‘Green News Report’ – June 4, 2015

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IN TODAY’S RADIO REPORT: Republican Rick Perry and Democrat Lincoln Chafee enter the 2016 race; Maryland bans fracking; Texas and Oklahoma ban fracking bans; PLUS: Big Oil CEOs call for a price on carbon (but there’s a catch)… All that and more in today’s Green News Report!

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IN ‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (see links below): EPA study: No evidence fracking has caused “widespread” impacts on drinking water; California Oil Spill Pipeline Had Been Left To Rust Paper-Thin; How to Thrive in the Age of Megadrought?; How Europe’s Climate Policies Led To More U.S. Trees Being Cut Down; 49 States Making Plans for EPA Carbon Rule—Even the Ones That Hate It; Minnesota Tribes Press Concerns Over Pipeline Plan, Wild Rice; Killing the Colorado River: Las Vegas’ ‘water witch’ policy-maker promotes unlimited growth amid drought… PLUS: Adapting to climate change is going to be a lot messier than we think… and much, MUCH more! …

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

• VIDEO: Big Oil Certainly Wasn’t Expecting Activists To Do THIS (Lee Camp, Redacted Tonight)

• 2016 Republican Presidential Nomination – The Candidates On Climate Change:
• Rick Perry launches comeback White House bid (CNN)
• Rick Perry Is Surprisingly Not The Worst GOP Presidential Candidate On The Environment (Climate Progress)
• VIDEO: Rick Perry suggests global warming is a hoax (CBS, 8/11/2011)
• What does Rick Perry believe? Where the candidate stands on 10 issues (PBS NewsHour)
• Rick Perry’s wife explains 2012 flameout (CNN):
  This time, she’s taking a gentler approach. “I did coax him to run, and I look back now and perhaps I should’ve stepped back a little bit,” Anita Perry, 63, said in an interview with CNN. “I am at peace with whatever he does. I really had to dig deep and go back in my faith and that was a pretty dark time for us.”
• As the ‘Texas Miracle’ Fades, a Closer Look at Policy (NY Times)
• Meet The Only Prominent GOP Presidential Candidate Who Accepts Climate Science (Climate Progress)
• Lindsey Graham is the best GOP contender on climate change. That isn’t saying much. (Salon)
• VIDEO: Santorum: ‘There Is No Such Thing As Global Warming’ (Forecast the Facts)
• 2016 Democratic Presidential Race Gets A New Entry:
• Lincoln Chafee Announces Presidential Run (TIME):
  A crowded Republican presidential primary has led to more than a few candidates being called longshots for 2016. But the most unlikely candidate may actually be on the Democratic side.
• VIDEO: Real Time with Bill Maher: Overtime (HBO, 5/8/ 2015)
• What does Lincoln Chafee believe? Where the candidate stands on 10 issues (PBS NewsHour)
• VIDEO: Lincoln Chafee Presidential Campaign Announcement (C-SPAN)
• Transcript: Read Full Text of Gov. Lincoln Chafee’s Campaign Launch (TIME)
• Gov. Chafee Signs Climate-Change Bill Into Law (Eco Rhode Island, 8/2/2014)
• Chafee creates council on climate change (WJAR Rhode Island)
• Lincoln Chafee on Energy & Oil (On The Issues)
• Big Oil CEOs Say They Want A Price On Carbon:
• In Stunning Reversal, ‘Big Oil’ Asks for Carbon Price (Climate Central) [emphasis added]:
  “We want to be a part of the solution and deliver energy to society sustainably for many decades to come.”…The CEOs of the companies, with nearly $1.4 trillion in annual revenue, sent a letter on Friday, which was released publicly on Monday, to Christiana Figueres, the United Nation’s climate chief, as well as Laurent Fabius, France’s Foreign Affairs and International Development Minister who will also lead the Paris climate talks later this year. In it, they ask for national and regional governments to set a price on carbon and for those regional carbon markets to be linked.
• Big Oil Companies Want a Price on Carbon. Here’s Why. (National Journal) [emphasis added]:
  Their effort reflects a strategic calculation for the companies that by engaging on the topic, they can help shape climate policies to benefit natural gas, which produces about half the carbon emissions of coal when burned to create electricity. Wider use of carbon pricing worldwide, depending on how stringent the policies, could benefit companies that produce gas and ship it around the globe in liquefied form..
