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Recent News:
from GreenTech Media: How Low Can Utility Emissions Go? When it comes to emissions, carbon dioxide tends to get the lion's share of the headlines. But there have been large gains in some of the other major emissions of the largest power producers in the U.S., according to a new report from NRDC and major energy companies, Benchmarking Air Emissions. The ninth annual report found that sulfur dioxide (SO2) and nitrogen oxides (NOX) are 70 percent and 72 percent lower, respectively, than they were in 1990. Mercury is down 40 percent since 2000, the first year that it was tracked.
from University of Colorado at Boulder: World's Melting Glaciers Making Large Contribution to Sea Rise While 99 percent of Earth's land ice is locked up in the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, the remaining ice in the world's glaciers contributed just as much to sea rise as the two ice sheets combined from 2003 to 2009, says a new study led by Clark University and involving the University Colorado Boulder. The new research found that all glacial regions lost mass from 2003 to 2009, with the biggest ice losses occurring in Arctic Canada, Alaska, coastal Greenland, the southern Andes and the Himalayas.
from Science Daily: Methane Emissions Higher Than Thought Across Much of U.S. After taking a rented camper outfitted with special equipment to measure methane on a cross-continent drive, a UC Santa Barbara scientist has found that methane emissions across large parts of the U.S. are higher than currently known, confirming what other more local studies have found. Their research is published in the journal Atmospheric Environment.... Leifer was joined by two UCSB undergraduate students on the road trip from Los Angeles to Florida, taking a primarily southern route through Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Louisiana, and along the Gulf of Mexico. They used specialized instrumentation, a gas chromatograph, to measure methane. The device was mounted in the RV, with an air ram on the roof that collected air samples from in front of the vehicle.... The researchers meandered slowly through areas of fossil fuel activity, such as petroleum and natural gas production, refining, and distribution areas, and other areas of interest. The wide range of sources studied included a coal-loading terminal, a wildfire, and wetlands.
from Scientific American: Climate Change Has Shifted the Location of the North and South Poles Researchers at the University of Texas, Austin, report that increased melting of the Greenland ice sheet -- and to a lesser degree, ice loss in other parts of the globe -- helped to shift the North Pole several centimeters east each year since 2005. "There was a big change," says lead author Jianli Chen, a geophysicist. From 1982 to 2005, the pole drifted southeast toward northern Labrador, Canada, at a rate of about 2 milliarcseconds --or roughly 6 centimetres -- per year. But in 2005, the pole changed course and began galloping east toward Greenland at a rate of more than 7 milliarcseconds per year.... Chen estimates that data on polar shifts goes back roughly a century, well before the advent of Earth-monitoring satellites. "We don't have a long record of measuring the polar ice sheet," he says. "But for polar motion, we have a long record."
from Los Angeles Times: Carbon dioxide in atmosphere did not break 400 ppm at Hawaii site Carbon dioxide measurements in the Earth's atmosphere did not break the symbolic milestone of 400 parts per million at a Hawaiian observatory last week, according to a revised reading from the nation's climate observers. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) revised its May 9 reading at the Mauna Loa observatory in Hawaii, saying it remained fractions of a point below the level of 400 ppm, at 399.89.
from Christian Science Monitor: Google Earth Engine unveils how Earth has altered Google has launched Google Earth Engine, a global, zoomable timelapse map that allows you to witness how humans have altered the surface of the Earth since 1984. Google has launched Google Earth Engine, a global, zoomable timelapse map that allows you to witness how humans have altered the surface of the Earth since 1984.
from Associated Press: Plans to export US natural gas stir debate A domestic natural gas boom already has lowered U.S. energy prices while stoking fears of environmental disaster. Now U.S. producers are poised to ship vast quantities of gas overseas as energy companies seek permits for proposed export projects that could set off a renewed frenzy of fracking. Expanded drilling is unlocking enormous reserves of crude oil and natural gas, offering the potential of moving the country closer to its decades-long quest for energy independence. Yet as the industry looks to profit from foreign markets, there is the specter of higher prices at home and increased manufacturing costs for products from plastics to fertilizers.
from CBCNews: Enbridge breaks safety rules at pipeline pump stations across Canada The biggest oil and gas pipeline company in Canada is breaking National Energy Board safety rules at 117 of its 125 pump stations across the country, but Enbridge says it's not to blame. Enbridge was ordered by the Canadian energy regulator to disclose whether or not it had backup power to operate emergency shut-down systems in the facilities that keep oil flowing through its pipes. The company told the NEB only eight of its pump stations complied with the board's backup power system regulation. On top of that, Enbridge disclosed that 83 of its pump stations were missing emergency shut-down buttons.
from Bloomberg News: Coal Mines' Methane Curbs Fall Victim to EPA Budget Cuts Methane emissions from coal mines escaped being curbed by the Environmental Protection Agency, which said mandatory U.S. budget cuts didn't leave it with the resources to determine if the pollution is a significant risk. The EPA rejected a petition from environmental groups, which three years ago asked the agency to limit the greenhouse gases released from the mines.... The denial, set to be published tomorrow in the Federal Register, is at least the fourth category of emitters the agency has refused to regulate, disappointing groups and some lawmakers who say that EPA needs to take bolder, quicker action to combat the threat of global warming. EPA turned down a petition to curb emissions from aircraft, ships and off-highway trucks in June.
from Al Jazeera: Climate talks end inconclusively, again Another week of international climate negotiations ended in Bonn, Germany on Friday, but there was little mid-level bureaucrats could do when world leaders remain in thrall to the fossil fuel industry, say environmentalists.
