‘Green News Report’ – July 30, 2013

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IN TODAY’S RADIO REPORT: President Obama smacks down Keystone XL jobs claims; EPA’s McCarthy smacks down false choice of jobs vs. environment; Rand Paul and Chris Christie smack down each other; In Australia, winter is the new summer; ‘Witches brew’ of pesticides still killing bees; PLUS: Solar-powered battery breakthrough – but you’ll never guess where it’s being used … All that and more in today’s Green News Report!

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IN ‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (see links below): Can GMO oranges save FL industry?; Internal EPA Report reveals disputes over fracking, water; Sunken tar sands oil still threatening Kalamazoo River; BP Oil Spill: Halliburton pleads guilty to destroying evidence; Feds details JPMorgan’s criminal electricity market manipulation; Legal battles over land rights, pipelines increase; Does Lake Michigan’s record low mark start of new era for Great Lakes?; FL natural gas pipeline explodes; Cashmere boom threatens snow leopards … PLUS: Sea level rise is ‘locking in quickly’ … and much, MUCH more! …

STORIES DISCUSSED IN TODAY’S ‘GREEN NEWS REPORT’…

• VIDEO: Chris Christie vs. Rand Paul on Hurricane Sandy Disaster Relief: (All In with Chris Hayes):




• Winter is the new summer in Australia: Melbourne’s hottest ever July day (Melbourne Herald-Sun)
• Coal’s Decline: Slow But Inevitable::
• Warren Buffett Says Coal’s Decline in U.S. to Be Gradual Yet Permanent (BusinessWeek)
• Goldman Sachs says coal-export terminals are a bad investment (Grist)
• Coal exports contradict Obama’s climate pledge: critics: (Huffington Post Green):
  Environmental experts who remain unimpressed with President Barack Obama’s war-on-carbon rhetoric point to one key reason for concern that’s off most Americans’ radar: U.S. coal exports.
• EU investment bank to stop financing coal-fired power plants: (Guardian UK):
  The European investment bank (EIB), the EU’s main lending arm, said it would stop financing most coal-fired power stations to help the 28-nation bloc reduce pollution and meet its climate targets.
• ‘Witches’ Brew’ of Pesticides, Fungicides Killing Bees:
• BEE APOCALYPSE NOW: Scientists discover what’s killing the bees and it’s worse than you thought (Todd Woody, Quartz) [emphasis added]:
  [A] new study has pinpointed some of the probable causes of bee deaths and the rather scary results show that averting bee-mageddon will be much more difficult than previously thought. But in a first-of-its-kind study published today in the journal PLOS ONE, scientists at the University of Maryland and the US Department of Agriculture have identified a witch’s brew of pesticides and fungicides contaminating pollen that bees collect to feed their hives. The findings break new ground on why large numbers of bees are dying though they do not identify the specific cause of CCD, where an entire beehive dies at once.
• BEES: Radar Antennae Show Disease, Pesticides Are Harming Bees’ Navigation: (UK Telegraph)
• Obama Slams False Keystone XL Jobs Claims:
• Obama: Keystone XL Pipeline Proponents’ Claims About Jobs and Gas Prices Are Bullshit (The BRAD BLOG):
  Okay. He didn’t use the word “bullshit”. But, other than that, good news: At least we now know that Obama knows the jobs claims and gas price claims made by the Keystone XL pipeline proponents are bullshit.
• Obama Calls Out Republicans For Wasting Time On Keystone: ‘That’s Not A Jobs Plan’ (Climate Progress)
• Interview With President Obama (NY Times)
• Fact Check: Keystone XL Tar Sands Pipeline Isn’t A Job Creator (Climate Progress)
• EPA’s Gina McCarthy Slams ‘False Choice’ of Jobs Vs. Environment:
• EPA chief: preventing climate change the opportunity of a lifetime: Gina McCarthy signals she is ready for political fight in optimistic first speech as head of US environmental agency (The Guardian UK)
• As new EPA chief, Gina McCarthy vows to act on climate change (Washington Post):
  The new head of the Environmental Protection Agency told an audience at Harvard Law School on Tuesday that cutting carbon pollution will “feed the economic agenda of this country,” and vowed to work with industry leaders on shaping policies aimed at curbing global warming.
• Insurance Industry, Republicans Split on Climate Change (Bloomberg)
• Climate Change Will Cause More Energy Breakdowns, U.S. Warns (NY Times) [emphasis added]:
  The effects are already being felt, the report says. Power plants are shutting down or reducing output because of a shortage of cooling water. Barges carrying coal and oil are being delayed by low water levels in major waterways. Floods and storm surges are inundating ports, refineries, pipelines and rail yards. Powerful windstorms and raging wildfires are felling transformers and transmission lines…. “The cost today is measured in the billions. Over the coming decades, it will be in the trillions. You can’t just put your head in the sand anymore.”
• Congress’ climate skeptics could snarl GOP’s strategy: (Politico)
• Dems’ Recess Game Plan: Push Climate Message: (Politico)
• Brilliant: Solar Battery Breakthrough Being Used for Oil Drilling.
• Dallas firm uses solar to power West Texas oil rigs (Dallas Business Journal):
  The sun can be harsh in West Texas but one Dallas entrepreneur is putting those rays to work powering oil wells.
  …
  Solar generators aren’t new but it’s the ability to provide three-phase, 480 volts on a consistent basis that makes it different. “That basically hasn’t been done with solar to my knowledge,” said Smith, who has filed a patent on the technology.

‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (Stuff we didn’t have time for in today’s audio report)…

• NASA climate change video: This is the U.S. in 2100 (Live Science):
  Scientists hope that the drastic results of CO2 emissions will provide motivation for Americans to start thinking about adaptive strategies to prepare for change.


• Internal EPA Report highlights disputes over fracking and well water: (LA Times):
  An EPA staff report suggests methane from hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, contaminated wells near Dimock, Pa., but the agency says the water’s safe to drink.
• 3 Years Later: Sunken Tar Sands Oil Is Looming Threat to Kalamazoo River: (InsideClimate.org):
  Once black with oil, the Kalamazoo River runs clear now. But EPA orders dredging and says it will be years before the spill’s long-term effects are known.
• Halliburton Pleads Guilty to Destroying Evidence After Gulf Spill (New York Times):
  Oil field services firm Halliburton will plead guilty to a misdemeanor charge of destroying evidence related to the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill in exchange for a fine and probation, the Justice Department said Thursday.
• Enron Redux: Feds describe how JPMorgan Chase allegedly gamed California power market (Sacramento Bee)
• Legal Battles Over Land Rights, Pipelines Are On the Rise: (KUT-FM Austin, TX):
  At Margaret O’Keefe’s farm in East Texas, they grow high-quality Bermuda grass. The fields are flat and vibrant green, surrounded by woods of a darker, richer green. The family loves this land. O’Keefe inherited it from her mother, who divided it among eight children.

• Does Lake Michigan’s Record Low Mark Start of New Era for Great Lakes? (Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel):
  Despite above-average precipitation, lake has seen below-average water levels for 14 years running. Less ice cover and more dark open water may explain why.
• Endangered snow leaopards: Victims of the cashmere trade: (Environment News Service):
  The vast highlands and open spaces of China, Tibet and Mongolia – once roamed by snow leopards, wild camels and yaks, Tibetan gazelles, wild sheep and goats – are increasingly dominated by domestic goats that produce hair for the lucrative cashmere trade.
  Soft and warm, cashmere scarves and sweaters, and cashmere-wool blend coats and suits fetch top prices in exclusive shops.
• At Least 8 Injured in FL Gas Pipeline Explosion, Fire: (Orlando Sentinel):
  Roads near a gas plant in Lake County were littered with twisted pieces of propane canisters early Tuesday, hours after explosions that injured at least eight people and forced the evacuation of residents up to a mile away.
• Above-Average Dead Zone Stretches 6,000 Sq. Miles Along Louisiana Coast: (NOLA Times-Picayune):
  The Dead Zone, an area of oxygen so low that Gulf-bottom organisms are killed and fish and crabs swim away, covered 5,840 square miles of Gulf of Mexico seafloor along Louisiana’s coastline this summer, according to a survey by scientists based at the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium.
• Sea level rise ‘locking in quickly’, cities threatened (Climate Central):
  Measurements tell us that global average sea level is currently rising by about 1 inch per decade. But in an invisible shadow process, our long-term sea level rise commitment or ‘lock-in’ — the sea level rise we don’t see now, but which carbon emissions and warming have locked in for later years — is growing 10 times faster, and this growth rate is accelerating.
• North Pole ‘Lake’ Once Again Turns to Ice: (Reuters):
  Images of a scientific observation buoy floating in what appeared to be an Arctic lake near the North Pole lit up the online world in the past week, sparking questions about whether this was a sign of global warming.
• Rosemount Land Used For WW2 Gun Powder Plant Focus of Controversy: (Minneapolis Star Tribune):
  University of Minnesota officials want the feds to share the burden of cleaning up a 3500-acre ammo plant on land owned by the university.
• Europe, China Agree to Settle Solar Panel Fight: (NY Times):
  The European Union’s trade chief said on Saturday that a deal had been reached with China to settle a dispute over exports of low-cost solar panels that had threatened to set off a wider trade war between two of the world’s largest economies.
• GMO: Race to Save The Orange By Altering Its DNA (NY Times):
  The call Ricke Kress and every other citrus grower in Florida dreaded came while he was driving. ‘It’s here’ was all his grove manager needed to say to force him over to the side of the road.
• Indonesia’s Palm Oil Industry Rife With Human-Rights Abuses (BusinessWeek):
  Among the estimated 3.7 million workers in the industry are thousands of child laborers and workers who face dangerous and abusive conditions. Debt bondage is common, and traffickers who prey on victims face few, if any, sanctions from business or government officials.
• Reuters Climate Change Coverage Declined Significantly After “Skeptic” Editor Joined
  New Analysis Backs Whistleblower’s Claims (Media Matters):
  A Media Matters study finds that Reuters’ coverage of climate change declined by nearly 50 percent under the regime of the current managing editor, lending credence to a former reporter’s claim that a “climate of fear” has gripped the agency.
• Here’s How the Koch Brothers Retaliate Against Journalists They Don’t Like (Grist)
• New Study Predicts Dramatic Sea Level Rise: (Reuters):
  Sea levels could rise by 2.3 metres for each degree Celsius that global temperatures increase and they will remain high for centuries to come, according to a new study by the leading climate research institute, released on Monday.

FOR MORE on Climate Science and Climate Change, go to our Green News Report: Essential Background Page