California will add science scores to its school accountability system. Why it matters - EdSource

Last week marked a watershed moment for climate accountability in two country’s highest courtrooms. In a landmark decision, the High Court of Australia ruled in favor of climate action in MACH Energy Australia v. Denman. Simultaneously, across the Pacific, the United States Supreme Court convened to hear oral arguments in Suncor Energy (USA) Inc. v. County Commissioners of Boulder County. For those of us working at the intersection of science, law, and policy, this convergence is not a coincidence, but evidence of a maturing field. Since 2015, over 215 climate cases against governments have reached these apex courts, with more than half resulting in outcomes positive for climate action. Together, these cases illustrate two increasingly important fronts in climate accountability: whether decision-makers must confront the full emissions consequences of fossil fuel extraction, and whether fossil fuel companies can be held responsible for the financial costs of climate harms linked to their conduct. For each of these, scientific evidence is helping define the questions courts can meaningfully answer.

The spacecraft delivered materials and equipment for new research studies to the station.

Mud from a fjord shows an Atlantic air pattern brought wetter, colder spells to southern Greenland, a clue to how its ice may fare. Greenland’s ice is shrinking as the planet warms. But in the island’s southwest, rainfall and snowfall have been influenced by the same North Atlantic air-pressure pattern for at least 5,000 years. When that pattern tipped one way, the region turned wetter and colder. The record comes from mud on the floor of a Greenland fjord, and it suggests snowfall, not only temperature, shaped how the area’s ice grew and shrank. It doesn’t yet show how glaciers there will respond to the warming ahead. Johan Faust, a researcher at MARUM, the Center for Marine Environmental Sciences at the University of Bremen in Germany, led the work with colleagues in Germany, Norway, Denmark and Canada. A seesaw in the airThe pattern is called the North Atlantic Oscillation. It’s the difference in air pressure between a low that sits near Iceland and a high near the Azores, and it’s strongest in winter. When that difference is large, the pattern is in its positive phase. Northwestern Europe and southwestern Greenland both get more rain and snow.