To say mask-wearing is "not justified by science" is just plain wrong

Air Canada, for some reason, believes that the federal governments highly suspect decision to do away with the requirement for masks on planes and trains is "acknowledging that air travel is safe and that the measures were not justified by science". 

Cobblers, I say. The government has made a purely political and economic decision and kowtowed to the anti-masking, anti-vaccine lobby. "Science" doesn't come into it. The "science" is that masks are one of the few measures available to us (and the easiest one at that) that can be effective in reducing the transmission of COVID-19, which is still rampant in Canada and in the rest of the world. 

Just because they think it benefits their own commercial interests (a dubious contention in itself - many people are now less likely to fly, not more) does not mean that it is the right thing to do.

Ontario court's mysterious ruling on teachers of colour

Way back in 2019, the province of Ontario, in its wisdom, mandated a math test for all new teachers, regardless of what subjects they are to teach.

Now, whatever you might think to that particular idea conceptually (and I know what I think), an Ontario Divisional Court has ruled that the math test should be discontinued, not because it's a daft idea, but because they say it has "a disproportionate effect on racialized teachers".

I don't know whether the court gave a little more insight into this decision, but I truly don't know what it means. Can people of colour not do math as well as white folks? Is this what they are saying? It's a bit of a mystery to me.

The government is taking its new math test for teachers to the Ontario appeals court.

US ratifies major international climate treaty - wait, what?

Hardly anybody noticed and very few news outlets bothered to report it, but the US Senate ratified a major international climate treaty this week.

The Senate finally joined 137 other countries (including Canada) in ratifying the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol (what? and what?). Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer dates back to 1987, and was the international agreement to eliminate chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and hydrochlorofluorocarbons (HCFCs) that had been found to be destroying the ozone layer. It was one of the stand-out international environmental agreements of the 20th century. The Kigali Amendment dates from 2016, and calls for the phasing out of hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs). HFCs have been widely used as replacements for the banned CFCs and HCFCs and, while they have next to no impact on ozone, they are potent greenhouse gases, hence the Kigali Amendment.

The US Senate voted to ratify it with bipartisan support (48 Democrats and 21 Republicans). Probably the main reason such a major ratification attracted such little media attention is the fact that the US has actually been effectively complying with the treaty since December 2020, even without having ratified it, when the US Congress passed stringent targets for eliminating HFCs as part of an otherwise lame COVID stimulus bill. 

By some calculations, this is expected to eliminate the equivalent of 900 million metric tons of carbon dioxide (for context, this is more emissions than Germany produces in a year) by 3036, so yes, this is a big deal climate-wise, not so much the ratification, but the 2020 legislation that hardly anyone remembers. The ratification, however, is important too, as it keeps the legal regime underpinning the agreement strong for the future. Now, the three largest producers and consumers of HFCs - USA, China and India - have all ratified the Amendment.

Between this and the climate change elements of the poorly-named Inflation Reduction Act (which I have commented on elsewhere), the Biden administration could be said to be presiding over a mini golden age of climate change policy-making. Long may it last.

Extraordinary footage of post-tropical storm Fiona aftermath

Here is some fascinating footage of coastal dunes in Prince Edward Island before and after post-tropical storm Fiona passed through the other day, courtesy of University of Windsor Research.

The dunes, delicate ecosystems at the best of times, have been completely scraped up and scattered to the winds. It looks for all the world as though an almighty backhoe has been through and excavated the whole beach. Extraordinary.

In among all the economic damage, it's easy to forget the environmental damage of all these storms and hurricanes, particularly when they affect us so rarely here in Canada.

Fallout from Ukraine war takes on an environmental aspect

Russia's invasion of Ukraine has already had many deleterious effects on the world, from runaway inflation to uncertain energy supply to famine in sub-Saharan Africa and elsewhere. But now another major implication is raising its head.

The apparent sabotage of both of the Nord Stream gas pipelines in the North Sea is leaking massive amounts of methane into the atmosphere. Most commentators are laying the blame on Russian actors, official or otherwise, despite the fact that it is also a shot in their own foot. The predictable Russian response, that it is sabotage by the USA or Germany (or anyone but Russia, really), is much less convincing.

