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(Or use “Click here to listen…” link below.)IN TODAY’S RADIO REPORT: VETOED: Obama nixes Keystone XL pipeline bill; EXPOSED: prominent climate denier researcher funded by fossil fuel industry; BUSTED: Duke Energy clipped by the Feds; Sorry, deniers: Climate change is not caused by the sun; PLUS: It’s GNR’s 6th Anniversary!…. All that and more in today’s Green News Report!
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IN ‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (see links below): Obama is right: climate change kills more people than terrorism; New U.S. heat records outnumber new cold records; Solar energy now unstoppable force; White House proposes first-ever Arctic oil drill rules; Roll up those windows: traffic pollution is killing you; Bjorn Lomborg: we must pollute the world’s poor with coal pollution; Marines graduate into solar industry… PLUS: The true impact of not recycling your old electronics… and much, MUCH more! …
STORIES DISCUSSED ON TODAY’S ‘GREEN NEWS REPORT’…
- THANK YOU for your support and for sharing the last six years of environment news and snark with us!
- VETOED: Obama Nixes Keystone XL Pipeline Fast-Track Bill:
- Obama Vetoes Keystone XL Pipeline Bill (NY Times)
- Read Obama’s Keystone veto statement (The Hill’s e2 Wire)
- 5 ways the Keystone saga could end (Politico):
Obama’s decision to approve or reject the oil pipeline could come weeks or months after he vetoes Congress’ pro-Keystone bill.
- Obama Just Vetoed The Keystone XL Pipeline. Now What? (Climate Progress),/li>
- Obama Vetoes Keystone Pipeline (National Journal): The veto marks the first high-profile clash between the White House and Capitol Hill Republicans.
- 9 questions about the Keystone XL pipeline debate you were too embarrassed to ask (Vox)
- Dr. Michael Mann: It’s game over for the Keystone pipeline (Guardian UK):
A vote in the Senate should be the beginning of the end for this dangerous, climate change-generating project. Even conservative estimates don’t add up.
- EXPOSED: Climate Change-Denying Researcher Funded By Fossil Fuels:
- The Slick Willie of Climate Denial – Science as “Deliverables†for the Disinfo Machine (Climate Crocks)
- Deeper Ties to Corporate Cash for Doubtful Climate Researcher (NY Times) [emphasis added]:
[N]ewly released documents show the extent to which Dr. Soon’s work has been tied to funding he received from corporate interests. He has accepted more than $1.2 million in money from the fossil-fuel industry over the last decade while failing to disclose that conflict of interest in most of his scientific papers. At least 11 papers he has published since 2008 omitted such a disclosure, and in at least eight of those cases, he appears to have violated ethical guidelines of the journals that published his work.
- Heartland Institute 58 Experts Poster Remixed by DeSmog, Willie Soon Among Denialist Dozens (DeSmog Blog)
- Senator Calls For Investigation Into Climate ‘Denial-For-Hire Scheme (Huffington Post Green)
- Sorry, Deniers – Global Warming Not Caused by the Sun:
- VIDEO: Oft-Cited Climate ‘Skeptic’ Received $1.2M from Fossil Fuel Industry, Failed to Disclose Payments (The BRAD BLOG):
Dr. Wei-Hock ‘Willie’ Soon took payments from Kochs, Southern Co., ExxonMobil; Peddled discredited scientific global warming theory…
- VIDEO: Fox Climate Reporting Rates “Pants on Fire†– “Retired Accountant†as Climate Expert (Climate Crocks)
- VIDEO: Richard Muller: I Was Wrong on Global Warming (Climate Crocks)
- BUSTED: Duke Energy Charged by the Feds for Dan River Coal Spill:
- Duke Energy: Coal Giant Dumped Waste Directly Into Rivers, Now Faces Criminal Charges (Climate Progress):
Federal prosecutors charged Duke with nine counts of misdemeanors under the Clean Water Act late Friday, saying that the energy company had been dumping coal ash from power plants in five North Carolina locations since at least 2010.
