Marty Walters

I have devoted much of my weather & climate career to engaging with journalists--including 200-300 news media interviews per year, many of which involve recurring conversations to facilitate timely & contextually accurate coverage. This recent collapse has been stunning and deeply disconcerting.

Thank you for the analysis! I was thinking the same thing but without any of the science-based explanation of why.

West Virginia AGJohn McCuskey—one of the oil and gas industry’s staunchest allies—called them an “industry-destroying problem.”

“There will be no more oil industries, there will be no more coal industries, there will be no more natural gas industries,” he said. “If we lose one, we lose them all.”

Trump is wiping out all climate regulation. Big Oil may regret it. For decades, oil majors fought climate regulation. Now, they’re afraid Trump’s extreme rollbacks could leave them on the hook to pay for what they’ve done.

"Oil corporations have realized that repealing the endangerment finding could backfire, leaving them more vulnerable to accountability than ever before.” I agree with this analysis. API has a plan, which sounds good until they get punched in the mouth. heated.world/p/trump-is-w...

Good move! My mom is blind, so I started riding DaBus at a very early age. I remember in high school being at canoe regattas on the windward side on Sunday and just waiting and waiting and wondering how long I’d have to wait for a bus to come by to take me back to town.

It is shocking how bad the reporting is on this across California.

The actual cost per acre for treatment and then separately for planning/permitting and oversight should be required for every single grant dollar and every project. AND we need to start preparing realistic cost projections for long-term maintenance and/or transition to ongoing treatment like PB.

So much easier to just stay home and live to drive another day. SR70 has been open throughout this storm, which is real gift given the last few years in the Feather River Canyon.

Hah! If only I were that geographically talented! But honestly I’m amazed anyone can remember that I’m from Plumas County just to start!

Here’s where all the drama is documented: bof.fire.ca.gov/projects-and...

So the Board of Forestry is in a standoff between the urban neighborhood gardeners and the insurance industry. Uncomfortable! We’ll be lucky if we see a resolution before mid 2026.

Among the four current proposed solutions, none of them exactly conform to the absolute zero vegetation in the Zero Zone that the Institute for Business and Home Safety, an insurance industry research group, advocated.

I really appreciate the BOF listened to our feedback on firewood, kerosene tanks, and definitions. We suggested allowance for large trees whose trunks and/or branches are within the 5-foot zone, but that are at least 5-10 feet from the home's roof and at least 10 feet away from chimneys.

That’s a total of about 2 million homes and nearly every home and commercial building in my region, #PlumasCounty. The Plumas County Fire Safe Council submitted comments to the Board of Forestry supporting the proposed regulations and pointing out some key issues - addressed in the next draft.

There were two presentations on Monday by LA-area organizations that are pushing back very hard on the proposals to significantly restrict the amount and kinds of vegetation that could be placed within five feet of homes in wildfire severity zones in California.

We are not going to see the Zone Zero regs adopted before mid 2026. On Monday, the California Board of Forestry's Zone Zero Committee met again to review their draft regulations.

Of the ten economists Nordhaus surveyed one is Lawrence Summers, ex-President of Harvard University, director of the National Economic Council from 2009-10, and the 71st United States Secretary of the Treasury from 1999 to 2001. It was he, who as the World Bank’s Chief Economist from ’91 to ’93, signed off on an internal memo arguing that exporting pollution to countries with lower wages would reduce “foregone earnings from increased morbidity and mortality,” so that “the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that.” Larry Summers appears as No.17 on the list. Under the sub-heading Apocalypse or Small Potatoes, Nordhaus asks respondents for their “best guess” at the impact of 3-degree warming by 2090. The reaction ..in the words of respondent 17, would be “small potatoes.”

Speaking of Larry Summers.

Here's what he famously said about toxic waste and #climate breakdown.

What a di*k! 🤡

Quoted here by @annpettifor.bsky.social
annpettifor.substack.com/p/nordhaus-r...

