How Canada Stifles Scientists; China's Reckless Fracking

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InsideClimate News on Canada Scientists are calling hypocrisy on Canada's government, which says publicly that climate change needs to be addressed but, under the rule of the Conservative Party, has been "leading a slow and systematic unraveling of environmental and climate research budgets." This has led some scientists to leave the country. For example, critics cite the closing of the Polar Environment Atmospheric Research Laboratory, which "is one of the closest labs in the world to the North Pole and is considered one of the best in the Arctic." 

The Guardian on food shortages in Britain Following flooding in Britain, expect a Christmas with fewer homegrown winter vegetables this year. Supermarkets have noted that they might need to import potatoes and sprouts, notable parts of "the traditional Christmas dinner." The National Farmers Union have predicted that terrible weather will "wreak financial havoc" on British farmers. 

The New York Times on cities as climate-change tool Guy Gugliotta reports that cities are a tool to understanding how we can manage climate change because they have "conditions that can mimic what life may be like in the temperate zone of a heated planet." A plant physiologist says cities may portend a "silver lining." Plants, for instance, could benefit from warmer temperatures at night. Still, "scientists caution that while the studies of New York City in August may be a way to preview what the temperate zone might be like in the future, lush parks during northern summers could mean trouble in hotter latitudes."

Scientific American on the Dust Bowl With drought lasting well into November across the Great Plains and a large dust storm hitting it as last as October, scientists explain what a coming Dust Bowl could look like. Craig Cox from the Environmental Working Group tells Melissa Gaskill that it could be "in a sense an invisible Dust Bowl—not like the big storms before, but withered crops, dry streams and other disasters that accompanied the Dust Bowl." Gaskill explains that Colorado, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas rely on irrigation that has become even more necessary with climate change. Katharine Hayhoe of the Climate Science Center at Texas Tech University in Lubbock tells Gaskill, "We built these vulnerabilities into the system and climate change is the final straw that may break the camel's back." 

Mother Jones on China's fracking Jaeah Lee reports on an investigation by the publication Caixin that explains how China is growing its fracking operations with "with virtually no regard for groundwater protection or other environmental safety measures." While fracking has become an environmental issue in the U.S., in China it hasn't been questioned even though it will probably bring more trouble for a country in a water crisis. 

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