from Greenwire: EPA to defend its greenhouse gas emission rules tomorrow U.S. EPA will return to court tomorrow to defend its regulations for fighting climate change from multiple challenges by Texas and industry groups. At issue before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit are two cases that center on EPA's implementation of greenhouse gas air emissions standards under the Clean Air Act after the agency determined the emissions endangered public health.
from The Keeling Curve: The Keeling Curve Want to watch the slow-motion trainwreck of our climate in real time? Go to the Keeling Curve web site and see current ppm rate of CO2 concentration as we march inexorably to 400.
from BBC: Arctic Ocean 'acidifying rapidly' Scientists from the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme (AMAP) monitored widespread changes in ocean chemistry in the region.... It is well known that CO2 warms the planet, but less well-known that it also makes the alkaline seas more acidic when it is absorbed from the air. Absorption is particularly fast in cold water so the Arctic is especially susceptible, and the recent decreases in summer sea ice have exposed more sea surface to atmospheric CO2.
from Reuters: Low-key U.S. plan for each nation to set climate goals wins ground A U.S.-led plan to let all countries set their own goals for fighting climate change is gaining grudging support at U.N. talks, even though the current level of pledges is far too low to limit rising temperatures substantially. The approach, being discussed this week at 160-nation talks in Bonn, Germany, would mean abandoning the blueprint of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, which set central goals for industrialized countries to cut emissions by 2012 and then let each work out national implementation.
from Los Angeles Times: Mark Zuckerberg's Fwd.us in heated controversy over political ads Mark Zuckerberg is being unfriended by progressives angered by television ads from his political advocacy group Fwd.us that praise lawmakers for supporting the expansion of the Keystone XL oil pipeline and drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.... Though none of the ads suggest that Zuckerberg or Facebook support these policies, that distinction may be lost on the general public.
from Reuters: Plants slow climate change by forming cloud sunshade: study Plants help to slow climate change by emitting gases as temperatures rise that lead to the formation of a sunshade of clouds over the planet, scientists said on Sunday. The tiny sun-dimming effect could offset about one percent of warming worldwide and up to 30 percent locally such as over vast northern forests in Siberia, Canada or the Nordic nations, they wrote in the journal Nature Geoscience. While proportionally small, some scientists said the study provided further evidence of the importance of protecting forests, which help to slow climate change by absorbing greenhouse gases as they grow and to preserve wildlife.
from Washington Post: Obama taps Charlotte mayor to lead Transportation Department, official says President Obama plans to nominate Charlotte Mayor Anthony Foxx to serve as transportation secretary, a White House official said Sunday... Foxx, whose city hosted the Democratic National Convention last year, has pushed to expand public transit options for Charlotte while serving as mayor. The city has started building the Charlotte Streetcar Project, one of several electric trolley systems underway in the country, and is expanding the LYNX light-rail system so it can reach the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.
from InsideClimate News: State Department Will Make Keystone Public Comments Public After All A State Department official confirmed that for the first time the department will make public all the public comments received on its draft environmental impact statement for the Keystone XL pipeline.... the comments would be posted on Regulations.gov.
from Associated Press: EPA methane report further divides fracking camps The Environmental Protection Agency has dramatically lowered its estimate of how much of a potent heat-trapping gas leaks during natural gas production, in a shift with major implications for a debate that has divided environmentalists: Does the recent boom in fracking help or hurt the fight against climate change?... The scope of the EPA's revision was vast. In a mid-April report on greenhouse emissions, the agency now says that tighter pollution controls instituted by the industry resulted in an average annual decrease of 41.6 million metric tons of methane emissions from 1990 through 2010, or more than 850 million metric tons overall. That's about a 20 percent reduction from previous estimates.
from Bangor Daily News: Ocean surface temperatures off Northeast coast highest in 150 years Data collected from the Gulf of Maine indicates that the average sea surface temperature in the gulf has risen 1.5 degrees from 2011 to 2012 and that in the past four years, it has risen between 2 and 3.5 degrees, depending on how one looks at the data collected from scientific studies. With the rising temperatures come concerns, and some indication, about how marine life along the coast will be affected. Officials and scientists in Maine have suggested that higher temperatures in the Gulf of Maine have been a factor in bacterial outbreaks in bivalves and in sea lice infestations in Cobscook and Passamaquoddy bays. Some have put partial blame on the gulf's warmer waters for a northeasterly shift of cod in the gulf into colder waters, for declining shrimp catches and for the glut of soft-shell lobsters last summer that caused a plummet in prices lobstermen were receiving for their catch.... Over the past 40 years, roughly half of 36 fish stocks in the northwest Atlantic Ocean studied by NEFSC have shifted northward, the statement added.
from RTCC: CO2 level nears 400ppm climate milestone Global atmospheric CO2 concentration is edging towards the 400 parts per million (ppm) mark for the first time in millions of years. That's the expectation of scientists at the Mauna Loa recording station in Hawaii, widely regarded as the most reliable record of atmospheric CO2.... The annual peak is in May just before summer plant growth sucks more CO2 out of the atmosphere. Levels have risen every year since recording began. Scripps estimates that the 400ppm mark could be breached this year and if not, it will definitely be broken in 2014. These levels were last sustained 3.2-5 million years ago when temperatures were 2-3 degrees C warmer. "I wish it weren't true, but it looks like the world is going to blow through the 400ppm level without losing a beat," said Scripps geophysicist Ralph Keeling, whose father Dave established the network of remote CO2 monitoring. "At this pace we'll hit 450ppm within a few decades," said Ralph Keeling.