- US charges Duke with illegal pollution from 5 coal ash dumps (WRAL-TV Raliegh) [emphasis added]:
The administration of Gov. Pat McCrory, a Republican who worked at Duke for 29 years, then proposed what environmentalists derided as a “sweetheart deal” under which the Charlotte-based company worth more than $50 billion would have paid fines of just $99,111 to settle violations over toxic groundwater leeching from two of its plants. That agreement, which included no requirement that Duke immediately stop or clean up the pollution, was pulled amid intense criticism after the Dan River spill.
- Criminal charges in spills to cost Duke Energy $100 million (Charlotte News-Observer) [emphasis added]:
Duke would pay a $100 million fine under a settlement agreement. Duke took a charge against earnings of that amount Tuesday to reflect its “probable financial exposure” to a grand jury probe of its coal ash practices.
- VIDEO: Duke Energy Charges with Crime Over Spill (The Rachel Maddow Show)
‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (Stuff we didn’t have time for in today’s audio report)…
- The true impact of not recycling your old electronics (Treehugger):
If we collectively did our part and Americans recycled the 130 million cellphones that are thrown away each year, we would save enough energy to power 24,000 homes….For every million cell phones recycled, 35,274 pounds of copper, 772 pounds of silver, 75 pounds of gold and 33 pounds of palladium could be recovered.
- Obama Is Right: Climate Change Kills More People Than Terrorism (The New Republic):
Twenty governments commissioned an independent report in 2012 from the group DARA International to study the human and economic costs of climate change. It linked 400,000 deaths worldwide to climate change each year, projecting deaths to increase to over 600,000 per year by 2030.
- VIDEO: Cold Snap Freezes East, but Across US, It’s Mostly Heat Records that Are Being Set (Climate Crocks)
- Unstoppable: Solar Power Comes of Age – How Harnessing the Sun Got Cheap and Practical (Foreign Affairs):
This time really is different: solar power is ready to compete on its own terms. The momentum behind solar power is a result of innovations in regulation, industry, technology, and financing. In a number of markets, it no longer needs public subsidies to compete on price with conventional power sources, such as coal, natural gas, and nuclear power.
- White House Proposes First-Ever Rules For Oil Drilling In The Arctic (Climate Progress) [emphasis added]:
“There is no proven way to respond to a spill in icy Arctic waters and, as Shell unfortunately demonstrated, companies simply are not ready for the Arctic Ocean,†Susan Murray, Ocean’s deputy vice president for the Pacific, told the Guardian. “Until and unless companies can operate safely and without harming the Arctic Ocean ecosystem, the government has no business allowing them into the region.â€
- Your Car Is Slowly Killing You (Take Part):
A new study shows that drivers are exposed to high levels of pollution when stopped at traffic lights—here’s some strategies to reduce that risk.
- For Bjorn Lomborg, Shilling For Anti-Environmental Causes Is A Matter Of Life And Death (Media Matters) [emphasis added]:
Of course, that wasn’t the conclusion of the study Lomborg was citing. The University of Minnesota researchers instead emphasized that “electric vehicles (EVs) powered by electricity from natural gas or wind, water, or solar power are best for improving air quality, whereas vehicles powered by corn ethanol and EVs powered by coal are the worst.” In other words, the solution is moving away from coal as quickly as possible, not scrapping electric cars.
…
So to recap Lomborg’s argument: Electric cars kill people because they are powered with coal, but poor countries should embrace coal in order to prevent deaths. - On Rajendra Pachauri’s Resignation from the UN Climate Panel: (Dot Earth, NY Times):
Rajendra K. Pachauri, the chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change since 2002, resigned today amid allegations of sexual harassment by a 29-year-old female employee of the Indian energy institute he has long run.
- Marines Graduate to Second Career in Solar (Triple Pundit):
On February 13, the Department of Energy announced the first class of Marines graduated from the pilot phase of its SunShot Initiative solar energy industry training program. As the Energy Department explains, the groundbreaking program prepares “service members for careers in the solar industry as solar photovoltaic system installers, sales representatives, system inspectors, and other solar-related opportunities.â€
- US Oyster, Clam Farms Face Economic Blow From Acidification: Study (Reuters):
U.S. shellfish producers in the Northeast and the Gulf of Mexico will be most vulnerable to an acidification of the oceans linked to climate change that makes it harder for clams and oysters to build shells, a study said on Monday.