• Why You Should Be Skeptical Of Big Oil Companies Asking For A Price On Carbon (Climate Progress):
  In a letter released Monday, Shell, BP, Total, Statoil, Eni, and the BG Group told the chief of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change that a price on carbon “should be a key element” of an international agreement to address global climate change. … it’s not like any of those six companies are halting their plans to drill. They haven’t recognized the science that says two-thirds of all proven fossil fuel reserves will have to be left in the ground to avoid catastrophic warming.
• Big Oil’s Plan to Become Big Gas (Bloomberg) [emphasis added]:
  “The enemy is coal,” Pouyanne said Monday. He vowed to pull out of coal mining and said Total may also halt coal trading in Europe. A key strategy for gas producers to push this agenda is asking governments to levy a price on carbon emissions from power plants. That creates an economic incentive to switch from coal, the top source of greenhouse gases, to cleaner options.
• Exxon, Chevron Say No Thanks to European Peers on Climate (Bloomberg)
• Texas and Oklahoma Ban Fracking Bans:
• Oklahoma joins Texas with law preventing cities, towns from banning oil and gas operations (AP) [emphasis added]:
  [C]ritics note the energy industry is among the primary contributors to the political campaigns of corporation commissioners and that the regulatory panel has done little to restrict practices such as wastewater injection wells, which have been linked to a dramatic increase in earthquakes across Oklahoma….Earthquake activity in Oklahoma in 2013 was 70 times greater than it was before 2008, state geologists reported.
• Texas Governor Signs Bill That Makes Local Fracking Bans Illegal (Climate Progress) [emphasis added]:
  “It’s a bad situation when city leaders’ hands are tied,” Denton Councilman Kevin Roden told the Wall Street Journal. “There seems to be an attitude that big state government knows better than the citizens of a city. I just think — conservative or liberal — that is something you don’t do in Texas.”
• Texans Vote To Ban Fracking (Climate Progress, 11/5/2014)
• Denton City Council poised to repeal fracking ban (Denton Record-Chronicle)
• Fracking Bans Are No Longer Allowed In Oklahoma (Climate Progress):
  [T]the Oklahoma Corporation Commission will retain control over oil and gas drilling. The state commission is run by three elected commissioners, all of whom are Republican. Chairman Bob Anthony is a member of the National Petroleum Council, a group that advises the U.S. Department of Energy on oil and gas industry interests.
• The Link Between Fracking Activity And Earthquakes Is Getting Stronger (Climate Progress):
  In the last decade, Oklahoma has experienced a dramatic increase in earthquakes — an increase that has happened in tandem with the spread of wastewater disposal from fracking operations across the state.
• Maryland Bans Fracking – For Two Years:
• Maryland’s Republican governor just let a fracking moratorium become law (Grist):
  The law’s backers in the General Assembly, some of whom pushed for a longer, eight-year moratorium, said the the state will now have time to gather more information about fracking’s impacts.
• MD fracking moratorium to become law without Hogan’s signature (Washington Post):
  “The movement behind this moratorium was unyielding,” Mitch Jones, a director with Food and Water Watch, an NGO, said in a statement Friday. “Passing a moratorium under a pro-fracking governor is a testament to the effectiveness that organizing can have.”
• Maryland bans fracking (The Hill):
  There has been little demand for fracking in Maryland since the practice took off nationally in certain areas of oil and natural gas shale deposits.
• Maryland joins New York as Pennsylvania border state banning fracking (Lancaster Online):
  [Pennsylvania Gov. Tom] Wolf has said that natural gas drilling must be done safely without harming people or the environment. He has reinstated a moratorium on additional fracking on state forest lands and state parks.