from Sioux Falls Argus Leader: Politics, science tangle over climate change in school standards South Dakota took part in a 26-state effort to update the way K-12 schools teach science, but the resulting standards face a series of hurdles on the way to implementation. The Next Generation Science Standards, released this month, emphasize the practice of science and critical thinking in place of rote memorization. But the standards, which map out what students should know and be able to do, already are drawing both praise and criticism for their unskeptical take on humans' role in climate change... But many politicians consider man's influence on global climate change to be unresolved.
from Bloomberg News: U.S. States Turn Against Renewable Energy as Gas Plunges More than half the U.S. states with laws requiring utilities to buy renewable energy are considering ways to pare back those mandates after a plunge in natural gas prices brought on by technology that boosted supply. Sixteen of the 29 states with renewable portfolio standards are considering legislation that would reduce the need for wind and solar power, according to researchers backed by the U.S. Energy Department. North Carolina lawmakers may be among the first to move, followed by Colorado and Connecticut. The efforts could benefit U.S. utilities such as Duke Energy Corp (DUK). and PG&E Corp (PCG). as well as Exxon Mobil Corp (XOM)., the biggest U.S. oil producer, and Peabody Energy Corp (BTU)., the largest U.S. coal mining company.
from Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: EPA settles with Wisconsin utilities on coal plant air pollution Wisconsin Power & Light Co. and three other utilities will spend $1.2 billion to clean up coal-fired power plants and shut down older plants under a settlement announced Monday with federal regulators. Under a settlement filed in federal court in Madison on Earth Day, the Environmental Protection Agency and Justice Department will assess a civil penalty of $2.45 million for alleged violations of air pollution laws over the years.... Utility ratepayers won't have to pay for the civil penalties... But it's possible they could pay for the environmental mitigation costs. And over time they will be on the hook for paying for the construction of environmental controls at the coal boilers that will remain open.
from Los Angeles Times: EPA criticizes environmental review of Keystone XL pipeline The Environmental Protection Agency on Monday criticized the State Department's environmental impact review of the Keystone XL pipeline, saying there was not enough evidence to back up key conclusions on gas emissions, safety and alternative routes. In a letter to top State Department officials, the agency said it had "environmental objections" to their review, which concluded the pipeline would have minimal impact on the environment. The analysis could complicate efforts to win approval for the controversial $7-billion project.
from TckTckTck: Groundbreaking Study Reaffirms Human Impact on Climate A groundbreaking new study, published in Nature Geoscience, has found that global temperatures were warmer between 1970 and 2000 than any other 30-year period in the last 1,400 years. The research, compiled by 73 scientists from 28 institutions worldwide, is the most comprehensive reconstruction of global temperatures to date. It used corals, ice cores, tree rings, lake and marine sediments, historical records, cave deposits and climate archives to help establish temperature trends over the last 2,000 years... The timing of the warming period correlates directly with an increase in carbon emissions from human activity over the same period and broadly confirms an ever-growing message from climate scientists: climate change is happening, it is caused by humans and billions of people will fall victim to it without urgent action.
from Public Citizen: New Report Finds: Keystone XL Would Increase Gas Prices and Reduce National Security The proposed Keystone XL pipeline is likely to increase gas prices contradicting claims by pipeline proponents, a new Public Citizen report finds. Public Citizen also concluded that because the Keystone pipeline is designed to promote exports from Canadian tar sands, it will reduce national energy security -- not bolster it, as pipeline backers claim. The report, America Can't Afford the Keystone Pipeline, documents rapidly increasing Chinese national government interests in Canadian tar sands, further confounding security claims.
from Politico: Environmentalists fear weaker fracking rule Environmentalists fear the oil and gas industry has the Obama administration's ear as the government prepares to release a new draft rule to govern fracking on federal lands. Though the Interior Department has yet to release an official draft, each subsequent leaked version contains less of what environmental groups want, the activists say, taking the rule further away from its potential of setting strict standards for the industry. "What we see is every step of the way, these rules are getting weaker,” said Fran Hunt, senior Washington representative for the Sierra Club's Beyond Natural Gas campaign.
from Reuters: Scientists find Antarctic ice is melting faster The summer ice melt in parts of Antarctica is at its highest level in 1,000 years, Australian and British researchers reported on Monday, adding new evidence of the impact of global warming on sensitive Antarctic glaciers and ice shelves. Researchers from the Australian National University and the British Antarctic Survey found data taken from an ice core also shows the summer ice melt has been 10 times more intense over the past 50 years compared with 600 years ago.
from Toronto Star: Comment on changes to Enbridge's Toronto pipeline now requires NEB permission oronto area residents -- or any others -- who want to comment on plans by Enbridge to revamp its oil pipeline through Greater Toronto must ask permission to write a letter to Canada's pipeline regulator. Permission won't necessarily be granted. And the 10-page application for would-be letter writers has some cryptic hurdles to jump...
from Planet Ark: Greens ask U.S. to delay Keystone decision after Arkansas leak Environmental groups on Monday asked the Obama administration to extend the approval process of the Keystone XL pipeline, using last month's spill of heavy Canadian crude oil in Arkansas as their latest reason to delay the project. The Obama administration is deciding whether to approve the Canada-to-Nebraska leg of TransCanada Corp's proposed pipeline, which would link Canada's oil sands, the world's third richest crude oil deposit, to refineries in Texas. The State Department, which issued a draft environmental assessment of the $5.3 billion project on March 1, indicated then that a final decision could come by July or August.
