Climate Truth & The Huffington Post – 2016-08-17 00:51:48
https://act.climatetruth.org/sign/EnergyLiesHere_fshare
What Exxon’s Olympic Ads SHOULD Say
Climate Truth.org
(August 16, 2016) — While climate change has been a major focus of the Rio Olympics, Exxon Mobil is paying a lot of money to advertise their #EnergyLivesHere campaign and brag about their to-do list.
Oh, Exxon. We already know you do WAY more than just “make the gas.” They claim to work on clean energy solutions in splashy ads, but in reality, Exxon lobbies our legislators to block the affordable clean energy we need.
Exxon’s greenwashing won’t fool us, because climate change is already impacting the Olympics and the world. Olympic athletes have been using their celebrity status to raise awareness of global warming, and the opening ceremonies featured a powerful video on the threat facing global cities. Scientists are predicting that many cities may soon be too hot and humid in the summers to host the Olympics at all.
Watch the #EnergyLiesHere video to see what Exxon’s ads SHOULD say, then sign up to join ClimateTruth.org and fight back against Exxon’s lies.
Exxon at the Rio Olympics:
Putting the Torch to Big Oil’s Role in Climate Change
Exxon is going for the gold in irony by running a massive advertising campaign at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio — where the global climate crisis has been a major theme.
Exxon wants to greenwash its image, but we can’t be fooled by expensive ads. By sharing this spoof of Exxon’s ad campaign, you can help expose the truth
Olympic athletes have been using their celebrity status to raise awareness of global warming, and the opening ceremonies featured a powerful video on the threat facing global cities. Scientists are predicting that many cities may soon be too hot and humid in the summers to host the Olympics at all.
Meanwhile, Exxon’s #EnergyLivesHere ads imply that their business model is based on clean energy and charity, rather than selling the fossil fuels that are driving global warming.
We can’t let Exxon get away with glossing over the real problem. While they claim to work on clean energy solutions in splashy ads like these, they lobby our legislators to block the affordable clean energy we need.
What’s just as bad is that Exxon funds disinformation to confuse the public about the threats of climate change.
We must stand with the Olympic athletes speaking out on climate change on behalf of home countries threatened by climate disaster — from Afghanistan to the Marshall Islands.
ACTION: Please share the #EnergyLiesHere video to make it clear that the world will not be fooled by Exxon’s greenwashing.
Truthfully yours,
Daniela, Emily, Brandy, Amanda, Brant, and the rest of the ClimateTruth.org team
MORE INFORMATION:
“Enjoy it while you can: Climate change is already hitting the Olympics hard,” Grist. 08-08-2016.
“ExxonMobil Takes The Olympic Gold In Deceitful Advertising,” The Huffington Post. 08-09-2016.
ClimateTruth.org fights the denial, distortion and disinformation that block bold action on climate change.
In 70 Years, The Earth Could Be Too Hot For The Summer Olympics
Finding suitable locations for the Olympics is about to get really, really difficult
Natasha Geiling / ThinkProgress
(August 16, 2016) — As a host city, Rio de Janeiro has seen its share of problems in preparing for and hosting the 2016 Olympic Games, from collapsing infrastructure to terrible pollution. But preliminary results of an ongoing study published Friday in the journal Lancet warn that infrastructure and security issues could be dwarfed by another huge problem for potential host cities in coming years: it could become simply too hot and humid for many cities to host the games at all.
“The climate could be so bad in 70 years that the Games will change forever.”
The study, written by a group of US and Australian researchers, looked at how global climate change would affect the viability of host cities in 2085. In less than eighty years, the researchers concluded, only eight cities in the Northern Hemisphere — outside of Western Europe — will have a cool enough climate to host the summer games.
No cities in Latin America or Africa would be viable hosts for the games, and only three North American cities — Calgary, Vancouver, and San Francisco — would qualify.
“The climate could be so bad in 70 years that the Games will change forever,” Kirk Smith, a professor of public health at Berkeley, and co-author of the findings, told SFGate. “They might hold the Summer Games indoors, but can you imagine running an indoor marathon?”
The study looked only at cities in the northern hemisphere, which houses 90 percent of the human population. And while the full findings of the study are yet to be published, these preliminary results are a red flag for cities like Tokyo, which is set to host the 2020 Summer Olympic Games, and Los Angeles, which is one of the final bid cities for the 2024 Olympics.
According to the study, both of these cities could be too hot and humid to host to outdoor athletic competition in 2085.
But it’s not just the Summer Olympics that are threatened by climate change — previous studies have also raised the possibility that the Winter Olympics could be equally endangered by rising global temperatures.
In a 2014 study, researchers from the University of Waterloo in Canada and the Management Center Innsbruck in Austria looked at how previous Winter Olympics host cities would fare in the 2050s and 2080s under low-emissions and high-emissions scenarios. For the high-emissions scenario, only six of the 19 past host cities for the Winter Olympics would be able to host the games. Under a low-emissions scenario, by the 2080s, only 10 previous hosts would be able to host the games.
Host cities for the Winter Olympics have already faced issues related to warming weather. In 2014, temperatures in Sochi reached 68 degrees Fahrenheit, making it the warmest winter games in history. In 2010, organizers at the Vancouver games had to bring in snow, airlifting it by helicopter and hauling it in by the truckload to ensure that there was enough powder to keep the games running.
With an increasing body of scientific literature warning that the viable number of Olympic sites could be seriously dwindling, the idea of hosting the Olympics in the same place each year seems more and more appealing. But before the International Olympic Committee takes over an empty island somewhere to create the Olympic Island, maybe someone should make sure it won’t eventually be underwater due to sea-level rise.
Posted in accordance with Title 17, Section 107, US Code, for noncommercial, educational purposes.
