Yves here. Yours truly is keeping the Yale Climate Connections headline even though it (like too many in the press) abuses and degrades the word “hero”. A hero takes physical risk, even of death, to take elective action to aid another with no motive of personal benefit. But whales are far more powerful and positive environmental actors than is widely acknowledged.

By Daisy Simmons, an assistant editor with Yale Climate Connections. Originally published at Yale Climate Connections

Who among us has not been at least momentarily awed by an image or video of a whale breaking through the ocean’s surface, connecting the sea and the sky in such a glorious, mammalian, and utterly alien way – a glimpse, if only for a moment, into another dimension of the world

Whales are some of the biggest and most majestic creatures on Earth, and scientists and conservationists say they are also climate heroes.…