from Washington Post: Crabs, supersized by carbon pollution, may upset Chesapeake's balance It is the dawn of the super crab. Crabs are bulking up on carbon pollution that pours out of power plants, factories and vehicles and settles in the oceans, turning the tough crustaceans into even more fearsome predators. That presents a major problem for the Chesapeake Bay, where crabs eat oysters. In a life-isn't-fair twist, the same carbon that crabs absorb to grow bigger stymies the development of oysters.
from TomDispatch: Is the Keystone XL Pipeline the "Stonewall" of the Climate Movement? ...Recently, I had a long talk with an administration insider who kept telling me that, for the next decade, we should focus all our energies on "killing coal." Why? Because it was politically feasible. And indeed we should, but climate-change science makes it clear that we need to put the same sort of thought and creative energy into killing oil and natural gas, too. I mean, the Arctic -- from Greenland to its seas -- essentially melted last summer in a way never before seen. The frozen Arctic is like a large physical feature. It's as if you woke up one morning and your left arm was missing....
from Fort Wayne Journal Gazette: 286-acre solar farm OK'd for Indianapolis A sprawling solar farm planned for Indianapolis' south side faces opposition from nearby residents worried its solar arrays will create irritating glints of reflected sunlight and harm property values.... Some said they feared reduced property values and problems with drainage and future development.
from International Herald Tribune: U.S. Moves Toward Teaching Climate Change; Britain Does the Opposite New science teaching standards in the United States will include extensive lessons on human-made climate change. Expected to be unveiled this week, the guidelines will bring the subject to classrooms in up to 40 states, in many cases for the first time. Eighth-grade pupils should understand that "human activities, such as the release of greenhouse gases from burning fossil fuels, are major factors in the current rise in Earth's mean surface temperature (global warming)," according to the Next Generation Science Standards. The proposed changes are causing some controversy in a country where the acceptance of man-made climate change is a political issue.
from The Hill: US carbon emissions drop as gas displaces coal A switch from coal to natural gas in electricity production helped drive down energy-related U.S. carbon dioxide emissions in 2012 to their lowest level since 1994, the federal Energy Information Administration said Friday. The carbon emissions have fallen every year since 2007, with the exception of 2010, according to the agency.... The biggest drop in 2012 came from declining use of coal, a fuel facing fierce competition from low natural gas prices, according to the EIA, which is the Energy Department's independent statistical arm.
from Washington Post: Methane leaks are undermining the shale-gas boom. Here's how to fix that. At first glance, the recent shale-gas boom in the United States looks like excellent news for efforts to slow climate change. Natural gas is nudging aside dirtier coal in the electric-power sector, which is driving down U.S. carbon-dioxide emissions. But the one huge caveat in this story has always been methane.... That brings us to a big new study from the World Resources Institute, which tries to compile everything we know about methane leaks. The bad news: We have no idea how much methane is actually seeping out of our natural-gas wells and pipelines. The good news: The technologies to plug those leaks are readily available, but new regulations may be necessary to make sure they're widely adopted.
from Midwest Energy News: Midwest Generation gets more time to clean up Illinois coal plants The Illinois Pollution Control Board on Thursday granted Midwest Generation two extra years to meet a state multi-pollutant standard that would require they install emissions controls on their four Illinois plants by 2015 and 2016.
from Mongabay: Scientists find the 'missing heat' of global warming 700 meters below the sea Critics of climate change often claim that warming has stopped since the late 1990s. While this is categorically false (the last decade was the warmest on record and 2005 and 2010 are generally considered tied for the warmest year), scientists do admit that warming hasn't occurred over land as rapidly as predicted in the last ten years, especially given continually rising greenhouse gas emissions. But a recent study in Geophysical Research Letters has found this so-called missing heat: 700 meters below the surface of the ocean...."This signals the beginning of the most sustained warming trend in this record of [ocean heat content]," the scientists write in the paper. "Indeed, recent warming rates of the waters below 700 meters appear to be unprecedented."
from Center for Climate Change Communication: A National Survey of Republicans and Republican-leaning Independents on Energy and Climate Change This short report is based on a January 2013 national survey of Republicans and Republican-leaning Independents. We found that they prefer clean energy as the basis of America's energy future and say the benefits of clean energy, such as energy independence (66 percent) saving resources for our children and grandchildren (57 percent), and providing a better life for our children and grandchildren (56 percent) outweigh the costs, such as more government regulation (42 percent) or higher energy prices (31 percent). By a margin of 2 to 1, respondents say America should take action to reduce our fossil fuel use. Also, only one third of respondents agree with the Republican Party's position on climate change, while about half agree with the party's position on how to meet America's energy needs.
from Popular Science: Over Time, Nuclear Power Would Kill Fewer People Than Petroleum Using nuclear power for energy instead of coal has prevented almost 2 million pollution-related deaths around the world, and could save millions more lives in the future, according to a new paper. It's the latest publication from James Hansen, NASA's fiery climate change scientist, who is retiring on Wednesday after 46 years with the space agency. The paper argues that policymakers should increase nuclear power, rather than continuing dependence on fossil fuels. The 2011 disaster at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant should not deter governments from expanding nuclear power... Nuclear power has already prevented 64 gigatons of greenhouse gas emissions, and would prevent the equivalent of another 80 to 240 gigatons, again depending on which fuel it replaces.
