‘Green News Report’ – February 19, 2013

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IN TODAY’S RADIO REPORT: All hands on deck (if not the corporate media!) for the largest climate rally in U.S. history… but is President Obama all talk and no action?; Secret memo reveals tar sands are poisoning Alberta, Canada; PLUS: Mayor Bloomberg’s big plans to greenify NYC … All that and more in today’s Green News Report!

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IN ‘GREEN NEWS EXTRA’ (see links below): Secret funding helped build vast network of climate denial thinktanks; BP challenges ‘excessive’ spill claims; GAO: Climate change poses big financial risk to US government; NASA: ‘Alarming’ water loss in Middle East; Study: Global warming will bring more blizzards, less overall snow; Air pollution causes heart attacks; Canadian enviro-activists ‘threat to national security’; Tesla v. NYT, round 3; OH accused of dumping fracking wastewater; Did PA lie about fracking water contamination? … PLUS: GMOs: Nearly half of all US farms now have superweeds … and much, MUCH more! …

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

• Two-thirds of Americans want Obama to act on climate change, says poll: Two new studies released after president’s state-of-the-union promise to act on climate change with or without Congress. (Guardian UK)
• 5 Myths About Keystone XL, Debunked (Media Matters)

• VIDEO: Obama Makes Case For Curbing Carbon Pollution From Existing Power Plants, Also Vows To Use ‘Bully Pulpit’ (Climate Progress):
  “Part of my job is to use the bully pulpit to help raise people’s awareness, because if the public cares about it, eventually Congress acts. If the public doesn’t care about it, it’s very hard to get big stuff done because legislators respond to their constituents sooner or later.”



• Don’t Hold Your Breath: Obama’s Threat to Act Unilaterally On Climate Looking Empty (Phillip Bump, Grist.org)
• Small Business Groups Praise Obama’s Climate Stance, Call For Regulation Of Existing Power Plants (Climate Progress)

• AUDIO: Mike Bloomberg on SoundCloud: The 2013 State of the City (Mike Bloomberg.com):
  “To make New York even more environmentally-friendly, during the year ahead we’ll encourage use of electric vehicles by installing curbside battery chargers at sites throughout the city. … push for a local law banning the Styrofoam food packaging that chokes solid waste landfills…we’ll also begin recycling food waste.”

