‘Green News Report’ – August 7, 2012

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IN TODAY’S RADIO REPORT: Fire at Chevron’s residential refinery near SF; Extreme heat fuels deadly wildfires in OK; Extreme storms shut down Lollapalooza; Score one for endangered species: Gibson Guitars pays up; PLUS: Extreme weather and historic heat waves said directly linked to global warming … All that and more in today’s Green News Report!

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IN ‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (see links below): Ocean acidification could disrupt marine food chains; Keystone XL threatens aquifer that irrigates central US; Proposed NV water pipeline raises fears of new ‘Dust Bowl’; Roosevelt’s Badlands Ranch faces oil industry threat; Obama Admin abandons 2C commitment; The Devil’s Rig: how wind energy powered 17th century empire; NREL: Solar has most renewable energy potential; Baltimore pays $3.7m for lead paint poisoning … PLUS: IEA Bombshell: Global Warming May Lead To ‘Miami Beach In Boston’ … and much, MUCH more! …

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

• The Green Front Interview with ‘Converted Skeptic’ Dr. Richard Muller:
• Skeptical Believer: Our Interview with the Kochs’ Former Global Warming Skeptic, Dr. Richard Muller (The BRAD BLOG):
  The unapologetic physicist takes shots at colleague Michael Mann and Al Gore; offers unsupported assertions about debunked ‘Climategate’; calls for conservation and ‘clean fracking’; stands by charge that most Global Warming concerns are ‘exaggerated’…
• VIDEO: David Letterman on Fracking: “We’re Screwed” (Grist):



