HEATED analyzed 133 breaking news stories about recent climate-fueled weather in the United States. The results were dismal—but there were some bright spots.
I've been supporting small(er) independent news orgs for this reason. Shout out to Planet Detroit which is doing great investigative work in and around Detroit.
Very nice article about the continued shortfall in the media, where you not only hold their feet to the fire for not making the extreme weather event connection to climate change, but also the connection to fossil fuel and other human activities as the source for the observed changes.
And yet you might consider tweaking your message a bit more: For instance, you make this double connection of fossil fuel emissions and climate change to the extreme weather events, and then oddly in this section, you drop the fossil fuel component:
"Here are some examples of how media outlets easily explained the connection between extreme rainfall and climate change:
“As the climate warms, extreme precipitation events such as this one are becoming more frequent and intense, studies show.” (Axios)
"Scientists say extreme weather events are becoming more frequent and intense as a result of human-caused climate change, fuelled by activities like burning fossil fuels and cutting down forests." (BBC)
"Both episodes bear the fingerprint of human-caused climate change, which is increasing the intensity and severity of top-tier rain events." (The Washington Post)"
Only the middle quote gives the double connection by mentioning both the changing climate and fossil fuel emissions as being linked to the extreme weather event increases.
Furthermore, those same two quotes commit the causality sin that is so common in climate journalism. Instead of saying
“As the climate warms, extreme precipitation events such as this one are becoming more frequent and intense, studies show.” (Axios) a much better description would be:
"As fossil fuel emissions are changing the chemistry of the atmosphere, greater heat retention is resulting in more frequent and extreme weather events, which is changing our climate."
And the last quote: "Both episodes bear the fingerprint of human-caused climate change, which is increasing the intensity and severity of top-tier rain events." (The Washington Post)" would be better worded with the following sentence:
"Both episodes bear the fingerprint of a warmer atmosphere, which makes more intense, severe, top-tier events possible. The warmer temps are the result of increased fossil fuel emissions, which has changed the atmosphere's chemistry, leading to a changing climate."
In other words, climate is just a running average of individual events. The climate is changing BECAUSE of increasingly frequent and extreme weather. It is these events that are changing the climate, not vice versa, and it is fossil fuel emissions that are making it possible by changing the chemistry of the atmosphere. Difficult to explain to journalists, let alone to readers, but worth putting out there...at least I think so. It's seldom done, I suspect, because it more directly links fossil fuel emissions to extreme weather events.
I hear you. We were just trying to make *both* points: 1) that it's easy to connect fossil fuels to heat and rainfall, and 2) that it's easy to connect climate change to extreme rain. We included the first point first because it's the most important. But we included the second because we saw that so few outlets even made a simple climate connection to extreme rain. Does that make sense?
Yes it does make sense that the first, most important point is to connect fossil fuels to heat and rainfall, and that it's easy for folks to connect climate change and extreme events. But most folks, journalists included, often don't realize that the extreme weather events are driving the change in the climate, not the other way around. That's because climate is just the cumulative sum of individual weather events, nothing more, nothing less.
So the real story is that fossil fuel emissions are juicing the atmosphere, in the same way steroids juice an athlete's performance, and the result is more frequent, extreme weather/"better" sports outputs, and the changing climate/improved statistics are the outcome, not the driver.
Does it depend on the author? Or even though both cover heat waves, one is more of an in depth weather report, while the other is a general news article? It is mentioned that an editor added a climate line to an AP article about flooding, so is it at the editor level and depends on the editor?
Just curious if a possible step would be to try and get some sort of editor enforced "template" or something for articles like this, so that at least the same outlet has consistent coverage linking climate change to weather. Or even a genuine industry wide reporting standard on this topic. No idea if that even makes sense in the context of how journalism works, and might be totally ignorant here. Sorry if that is the case!
Thanks for your reporting. It is so frustrating to hear reports of increasing extreme weather as if it is happening to us instead of caused by us. My personal take on it is that journalists share in the cultural belief that Nature is separate from human beings and thus a force outside ourselves and our society. In addition, if the connection to the use of fossil fuels is made then we are all implicated in that, including news outlets. How much CO2 is emitted by CNN for example? Might make a news outlet a wee bit uncomfortable to consider that.
