers, the second-largest subspecies in the world, took a turn for the worse after the fall of the Soviet Union. But an international team of biologists in remote Russia has been working to try to save the big cats. “Tigers Between Empires” traces that effort, in a new BookShelf review from contributing editor Jennifer Weeks.
"Blue Hill is the nation’s oldest continually operating weather observatory, according to executive director Alex Evans. Since 1885, staff and volunteers have relied on many of the same instruments, including mercury and alcohol thermometers, hygrometers that use human hair to measure moisture in the air, and that glass sphere on the roof tracking the hours of bright sunshine."
"For decades, a small EPA program assessed toxic chemicals. In an internal memo obtained by ProPublica, a top Trump appointee sharply criticized the program’s work and directed agency offices to review regulations that relied on its assessments."
"As congressional Republicans accuse climate scholars and lawyers of colluding to influence the judiciary, a symposium hosted by a center funded by the fossil fuel industry educates judges about free-market views of climate science."
"Bayer promised to “provide a small thanks” to Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin for removing warnings about Roundup, the company’s herbicide that has been the subject of tens of thousands of cancer lawsuits, according to internal emails revealed at a Congressional hearing Tuesday."
"The agency’s prestigious research office spent decades doing scientific work insulated from political pressure. Now it’s being dismantled."
"U.S. President Donald Trump yesterday fired all 24 members of the National Science Board (NSB), the body that oversees the National Science Foundation (NSF). Many science advocates see it as the latest step by his administration to erode—some would say destroy—the independence of the 76-year-old research agency."
"Sweeping changes underway at the federal agency tasked with protecting the nation’s forests could result in the loss of more than a century of critical historical documents, conservationists warn."
"Republican allies of the oil and gas industry question the objectivity of an independent report from the nation’s top science advisers on the harms of human-caused climate change."
