IoES in the News
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Daniel Swain in The New York Times — California Fires: Want to Control Blazes? Start More, Experts Say
Which leaves what Daniel Swain, a California climate expert, told the New York Times one smaller-scale fix to the wildfire crisis. Communities and homeowners themselves can better prepare by clearing fire breaks or…
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Daniel Swain KQED Interview: The Link Between Climate Change and Wildfires
Record-breaking heat, dry vegetation, and lightning each played a role in sparking wildfires that have burnt more than one million acres across California. But to what extent were these factors…
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Daniel Swain in The New York Times — California Fires: Why This Year Is Different
Tuesday: The vast scale of wildfires rampaging across the state is an indication of what’s to come. What’s different this year, officials and experts said on Monday, isn’t just that…
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Daniel Swain Q&A in Bloomberg Green: California’s Climate Tinderbox: A Scientist Explains the Fire Crisis
Unexpected bad news hit California more than 11,000 times last week. That’s the estimated number of lightning strikes that unleashed two of the biggest fires in state history. Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at…
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Daniel Swain in The New York Times: Scope of California Wildfires Is Staggering
More than 7,000 fires have chewed through 1.4 million acres this year, making this fire season one of the most active ever. “I’m running out of superlatives,” said Daniel Swain,…
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Daniel Swain in San Francisco Chronicle: ‘The Bay Area dodged a bullet’: Monday lightning storms are mild as wildfires keep burning
Temperatures will hover around the mid-70s inland and across the East Bay, reaching the mid-90s in cities like Livermore. Winds weren’t predicted to hamper the ongoing firefights, with “no strong…
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Daniel Swain in San Francisco Chronicle: Wildfires are an annual California nightmare now. Will they only get worse?
In the past week, the extent and complexity of the blazes have stretched California’s firefighting resources to the limit. Some of the larger, more remote fires may still be burning…
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Daniel Swain in Inside Climate News: California and Colorado Fires May Be Part of a Climate-Driven Transformation of Wildfires Around the Globe
The wildfires that exploded over the past few days in California and Colorado show clear influences of global warming, climate scientists say, and evidence of how a warming and drying…
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Daniel Swain in Vox: Dry lightning, extreme heat, and Covid-19 are all shaping California’s efforts to contain massive, deadly blazes.
A stunning, sudden surge of wildfires is burning through California, threatening towns and sending choking smoke over major cities and across much of the United States. It’s creating an epic…
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Daniel Swain in Mercury News: California’s devastating summer blazes are a bad omen for fall wildfire season
“Global warming is making extreme heat waves more intense and likely, and climate change is making California fire risk worse,” said Daniel L. Swain, a climate scientist at the University…
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Los Angeles Urban Cooling Collaborative in Legal Planet: Beat the Heat
The detailed Rx for Hot Cities report, released this year by local nonprofit TreePeople and a group of researchers and urban practitioners called the Los Angeles Urban Cooling Collective, suggests that if Los…
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Daniel Swain in MIT Technology Review: Yes, climate change is almost certainly fueling California’s massive fires
Over the last four decades, the combined forces of higher temperatures and lower precipitation levels have already doubled the risk of extreme wildfire conditions in California during the fall, according…
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Daniel Swain in Mashable: Popular wildlife cam just became a dreadful fire cam
One of these many blazes, the Dolan Fire, is a grim scene on the normally pleasant explore.org wildlife webcams in the Ventana Wildlife Society’s Condor Sanctuary, located some two miles from the Pacific…
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Daniel Swain in Ventura County Star — California wildfires: Little relief on horizon as fire siege pummels the Golden State
California still has weeks or months to go before its peak fire season as crews battle hundreds of blazes sparked by extreme heat and intense lightning. A massive heat wave baked…
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Daniel Swain in the Guardian: California wildfires: thousands evacuate as ‘siege’ of flames overwhelms state
Hundreds of fires, stoked by a searing heatwave, prompt governor to declare a state of emergency. “It’s kind of an overwhelming fire siege,” said Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at…
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Daniel Swain in the Los Angeles Times: Destructive Bay Area fires fueled by rare mix of intense dry lightning and extreme heat
Many of the fires burning unchecked across the Bay Area and Northern California have been caused by lightning strikes and fueled by extremely hot weather. This moisture is why so many of the…
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Daniel Swain in CBS Los Angeles: As Temperatures Hit Triple-Digits, Scientist Warns This Could Be ‘One Of Biggest Heat Waves We’ve Seen This Decade’
As temperatures across California hit triple-digits, a local scientist warns that this hot spell could be “one of the biggest heat waves we’ve seen this decade.” “We’re going to see…
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Rajit Gadh in Automotive News: EV fast charging technology floors it
An EVgo station in Baker, Calif., promises a refueling experience that’s about as close to a gas station for EVs as currently possible. Rajit Gadh, director of the UCLA Smart…
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Daniel Swain study mentioned in Santa Rosa Press Democrat: PG&E prepares for planned outages, but vows they will be smaller and shorter in 2020
PG&E executives claim shutting off the power is still an essential tool for preventing wildfires and Californians can expect to lose power during risky fire weather again. California’s warmest years…
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Jon Christensen in The New York Times: Sierra Club Says It Must Confront the Racism of John Muir
Muir, a monumental figure in American environmentalism and a Sierra Club founder, traded in “deeply harmful racist stereotypes,” the organization said. “The Muir ideal of the lone white man at…
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Jon Christensen shares opinion in SFist: Muir Woods Might Want To Look For a New Name As The Sierra Club Reckons With Its Founder’s Racism
The sheer number of things named after famed environmentalist John Muir in California makes for widespread implications if and when it comes time to remove his name from places of…
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Daniel Swain in San Francisco Chronicle: Bigger, badder storms coming in years ahead, and California is right in their path
California’s wild weather swings, from pounding rain to drought and from fires to floods, are widely expected to worsen as the climate warms. A new study shows just how severe…
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Daniel Swain in LA Times: As if the pandemic weren’t enough, 2020 might be the hottest year ever
U.S. government data shows that so far, 2020 is the second-hottest year on record globally, trailing only 2016. “Heat actually has a lot of morbidity and mortality that I think goes under-recognized,”…
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Congratulations to IoES Director Dr. Peter Kareiva on becoming CEO of Aquarium of the Pacific
We send our heartfelt congratulations to Dr. Peter Kareiva as he takes on his new role as president and CEO of the Aquarium of the Pacific. Dr. Kareiva will step…
