‘Green News Report’ – December 15, 2016

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IN TODAY’S RADIO REPORT: Trump taps former Texas Governor (and super genius!) Rick Perry to head the nation’s nuclear arsenal; Trump’s pick for Interior Department, Rep. Ryan Zinke, not a fan of oil and gas regulations; EPA now says fracking does harm drinking water supplies; PLUS: The Arctic is unraveling, shout NOAA scientists… All that and more in today’s Green News Report!

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IN ‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (see links below): Solar capacity has increased 99 per cent since last quarter; Under Trump, States And Cities Must Lead On Energy; Oil refineries threaten public safety; Feds Will Not Reconsider Their Denial Of Jordan Cove LNG Terminal; “You Are Hurting Future Generations”; So what if Trump and Perry shut down the Energy Department? No one will miss it; Scientists are frantically copying U.S. climate data, fearing it might vanish under Trump… PLUS: Secretary Jewell Urges Scientists To ‘Fight Disinformation’ Under Trump… and much, MUCH more! …

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

• Trump picks former rival, former TX Gov. Rick Perry for Energy Department:
• BradCast: ‘Are You Now or Have You Ever Been a Climate Scientist?’: Physicist, author and former Asst. Energy Sec. Joe Romm on Trump, Perry, Tillerson, the DoE and ‘the fate of the next thousand years’ (The Brad Blog)
• Trump taps Rick Perry, vocal climate critic, to lead DOE (E&E News):
  When Texas was enduring thousands of wildfires and extreme drought in 2011 that scientists said was amplified by global warming, then-Gov. Rick Perry (R) never once mentioned climate change. Instead, he called for an official three days of prayer. The drought worsened. Major rains didn’t come for another 170 days.
• Will Rick Perry Promote Science at the Department of Energy? (The Atlantic)
• U.S. oil industry cheers Trump energy pick, seeks gas export boost (Reuters):
  “As the former governor of Texas, Rick Perry knows the important impact that energy production has on our nation’s economy. In his new role at the Energy Department, he has the opportunity to encourage increased exports of domestically produced natural gas,” he said in a statement. Natural gas companies are eager to access foreign markets for their supply after a decade-long drilling boom that triggered a domestic glut and depressed prices.
• Message for Rick Perry: The Department of energy doesn’t actually produce energy policy (Salon)
• Trump team’s chilling questionnaire backfires, Energy Dept. refuses:
• Energy Dept. won’t turn over identities of those working on climate to Trump (USA Today):
  “We will be forthcoming with all publicly available information with the transition team. We will not be providing any individual names to the transition team,” spokesman Eben Burnham-Snyder said in a statement.
• Trump team says Energy Dept. questionnaire unauthorized (AP)
• Trump transition team for Energy Department seeks names of employees involved in climate meetings (Washington Post)
• Trump picks Rep. Ryan Zinke (R-MT) to head Interior Dept.:
• VIDEO Freshman Class: Rep. Ryan Zinke (Fox News)
• Trump taps Montana Rep. Ryan Zinke for Interior secretary (USA Today):
  According to the League of Conservation Voters, Zinke’s voting record places him at the bottom of their rankings of members of Congress. In 2015, his first year in the House, Zinke voted with the league on 3% of their scored votes, compared to 41% of all House members.
• Trump’s Interior Nominee Ryan Zinke Was for Climate Action Before He Was Against It (Mother Jones)
• Trump taps Rep. Ryan Zinke for Interior, adds another climate denier to the cabinet (Climate Progress) [emphasis added]:
  “It’s not a hoax, but it’s not proven science either,” Zinke has said. “But you don’t dismantle America’s power and energy on a maybe.”
• NOAA Arctic Report Card: ‘The Arctic is unraveling’:
• Scientists alarmed by rapid pace of Arctic warming, sea ice melt (Mashable):
  Arctic climate change went into overdrive in 2016, with record high temperatures eclipsing anything seen since at least 1900. Accompanying the record warmth were freak losses of sea ice, melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet and a host of cascading feedbacks that scientists have been warning about for years.
• ‘The Arctic Is Unraveling,’ Scientists Conclude After Latest Sobering Climate Report (Inside Climate News):
  “We’ve seen a year in 2016 like we’ve never seen before … with clear acceleration of many global warming signals. The Arctic was whispering change. Now it’s not whispering. It’s speaking, it’s shouting change, and the changes are large,” said co-author Donald Perovich, who studies Arctic climate at Dartmouth College.

• EPA reverses course, confirms fracking has harmed water supplies:
• EPA’s late changes to fracking study downplay risk of drinking water pollution (Marketplace)
Documents obtained by APM Reports and Marketplace show that in the six weeks before the study’s public release, officials inserted a key phrase into the executive summary that said researchers did not find evidence of “widespread systemic impacts” of fracking by the oil and gas industry on the nation’s drinking water. Earlier draft versions emphasized more directly that fracking has contaminated drinking water in some places.
• The EPA Once Said Fracking Did Not Cause Widespread Water Contamination. Not Anymore (Inside Climate News):
  In a significant reversal, the Environmental Protection Agency struck from a major 2015 report its conclusion that fracking has not caused “widespread, systemic impacts on drinking water” in the United States. The agency cited the lack of data and evidence to support the finding.
• EPA’s Fracking Finding Misled on Threat to Drinking Water, Scientists Conclude (Inside Climate News, 8/12/2016)
• EPA changes its stand on fracking, says it can harm drinking water in ‘some circumstances’ (Washington Post)

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

• Scientists are Saving Climate Data; This Is Why it Matters (Climate Central):
  “These are products funded by taxpayers who own the intellectual property and should be granted unfettered access,” said Ryan Maue, a meteorologist who works at the private weather firm WeatherBell and is an adjunct scholar at the conservative Cato Institute.
• So what if Trump and Perry shut down the Energy Department? No one will miss it (CNBC) [emphasis added]:
  We could try to answer that question by diving into the bitterly partisan political and economic debate over the size of government that’s been dividing people in this country since the days of Jefferson and Hamilton. Or we could wisely dump that academic argument and realize that the answer lies in how well the Trump team manages to make sure the changes get noticed by normal voters in a positive way. In politics, perception truly is reality.
• “You Are Hurting Future Generations”: Mark Ruffalo’s Message to People Profiting from Fossil Fuels (Demcoracy Now!)
• Scientists are frantically copying U.S. climate data, fearing it might vanish under Trump (Washington Post)
• Solar capacity has increased 99 per cent since last quarter: (Climate Progress)
• Secretary Jewell Urges Scientists To ‘Fight Disinformation’ Under Trump (Washington Post):
• Carbon Wars: ‘Get Someone Up Here. We’re All Dying.’ – Oil refineries threaten public safety (Center for Public Integrity)
• Experts: Under Trump, States And Cities Must Lead On Energy (Midwest Energy News)
• Feds Will Not Reconsider Their Denial Of Jordan Cove LNG Terminal (Oregon Live)
• NASA Just Created a Stunning New 3-D View of CO2 (Climate Central)
  

• No country on Earth is taking the 2 degree climate target seriously (Vox):
  If we mean what we say, no more new fossil fuels, anywhere.

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

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