‘Green News Report’ – December 7, 2017

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IN TODAY’S RADIO REPORT: Southern California wildfires continue to rage out of control amid record wind and dry conditions; Interior Secretary proposes shrinking even more national monuments; New study warns even more public lands are at risk due to fossil fuel exploitation; PLUS: Good news for renewable energy – it’s now cheaper than both coal and nuclear plants… All that and more in today’s Green News Report!

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IN ‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (see links below): Are humans in invasive species?; To prevent climate catastrophe, Democrats need to learn a ruthless lesson from Senate GOP; How a group of friends saved a stranger’s house in Ventura; Alaskan oil lease sale brings few bids; VW officials gets 7 years in prison for emissions-cheating scandal; House moderates opposes ANWR drilling in tax cut bill; The most accurate climate models predict greater warming; Trump administration exceeding the energy industry’s wildest dreams; Asthma hotspots more profitable to neglect for hospitals; US mayors sign climate charter; Only 60 years of farming left if soil degradation continues… PLUS: Hurricane Harvey could leave Texas $1 billion short… and much, MUCH more! …

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

• Southern California wildfires continue to rage out of control:
• Live Updates: Southern California fires live updates: Homes burn in Bel-Air as new fire erupts in heart of L.A. (LA Times):
  Multiple fires are raging in Southern California. A series of Santa Ana wind-driven wildfires have destroyed at least 180 structures, forced thousands to flee and smothered the region with smoke in what officials predicted would be a pitched battle for days.
• Fire crews fight to protect Ojai as Thomas fire explodes to 90,000 acres; hundreds of homes are feared lost in Ventura County (LA Times)
• California Fires Enter the Heart of Los Angeles (NY Times):
  As fires raged out of control across Southern California, a new blaze erupted in the Bel-Air neighborhood of Los Angeles, near iconic landmarks like the U.C.L.A. campus and the Getty Museum, home to old masters paintings and ancient Roman statues.
• The Fire Is Roaring Over the Ridge. It’s Time to Go. (NY Times):
  Some had just seconds to spare before their homes and neighborhoods were consumed by the deadly fires in California.
• Climate change gives California’s wildfire season an unwelcome boost (Climate Progress)
• Zinke proposes shrinking more national monuments:
• Zinke: Shrink 2 More National Monuments And Shift Management Of 10 (Washington Post):
  Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke on Tuesday called on President Trump to shrink a total of four national monuments and change the way six other land and marine sites are managed, a sweeping overhaul of how protected areas are maintained in the United States… He also would revise the proclamations for those and the others to clarify that certain activities are allowed.
• Ryan Zinke recommends Trump shrink two more US national monuments (Guardian UK):
  Interior secretary Ryan Zinke has announced recommendations to shrink two more national monuments in the western US – Cascade-Siskiyou in Oregon and California, and Gold Butte in Nevada. He also said Donald Trump should consider changing the boundaries of the Pacific Remote Islands and Rose Atoll Marine monuments in the Pacific Ocean.
• National Monuments: Zinke Urges Commercial Fishing In 3 Protected Areas (E&E News)
• Loss of protections for marine sanctuaries could threaten oceanic environment and fisheries, Stanford experts say (Stanford Univ.):
  “If a trawl fisherman runs a net along the bottom, the destruction can be near total. Ecosystems may not return to a pre-disturbance state for many thousands of years. Fish recruitment declines, and the fisherman has killed the goose that lays golden eggs. It’s short-term gain and long-term disaster…It’s not just fishing. If marine monuments are axed we could also see oil drilling and deep-sea mining happening just a 20-minute boat ride away from our nation’s healthiest coral reefs.”
• Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR): “National monuments President Obama created or expanded generate $156 million+ in local economic activity. Donald Trump’s rollback harms rural economic progress & job creation.” (Twitter)
• VIDEO: Trump shrinks two huge national monuments in Utah, drawing praise and protests (Washington Post) [emphasis added]:
  If these revisions are successfully sustained in court, they would redefine not only how existing public lands are protected but the extent to which future presidents could dictate that they remain untouched.
• Patagonia sues Trump Administration over national monuments:
• I’m not going to ‘let evil win’: Patagonia’s billionaire owner says he plans to sue Trump (Washington Post):
  Outdoor goods retailers Patagonia, REI and the North Face are firing back against President Trump’s executive order this week that would drastically reduce the size of two national monuments in Utah.
• The President Stole Your Land (Patagonia):
  In an illegal move, the president just reduced the size of Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monuments. This is the largest elimination of protected land in American history.
• VIDEO: Navajo Nation VP blasts Trump’s move to drastically shrink national monuments (Media Matters)
• In rare move, 5 tribes join to file lawsuit against President Trump over Bears Ears (KUTV)
• Environmental, conservation groups sue Trump over monument changes (CNN)
• At risk: huge swaths of public lands atop fossil fuel deposits:
• Area of protected land larger than California at risk from drilling under Trump (Unearthed, Greenpeace):
  Unearthed has mapped – for the first time – the overlap between every federally protected park, forest, monument and wildlife refuge in the US and major fossil fuel deposits
• Now We Finally Know How Much Federal Land Could Be at Stake in Trump’s Rush for More Drilling: interactive map lays it all out. (Mother Jones) [emphasis added]:
  Trump’s actions Monday foreshadow the much wider stakes of his presidency: Beyond monuments, many federal lands sit on top of fossil fuels, and he has wide latitude to open them up to more development…They calculate that within those public lands are 28.9 million acres of national forests, 13.6 million acres of national wildlife refuge, 2.9 million acres of parks, and 7 million acres of wilderness overlapping with fossil fuel fields and basins. This is the first relatively comprehensive inventory of federally protected land intersecting with oil, coal, and gas deposits.
• Renewable energy keeps getting cheaper, much faster than predicted:
• New study reaches a stunning conclusion about the cost of solar and wind energy (Climate Progress):
  In one of the fastest and most astonishing turnarounds in the history of energy, building and running new renewable energy is now cheaper than just running existing coal and nuclear plants in many areas.
• Levelized Cost of Energy 2017 (Lazard Ltd.):
  Lazard’s latest annual Levelized Cost of Energy Analysis (LCOE 11.0) shows a continued decline in the cost of generating electricity from alternative energy technologies, especially utility-scale solar and wind.

