This week’s Current Climate, which every Monday brings you the latest news about the business of sustainability. Sign up to get it in your inbox every week.
Talk about unexpected negative impacts of climate change: Extreme weather is threatening the country’s medical blood supply.
The American Red Cross declared an emergency blood shortage as its national inventory dropped more than 25% in July, with continued heat making it harder to replenish the supply. Nationally, more than 100 blood drives have been impacted, including in nearly every state, according to the organization. Since the beginning of August, another 60 blood drives across the U.S. were canceled due to heat and extreme weather, according to The Guardian, citing a Red Cross spokesperson.
America’s Blood Centers, a national association of community blood centers, noting a “critical shortage,” urged eligible people, especially those with types O-positive and O-negative, to donate blood to meet demand. And with the effects of the climate crisis – including hurricanes, storms, heat and flooding – continuing to limit turnout, the American Red Cross offered $20 Amazon gift cards to donors who give blood before August 31.
The Big Read
The number of violent incidents linked to water resources around the world has increased dramatically in recent years, with a particularly big rise last year, according to a new study. The Pacific Institute’s annual Water Conflict Chronology report shows there were 347 instances of water-related armed conflict in 2023, up from 231 in 2022. These include attacks on water systems, disputes over access to water and the use of water as a weapon of war.
Senior fellow and cofounder of the Pacific Institute Peter Gleick calls the global increase in such incidents “disturbing.”
“It was a very substantial increase, and it’s an indication of the importance of water and the failure of institutions to manage water properly,” Gleick said in an interview. “Climate change is absolutely playing a role, although we do not know yet the full extent of that role.”
Read more here
Hot Topic
Brian Kelly, CEO of California’s High-Speed Rail Authority, on the $125 billion project’s progress, Brighline’s bullet train and why he’s stepping down
When you took the job in 2018 there was a lot of skepticism about the project’s cost and its fate. Things seem to be on a better footing. How do you assess the progress?
When I got here we were underway on some structures in the [Central] Valley, but very little of it was advanced. One matrix we use is how many people do we have working in construction jobs. When I came on we had created about 2,500 construction jobs. Today that number is 14,000. The project in the Valley is now about 65% complete in terms of that construction.
This is a tale of two projects. Construction in the Valley, on that first 119 miles where we started, got off to a really rough start. A lot of things were kind of done out of sequence. So what we’ve been doing is getting that sequence right. We’ve got the right-of-way just about fully done. We’ve moved the utilities and just have a few left to do. I’ve spent a lot of my time here getting that work done so we can get construction going, and we’re at the tail end of that.
Story two now is doing the new work in front of us in the right sequence, making sure all that pre-construction stuff is done, doing the construction and then moving forward on how to get to San Francisco and LA. To me, there’s a much more optimistic future than the challenges of the past.
When will the first segment open and what’s the total cost?
Our goal is to be operational by 2033. We currently have a budget of just over $28 billion. The cost estimate to get all of Merced to Bakersfield done, and a bunch of other obligations – we do work in the Bay Area and in L.A. on some stuff – it’s somewhere between $33 and $35 billion to get everything done.
What’s the total cost to connect from San Francisco to Los Angeles?
In today’s dollars it’s on the order of $125 billion.
This is the biggest public infrastructure project in the U.S.?
By far. It’s not even close.
Where will the additional funds come from to complete it?
We fight like heck all the time for the next increment of funding. Hopefully what Biden started on this federal interest in modernizing rail will continue. The federal government even talks about what they call the rail trust fund, which is like a multi-year investment. Rather than fight year to year over this, like we do at the highways we’d have a rail trust fund with a dedicated source over time. Then states can line up to get going on it. It’s how they did the interstate highway system. It’s what you need on rail.
To get to that next level, really get operations rolling, it does take the federal government to say `this is a priority and we’re doing it.’ Once they say that, it happens. Just like the interstate highway system happened. We’ve got to have that.
Amtrak ridership is up and Brightline Florida has brought new interest in passenger rail. Will Brightline’s high-speed Las Vegas to Los Angeles train help the California project?
It’s a phenomenal project.
I’m rooting for Brightline to get it going because I think it’s good. I love what it could be where we would connect with them. They are L.A. to Vegas, but we could help them bring Northern California people to Vegas too when we connect. And that’s very cool.
Why are you stepping down?
When I took the job in 2018, I told everybody who would listen that I was going to do it for three to five years. This is year six, and I really believe the project is at a turning point, moving from construction to starting to figure out how to operate a railroad. We’re buying trains, we’re doing stations, and things like fares and schedules are going to be really important. That is not my expertise. Mine is transportation policy – getting the organization to set goals and moving toward those goals. Now it’s about operations and operating considerations. I think it’s the right time to bring in somebody with that experience.
What Else We’re Reading
Solar is 59% of the 20 GW of new power generation the U.S. added this year
Clean hydrogen and biofuel projects struggle to launch
China makes $31 billion nuclear push with approvals for 11 reactors across five regions
Water usage in Virginia’s ‘data center alley’ has jumped by almost two-thirds since 2019
U.S. to support global treaty aiming to reduce production of plastics
Scores in Serbia rally against Rio Tinto’s lithium project
California gets the nation’s first zero-emission hydrogen-powered passenger train
Copper giant Codelco invests in EVs, cacti as part of green makeover
Ford scraps electric SUV in $1.9 billion hit to EV ambitions
How booming electricity demand is stalling efforts to retire coal and gas
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