from Washington Post: Bracket busters and gas guzzlers In addition to broken dreams, shredded brackets and lost productivity, you can add higher carbon emissions to the adverse effects of March Madness. Booz Allen Hamilton put a new spin on bracket tracking this year, developing an online game that allows users to measure the carbon footprint of their predicted winners...In traveling to the Sweet 16 this past weekend at the Verizon Center, Indiana, Syracuse, Miami and Marquette added about 140,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions into the atmosphere -- about the same impact of providing one year of heat and electricity to 7,147 homes.
from USA Today: Report: Most insurers not prepared for climate change Most insurance companies do not have comprehensive strategies to cope with climate change despite mounting weather-related claims, says a report to be released Thursday. Of 184 companies surveyed, only 23 had such strategies, and 13 of those that did were foreign-owned, according to report by Ceres, a Boston-based non-profit that promotes eco-minded business practices. The report says the most prepared tend to be the largest companies with scientists on staff and those that insure property rather than life or health. Many companies "won't talk about climate change" and if they do, they use "hedged" language to avoid the controversial issue of whether it's man-made, says author Sharlene Leurig, senior manager of Ceres' insurance program. She says the issue is less politically divisive in Europe, where insurers are often better prepared.
from London Guardian: Scientists link frozen spring to dramatic Arctic sea ice loss Climate scientists have linked the massive snowstorms and bitter spring weather now being experienced across Britain and large parts of Europe and North America to the dramatic loss of Arctic sea ice. Both the extent and the volume of the sea ice that forms and melts each year in the Arctic Ocean fell to an historic low last autumn, and satellite records published on Monday by the National Snow and Ice Data Centre (NSIDC) in Boulder, Colorado, show the ice extent is close to the minimum recorded for this time of year.... the Arctic ice loss adds heat to the ocean and atmosphere which shifts the position of the jet stream -- the high-altitude river of air that steers storm systems and governs most weather in northern hemisphere.
from USA Today: Poll questions shift public views on global warming ...The majority of the public pretty much understands that global warming is happening, and has for a long time, the authors say. Some of what looks like confusion about what folks think may result more from the poll questions themselves, rather than from the people answering the questions....ask people what they believe and they will mostly say they believe global warming is happening. If you pile on top of that question the additional task of asking people to assess what they know of the evidence (which may be very little), they become more doubtful in their answers.
from Reuters: Reef-building corals lose out to softer cousins due warming Climate change is likely to make reef-building stony corals lose out to softer cousins in a damaging shift for many types of fish that use reefs as hideaways and nurseries for their young, a study showed. Soft corals such as mushroom-shaped yellow leather coral, which lack a hard outer skeleton, were far more abundant than hard corals off Iwotorishima, an island off south Japan where volcanic vents make the waters slightly acidic, it said. A build-up of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is turning the oceans more acidic in a process likely to hamper the ability of creatures such as lobsters, crabs, mussels or stony corals to build protective outer layers.
from InsideClimate News: Keystone Public Comments Won't Be Made Public, State Department Says When the State Department hired a contractor to produce the latest environmental impact statement for the controversial Keystone XL pipeline, it asked for a Web-based electronic docket to record public comments as they flowed in each day. Thousands of comments are expected to be filed by people and businesses eager to influence the outcome of the intense international debate over the project ... But the only way to see the comments themselves is by filing a request under the Freedom of Information Act, or FOIA, a process that can take so long that the Keystone debate could be over before the documents are made available.
from Guardian: Monbiot: Japan's 'frozen gas' is worthless if we take climate change seriously There's only one way of knowing whether or not governments are serious about climate change: have they decided to leave most of their fossil fuel reserves in the ground? We have already discovered far more carbon than we can afford to burn, if we are not to commit the world to very dangerous levels of heating. Only if most of it - four-fifths according to a detailed estimate - is left where it sits is there a good chance of preventing more than 2 degrees C of global warming. Forgive me if you've heard me say this many times before. But it is the only point that is really worth making. It doesn't matter how many wind turbines you build, or energy-saving lightbulbs you install, or more economical cars you manufacture: unless most of our fossil fuel reserves are declared off-limits they will, sooner or later, be extracted and burned. The question of whether it is sooner or whether it is later makes little difference: we have already identified more underground carbon than we can afford to burn between now and the year 3000.... Like all the nations which continue to extend the fossil fuel frontier (such as Britain, where companies intend to start producing gas through fracking) Japan is adding to the mountain of fossil fuels we cannot responsibly burn. The brave new technology it has developed, now lauded in the media, would be worthless in a world that took climate change seriously.
from London Guardian: China pours cash into melting Arctic in bid to win influence At face value, it is not one of the world's most important relationships. When Norway and China fell out two years ago over a Nobel prize awarded to a Chinese dissident, the spat had little wider resonance. But diplomatic relations are thawing as quickly as Arctic ice " and the upshot could be significant for the frigid northern wastes of the planet, which are thought to sit on formidable quantities of mineral reserves. China has been cosying up to Arctic countries as part of its effort to secure "permanent observer" status on the Arctic Council, an eight-country political body that decides regional policy. Norway was initially sniffy at the approaches because of the Nobel row, but appears to have changed its tune before a formal decision in May.