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

For a comprehensive roundup of daily environmental news you can trust, see the Society of Environmental Journalists’ Daily Headlines page

• Are We an Invasive Species? Plus, Other Burning Climate Questions (NY Times)
• To prevent climate catastrophe, Democrats need to learn a ruthless lesson from Senate GOP (Climate Progress)
• The story behind the photos: How a group of friends saved a stranger’s house in Ventura (LA Times)
• Hurricane Harvey could leave Texas $1 billion short (Houston Chronicle)
• Only 26 percent of Hurricane Harvey survivors had FEMA aid request approved, survey finds (Washington Post)
• Alaskan oil lease sale brings few bids despite vast territory offered (Reuters)
• Volkswagen Official Gets 7-Year Term in Diesel-Emissions Cheating (NY Times)
• House Moderates Oppose Allowing Arctic Oil Drilling In Tax Bill (McClatchy)
• More Than 200 Nations Promise To Stop Ocean Plastic Waste (Reuters)
• The Most Accurate Climate Models Predict Greater Warming, Study Shows (Inside Climate News)
• Trump administration exceeding the energy industry’s wildest dreams (Climate Progress)
• Right-wing lobbying group ALEC fails to pass resolution targeting EPA endangerment finding (Climate Progress)
• Georgia Regulators Question Economics Of Completing Nuclear Plant (Chattanooga Times Free Press)
• Hospitals Find Asthma Hot Spots More Profitable To Neglect Than Fix (Washington Post)
• Mayors Sign Climate Charter After Trump Ditches Paris Accord (NBC Chicago)
• Toxic Exposures May Cost The World 10% Of GDP: Study (Environmental Health News)
• An Environmentalist Is Iceland’s New Prime Minister (NY Times)
• Only 60 Years of Farming Left If Soil Degradation Continues (Scientific American)
• Here’s a road map for solving 3 of the world’s biggest problems (Vox)
• Conservatives probably can’t be persuaded on climate change. So now what? (Vox)
• The Climate Risks We Face (NY Times):
  To stabilize global temperature, net carbon dioxide emissions must be reduced to zero. The window of time is rapidly closing to reduce emissions and limit warming to no more than 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit or 2 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels, the goal set in the Paris climate accord. The further we push the climate system beyond historical conditions, the greater the risks of potentially unforeseen and even catastrophic changes to the climate – so every reduction in emissions helps.
• The Uninhabitable Earth: When will climate change make earth too hot for humans? (New York Magazine):
  Famine, economic collapse, a sun that cooks us: What climate change could wreak – sooner than you think.
• A beginner’s guide to the debate over 100% renewable energy (Vox):
  Clean-energy enthusiasts frequently claim that we can go bigger, that it’s possible for the whole world to run on renewables – we merely lack the “political will.” So, is it true? Do we know how get to an all-renewables system? Not yet. Not really.
• 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).