• FUN FACTS About Big Oil Profits: GRAPHIC: GRAPHIC (Climate Progress):
  Every hour so far in 2012, the five largest oil corporations have recorded a $14,400,000 profit. And every hour, they received more than $270,000 in federal tax breaks. That adds up to $2.4 billion in subsidies every year for the five largest oil corporations – Royal Dutch Shell, ExxonMobil, Chevron, BP, and ConocoPhillips – all ranked as the top 9 companies in the world.
• Fire at Chevron’s Residential Oil Refinery near SF:
• VIDEO: Refinery fire fully contained but continues to burn (KGO San Francisco)
• Fire at Chevron CA Refinery Sends Scores to Hospitals: (SF Chronicle):
  Thousands of East Bay residents were ordered to stay in their homes with the windows and doors closed Monday night after a series of explosions and fires tore through Chevron’s Richmond refinery.
• Chevron Refinery Fire May Push California Gasoline Higher (Bloomberg News)
• Ecuador: Chevron Ignores Midnight Deadline to Pay Damages:
• Chevron Faces Midnight Deadline in $19 Billion Ecuador Judgment (Environment News Service)
• NY judge lets Chevron’s Ecuador claim move forward (AP):
  Chevron has long claimed that a 1998 agreement Texaco signed with Ecuador after a $40 million cleanup absolves it of liability. Ecuadorans say the agreement did not protect the company from the claims of individuals, and they say the cleanup was fraudulent.
• Chevron in Ecuador: For over three decades, Chevron chose profit over people in the Ecuadorian Amazon. (Ecuador activist site)
• A Hopeful Turn in the Chevron-Ecuador Fight (BusinessWeek)
• Extreme Heat Fuels Deadly Wildfires in OK:
• OK wildfire leaves dozens homeless; Dental records sought to ID 1 body found (CBS News)
• Wildfires leave 1 dead, dozens homeless in Okla. (Bloomberg News)
• July Heat Records Crush Cold Records By 17 To 1, ‘Historic Heat Wave And Drought’ Fuels Oklahoma Fires (Climate Progress)
• Drought seen slashing U.S. corn crop to five-year low (Reuters)
• Extreme Storms Shut Down Lollapalooza Music Festival:
• Lollapalooza’s first evacuation relatively smooth, but no refunds for disappointed fans (Chicago Tribune)
• Lollapalooza: Wild weather can’t stop the music (USA Today)
• Watch FUSE Network’s Lollapalooza Coverage (Fuse.tv)
• Global Warming Directly Linked to Extreme Weather and Historic Heat Waves:
• New study links current events to climate change (AP):
  “This is not some scientific theory. We are now experiencing scientific fact,” Hansen told The Associated Press in an interview.
• VIDEO: NASA Study Links Extreme Summer Heat to Climate Change: (PBS Newshour)
• STUDY: Perception of climate change (Proceedings of the Natl Academy of Science):
  “Climate dice,” describing the chance of unusually warm or cool seasons, have become more and more “loaded” in the past 30 y, coincident with rapid global warming. The distribution of seasonal mean temperature anomalies has shifted toward higher temperatures and the range of anomalies has increased.
• Global Warming: An Exclusive Look at James Hansen’s Scary New Math (TIME):
  A new analysis by the NASA climatologist for the first time ties specific weather events to human-induced climate change.
• AUDIO: Are Recent Heat Waves A Result Of Climate Change? (NPR):
  [E]xtremes do happen now and then without climate change – think of the Dust Bowl drought of the 1930s. But Hansen says the difference is that these kinds of extreme events are happening much more often. “Now between 10 to 12 percent of the planet in the last 10 years has been covered by these three-standard-deviation anomalies,” he says.
• Hansen Study: Extreme Weather Tied to Climate Change (Climate Central):
  Other recent studies, however, have shown that the same extreme events mentioned in Hansen’s study were the result of a mix of natural climate variability and manmade global warming, and the authors of such studies are reluctant to go as far as Hansen does in claiming that global warming is the “cause” of such events.
• Scientists Warn Congress About Disastrous Effects of Climate Change (Guardian UK, via Wired) [emphasis added]:
  “It is critical to understand that the link between climate change and the kinds of extremes that lead to disaster is clear,” Christopher Field, a lead author of the IPCC report and director of global ecology at the Carnegie Institute for Science, said in testimony. “There is no doubt that climate has changed,” he went on. “There is also no doubt that a changing climate changes the risks of extremes, including extremes that can lead to disaster.”
• Study Finds More of Earth Is Hotter and Says Global Warming Is at Work (NY Times)
• Score One for Endangered Species: Gibson Guitars Fined Over Exotic Wood:
• Gibson Guitar Settles Claim Over Imported Ebony (NY Times)
• Gibson Guitar Acknowledges Exotic Wood Violation (AP):
  Gibson’s decision to cooperate with the federal Lacey Act banning the import of endangered wood products stood in contrast to a publicity campaign mounted in protest after agents raided Gibson facilities in Memphis and Nashville. Republicans and tea party members had rallied behind Juszkiewicz at the time he denounced the raids as overzealous federal regulation that threatened American jobs.