from Huffington Post: Bills Pushed By State Legislators Would Make Farm Animal Abuse Investigations More Difficult in a pushback led by the meat and poultry industries, state legislators across the country are introducing laws making it harder for animal welfare advocates to investigate cruelty and food safety cases. Some bills make it illegal to take photographs at a farming operation. Others make it a crime for someone such as an animal welfare advocate to lie on an application to get a job at a plant...the American Legislative Exchange Council, a conservative think tank backed by business interests... has labeled those who interfere with animal operations "terrorists," though a spokesman said he wishes now that the organization had called its legislation the "Freedom to Farm Act" rather than the "Animal and Ecological Terrorism Act."
from Reuters: U.S. utilities to burn more coal as natgas prices climb -traders ... The relative price difference between NYMEX Central Appalachian coal and NYMEX Henry Hub gas is at its widest since June 2011 at almost $1.50 per million British thermal units (mmBtu), according to Reuters data. Natural gas traded at $3.87 per mmBtu on Friday morning, while Eastern coal was selling at $2.40 per mmBtu. Prices of Central Appalachian coal have slipped to their lowest levels since late January. Meanwhile, natural gas prices climbed to their highest levels since November due to four straight weeks of larger-than-expected drawdowns from inventories.
from Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Company could nearly double pipeline capacity Enbridge Inc. is seeking approval from the U.S. State Department to sharply upgrade its oil delivery from Canada's tar sands region to Superior, according to government documents published on Friday. Enbridge potentially could nearly double its capacity, the documents showed, indicating that the Canadian firm has plans to transport more oil through Wisconsin than previously reported.... Enbridge has occasionally struggled with pipeline problems, including a massive spill in 2010 that required the cleanup of 819,000 gallons of oil that entered a creek and then flowed into the Kalamazoo River in Michigan.
from Washington Post: EPA likely to delay climate rules for new power plants The Obama administration is leaning toward revising its landmark proposal to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from new power plants, according to several individuals briefed on the matter, a move that would delay tougher restrictions and could anger many environmentalists. The discussions center on the first-ever greenhouse gas regulations for power plants, which were proposed by the Environmental Protection Agency nearly a year ago. Rewriting the proposal would significantly delay any action, and might allow the agency to set a separate standard for coal-fired power plants, which are roughly twice as polluting as those fueled by natural gas.
from American Geophysical Union: Canadian Arctic Glacier Melt Accelerating, Irreversible, Projections Suggest ...In the past few years, the mass of the glaciers in the Canadian Arctic archipelago has begun to plummet. Observations from NASA's Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) satellites suggest that from 2004 to 2011 the region's glaciers shed approximately 580 gigatons of ice. Aside from glacier calving, which plays only a small role in Canadian glacier mass loss, the drop is due largely to a shift in the surface-mass balance, with warming-induced meltwater runoff outpacing the accumulation of new snowfall.
from Truthout: Tar Sands Resistance Escalates in Massachusetts The national week of actions against the Keystone XL pipeline called for by the nonviolent direct action group Tar Sands Blockade is supposed to run from March 16-23. Activists in Massachusetts decided they wanted to turn up the heat a little early. On Monday, March 11, 2013, at about 10:30 AM, over 100 protesters stormed the Massachusetts offices of TransCanada, the company that stands to profit most from the pipeline's construction. After two hours, 26 people were arrested for handcuffing their bodies together, blockading the entrance and refusing to leave until the pipeline project was abandoned. The action was billed as a Funeral for Our Future and included somber songs, construction paper flowers and a homemade coffin. This was the third protest as part of an escalating direct action campaign in Westborough, Massachusetts, targeting the TransCanada offices there.
from Grist: 'State Department' Keystone XL Report Actually Written By TransCanada Contractor The State Department's "don't worry" environmental impact statement for the proposed Keystone XL tarsands pipeline, released late Friday afternoon, was written not by government officials but by a private company in the pay of the pipeline's owner. The "sustainability consultancy" Environmental Resources Management (ERM) was paid an undisclosed amount under contract to TransCanada to write the statement, which is now an official government document. The statement estimates, and then dismisses, the pipeline's massive carbon footprint and other environmental impacts, because, it asserts, the mining and burning of the tar sands is unstoppable.
from Boston University College of Arts & Sciences : Amplified Greenhouse Effect Shaping North Into South An international team of 21 authors from 17 institutions in seven countries has just published a study in the journal Natural Climate Change showing that, as the cover of snow and ice in the northern latitudes has diminished in recent years, the temperature over the northern land mass has increased at different rates during the four seasons, causing a reduction in temperature and vegetation seasonality in this area. In other words, the temperature and vegetation at northern latitudes increasingly resembles those found several degrees of latitude farther south as recently as 30 years ago.
from Earth Policy Institute: Where Has All the Ice Gone? ... In September 2012, sea ice in the Arctic Ocean shrank to a record low extent and volume. The region has warmed two degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) since the 1960s -- twice as much as lower latitudes. With less snow and ice to reflect the sun's rays and with more exposed ocean to absorb heat, a vicious cycle leads to even warmer temperatures. Thinner ice combined with rising temperatures makes it increasingly difficult for the sea ice to recover. The historically ever-present white cap at the top of the globe could disappear entirely during the summer within two decades...Greenland's ice loss has accelerated from 51 billion tons per year in the 1990s to 263 billion tons per year today... parts of Antarctica's vast ice sheet may be even less stable. The continent is flanked by 54 major ice shelves, which act as brakes slowing the movement of ice in land-based glaciers out to sea. Twenty of them show signs of thinning and weakening, which translates into accelerated ice loss.