Also: a change in projections is not a change in emissions. It's one indicator of progress: but it's misleading to present it as the best, most reliable or most meaningful, or to centre it too aggressively.

At worst: lukewarmists and centre-right techno-solutionists do this to downplay urgency

Several States at #COP30 are feeling nervous this week. Turns out, clarifying your legal obligations is uncomfortable when you’ve been ignoring them.

A short thread to clarify how the International Court of Justice climate ruling is a lens 🔎 not handcuffs 🚔.

A 🧵

I’ve already started reading it. Sometimes I think I’m grasping at straws, and sometimes I think yes, I gotta comb through every bit of strategy and intelligence. Low resource places like Plumas County, we’re inundated with information and totally on our own all at the same time.

November 6-7 Workshop Managing Risk in a Changing World Noon-3pm Eastern Time on Zoom Intensifying weather Unstable economy Tightening resources Asset quality is the key to investment and lending resilience. Learn the right moves now. Environmental Bankers Association

Rare opportunity to access an insider view of commercial banking asset valuation and emerging risks. This is a 6-hour workshop over two days, and we really get into some deep and challenging issues. $250 but DM me for a great discount code!

www.envirobank.org/page/Managin...

A photo of the Mountain Maidu Big Meadows (now Lake Almanor) with Kohm Yah-mah-nee (now called Mount Lassen) with its first layer of snow for the season.

Big Meadows was dammed to form Lake Almanor with Kohm Yah-mah-nee (now called Mount Lassen) in the background, with its first layer of snow for the season.

I'm realizing that I really need to understand the grandfathering provisions for post-catastrophe rebuilding in California. I do not understand why rebuilt homes in Greenville are not built to the WUI code and exactly which elements they were exempted from. Putting this on my homework list.

A photo of a home burning down with the text "Homes that ignite by wildfire have a 90+% chance of completely burning down. Source: CAL FIRE DINS Data" There is a smaller photo of Chief Daniel Berlant.

California insurance town hall this afternoon - just catching it after getting home from inspecting homes for wildfire risks. But not only do I talk about preventing home ignitions, I share the good news that home hardening increases your home's chance of surviving by a whole lot!

Why banks’ credit risk models are blind to climate shocks Regulators need to change the rules to ensure adequate climate risk management

Why banks’ credit risk models are blind to climate

18% of banks integrate climate risk into their internal ratings-based models

credit risk and climate risk models are built on different logics

Unless supervisors adapt, these models will remain blind..
www.thebanker.com/content/1f61...

California's home insurer of last resort seeks 36% rate hike following January fires The California FAIR Plan Assn., which covers homeowners denied insurance, is seeking a 35.8% rate increase, though some policyholders could pay more or less depending on fire risk.

CA FAIR plan seeks 35.8% rate increase.

#climaterisk

www.latimes.com/business/sto...

This is 21st Century Fire:
Maine is the Nova Scotia of the US: historically, foggy, soggy
#wildfire

Wildfire-smoke-related deaths in the US could climb to 70,000 per year by 2050 due to climate change, study finds The number of deaths from exposure to wildfire smoke in the U.S. could rise by more than 70% in the next 25 years. The human and economic costs involved would be astronomical, researchers say.

Wildfire-smoke-related deaths in the US could climb to 70,000 per year by 2050 due to climate change, study finds www.livescience.com/health/virus... #ClimateCrisis #FossilFuels #Heatwave #Wildfire #Particulates #America

How to track disaster spending in your community As rising global temperatures fuel more intense weather, and disaster recovery budgets skyrocket, this accountability work has never been more important.

How to track disaster spending in your community.

grist.org/accountabili...

#Disaster #Weather #Climate #Money #Contracts

65K Houston-area properties have been built in floodplains since Hurricane Harvey Houston’s relentless push into new suburbs has overlooked flood risks, putting tens of thousands of families in harm’s way.

Terrific investigation by the @houstonchronicle.com finds that 20% of residential properties built since Harvey in greater Houston are in a mapped floodplain, 57,000 in-all. www.houstonchronicle.com/projects/202...