- New York City Could See 6-Foot Sea Rise, Tripling of Heat Waves by 2100 (Scientific American):
Coastal communities, like many on Staten Island and in low-lying Brooklyn and Queens, could be in particular jeopardy, with storms likely to alter local beaches and coastlines. To date, the city has already dumped 26,000 linear feet of sand along Staten Island’s shorelines, for instance, but that number could pale in comparison with future adaptation needs, the report said.
- “More research” into geoengineering is not such a hot idea (Grist):
Regarding albedo modification, I cannot improve on the piquant words of environmental scientist Raymond T. Pierrehumbert: “the idea of ‘fixing’ the climate by hacking the Earth’s reflection of sunlight is wildly, utterly, howlingly barking mad.”
…
If it’s crazy today, it would be crazy tomorrow, so why not just abandon it? - Now’s Your Chance to Help Save the Imperiled Monarch Butterfly-and Get Paid to Do So (Take Part) [emphasis added]:
Another threat, according to Grant, has been well-intentioned individuals who have planted a tropical form of milkweed, which competes with native varieties and is not beneficial to monarchs or other pollinators.
- It’s Not Too Late To Stop Climate Change, And It’ll Be Super-Cheap (Climate Progress):
I rarely disagree with Dave Roberts. But he has a column on Grist, “We can solve climate change, but it won’t be cheap or easy,” that is wrong, pure and simple….The most important climate issue is the cost and consequences of inaction.
FOR MORE on Climate Science and Climate Change, go to our Green News Report: Essential Background Page
But exactly how bad is still an open question, and a lot depends not only on how we react, but how quickly. The rate at which humans cut down on greenhouse gas emissions–if we do choose to cut them–will have a large bearing on how the world turns out by 2100, the forecasts reveal.
Restraining global warming to no more than 2 degrees Celsius will require changing how the world produces and uses energy to power its cities and factories, heats and cools buildings, as well as moves people and goods in airplanes, trains, cars, ships and trucks, according to the IPCC. Changes are required not just in technology, but also in people’s behavior.
You do know that Shell was one of the first funders of WWF and that they were heavily into making money out of wind.
And the lies they spread were to raise the price of oil through the gullible idiots that went along with the global warming scam!
Denier, Mike Haseler, so-called “Scottish Sceptic,” who offers no credentials; no facts; no science, while speciously claiming that global warming is a “scam” lays down a piece of oil cartel propaganda, aka greenwash by claiming that Shell Oil is heavily into “making money out of wind.”
That canard was debunked by Rolling Stone‘s Antonia Juhasz.
Juhasz zeroes in on Shell, the world’s largest company:
Shell abandoned solar in 2006 and maintains only minor investments in wind and some hydrogen research today.
The bulk of Shell’s alternative investments today are in biofuels. Meanwhile, it presses ahead with the world’s deepest offshore oil well in the Gulf of Mexico and refuses to do more than “pause” plans for drilling in the U.S. Arctic – even after one of its drilling rigs ran aground in Kodiak, Alaska in January.
Have any other greenwashing tall tales you’d like to add, Mike?
Great job Des.
Well said Ernie @2.
RE: “New York City Could See 6-Foot Sea Rise … by 2100” in one of the links above.
You know that sea-level rise calculations have been notoriously low … underestimated … because scientists are afraid to scare the sheeple.
A paper in a recent journal points out that in only 2 years (2009-2010) sea levels near New York City rose 128 mm (5.04 in.) which is 2.52 inches per year:
(Nature Communications). These types of surges will not only continue, they will increase over time.
In a 10 year run that would be 25.2 inches, or 2 feet 1.2 inches, which is quite dangerous to New York.
Because, among other things, of flooding damage.
Not to mention Miami Beach, Norfolk, and other coastal cities.
Especially during storm surges.
The Pentagon told Obama that climate change is the greatest threat to our national security.
If the sea level rise surges happen in only 43 of the next 85 years (until 2100), that would be 9.03 feet of sea level rise.
Not a mere 6 feet as conservatively suggested in the “New York City Could See 6-Foot Sea Rise” link.
Historically, the sea level rises have been underestimated, increasing our exposure to being unprepared.
Time to realize that the underestimates are much more dangerous than the overestimates.