from Orion Magazine: A Moral Atmosphere ...Here's the math, obviously imprecise: maybe 10 percent of the population cares enough to make strenuous efforts to change -- maybe 15 percent. If they all do all they can, in their homes and offices and so forth, then, well . . . nothing much shifts. The trajectory of our climate horror stays about the same. But if 10 percent of people, once they've changed the light bulbs, work all-out to change the system? That's enough. That's more than enough. It would be enough to match the power of the fossil fuel industry, enough to convince our legislators to put a price on carbon.
from New York Times: No to Keystone. Yes to Crazy. I HOPE the president turns down the Keystone XL oil pipeline. (Who wants the U.S. to facilitate the dirtiest extraction of the dirtiest crude from tar sands in Canada's far north?) But I don't think he will. So I hope that Bill McKibben and his 350.org coalition go crazy. I'm talking chain-themselves-to-the-White-House-fence-stop-traffic-at-the-Capitol kind of crazy, because I think if we all make enough noise about this, we might be able to trade a lousy Keystone pipeline for some really good systemic responses to climate change. We don't get such an opportunity often -- namely, a second-term Democratic president who is under heavy pressure to approve a pipeline to create some jobs but who also has a green base that he can't ignore. So cue up the protests, and pay no attention to people counseling rational and mature behavior.
from AP, via Yahoo: Recent heat spike unlike anything in 11,000 years A new study looking at 11,000 years of climate temperatures shows the world in the middle of a dramatic U-turn, lurching from near-record cooling to a heat spike. Research released Thursday in the journal Science uses fossils of tiny marine organisms to reconstruct global temperatures back to the end of the last ice age. It shows how the globe for several thousands of years was cooling until an unprecedented reversal in the 20th century. Scientists say it is further evidence that modern-day global warming isn't natural, but the result of rising carbon dioxide emissions that have rapidly grown since the Industrial Revolution began roughly 250 years ago.... "In 100 years, we've gone from the cold end of the spectrum to the warm end of the spectrum," Marcott said. "We've never seen something this rapid. Even in the ice age the global temperature never changed this quickly."
from Environmental Defense Fund: Study Intends To Determine Methane Leakage Associated With A Growing Natural Gas Transportation Sector In a paper published last year, EDF scientists and other leading researchers examined the impact of potential fugitive emissions on the climate benefits of a switch from diesel to natural gas heavy-duty trucks. The study found that, according to the best available data, methane leak rates would need to be below 1 percent of gas produced in order to ensure that switching from diesel to natural gas produces climate benefits at all points in time. They also found that - using the EPA leakage rate estimates at that time - converting a fleet of heavy duty diesel vehicles to natural gas would result in increased climate warming for more than 250 years before any climate benefits were achieved. EDF is working with leading researchers and companies in a series of studies designed to better understand and characterize the methane leak rate across the natural gas supply chain. The studies will take direct measurements at various points across the production, gathering and processing, long distance transmission and storage, local distribution, and transportation. The first study, led by researchers at the University of Texas, is measuring emissions from natural gas production. Results will be released in the coming months.
from Associated Press: US scientists report big jump in heat-trapping CO2 The amount of heat-trapping carbon dioxide in the air jumped dramatically in 2012, making it very unlikely that global warming can be limited to another 2 degrees as many global leaders have hoped, new federal figures show. Scientists say the rise in CO2 reflects the world's economy revving up and burning more fossil fuels, especially in China. Carbon dioxide levels jumped by 2.67 parts per million since 2011 to total just under 395 parts per million...
from InsideClimate News: Critical Part of Keystone Report Done by Firms with Deep Oil Industry Ties The State Department's recent conclusion that the Keystone XL pipeline "is unlikely to have a substantial impact" on the rate of Canada's oil sands development was based on analysis provided by two consulting firms with ties to oil and pipeline companies that could benefit from the proposed project. EnSys Energy has worked with ExxonMobil, BP and Koch Industries, which own oil sands production facilities and refineries in the Midwest that process heavy Canadian crude oil. Imperial Oil, one of Canada's largest oil sands producers, is a subsidiary of Exxon. ICF International works with pipeline and oil companies but doesn't list specific clients on its website. It declined to comment on the Keystone, referring questions to the State Department.
from New Scientist: Globetrotting Sahara sand takes rain to California If the Sahara gets any drier, it could make California wetter. That's because the dust and microbes that help form clouds can travel around the world on narrow air streams called "atmospheric rivers", causing rain. The particles, or aerosols, help clouds form by acting as seeds for water vapour to condense around. Atmospheric rivers carry this dust-laden water until they hit mountains, such as California's Sierra Nevada, where their cargo turns to precipitation....In two storms with otherwise identical conditions, the one containing more dust was much wetter, suggesting that in future, extra dust from desertification and activities such as agriculture could make far-flung places wetter.
from PNAS, via PhysOrg: Global warming will open unexpected new shipping routes in Arctic, researchers find "The development is both exciting from an economic development point of view and worrisome in terms of safety, both for the Arctic environment and for the ships themselves," said lead researcher Laurence C. Smith, a professor of geography at UCLA. The findings, which explore accessibility during the Arctic's most navigable month of the year, September, appear in the latest issue of the scholarly journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Plus. The first thorough assessment of trans-Arctic shipping potential as global temperatures continue to rise, the study is based on independent climate forecasts for the years 2040 to 2059. By mid-century, even ordinary shipping vessels will be able to navigate previously inaccessible parts of the Arctic Ocean, and they will not need icebreakers to blaze their path as they do today, the researchers found. "We're talking about a future in which open-water vessels will, at least during some years, be able to navigate unescorted through the Arctic, which at the moment is inconceivable," said co-author Scott R. Stephenson, a Ph.D. candidate in the UCLA Department of Geography.