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

• Ocean acidification could disrupt marine food chains (Reuters):
  Ocean acidification caused by climate change is making it harder for creatures from clams to sea urchins to grow their shells, and the trend is likely to be felt most in polar regions, scientists said on Monday.”The results suggest that increased acidity is affecting the size and weight of shells and skeletons, and the trend is widespread across marine species,” the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) said in a statement of the findings.
• Keystone XL Pipeline May Threaten Aquifer That Irrigates Much of Central US: (Washington Post):
  Jane Kleeb is a savvy activist who, Nebraska’s Republican governor once said, ‘has a tendency to shoot her mouth off most days.’ A Florida native who moved to Nebraska in 2007 after marrying a rancher active in Democratic politics, she did as much as anyone to bring the massive Keystone XL crude oil pipeline to a halt last year.
• Proposed NV Water Pipeline Raises Fears of New ‘Dust Bowl’: (Greenwire):
  Environmentalists are warning that a plan to pipe billions of gallons of water a year from rural central Nevada nearly 300 miles to the Las Vegas metropolitan area will dry up wetlands and springs, damaging thousands of acres of wildlife habitat and potentially creating a ‘dust bowl’ scenario.
• Teddy Roosevelt’s Badlands Ranch Faces Oil Industry Threat (NPR):
  Theodore Roosevelt’s Elkhorn Ranch in North Dakota is often called the Walden Pond of the West. But Roosevelt’s ranch is now feeling the pressure of an oil boom that is industrializing the local landscape. Critics say a proposed gravel pit and a bridge could destroy the very thing that made such a lasting impression on Roosevelt: the restorative power of wilderness.
• IEA Bombshell: Global Warming May Lead To ‘Miami Beach In Boston’ Situation Unless Urgent Action Is Taken (Climate Progress):
  Ambassador Richard H. Jones warned that if energy policies do not adapt, enough carbon dioxide will be being emitted to reach 1,000 parts per million in the atmosphere. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change that equates to 6º Celsius increase in temperature by the end of this century. “That’s basically Miami Beach in Boston,” he said.
• Obama Administration Abandons Two-Degree Commitment Made In 2010 (Climate Progress) [emphasis in original]:
  “This kind of flexible, evolving legal agreement cannot guarantee that we meet a 2 degree [Celsius] goal, but insisting on a structure that would guarantee such a goal will only lead to deadlock. It is more important to start now with a regime that can get us going in the right direction and that is built in a way maximally conducive to raising ambition, spurring innovation, and building political will.”
• VIDEO: The Devil’s Rig – Wind Power and the Birth of the Industrial Age (Peter Sinclair’s Climate Crock of the Week):
  Michael Mosley explains how Holland became an empire in the 17th century.
• National Renewable Energy Laboratory: Solar Has The Most Potential Of Any Renewable Energy Source (Climate Progress):
  A recently released study by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, estimates that the technical potential of photovoltaic cells and concentrated solar power (CSP) in the United States is as much as 200,000 Gigawatts, enough to generate about 400,000 TWh of energy annually.
• Baltimore Housing Authority Pays #3.7m for Lead Paint Poisoning: (Baltimore Sun):
  Baltimore’s public housing agency announced Monday it has paid $3.7 million to a former public housing resident who suffered lead-paint poisoning as a young child in the 1980s.
• Obama Signs Camp LeJeune Water Bill: (AP):
  President Barack Obama signed a bill Monday promising health benefits for Marines and families who were exposed to contaminated water at a North Carolina Marine base for decades.
• Atmospheric CO2 Drove Climate Change During Longest Interglacial (Science Daily)
• Romney campaign: Let wind energy credit die this year [but not oil subsidies!] (The Hill’s E2 Wire):
  Mitt Romney’s campaign said Monday that he wants longstanding tax credits that help finance wind energy projects to expire at year’s end, providing a stark political contrast with President Obama, who is pushing Congress to renew the incentive.
• Bill McKibben: Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math (Rolling Stone):
  The fight, in the end, is about whether the industry will succeed in its fight to keep its special pollution break alive past the point of climate catastrophe, or whether, in the economists’ parlance, we’ll make them internalize those externalities.
• Must-See Videos: ABC Interviews Climatologist Michael Mann (Climate Progress)