"Our analysis focused only on breaking stories because climate change is not a follow-up story; it is the story of the lethal and economically devastating extreme weather playing out across the country. To not mention climate change in a breaking news story about record heat in June 2024 is like not mentioning COVID-19 in a breaking news article about record hospitalizations in March 2020. It’s an abdication of journalistic responsibility to inform. "
Yeah, again. But I continue to be more annoyed by the media focus on downplaying and dissing renewables and energy storage and hyping supposed power shortfalls, nukes, baseload, whatever. For instance this year's sweet summer solstice solar report,
OMG; Democrats making money on energy and lobbying for it!!!
It would take 1000 lines to list all the stories recently referencing press releases on the "need" for new powerplants tomorrow for all this "AI" we "need."
California recently has been showing how effective batteries added to their solar surplus have been, particularly offsetting gas. Unlike the web page below, which does admittedly provide extra-positive spin,
We can see (if we wanted to) the climate changes happening right in front of us more and more every year. Lack of snows in the winters, extreme rains causing flooding, heat domes becoming more frequent. Add to that, global human migrations to escape the ravages of drought caused by global warming. Which will eventually lead to a global war over lack of food and shelter. Countries will fall. Smaller ones will rise up in their place. We are starting to see the reversion of humanity back to a time before the industrial revolution, when the small tribal units took care of themselves. It will take many, many more generations to accomplish this but this is the only sustainable model that the planets ecosystems can handle.
I'm so glad you wrote this piece. I wonder why media is doing such a shit job covering climate ALL of the time! Do you think it has to do with who owns the larger media companies?
I've been supporting small(er) independent news orgs for this reason. Shout out to Planet Detroit which is doing great investigative work in and around Detroit.
Love Planet Detroit, support them as well!
Very nice article about the continued shortfall in the media, where you not only hold their feet to the fire for not making the extreme weather event connection to climate change, but also the connection to fossil fuel and other human activities as the source for the observed changes.
And yet you might consider tweaking your message a bit more: For instance, you make this double connection of fossil fuel emissions and climate change to the extreme weather events, and then oddly in this section, you drop the fossil fuel component:
"Here are some examples of how media outlets easily explained the connection between extreme rainfall and climate change:
“As the climate warms, extreme precipitation events such as this one are becoming more frequent and intense, studies show.” (Axios)
"Scientists say extreme weather events are becoming more frequent and intense as a result of human-caused climate change, fuelled by activities like burning fossil fuels and cutting down forests." (BBC)
"Both episodes bear the fingerprint of human-caused climate change, which is increasing the intensity and severity of top-tier rain events." (The Washington Post)"
Only the middle quote gives the double connection by mentioning both the changing climate and fossil fuel emissions as being linked to the extreme weather event increases.
Furthermore, those same two quotes commit the causality sin that is so common in climate journalism. Instead of saying
“As the climate warms, extreme precipitation events such as this one are becoming more frequent and intense, studies show.” (Axios) a much better description would be:
"As fossil fuel emissions are changing the chemistry of the atmosphere, greater heat retention is resulting in more frequent and extreme weather events, which is changing our climate."
And the last quote: "Both episodes bear the fingerprint of human-caused climate change, which is increasing the intensity and severity of top-tier rain events." (The Washington Post)" would be better worded with the following sentence:
"Both episodes bear the fingerprint of a warmer atmosphere, which makes more intense, severe, top-tier events possible. The warmer temps are the result of increased fossil fuel emissions, which has changed the atmosphere's chemistry, leading to a changing climate."
In other words, climate is just a running average of individual events. The climate is changing BECAUSE of increasingly frequent and extreme weather. It is these events that are changing the climate, not vice versa, and it is fossil fuel emissions that are making it possible by changing the chemistry of the atmosphere. Difficult to explain to journalists, let alone to readers, but worth putting out there...at least I think so. It's seldom done, I suspect, because it more directly links fossil fuel emissions to extreme weather events.
I hear you. We were just trying to make *both* points: 1) that it's easy to connect fossil fuels to heat and rainfall, and 2) that it's easy to connect climate change to extreme rain. We included the first point first because it's the most important. But we included the second because we saw that so few outlets even made a simple climate connection to extreme rain. Does that make sense?
Yes it does make sense that the first, most important point is to connect fossil fuels to heat and rainfall, and that it's easy for folks to connect climate change and extreme events. But most folks, journalists included, often don't realize that the extreme weather events are driving the change in the climate, not the other way around. That's because climate is just the cumulative sum of individual weather events, nothing more, nothing less.
