Discussion of climate, how it is changing, activism around that, the politics, and the energy systems change we need in order to stabilize things.
As a starting point, the burning of fossil fuels, and to a lesser extent deforestation and release of methane are responsible for the warming in recent decades:
How much each change to the atmosphere has warmed the world:
Recommended actions to cut greenhouse gas emissions in the near future:
Anti-science, inactivism, and unsupported conspiracy theories are not ok here.
By reducing their gross carbon emissions?
It recommends limiting development, taking steps to reduce wildfire risk like culling invasive grasses and introducing Joshua trees with genetic variations that make them more resilient to warming temperatures.
Oops. Nope. Oh well.
California has the 3rd lowest per capita carbon emissions in the US, after only NY and Massachusetts. They have 12% of the US population and only contribute 6% of total US carbon emissions. No states have done more regarding carbon emissions legislatively than California
They have 12% of the US population and only contribute 6% of total US carbon emissions.
They buy 30% of their electricity from outside the state, primarily Texas.
When they stop doing that, we can talk about their real emissions.
They buy 30% of their electricity from outside the state, primarily Texas.
Of the electricity California imports, 41,838 GWh is from nuclear or renewable resources, while 13,306 GWh is from fossil fuel sources. 10,373 is purchased on the open market and untraceable to a specific source. This means 64% of the energy imports you're saying are problematic are directly traceable to nuclear or renewable sources.
None of this changes the fact that they use less energy per capita than all but two states, and by a significant margin vs the median.
You can still calculate the real emissions based on the generation mix from the imports though.
Invasive plants have been making their way into the state since the Spanish were building missions in the 1700s, says Matthew Brooks, research ecologist at the USGS Western Ecological Research Center. As more people continued to settle in the area, so did stray seeds. The plants, most of Mediterranean origin, were often introduced accidentally through animal feed. https://www.popsci.com/california-fires-invasive-grasses/
deeper:
This comprehensive review of a century of scientific inquiry illuminates the causes and consequences of cheatgrass (Bromus tectorum) invasions, and evaluates solutions to restore healthy native ecosystems. Introduced to North America in the 1800s, this Eurasian annual was spread by railroads, vehicles, and livestock, colonizing lands disturbed and degraded by overgrazing and other factors. Today, millions of acres have been converted to cheatgrass monoculture. Tens of millions of acres more remain at high risk of invasion. Continuing expansion across vast areas of the West indicates that current livestock grazing remains responsible for cheatgrass expansion and dominance. Cheatgrass is a habitat generalist, has an extremely high reproductive rate, and germinates earlier than native grasses. It outcompetes seedlings of native plants for water and soil nutrients and alters soil chemistry and flora to its own advantage. Livestock trampling, grazing, and surface disturbance are the key ecological switches that transitions healthy arid ecosystems to cheatgrass- invaded systems, by eliminating the native bunchgrasses and biological soil crusts that are the natural defense against weeds. A livestock-cheatgrass-fire cycle now prevails across much of the public lands of the western United States, rendering lands susceptible to larger and more frequent fires. Cheatgrass invasion degrades or eliminates habitat for native wildlife and range for livestock. Climate change will likely shift the distribution of cheatgrass, and may exacerbate invasions. Solutions to restore native habitats remain elusive and expensive. Disking, targeted grazing, prescribed fire, fuelbreak construction risk a worsening of cheatgrass infestations; plantings of non-native forage species create invasive weed infestations of their own; while herbicides, natural parasites, seeding with native plants may fail on the regional scale demanded by the problem. Reduction or elimination of livestock grazing achieves results on a sufficiently large scale, but full restoration can take decades. Conversion of native rangelands to cheatgrass markedly decreases soil carbon, so returning cheatgrass infestations to native plant assemblages could play a key role in climate mitigation. We recommend rest from livestock grazing on an allotment scale until native species replace cheatgrass. On lands with light infestations, we recommend reducing livestock grazing to levels that promote the flourishing of native species and the maintenance of soil biocrusts. Cheatgrass invasions: History, causes, consequences, and solutions, Erik M. Molvar, Roger Rosentreter, Don Mansfield,6and Greta M. Anderson - PDF