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

• EPA study: No evidence fracking has caused “widespread” impacts on drinking water (Fuel Fix) [emphasis added]:
  But its scope has been criticized by hydraulic fracturing skeptics, who say the agency was forced to analyze data without forward-looking studies that include tests of wells both before and after hydraulic fracturing operations to determine baseline conditions and document changes. In its draft, the EPA itself acknowledged that its findings could be affected by “insufficient pre- and post-fracturing data on the quality of drinking water resources.”
• California Oil Spill Pipeline Had Been Left To Rust Paper-Thin (AP):
  An oil pipeline that ruptured and spilled an estimated 383,000 litres (101,000 gallons) of crude near Santa Barbara in May had been allowed to corrode to a tiny fraction of its original thickness, federal regulators have said.
• Adapting to climate change is going to be a lot messier than we think (Vox.com):
  The first rule of climate adaptation should be “stop making things worse.” And yet, surprisingly often, we break that rule.
• How to Thrive in the Age of Megadrought? (Motherboard):
  But how do you survive a megadrought? How might we triumph over Mad Max-levels of wasteland dry, without turning into water-hoarding, Valhalla-worshipping mutants?
• How Europe’s Climate Policies Led To More U.S. Trees Being Cut Down (Washington Post):
  For the sake of a greener Europe, thousands of American trees are falling each month in the forests outside this cotton-country town.
• 49 States Making Plans for EPA Carbon Rule—Even the Ones That Hate It (InsideClimate News):
  The Environmental Protection Agency’s plans to finalize the rules on carbon emissions from power plants are still several months away. But most states, even those challenging the agency in court, are already investigating ways to comply.
• DC Circuit Court rejects challenges to EPA ozone regulations (Utility Dive):
  A federal appeals court [Tuesday] rejected a series of challenges from states, environmental groups and energy companies to U.S. EPA’s determinations of which parts of the country meet its standard for ozone, a main component of smog.
• E.P.A. to Set New Limits on Airplane Emissions (NY Times):
  The Obama administration is set to announce that it will require new rules to cut emissions from airplanes, expanding a quest to tackle climate change that has included a string of significant regulations on cars, trucks and power plants.
• White House Meeting Elicits Pledges to Reduce Antibiotic Use (NY Times):
  The Obama administration convened representatives of hospitals, food producers, professional medical societies and restaurant chains on Tuesday and extracted pledges to reduce the use of lifesaving antibiotics, whose effectiveness is waning because of overuse.
• Groups Sue Agency To Block Shell’s Arctic Offshore Drilling (AP):
  Ten environmental groups Tuesday sued a federal agency over its approval of a plan by Royal Dutch Shell PLC for exploratory petroleum drilling off Alaska’s northwest coast.
• Minnesota Tribes Press Concerns Over Pipeline Plan, Wild Rice (Minnesota Public Radio):
  Several Minnesota Indian bands are upset about what they say is a lack of consultation over a proposed controversial oil pipeline across northern Minnesota.
• Killing the Colorado: “The ‘Water Witch’ (Pro Publica) [emphasis added]:
  Yet even last summer — staring at the effects of growth and drought on the reservoir, where once-drowned islands were visible for the first time in as much as 75 years — Mulroy apologized for none of it. She bridled at the idea that Las Vegas or other desert cities had reached the outer edge of what their environments could support. “That’s the silliest thing I have ever heard,” she said, her voice rising in anger. “I’ve had it right up to here with all this ‘Stop your growth.’”
• Reducing Drilling Pollution—Wyoming Did It, No Big Deal. Will Texas? (Environmental Defense Fund):
  Texas may lead the nation in oil and gas drilling, but it is falling way behind other states – including other industry-friendly states like Wyoming — in protecting its residents from drilling impacts.
• Jeb Bush meets with coal industry CEOs, drawing criticism from environmental activists (Washington Post):
  Bush was the only potential presidential candidate on the agenda at the fourth annual meeting of the Coal & Investment Leadership Forum, which includes top officers of some of the largest coal firms in the eastern United States.
• New EPA water rule continues coal industry exemption (Charleston Gazette) [emphasis added]:
  [B]uried in the nearly 300-page rule made public last week is language that maintains a long-standing exemption that various industries — from coal mining to large-scale farming — have used to allow them to turn what might otherwise be considered streams into huge waste impoundments.
• House bill would undo decades of fisheries management, add ‘flexibility’ to federal fishing law (AP):
  A bill sponsored by Rep. Don Young, R-Alaska, would remove a 10-year timeframe for rebuilding depleted fish stocks and allow fisheries managers to consider the economic needs of fishing communities in setting annual catch limits….Forty-three percent of fish stocks identified as being overfished were rebuilt or showed good progress toward rebuilding within 10 years, the time limit required by the Magnuson-Stevens law, the report said. Another 31 percent were on track to rebuild if sharply reduced fishing levels remain in place, the report said.
• Appalachian Power ceases operations in 3 W.Va. coal-fired plants, 2 in Va. (Bluefield Daily Telegraph):
  Upgrading the plant to comply with the new federal EPA rules dealing with mercury and air toxic standards was cost prohibitive for the company. The age of the plant, which was built in 1919, also made it difficult to convert the facility from coal to natural gas.
• 10 Billion Tons of Coal Could Erase Obama’s Progress on Climate Change (Motherboard):
  Some 10.2 billion tons of coal, sitting on 106,00 acres of public land, have been authorized for sale by the Obama administration today.
• Coal Industry Fighting for Survival on 7 Fronts (InsideClimate News):
  The ‘war on coal’ started long before Obama took office to control the costly and deadly health impacts of an otherwise cheap and abundant fuel.
• Holding Your Breath in India (NY Times):
  A recent study showed that nearly half of Delhi’s 4.4 million schoolchildren have irreversible lung damage from the poisonous air.
• Rate Of Climate Change To Soar By 2020s, With Arctic Warming 1°F Per Decade (Climate Progress):
  New research from a major national lab projects that the rate of climate change, which has risen sharply in recent decades, will soar by the 2020s. This worrisome projection – which has implications for extreme weather, sea level rise, and permafrost melt – is consistent with several recent studies.
• 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.

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

• Video Proof That Global Warming is a ‘Hoax’!: NASA Temperature Data 1888-2011 (The BRAD BLOG):



• NASA climate change video: This is the U.S. in 2100 (NASA).