Climate - The Handbuilt City

ohio smog sunset from smoke from wildfires

Climate Environment

Hazy Air, Coughing? Don’t Worry. That’s Just The Latest Apocalypse!

May 23, 2023May 23, 2023 Nat M. Zorach 0 Comments air pollution, air quality, albedo, alberta, aqi, carbon dioxide, climate, climate change, danielle smith, environment, forest fires, fort mcmurray, global dimming, greta thunberg, indigenous and first nations, indigenous peoples, outdoor air quality, particulate, particulate emissions, public health, rachel notley, respiratory illness, the texas of canada, think global act local, wildfires

Tuesday morning coffee thoughts. On our long drive back to M*ch*g*n from Pennsylvania/Delaware yesterday, I started reading snippets on the

michigan lieutenant governor garlin gilchrist

Energy Efficiency Climate Energy Utilities

MI Healthy Climate Conference: Is It A New Day In Michigan?

April 17, 2023April 16, 2023 Nat M. Zorach 0 Comments apparatus room, aubrey agee, cannondale, cannondale ebikes, climate, foundation hotel, garlin gilchrist, governor gretchen whitmer, ibew, judd herzer, Katherine Peretick, lieutenant governor, metropolis bikes, MI Healthy Climate, mi healthy climate initiative, mi healthy climate plan, MPSC, Nat Zorach, seel detroit

I wrapped up a couple of days at the MI Healthy Climate conference. We talked about decarbonization, public health, and innovation. We even got to see some eBikes!

histogram methane emissions

Policy Climate Energy Environment

Why Regulating Methane, Not CO2, Is Key to Climate Policy

April 15, 2023April 15, 2023 Nat M. Zorach 0 Comments agriculture, anthropogenic methane, anthropogenic methane emissions, carbon, carbon dioxide, carbon dioxide emissions, carbon footprint, carbon sequestration, cars, ch4, climate, climate change, climate crisis, climate policy, cows, energy waste reduction, epa, gwp, landfills, methane, methane emissions, methane gas, waste management, wetland carbon sequestration, wetland restoration, wetlands

Carbon dioxide is often the bad guy in the climate change debate. But methane– mostly from anthropogenic sources- is a far more potent greenhouse gas. And, unlike carbon dioxide, methane emissions are virtually all a product of waste (rather than the product of combustion from, say, burning a gas like methane). Reduce waste = reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Climate Michigan Energy Infrastructure Utilities

The Anatomy of a Power Outage in Michigan

March 5, 2023March 6, 2023 Nat M. Zorach 0 Comments Consumers Energy, consumers outage, consumers outages, DTE, DTE Energy, dte outage, dte power outage, ERCOT, ercot disaster, february 2022 ice storm michigan, infrastructure, michigan power outages, miso, PJM, power grid, power lines, power outage, power outages, public utilities, utilities, utility company, voltage

The power went out. Then the ice melted. A few days later, the snow came, and the power went out– again. Now that the snow is gone, what’s next?

wielka-woda-high-water-netflix-polish-series

Culture & Language Climate

Wielka Woda: Climate Future Through Historical Fiction

December 7, 2022December 7, 2022 Nat M. Zorach 0 Comments Agnieszka Żulewska, climate, climate change, climate fiction, doomsday glacier, Erin Brockovich, film, how high we go in the dark, Jakub Marczak, Jaśmina Tremer, mckinsey, poland, rocky mountain institute, sequoia nagamatsu, solarpunk, streaming services, thwaites glacier, Tomasz Schuchardt, wielka woda, Wroclaw, you forgot about poland

A new Polish-language Netflix series explores the catastrophic 1997 floods of Central Europe through a tightly-crafted, intense drama. Is it just fiction? Or is it cautionary?

fema-flood-map-southwest-florida-fort-myers-naples-lee-county-climate-change-hurricane-ian

Real Estate Urban Planning Climate Environment

Sprawlhaven, Florida: Suburbs In The Age Of Climate Change

November 10, 2022November 18, 2022 Nat M. Zorach 0 Comments arcade theater fort myers, caloosahatchee, cape coral, charlotte county, climate, climate change in florida, collier county, duke energy, florida, florida climate change, florida department of community affairs, ford's garage fort myers, hurricane ian, immokalee, insurance, insurance and climate change, lee county, miami-dade county, miami-dade urban growth boundary, monroe county, naples, naples florida, punta gorda, rick scott, storm damage florida, ugb, urban growth boundary, wesley marx

Fort Myers, Florida, is a flashpoint for the Sunshine State’s battle against climate change. It’s a battle that the state isn’t exactly winning. Part of that is coming from the self-inflicted wounds of eviscerating public sector oversight of real estate development. We’ve got photos of the traffic jams and storm damage to prove it.

Detroit Book Reviews Mobility Sustainability Climate Michigan

Book Review: Women Driven Mobility by Katelyn Davis and Kristin Shaw

April 26, 2022April 25, 2022 Nat M. Zorach 0 Comments climate change, decarbonization, Detroit, Electric cars, electric vehicles, electrification, emily wasley, fisker, Gretchen Whitmer, jessica robinson, karma, katelyn davis, kristin shaw, lordstown, michigan, mobility, nikola, Tesla, transportation decarbonization, transportation electrification, TSLA, women-driven mobility, wsp

Nat looks at a new book by Katelyn Davis and Kristin Shaw about women in the mobility and transportation space, and asks whether a politics of benevolent incrementalism is going to help us solve the climate crisis.

Throw out your flood-damaged possessions. And your climate models.

July 16, 2021July 16, 2021 Nat M. Zorach 0 Comments american society of adaptation professionals, ASAP, basement flooding, climate, climate adaptation, climate change, climate change models, climate modeling, climate models, flood, floods, how to fix basement flooding, NOAA, resilience, resiliency, resiliency and adaptation

Throw the climate modeling out the window with your flood-damaged worldly possessions. It’s time to figure out how to adapt.

flooding-detroit-hamtramck-michigan-severe-weather-climate-change-rainfall

Climate Ecology

If Not Now, When? Detroit Flooding Raises Questions.

June 28, 2021June 28, 2021 Nat M. Zorach 0 Comments climate adaptation, climate change, combined sewer, combined sewer overflow, detroit flooding, detroit water and sewerage department, drainage tax, duggan administration, dwsd, flood, flood insurance, floods, gary brown, gary brown is a cop, glwa, green infrastructure, green new deal, green stormwater infrastructure, infrastructure hardening, insurance, june 2021 storms, market solutions, rain tax, sewage, sewer, sewers, stormwater, stormwater infrastructure, stormwater management, stormwater retention

Widespread flooding across Metro Detroit has left basements filled with water, backed up sewage, and has left homeowners with questions about what the state and city have been doing, if not preparing our infrastructure for climate change.

Bye, Coal-icia! Consumers Energy Advances Decarbonization Goals

June 23, 2021 Nat M. Zorach 0 Comments campbell, clean coal, CMS, coal, coal power, coal power plant, coal retirement, Consumers Energy, decarbonization, demand response, DTE Energy, economic dispatch, essexville, fossil fuels, IRP, jackson, jackson michigan, karn, ludington, ludington pumped storage, merit order, mid-merit, noneconomic dispatch, retirement of fossil fuels, the war on coal, utility planning, west michigan

Jackson, Michigan-based Consumers Energy (NYSE: CMS) made a groundbreaking announcement in a press conference this morning that it is ditching

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