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

• Secret funding helped build vast network of climate denial thinktanks: (Guardian UK):
  Anonymous billionaires donated $120m to more than 100 anti-climate groups working to discredit climate change science [And it’s all tax-deductible! — ed.]
• BP challenges ‘excessive’ spill claims (The Hill’s E2 Wire):
  BP announced Tuesday that it would defend itself in court against “excessive” claims for civilian penalties and federal gross negligence charges regarding its role in the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill.
• GAO: Climate change poses big financial risk to US government (NBC News):
  The federal government is facing significant financial risks related to extreme weather events, and states and cities can no longer depend on it for extra help after such events occur, the Republican chairman of House Oversight and Government Reform Committee said Friday.
• NASA Probes Show ‘Alarming’ Water Loss in Middle East (Climate Central):
  Parts of the Middle East are losing groundwater reserves at “an alarming rate,” according to a new analysis of NASA satellite data.From the beginning to 2003 to the end of 2009, portions of Iran, Iraq, Turkey and Syria that lie within the Tigris and Euphrates river basins shed 117 million acre-feet of water. That’s roughly equivalent to the volume of the Dead Sea.
• Experts: Global warming can strangely trigger less yearly snowfall, but more potent blizzards (Washington Post) [emphasis added]:
  [T]he answer lies in atmospheric physics. A warmer atmosphere can hold, and dump, more moisture, snow experts say. And two soon-to-be-published studies demonstrate how there can be more giant blizzards yet less snow overall each year. Projections are that that’s likely to continue with manmade global warming.
• Researchers Link Air Pollution To Heart Attacks (Forbes):
  Air pollution causes heart attacks and death. Especially when the pollutants include ozone and particulate matter. And more often in the summer time, when ozone levels are higher…. Air pollution is of particular concern in Houston, which is home to the nation’s biggest petrochemical refining complex
• GOP bills target ‘overreaching’ EPA (The Hill’s E2 Wire)
• Canada’s environmental activists seen as ‘threat to national security’: Police and security agencies describe green groups’ protests and petitions as ‘forms of attack’, documents reveal (Guardian UK)
• Carbon Market’s Fate in Europe Hangs on EU Vote to Fix Surplus: European Union lawmakers may determine the fate of the world’s biggest carbon market when they vote today on a proposal to cut a record surplus of emission permits that has pushed prices to an all-time low. (Bloomberg News)
• UK Climate Change Secretary Slams Deniers As ‘Dogmatic And Blinkered’ (Climate Progress):
  “It screams out from decade upon decade of research. The basic physics of climate change is irrefutable.”
• NYT Public Editor: Problems With Precision and Judgment, but Not Integrity, in Tesla Test (NY Times)
• GMOs: Nearly Half of All US Farms Now Have Superweeds (Mother Jones):
  Last year’s drought took a big bite out of the two most prodigious US crops, corn and soy. But it apparently didn’t slow down the spread of weeds that have developed resistance to Monsanto’s herbicide Roundup (glyphosate), used on crops engineered by Monsanto to resist it. More than 70 percent of all the the corn, soy, and cotton grown in the US is now genetically modified to withstand glyphosate.
• Ohio company accused of dumping fracking waste faces federal charges (Cleveland Plain Dealer):
  Federal charges are expected to be filed today against an oil and natural gas drilling company accused of dumping more than 20,000 gallons of fracking waste into a tributary of the Mahoning River on Jan. 31, according to a news release from U.S. Attorney Steven Dettelbach.
• A Clash in Pennsylvania Over Fracking and Water Tests (NYT Green) [emphasis added]]:
  [T]he state Department of Health’s Bureau of Laboratories …[disclosed] last November that department scientists had omitted data on some toxic metals found in water taken from a site in southwestern Pennsylvania.
• Report: Sandy was 2nd-costliest hurricane in US (AP): The deadliest hurricane in U.S. history hit Galveston, Texas, in 1900 and killed 8,000 to 12,000 people.
• Bloomberg Pushes for Plastic-Foam Ban in ‘State of the City’ (Bloomberg):
  New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said he intends to use his final year in office to push for more recycling and electric vehicles, a curbside food-composting pilot program and a ban on plastic-foam food packaging.
• New Jersey Water Officials Charged With Poisoning Drinking Water (Environment News Service):
  Two top officials of the East Orange Water Commission have been charged with conspiring to close contaminated wells before monthly water tests so as to falsely report low levels of a regulated contaminant in drinking water supplied to customers, then opening the wells, allowing the chemical back into the water supply.
• What’s at stake in the fight between Tesla and the New York Times (Washington Post)
• Colourful ‘solar glass’ means entire buildings can generate clean power: British firm develops colourful, transparent solar cells that will add just 10% to glass buildings’ cost (Guardian UK)
• Fox Stands In The Way Of Energy Security Progress (Media Matters)
• Secret funding helped build vast network of climate denial thinktanks (Guardian UK)
• $188b Price Tag From U.S. Extreme Weather From 2011 To 2012 (Climate Progress)
• The New Sustainable Energy Factbook: A Strong Case for Consistent Policy (Bloomberg New Energy Finance, via Climate Progress.org):
  The report provides a detailed account of the energy market for investors and policymakers making a strong case for the role of stable policies in leveling the playing field for clean energy technologies in the evolving energy landscape.
• VIDEO: Humans Have Already Set in Motion 69 Feet of Sea Level Rise (Mother Jones): Glaciologist Jason Box describes a post-warming world that you won’t even be able to recognize.

• COVER STORY: It’s Global Warming, Stupid (Businessweek):
  Yes, yes, it’s unsophisticated to blame any given storm on climate change. Men and women in white lab coats tell us-and they’re right-that many factors contribute to each severe weather episode. Climate deniers exploit scientific complexity to avoid any discussion at all.
  …
  If all that doesn’t impress, forget the scientists ostensibly devoted to advancing knowledge and saving lives. Listen instead to corporate insurers committed to compiling statistics for profit.
• CO2 Emissions Rises Mean Dangerous Climate Change Now Almost Certain (Guardian)
• Study: Sea Levels Rising 60% Faster Than Projected, Planet Keeps Warming As Expected (Climate Progress)
• Ocean Acidification: Animals are already dissolving in Southern Ocean (New Scientist)
• Global warming targets further out of reach, UN says (Phys.org):
  Based on current pledges, global average temperatures could rise by 3 to 5 degrees Celsius (5.4 to 9.0 degrees Fahrenheit) this century — way above the two degrees Celsius being targeted, said a UN Environment Programme (UNEP) report.
• Thawing of permafrost to be ‘major factor’ in global warming, warns UN report (UN News Centre)
• 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.

• Skeptical Science: Get the FULL DEBUNKING of ALL Climate Science Denier Arguments
• Report: Humans near tipping point that could dramatically change Earth (CS Monitor) [emphasis added]:
  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)
• 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)
• 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… “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)
• The Real Global Warming Signal (Tamino)
• No, global warming hasn’t stopped (New Scientist)
• 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?