Climate Point: Confounded by climate terms? You're not alone. Mitigation, adaptation, WTH?

Welcome to Climate Point, your weekly guide to climate, energy and the environment. I'm Janet Wilson from Palm Springs, California.

Even if you're concerned about a rapidly warming planet, it can be tough to decipher all the jargon. Take three parts science-speak and two parts bureaucratic lingo, add a dash of pontificating economists, and you're left scratching your head. You're not alone.

A new study by the University of Southern California and the United Nations Foundation finds U.S. residents struggle to understand terms used in international reports to describe climate change, and think it could be done a lot more simply.

The least understood word? Mitigation. According to Merriam-Webster's online dictionary, it means making something less severe, dangerous, painful, harsh or damaging. Got it.

Other terms in the survey were “carbon neutral,” “unprecedented transition,” “tipping point,” “sustainable development,” “carbon dioxide removal,” “adaptation,” and “abrupt change.”  Guess which was the easiest to understand? If you said "abrupt change,” you're right. 

Participants were also asked to provide suggestions for alternative language. In general, they advised using simpler terms and using them in the context of climate change. For example, for “tipping point,” which the IPCC defines as “an irreversible change in the climate system,” one respondent offered: “too late to fix anything.”

Let's hope not, though this summer's hit parade of climate disasters continues. Here are some other stories that may be of interest.

MUST-READ STORIES

Slick. What appears to be a miles-long oil slick is visible near an offshore rig in the Gulf of Mexico after Hurricane Ida, according to aerial survey imagery by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration reviewed by the Associated Press.

The government imagery, along with additional photos by AP, also show Louisiana port facilities, oil refineries and shipyards in the storm’s path, with the telltale rainbow sheen typical of spills visible in the water of bays and bayous.

State and federal regulators said Wednesday that they had been unable to reach the stricken area. AP's Michael Biesecker and Gerald Herbert break the news.

Lights out. While Hurricane Ida didn't overtop New Orleans' levees, as Katrina did 16 years ago, it did knock out all eight main transmission lines into the city, as Ivan Penn with the New York Times details. A new natural gas energy plant by Entergy did not provide backup. More than a million customers in Louisiana and 100,000 in Mississippi were left in the dark. The storm raises fresh questions about how well the energy industry has prepared for natural disasters, which scientists believe are becoming more common because of climate change

Fuel. Despite being home to major oil and gas refineries, Louisiana is now  "desperate" for gasoline and diesel to fuel recovery efforts in the southeastern part of the state.  

Mold. Louisiana residents with no power in punishing heat are bracing for another concern: mold. Ida's 150 mph winds blew water into houses. Roof damage or blown-out windows can trap water inside, spawning mold colonies in as soon as 48 hours.

"Once they start to grow, it's exponential," Claudette Reichel, a housing specialist at the Louisiana State University Agricultural Center, told Todd A. Price with Houma Today.

Marooned. Crewmembers say they are stranded on a leaking drill ship after being forced to ride out horror-filled hours of Hurricane Ida in the Gulf of Mexico 100 miles from shore. They said the companies who were supposed to evacuate them before the storm never did.

"I was watching grown men with life jackets hold on for dear life crying in the hallway. It was bad,” a crew member told KLFY.

Overdue. Cape Cod and much of the Northeast coast is overdue for major hurricane.

Tahoe turmoil. Western wildfires continue to rage, with 1.88 million acres in California alone burned by midday Wednesday. U.S. Army troops arrived to help 14,000 exhausted firefighters battle the Dixie Fire and other monster blazes. Lake Tahoe area tourists and residents, many of them blue-collar workers, evacuated on Tuesday, sitting in traffic for hours as flames approached. The fire drove home a hidden truth, as the Reno Gazette Journal's Amy Alonzo and Marcella Corona write: 

"Everyone knows about the big, beautiful mansions and gem blue water. But behind Lake Tahoe’s beauty live thousands of people who support the region’s bustling tourist industry and provide services for this small resort community. As the Caldor Fire burns through the Tahoe Basin, forcing residents to flee homes and businesses, blue-collar workers are now unsure what their future holds there."

Wild. There are other casualties as such fires burn more frequently. The Caldor Fire may imperil fish important to Lake Tahoe-area tribes, including threatened Lahontan cutthroat trout, as Debra Uracia Krol will the Arizona Republic tells us. And all of California's national forests but one are now shut through mid-September, including over popular Labor Day weekend, in an attempt to prevent more fires.

POLITICAL CLIMATE

Drill, baby, drill. The Biden administration announced plans on Tuesday to open 80 million acres of the Gulf of Mexico to oil and gas exploration, as the White House sought to comply with a court order requiring it to resume lease auctions. Four infuriated environmental groups immediately sued to block the action.

The move represents a setback for Biden's plans to fight climate change, writes Nichola Groom with Reuters. Biden paused drilling auctions after taking office in January. But in June, a federal judge ordered a resumption of auctions, saying the government was required by law to offer acreage to the oil and gas industry.

Serious harm. A federal judge threw out a Trump administration rule allowing the draining and filling of streams, marshes and wetlands. U.S. District Judge Rosemary Márquez, in Arizona, wrote that Trump officials made major errors while writing the regulation and leaving it in place could lead to “serious environmental harm.”

Business and farm groups had supported the push to replace Obama-era rules. The decision, which applies nationwide, will protect drinking-water supplies for millions of Americans, and for thousands of wildlife species that depend on wetlands. The Washington Post's Dino Grandoni and Brady Dennis fill us in.

Ohio says no to oily deicer. The Ohio Department of Transportation will stop purchasing a deicer made from processed brine drawn from oil and gas wells. The agency did not cite environmental concerns in its decision, but a sister agency that tested the product, called AquaSalina, found high levels of carcinogenic radioactive materials, per Beth Harville at the Columbus Dispatch.

AND ANOTHER THING

Perk up. Researchers at Kew's Royal Botanic Gardens have rediscovered a coffee plant that could thrive in a warmer world, according to Yale Climate Connections. The species, once commonly grown in West Africa, was rediscovered in the wild in 2018 after years of searching. It boasts a unique combination of tolerance to high heat and  good flavor — throwing a lifeline to the multibillion-dollar coffee industry, which is vulnerable to climate change – and to all of us who can't survive without our morning cup. 

That's all for this week. Stay lively, and for more climate, energy and environment news, follow me @janetwilson66. You can sign up to get Climate Point in your inbox for free here.