ecoRI News spoke with experts about the risks that Rhode Island will face going forward as heat waves hit more frequently and for longer periods. DEEPS Chair Meredith Hastings commented, noting that when it’s hot outside, air quality tends to get worse. “Under hotter conditions we speed up reactions,” she said. “That can lead to the faster production of secondary pollution.”

Dozens of veteran climate scientists have launched a coordinated response to a Trump administration report that casts doubt on the severity of climate change. Kim Cobb, DEEPS Professor and Director of IBES, told CNN it’s significant that the Trump administration is deep-sixing the climate assessments at the same time it’s releasing a misleading new report. She also said she hopes to help “set the record straight” on climate science in their response to the DOE report.

Strong new evidence suggests that primordial material from the planet’s center is somehow making its way out. Continent-size entities anchored to the core-mantle boundary might be involved. Assistant Professor Harriet Lau commented on this exciting research, noting: if material is effusing from the core into the mantle, is the boundary between them “as distinct as we think?”