All Hell Breaking Loose: The Pentagon’s Perspective
On Climate Change, by Michael T. Klare

The Pentagon, unsentimental and politically conservative, might not seem likely to be worried about climate change―still linked, for many people, with polar bears and coral reefs. Yet of all the major institutions in American society, none take climate change as seriously as the U.S. military. Both as participants in climate-triggered conflicts abroad, and as first responders to hurricanes and other disasters on American soil, the armed services are already confronting the impacts of global warming.

The military now regards climate change as one of the top threats to American national security―and is busy developing strategies to cope with it. Drawing on previously obscure reports and government documents, renowned security expert Michael Klare shows that the U.S. military sees the climate threat as imperiling the country on several fronts at once. Read more about the book here.

Related Reading 

• A military perspective on climate change could bridge the gap between believers and doubters, by Michael Klare, The Conversation. Military leaders are also contending with climate change impacts on bases, forces and equipment. Hurricanes Florence and Michael in 2018 and heavy inland flooding in the spring of 2019 caused an estimated US$10 billion in damage to Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune in North Carolina, Tyndall Air Force Base in Florida and Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska. Scientists widely agree that climate change is making storms like these larger, more intense and longer-lasting.
• War Is Hell – So Is Climate Change, Sierra Magazine

Additional Recommended Reading

• A quarter of all tweets about climate change are produced by bots, Grist 
• Knitters Chronicle Climate Change One Stitch at a Time, The New York Times
  Volunteers use different colors of yarn to make “temperature scarves” that serve as fashionable records of a warming world.
• Jeff Bezos commits $10B to climate. How should he spend it?, written by Catherine Morehouse, Utility Dive. “It dwarfs other philanthropy in this realm,” Robert Stavins, professor of energy and economic development at Harvard and director of the university’s environmental economics program told Utility Dive. “It sort of rises to the level of government actions in the climate policy or climate realm. So it’s potentially very significant.”
• Delta lifts off with $1 billion pledge to become carbon neutral, GreenBiz
• What Corporate Leadership on Fighting Climate Change Really Looks Like, Washington Monthly
• Renewable energy could power the world by 2050, Climate News Network
• The Future Of Battery Energy Storage Is Upon Us, Forbes
• Alameda Municipal Power in California reaches 100% clean energy, American Public Power Association
• Bill Berry: There’s plenty of good work happening in agriculture, The Cap Times

Warren Buffett’s Annual Letter – Iowa’s Outstanding Wind Energy Development

Here’s what Buffett is telling shareholders in his annual letter, Omaha World-Herald

Buffett talked up the success of Berkshire’s energy subsidiary, which was launched in 2000 when Berkshire purchased MidAmerican Energy in neighboring Iowa. He said MidAmerican will hit a significant milestone in 2021 when it’s projected to be producing 25.2 million megawatt-hours of electricity from wind. That’s more than the annual needs of all of its Iowa customers. “In other words, our utility will have attained wind-energy self-sufficiency in the state of Iowa,” he said.

He noted the company has done that with rate increases of less than 1% a year, and the company has pledged no rate increases through at least 2028. He contrasted that to the other major utility in Iowa, which gets less than 10% of its power from wind and which has rates 61% higher than MidAmerican. Buffett also put out an offer to the rest of the industry. Berkshire has the operating talent and experience to manage “truly huge utility projects” of $100 billion or more, he said. “We stand ready, willing and able to take on such opportunities,” he said.