Blue-green algal bloom. Source: Minnesota Pollution Control Agency
Senator James Inhofe of Oklahoma is one of the most prominent climate change deniers in the U.S., and a frequent critic of the regulatory practices of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
An unfortunate run-in with reality, however, caused him to miss the annual Heartland Deniers Conference last week, where he was scheduled to deliver the keynote address.
It seems that Sen. Inhofe decided to take a morning swim in the algae-infested waters of Oklahoma’s Grand Lake. By evening, he’d become “deathly sick” with a severe upper respiratory illness.
What contributes to the kind of toxic, blue-green algae bloom that made Inhofe so ill?
You guessed it — warmer than average temperatures and dry conditions, such as those predicted for states like Oklahoma by global warming models, and nutrient runoff, which Inhofe has argued should not be regulated by the EPA under the Clean Water Act.
Meanwhile, Oklahoma is suffering a record-setting heat wave and drought conditions that haven’t been seen since the Dust Bowl era of the 1930s, and Inhofe acknowledges that the algae bloom that made him ill is unlike anything he’s seen on the lake in the decades since he’s had a home there.
So, having been treated to a personal preview of things to come, might the Senator reconsider his stands on climate change and environmental? I suppose anything is possible, but I wouldn’t count on it.
His reason for missing the conference? He was “under the weather…”