So the real story is that fossil fuel emissions are juicing the atmosphere, in the same way steroids juice an athlete's performance, and the result is more frequent, extreme weather/"better" sports outputs, and the changing climate/improved statistics are the outcome, not the driver.
Thank you both for putting this together!
I'm curious why even from the same outlet like AP there are articles mentioning the influence of climate change while others don't:
https://apnews.com/article/heat-wave-southwest-vegas-arizona-florida-761a5f251ad1cc714e87ee605b97440b
https://apnews.com/article/extreme-heat-wave-climate-e93d6f7d22ab0609c14a15fc5f14eef9
Does it depend on the author? Or even though both cover heat waves, one is more of an in depth weather report, while the other is a general news article? It is mentioned that an editor added a climate line to an AP article about flooding, so is it at the editor level and depends on the editor?
Just curious if a possible step would be to try and get some sort of editor enforced "template" or something for articles like this, so that at least the same outlet has consistent coverage linking climate change to weather. Or even a genuine industry wide reporting standard on this topic. No idea if that even makes sense in the context of how journalism works, and might be totally ignorant here. Sorry if that is the case!
Thanks for your reporting. It is so frustrating to hear reports of increasing extreme weather as if it is happening to us instead of caused by us. My personal take on it is that journalists share in the cultural belief that Nature is separate from human beings and thus a force outside ourselves and our society. In addition, if the connection to the use of fossil fuels is made then we are all implicated in that, including news outlets. How much CO2 is emitted by CNN for example? Might make a news outlet a wee bit uncomfortable to consider that.
"Our analysis focused only on breaking stories because climate change is not a follow-up story; it is the story of the lethal and economically devastating extreme weather playing out across the country. To not mention climate change in a breaking news story about record heat in June 2024 is like not mentioning COVID-19 in a breaking news article about record hospitalizations in March 2020. It’s an abdication of journalistic responsibility to inform. "
This is the writing I'm here for. Thank you both!
Yeah, again. But I continue to be more annoyed by the media focus on downplaying and dissing renewables and energy storage and hyping supposed power shortfalls, nukes, baseload, whatever. For instance this year's sweet summer solstice solar report,
https://ember-climate.org/insights/in-brief/the-global-solar-revolution/
was, according to a quick google news search, only adequately reported by Newsweek here
https://www.newsweek.com/good-day-sunshine-solar-hits-record-global-power-supply-summer-solstice-1915500
And briefly by MSN.
I open today's Denver Post to see this AP (Associated Petroleum?) headline:
"A signature Biden law aimed to boost renewable energy. It also helped a solar company reap billions"
https://apnews.com/article/biden-solar-inflation-reduction-act-dca914675cd0855004214d82aab5b10c
OMG; Democrats making money on energy and lobbying for it!!!
It would take 1000 lines to list all the stories recently referencing press releases on the "need" for new powerplants tomorrow for all this "AI" we "need."
California recently has been showing how effective batteries added to their solar surplus have been, particularly offsetting gas. Unlike the web page below, which does admittedly provide extra-positive spin,
https://theprogressplaybook.com/2024/06/20/gas-power-output-nearly-halves-in-california-in-one-year-as-batteries-steal-the-show/
Mainstream media is sure to waffle:
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/05/07/climate/battery-electricity-solar-california-texas.html
There were probably more stories on the "problem" that the eclipse would cause for solar.
We can see (if we wanted to) the climate changes happening right in front of us more and more every year. Lack of snows in the winters, extreme rains causing flooding, heat domes becoming more frequent. Add to that, global human migrations to escape the ravages of drought caused by global warming. Which will eventually lead to a global war over lack of food and shelter. Countries will fall. Smaller ones will rise up in their place. We are starting to see the reversion of humanity back to a time before the industrial revolution, when the small tribal units took care of themselves. It will take many, many more generations to accomplish this but this is the only sustainable model that the planets ecosystems can handle.
This is a good report about Big Oil spreading their tentacles into media organizations:
https://www.desmog.com/2023/12/05/reuters-new-york-times-top-list-of-fossil-fuel-industrys-media-enablers/
I'm so glad you wrote this piece. I wonder why media is doing such a shit job covering climate ALL of the time! Do you think it has to do with who owns the larger media companies?