It is hard to measure the amount of gas escaping from the pipelines, but it is likely to be the largest ever methane leak, and words like "disastrous" and "unprecedented are being bandied around by climate scientists. Methane is a potent greenhouse gas and has a climate impact of over 80 times that of carbon dioxide over a 20-year period. The Environmental Defense Fund has estimated that more than 115,000 tons of methane has escaped, equivalent to about 9.6 million tons of carbon dioxide, or emissions from 2 million cars for a year.

This is just one more disastrous effect of Putin's ill-advised exercise in empire-building. Europe, and the world in general, will be recovering from this for many years to come.

The fascinating (and unexplained) phenomenon of chain fountains

I seem to have missed it until my daughter pointed it out to me, but apparently chain fountains are "all over the Internet".

A chain fountain is a strange scientific phenomenon similar to the way in which certain polymers and even plastic beads will self-siphon out of a beaker, once given a start. But Steve Mould realized that, when metal beads are used instead of plastic, the chain actually rises above the pot before falling back down, in a kind of counter-intuitive anti-gravitational event.

In this longer video, as well as trying to break the world record for the highest recorded chain fountain, Mould (whose YouTube channel specializes in all sorts of of weird and inexplicable physical effects) attempts to give a layman's explanation of it without getting too bogged down in the physics and the math (roughly gravitational potential energy being converted into kinetic energy), but it seems clear that there are still some unknown forces acting on the chain, which has become known as the "Mould effect", so even the brightest minds have been unable to fully explain it.

The twisty logic of carbon credits

Ontario Power Generation (OPG) has agreed to sell clean energy credits to Microsoft, which has made promises to clean up its energy profile and make its operations carbon neutral by 2030.

This all sounds very laudable, but as far as I can tell, the OPG credits should not be considered carbon credits at all. Microsoft is paying OPG money to make its annual report look better, but OPG is not doing anything new to justify the credits. Yes, Ontario's energy production is reasonably green (if you count a significant proportion of nuclear energy, which may be carbon neutral, but is far from environmentally sound in other respects). But the money Microsoft is paying for the credits does not require OPG to do anything new, just to carry on doing what it was doing before. This is not my understanding of how carbon credits are supposed to work.

Another part of this same Globe article adds a new twist. The City of Ottawa, which buys its electricity from OPG like everyone else in Ontario, is officially objecting to OPG selling its clean energy credits outside the province to coal-burning jurisdictions seeking to improve their energy profile.

Once again, you might think this was a good thing: these other states and provinces obtain electricity with less carbon output, substituting some of their own dirty electricity with clean Ontario energy. However, Ottawa is arguing that "this is removing the environmental attributes from the electricity our community consumes". As an Environmental Defence lawyer puts it, "It's as if Ontario is back to burning coal, by giving other people an excuse to do so".

Now, hold on, does that make any logical sense? If a coal-burning state or province buys in some of Ontario's cleaner power, they have to generate less of their own dirty power. It works as an environmentally beneficial substitution, surely. It neither reflects badly on Ontario, nor on anyone else who buys Ontario's power. Nevertheless, Environmental Defence, which in other respects I would trust, are calling on Ontario Energy Board (OEB) to investigate OPG's practice of selling to coal-burning outsiders. This makes no sense to me.

This is just another aspect of the twisty pretzel logic that seems to operate wherever carbon credits are involved.

Gross irresponsibility in the face of Mother Nature

The Maritime provinces of Canada has been hit by a huge storm, post-tropical storm Fiona, not quite a hurricane, but close. Television coverage has been blanket, among the reports being the usual interviews with harassed regular folks on the ground.

However, I couldn't help but take issue with one such interview, a middle-aged woman with small kids, who was on the verge of tears and seemed absolutely outraged that the storm should have interfered with their vacation at a cottage, somewhere in Nova Scotia.

Er, sorry, but did she not know that a huge storm was coming, one of those once-in-a-century events that tend to occur every year or two these days? The media has been saturated with it for the best part of a week. I knew about it; why did she not? Or, if she did, why was she (and her family) still there? 

It's one thing for residents to consider relocating for the duration of the storm, but there is no reason at all for a tourist to still be there, relying on the hard-pressed emergency services to pull them out if need be. This is the height of irresponsibility and should be called out in no uncertain terms by the television reporters in question.