• Skeptical Science: Get the FULL DEBUNKING of ALL Climate Science Denier Arguments
• Report: Humans near tipping point that could dramatically change Earth (CS Monitor):
  Human activity is affecting Earth in many ways, but a new study suggests that continued population growth and its impact on climate and ecology could trigger a more profound chain reaction of effects within little more than a decade.
• VIDEO: James Hansen: Why I must speak out about climate change (TED Talks):
  Top climate scientist James Hansen tells the story of his involvement in the science of and debate over global climate change. In doing so he outlines the overwhelming evidence that change is happening and why that makes him deeply worried about the future.
• VIDEO ANIMATION: Time history of atmospheric CO2 (NOAA Carbon Tracker YouTube channel):
• VIDEO: Animation Charts Modern Global Warming (NYT Green)
• Thinking Big: NREL Study Shows 80 Percent Renewables Possible By 2050 (Climate Progress)
• Must-Read: Economist William Nordhaus Slams Global Warming Deniers, Explains Cost of Delay is $4 Trillion (Climate Progress):
  Nordhaus’s blunt piece – “Why the Global Warming Skeptics Are Wrong” – is worth reading because he is no climate hawk.
  …
  “The skeptics’ summary is based on poor analysis and on an incorrect reading of the results.”
• Part 1: The brutal logic of climate change (David Roberts, Grist) [emphasis added]:
  It’s simple: If there is to be any hope of avoiding civilization-threatening climate disruption, the U.S. and other nations must act immediately and aggressively on an unprecedented scale. That means moving to emergency footing. War footing. “Hitler is on the march and our survival is at stake” footing. That simply won’t be possible unless a critical mass of people are on board. It’s not the kind of thing you can sneak in incrementally.

  It is unpleasant to talk like this. People don’t want to hear it.

• Part 2: The brutal logic of climate change mitigation (David Roberts, Grist)
• How to Buy Time in the Fight against Climate Change: Mobilize to Stop Soot and Methane: A short list of relatively simple actions taken to reduce greenhouse gases other than CO2 could help put the brakes on global warming–if implemented globally (Scientific American)
• Climate Scientists Rebuke Rupert Murdoch: WSJ Denier Op-Ed Like ‘Dentists Practicing Cardiology’ (Think Progress Green)
• Saudi Oil Minister Calls Global Warming “Humanity’s Most Pressing Concern” (Climate Progress):
  “We know that pumping oil out of the ground does not create many jobs. It does not foster an entrepreneurial spirit, nor does it sharpen critical faculties.”
• VIDEO: Behold: The World’s First 24/7 Solar Plant is Up and Running (Treehugger)
• World headed for irreversible climate change in five years, IEA warns: If fossil fuel infrastructure is not rapidly changed, the world will ‘lose for ever’ the chance to avoid dangerous climate change (Guardian UK) [emphasis added]:
  The world is likely to build so many fossil-fuelled power stations, energy-guzzling factories and inefficient buildings in the next five years that it will become impossible to hold global warming to safe levels, and the last chance of combating dangerous climate change will be “lost for ever”, according to the most thorough analysis yet of world energy infrastructure.
  …
  “The door is closing,” Fatih Birol, chief economist at the International Energy Agency, said. “I am very worried – if we don’t change direction now on how we use energy, we will end up beyond what scientists tell us is the minimum [for safety]. The door will be closed forever.”
• Concise Overview: The IPCC report on extreme climate and weather events (Real Climate)
• READ the IPCC Report: Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation (UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change)
• The Real Global Warming Signal (Tamino)
• No, global warming hasn’t stopped (New Scientist)
• Top UN Climate Official Blasts U.S. Climate Policy: Americans Must Realize “This Is Their Future They’re Compromising” (Think Progress Green)
• VIDEO: Climate Scientists Michael Mann on “A Look Into Our Climate: Past To Present To Future” (TEDx, YouTube)
• Earth’s Plant Growth Fell Because of Climate Change, Study Finds (NYT Green)
• Heads in the Sand: Warning: “Climate change is occurring … and poses significant risks to humans and the environment,” reports the National Academy of Sciences. As climate-change science moves in one direction, Republicans in Congress are moving in another. Why?
  (National Journal) [emphasis added]:
  Tim Phillips, president of Americans for Prosperity, says there’s no question that the influence of his group and others like it has been instrumental in the rise of Republican candidates who question or deny climate science. “If you look at where the situation was three years ago and where it is today, there’s been a dramatic turnaround. Most of these candidates have figured out that the science has become political,” he said.
  …
  Groups like Americans for Prosperity have done it.“