‘Green News Report’ – April 5, 2016

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IN TODAY’S RADIO REPORT: New report finds climate change is going to kill a lot of Americans; The Keystone Pipeline springs a leak; Good news and bad news for California’s epic, historic drought; Another heat wave hits Alaska; PLUS: Customers flock to reserve Tesla’s Model 3, which doesn’t even exist yet… All that and more in today’s Green News Report!

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IN ‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (see links below): Can Coal Companies Afford To Clean Up Coal Country?; ‘Fractivists’ Increase Pressure on Clinton and Sanders in New York; Climate Change Puts Trillions in Financial Assets At Risk: Study; Federal Judge Approves $20 Billion Settlement From BP Oil Spill; Chicago To Start Testing Water In Homes of Children Poisoned By Lead; New Study: “Acidic Pacific: Act Now, or West Coast Pays Dearly; Judge: Climate Change Imperils Wolverines And Feds Must Act…PLUS: Australia: No ‘science for science sake’… and much, MUCH more! …

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

• New Report Finds Climate Change Is Going To Kill A Lot Of Americans:
• U.S. Global Change Research Program (GlobalChange.gov)
• VIDEO: Impacts of Climate Change on Human Health in the United States (News conference, WhiteHouse.gov)
• The Deepening Story of How Climate Change Threatens Human Health (WhiteHouse.gov)
• Fever: Federal report says global warming making US sick (AP):
  Man-made global warming is making America sicker, and it’s only going to get worse, according to a new federal government report. The 332-page report issued Monday by the Obama administration said global warming will make the air dirtier, water more contaminated and food more tainted. It warned of diseases, such as those spread by ticks and mosquitoes, longer allergy seasons, and thousands of heat wave deaths.
• Climate change threat to public health worse than polio, White House warns (Guardian UK):
  Hot, sunny days cook more smog which makes breathing conditions worse for sufferers of asthma, emphysema and other respiratory conditions. Warming temperatures also extend the allergy season and fuel the risk of wildfires – whose smoke also worsens air quality.
• Baked Alaska: March Temperature Record Tops 70 Degrees:
• The temperature just hit 71 degrees. In Alaska. In March. (Alaska Dispatch News):
  Before 2016, Alaska temperatures in March hadn’t hit the 70-degree mark for any years on record….”We basically had a June or July air mass move in in March,” Brettschneider said. “If we had June or July sun, it would have been 80 degrees, but we didn’t.”
• Midwinter months break temperature records across Alaska (Alaska Dispatch News)
• Low-snow season goes for a record in Anchorage’s weather books (Alaska Dispatch News)
• Good News And Bad News For California’s Epic Drought:
• Snowpack 97% of Average in California’s Northern Sierra (National Geographic):
  New spring survey shows some drought relief but more conservation is needed to ensure adequate water supply… In normal years, California gets about 30 percent of its water supply from the Sierra Nevada snowpack.
• No, California’s drought isn’t over. Here’s why easing the drought rules would be a big mistake (LA Times):
  Experts reckon that even if 2016 represents a break from the record dry conditions of the last four years, the damage done by the drought to the state’s water supply will be lasting. Long-term reserves in groundwater have been drained to the point that years, even decades, of wet weather would be required to replenish them.
• Drought still grips Southern California, keeping pressure on state water supplies (Sacramento Bee)
• TransCanada Shuts Down Existing Keystone Pipeline After Leak:
• Keystone pipeline springs leak in South Dakota (CNN Money)
• TransCanada shuts down Keystone after oil seeps to surface (National Observer):
  “My understanding is that it was a passerby that observed it and called the company,” said Nelson, chairman of the South Dakota Public Utilities Commission. If confirmed, this would mean that the company’s leak detection system failed to identify the incident.
• North Dakota: Native American Tribes Protest Proposed Pipeline:
• Native American tribes mobilize against proposed North Dakota oil pipeline (Guardian UK):
  About 200 people rode on horseback to protest against pipeline that encroaches on tribal lands and could pollute Missouri river: ‘We’re looking out for all people.’
• Sioux spirit camp to protest Dakota Access Pipeline (Bismarck Tribune)
• Dakota Access Pipeline Threat: What You Need to Know (Indian Country Today Media Network)
• Customers Line Up to Reserve Tesla Model 3:
• Meet Tesla’s Model 3, Its Long-Awaited Car for the Masses (Wired)
• Did Elon Musk Just Kill Gasoline Powered Cars? (Climate Crocks):
  By nightfall on Saturday, that order tally had jumped to 276,000. That’s more than $US280 million in zero-cost capital to Tesla, from the $US1,000, $A1,500 and €1,000 deposits, and total orders for more than $A13 billion of electric vehicles….It is – by a long shot – the fastest growing customer order book in the history of the automobile industry.
• Tesla Motors’ Elon Musk just killed the petrol car (Renew Economy):
  And what would that master plan be? According to Morgan Stanley analysts, it’s not actually the volumes that will count. Musk’s vision, they say, if for a shared, autonomous electric transport network where revenue is generated through the sales of miles rather than units.
• The Electric Car Revolution Is Now Scheduled for 2022 (Wired):
  “By 2022,” the report says, “the unsubsidized total cost of ownership of BEVs [battery electric vehicles] will fall below that of an internal combustion engine vehicle.” From there, the report projects a steadily increasing rate of adoption, reaching global sales of 41 million—25 percent of total market share—by 2040.

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

• Can Coal Companies Afford To Clean Up Coal Country? (Washington Post):
  A worsening financial crisis for the nation’s biggest coal companies is sparking concerns that U.S. taxpayers could be stuck with hundreds of millions, if not billions, of dollars in cleanup costs across a landscape of shuttered mines stretching from Appalachia to the northern Plains.
• ‘Fractivists’ Increase Pressure on Clinton and Sanders in New York (NY Times):