William A. Liggett — June 24, 2020

For someone who is concerned about climate change, I am fortunate to live in Boulder, Colorado with its large number of scientists working for agencies based here including the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC), and several environmental research departments at the University of Colorado. Todd Sanford is a neighbor and one of those climate scientists who I was introduced to recently. …

William A. Liggett — December 12, 2019

The biggest challenge facing humanity now is climate change, so shouldn’t we use every tool we have to address it? How can we change attitudes? How about behavior? How can we help people see a path toward reducing greenhouse gasses? The social psychologist Sander van der Linden suggests, “The ultimate solution to climate change lies with (changing) the psychology of the individual.”

I welcome any effort to use social science (e.g. sociology or anthropology) to answer these concerns, but my training in applied social psychology makes me consider all the factors that influence attitudes and behaviors, including the internal (psychological and physiological) and external (social and physical). …

William A. Liggett— Aug 10, 2019

Later this month, a brass plaque will be installed to commemorate the first of Iceland’s glaciers to be downgraded from “glacier” to “dead ice” due to its shrinking from climate change. Such a gesture brings the world’s attention to the plight facing most of the glaciers on the planet. The Arapahoe Glacier near my home in Colorado experienced a similar downgrade to a snowfield in 2008.

Ever since the enlightenment in the 18th century, human civilization has relied on science and technology to solve difficult problems, like overcoming diseases and travel over long distances. …

William A. Liggett

Are strong women overlooked and even disliked because of a cultural bias? In addition to the attention this has received recently, I have suspected a similar theme in some of the reviews of my first novel, Watermelon Snow.

Although generally favorable (4.4 out of 5 stars on Amazon), some comments have been critical of one of the protagonists, Kate, a glaciologist leading a group of graduate students on a summer field project on the Blue Glacier in Washington state. One person commented, “The main character was pretty rigid and demanding a lot of the time.” …

Have you noticed headlines recently like this one? From CBS News: Record-Breaking Heat and Fire are Worsened by Climate Change, Scientists Say. Some major media outlets are beginning to link climate change to the reports of severe weather events this summer.

Is it possible that this summer’s high number and intensity of heat waves, wildfires in the west, and record rains and flooding in the east have finally convinced people that the effects of global warming are happening today?

Some of us had thought we had until 2100 or at least until 2050 before climate change would be upon us, but the headlines from around the world this summer tell a different story. …

William A. Liggett

Just when we started to worry about sea level rise and species loss, now we are confronted with bunker fuel. It can feel like “What’s next? It’s all too much.”

I can relate to that reaction because I subscribe to “Google Alerts,” which emails me a daily list of mostly bad news articles about the environment. I continue to read them because they paint a picture of our changing world that we need to be aware of, even if we can’t personally control the outcome.

Well, at the risk of sending another bad news story your way, here goes. …