WEBVTT

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GEOFF BENNETT: Good evening.
It is good to be with
you. And we begin tonight
with a fast spreading

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fire that's burning out of
control in California at
the doorstep of Yosemite
National Park. Hot

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and dry conditions linked
to climate change are
making it an exceptionally
tough fire to fight.

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The flames moved so
swiftly residents had very
little warning to get out.

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The fire engulfed entire
homes in the sparsely
populated mountain communities

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of Mariposa County. So far
more than 6,000 people have
been forced to evacuate.

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The Oak fire ignited Friday
afternoon and since then
has exploded in size,

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more than doubling from
Saturday into Sunday to 22
square miles enabling the fire,

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foam dry vegetation after the
worst drought in a decade. How
fire authorities report more

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than 2,000 firefighters are
battling the blaze that so
far is 0 percent contained.

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The Oak fire is so large, it's
visible from the International
Space Station drifting over

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a swath of the western
United States. That says 85
million people across the
country this weekend are

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under excessive heat
warnings or advisories. In
some places, temperatures
hitting triple digits.

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Joining us now to talk more
about the role of climate
change and all of this

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is Michael Mann. He's a
professor of atmospheric
science at Penn State University

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and author of the new
Climate War. Michael, it's
good to have you with us.

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And look, we've got record heat
from coast to coast drought
in the south in the west,

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you've got pervasive wildfires,
as this map that we're
going to put up makes clear.

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Does this all of this mean
that climate change is
happening faster than expected?

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MICHAEL MANN, DIRECTOR, EARTH
SYSTEM SCIENCE CENTER: Yes.
Thanks, Geoff. It's good to be

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with you. It's unfortunate that
we're always talking about these
sorts of very damaging extreme

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weather events these days. And,
yes, there are some impacts of
climate change that are playing

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out faster, and with a
greater magnitude than
we predicted, just say a
decade ago or so. That's

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true with the collapse
of the ice sheets and
the sea level rise that's
occurring because of that.

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And it's true with many of
these extreme summer weather
events that we're seeing.

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And one of the ingredients,
of course is, you know,
you make the planet warmer,

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you're going to see more
extreme heat. You dry
out the continents in the
summer, you're going to get

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worse drought. You combine
that heat and drought
and you get the sorts of
wildfires that we've seen

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out west in California and
throughout the western United
States in recent years.

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But there's an extra ingredient
there that isn't actually very
well captured in the models. And

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that's the behavior of
the Jetstream that causes
these high and low pressure
systems to get stuck

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in place. And when you get one
of these deep, high pressures,
like we have out west right now,

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over California and the
western U.S., that's when
you get those extremely
hot, dry conditions that

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give you these wildfires.
And what's happening
is those systems are
getting stuck in place.

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So the extreme heat that we've
seen, the floods, the wildfires,
the drought across the entire

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northern hemisphere this summer,
part of what's going on, is
this sort of stuck, jet stream

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pattern. It is something
that we think is being
made more frequent because
of climate change, and

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it isn't well captured in
the models. It's another
reminder that uncertainty
isn't our friend here.

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GEOFF BENNETT: Are the
heat waves across the globe
connected? I ask the question

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because we saw a parts of
Oklahoma hit 115 degrees
this past week. Meantime,

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you've got airport runways
melting in the UK, from the
heat is all of that connected.

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MICHAEL MANN: It is connected.
I mean, obviously you
make the planet warmer,

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you get more that extreme
summer heat. So there's that
connection. But there's also

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this behavior of the jet stream
where you get these very large
Mander. When the jet stream

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wiggles north and south
dramatically, that
means that there are big
weather systems underneath

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there big high and low pressure
systems. And that's where you
get either with a high pressure

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the extreme heat drought in
those wildfires, or with a low
pressure, the extreme flooding.

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And so we've seen this
summer after summer, it's
sort of Groundhog Day

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now here. Every summer now
we see this phenomenon,
part of it is pretty basic,

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it's easy to explain in terms
of human caused warming, but
some of the mechanisms are more

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subtle. And again, they are one
of the reasons the models may be
under estimating the impact that

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climate change is now having on
these devastating extreme events
that we're seeing every summer.

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GEOFF BENNETT: It's interesting,
former Vice President Al Gore
was on a number of the Sunday

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shows this morning. And he made
that same point that some of the
warnings about climate change

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might have been, in many
ways too conservative,
take a look at this.

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AL GORE, Former U.S.
Vice President: And the
fact that they were dead,
right, maybe a little

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conservative, even in
their projections should
cause us to pay more
careful attention to what

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they're warning us about
now. They're saying that
if we don't stop using
our atmosphere as an open

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sewer, and if we don't
stop these heat trapping
emissions, things are
going to get a lot worse.

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GEOFF BENNETT: So what
do you make of that?

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MICHAEL MANN: Yes, well, you
know, Al Gore was out there in
front warning us decades ago

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as the scientific community
was warning us decades ago. And
what we're seeing happen now

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is our predictions playing out.
That's the sad part of this. We
understood that we had a crisis

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on our hands decades ago.
But because of inaction,
much of it, because of
the fossil fuel industry

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and politicians who refuse to
act on climate, we've allowed
this problem now to grow to epic

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proportions to the point
where we're seeing the
devastating consequences
play out in real time.

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GEOFF BENNETT: President Biden,
as you know, he's trying to
keep his faltering climate

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change agenda alive by taking
executive action, since
you have Democratic Senator

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Joe Manchin, and all of
the Senate Republicans
withholding their vote
on legislative action.

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Are executive actions enough?
And what more should the private
sector do on their own? I

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would think that good climate
policy would also be in many
ways good business policy.

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MICHAEL MANN: Yes, that's
exactly right, Geoff,
and you are seeing some
companies take a more

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enlightened view,
recognizing that you
know, that their customers
that their clients expect

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environmental stewardship.
This is weighing on the minds
of Americans, increasingly,

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these devastating impacts
that we're seeing from extreme
weather events that have been

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exacerbated by climate change.
And so it is important that
business be out in front,

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lobbying politicians to act
on our collective behalf
to do what's right here.

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But you're right. Right now,
we're sort of stuck with
this split Congress with,

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you know, a Democrat and Joe
Manchin, who refuses to support

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his fellow Democrats in
passing climate legislation.
There's a limit to what

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you can do through
executive actions, the
Biden administration
is doing what it can.

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But the most important
thing it can do right now
is to use the bully pulpit

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to convey the absolute
-- absolutely essential
importance of turning out in

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these midterm elections
this fall in voting for
politicians who will
support climate legislation,

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because the only way that we are
going to be living -- be able
to live up to our obligations

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to the rest of the world to
cut our carbon emissions in
half by 2030 as we've promised.

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The only way that will
happen is if we pass climate
legislation and we need a

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Congress that's willing to
do that, and if we have,
you know, Congress people

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who aren't willing to do that
we need to vote them out and we
need to vote in those who will.

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GEOFF BENNETT: Michael
Mann, it's always great
to speak with you.

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Circumstances aside. Thanks
so much for your time.

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MICHAEL MANN: Thank you, Geoff.