from E&E Publishing: Great Lakes community defined by ice ponders life without it For decades, winter visitors to Apostle Islands National Lakeshore on Wisconsin's rugged Lake Superior coast have marveled at the artistry that happens when water, waves and subfreezing temperatures converge, creating natural ice sculptures as artful as glassworks. The ephemeral event, when upstream rivulets flow into caves at the lake's edge and harden into blue-green stalactites anchored in a bed of clear Lake Superior ice, is so popular with tourists that the National Park Service maintains a telephone hotline to let people know when it's safe enough to make the 2-mile hike across the hardened lake to view what are called the sea caves...Among the most worrying trends for scientists and policymakers is the loss of winter lake ice, a condition exacerbated by higher air and water temperatures, that has changed the way the gigantic lake and its micro-climate behave.
from InsideClimate News: Climate Change Science Poised to Enter Nation's Classrooms New national science standards that make the teaching of global warming part of the public school curriculum are slated to be released this month, potentially ending an era in which climate skepticism has been allowed to seep into the nation's classrooms.... They recommend that educators teach the evidence for man-made climate change starting as early as elementary school and incorporate it into all science classes, ranging from earth science to chemistry. By eighth grade, students should understand that "human activities, such as the release of greenhouse gases from burning fossil fuels, are major factors in the current rise in Earth's mean surface temperature (global warming)," the standards say.
from Minneapolis Star Tribune: Canadian crude oil finds a new pathway through Minnesota If President Obama rejects the Keystone XL pipeline, large quantities of the Canadian oil it's designed to carry will still roll into the United States -- on railroads with tracks through Minnesota. The proposed pipeline across Montana, South Dakota and Nebraska has provoked opposition from environmental activists who say extraction of crude oil from tar sands increases greenhouse gases that cause global warming. As anti-pipeline groups have pressed the White House to kill the project, the oil and railroad industries have been building oil-loading terminals and buying tank cars to ship Canadian crude oil by rail.
from Indiana Living Green: To engineer the climate, or not to engineer the climate ... For those paying attention to the positive feedback mechanism occurring in the Arctic, this few tenths of a degree rise is unstoppable -- and, imminent. The ice melt in the Arctic is suffering a feedback loop. The more the ice melts, the more the sunlight warms the water, instead of bouncing off the ice back into the atmosphere. The warmer the water, the less ice forms; the less ice forms, the easier it is to melt, thus warming the water, diminishing the ice and warming the water, ad infinitum. Or, shall I say, sad infinitum. Cooling off the planet right now seems to me to be a prudent course of action, except that we don't know what unintended consequences may result from SRM or any act of geoengineering.
from University of Colorado at Boulder : Volcanic Aerosols, Not Pollutants, Tamped Down Recent Earth Warming A team led by the University of Colorado Boulder looking for clues about why Earth did not warm as much as scientists expected between 2000 and 2010 now thinks the culprits are hiding in plain sight -- dozens of volcanoes spewing sulfur dioxide.... previous observations suggest that increases in stratospheric aerosols since 2000 have counterbalanced as much as 25 percent of the warming scientists blame on human greenhouse gas emissions. "This new study indicates it is emissions from small to moderate volcanoes that have been slowing the warming of the planet"...
from Columbia Journalism Review: NYT cancels Green blog - No explanation from editors following surprise announcement At 5pm on Friday afternoon, The New York Times posted the following announcement: The Times is discontinuing the Green blog, which was created to track environmental and energy news and to foster lively discussion of developments in both areas. This change will allow us to direct production resources to other online projects. But we will forge ahead with our aggressive reporting on environmental and energy topics, including climate change, land use, threatened ecosystems, government policy, the fossil fuel industries, the growing renewables sector and consumer choices. This is terrible news, to say the least. When the Times announced in January that it was dismantling its three-year-old environment pod and reassigning its editors and reporters to other desks, managing editor Dean Baquet insisted that the outlet remained as committed as ever to covering the environment. Obviously, that was an outright lie.
from Associated Press: Climate-change activists jeer as U.S. report says Keystone XL pipeline would have no major environmental impacts A new U.S. State Department report is the latest evidence that the long-delayed Keystone XL oil pipeline from Canada should be approved, supporters say. The draft report, issued Friday, finds there would be no significant environmental impact to most resources along the proposed route from western Canada to refineries in Texas. The report also said other options to get the oil from Canada to Gulf Coast refineries are worse for climate change.... The State Department analysis for the first time evaluated two options using rail: shipping the oil on trains to existing pipelines or to oil tankers. The report shows that those other methods would release more greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming than the pipeline. The Keystone XL pipeline, according to the report, would release annually the same amount of global warming pollution as 626,000 passenger cars.
from E&E Publishing: Senator's move to Chevron sparks ethics uproar A California senator's decision to quit and jump to Chevron Corp. has sparked questions about whether he should have negotiated for that job while in a position to help the company politically. Former Sen. Michael Rubio (D) resigned Friday to work as manager of California governmental affairs for Chevron (E&ENews PM, Feb. 22). He had been chairman of the state Senate's Environmental Quality Committee when he accepted the oil company position. Well, there's more stories than this -- but that was 75 of them! You may want to try the PANICloud for more specific topics! |
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