Israel to restore section of Dead Sea shore. Jeremy Rifkin on global issues and the future of our planet. The Paradigm Project - Stoveman. Kentucky Coal Companies Remind Us Why We Really, Really Need the EPA « Appalachian Voices. The latest episode in the saga known as Big Coal’s Watergate began today when environmental and citizen groups filed a second notice of intent to sue the two largest mountaintop removal mining companies in Kentucky. Appalachian Voices, Kentuckians For The Commonwealth, Kentucky Riverkeeper, and Waterkeeper Alliance notified ICG and Frasure Creek Mining of their intent to sue the companies for more than 4,000 violations of the Clean Water Act — these on top of more than 20,000 violations the groups already sued over back in October. As an editorial in the Lexington Herald-Leader wrote about the previous lawsuit against these same companies: The environmental groups uncovered a massive failure by the industry to file accurate water discharge monitoring reports.
They filed an intent to sue which triggered the investigation by the state’s Energy and Environment Cabinet. This time around, none of the evidence that mines were violating pollution limits is in question. No Laughing Matter. Do we have a moral obligation to stop screwing up the planet? Scramble for Arctic oil and gas puts pristine ecosystem at risk - News. One cannot exclude that in the future there will be...armed intervention The Arctic covers 30 million square km, has 24 time zones and is home to just four million people. It also has vast reserves of oil and gas, not to mention diamonds, platinum, nickel and iron. Those reserves have been known about for centuries, yet a combination of new extraction technology and rising demand means that the human race is ready to start ripping them out - raising the threat of devastating pollution to a uniquely clean environment and worsening the problem of global warming, even as the ice caps are melting.
Greenpeace claims they could even cause a war in the region, with releases this month by Wikileaks, the whistle-blowing website, showing how the scramble for oil and gas in the Arctic is sparking military tension. One reason why is that more than a fifth of the world's oil and gas reserves lie beneath the Arctic. The Arctic already has a history of oil spills. AEP to retire 6,000 MW of U.S. coal generation. Solar Energy Technologies Program: Glossary.
Fox News Spreads Propaganda on Clean Energy. Apparently, the Fox News article “Four Dirty Secrets about Clean Energy” is going viral, as I just got it from a friend who is normally not too closely connected to the subject. I have to hand it to these guys; they’re sure good at getting their word out. In addition to admiring the sheer aggression with which Fox promotes its beliefs, one has to like their cleverness as well. Even the ploy of referring to their enemies’ concepts as “Dirty Secrets,” implying as it does the existence of some clandestine group with a malicious, hidden agenda is really a very bright idea from a public relations perspective. In any case, I promised my friend that I would take a few minutes and respond to each of these damnable “dirty tricks,” so here goes: Dirty Secret #1: If “clean energy” were actually cheaper than fossil fuels, it wouldn’t need a policy. The cost of renewable energy is anything but a secret.
This ties into #1 above. Oh, you’re concerned about carbon? Say Earthalujah! Reverend Billy preaches the green gospel. The Reverend wants you to believe the Earth can be saved! Amen.Photo: Brennan CavanaughThe Reverend preaches: “It’s not easy for Americans to slow down their consumption. No, it ain’t! We’ve got to help each other out. Give each other the power. Yes we do! To back away from the product. To turn. And the choir sings: “Eartha-lu, Eartha-lu, Eartha-lu-jah! “This force is inside each of us,” the Reverend continues. This is Sunday evening in Reverend Billy Talen’s Church of Earthalujah, a “neo-pagan gospel experiment,” a “radical Earth worship show” that’s developed from the performance artist’s anti-consumerism crusade known as the Church of Life After Shopping.
After her first visit on a recent Sunday, Linda Novenski, a childcare provider in her 60s, was inspired to action. At the close of the show, Novenski joined more than 100 others on stage, nearly everyone in the audience, in response to the Reverend’s call to accept the ever-expanding beliefs of the Church of Earthalujah. Big Coal Fights Off Crackdown on Toxic Ash | Rolling Stone Politics | RS Politics Daily | Rolling Stone Writers and Editors on Political News. Associated Baptist Press - Opinion: Vanishing mountains. High gasoline prices prompt Justice Department to eye energy industry. By Terry Frieden, CNN Justice Producer April 22, 2011 -- Updated 1417 GMT (2217 HKT) Regular gas is nearly $5 a gallon at a service station this week in Washington.
NEW: Obama promises to ensure companies don't take advantage of U.S. consumersThere is no current evidence of illegal conduct, Attorney General Holder says"We will be vigilant in monitoring the oil and gas markets," he saysHe notes there are "lawful reasons" for increases in gasoline prices Washington (CNN) -- Prodded by growing public frustration over sharply rising gasoline prices, the Justice Department on Thursday announced the formation of a team -- the "Oil and Gas Price Fraud Working Group -- tasked with the goal of ensuring consumers are not victims of price gouging.
Gas prices exceeding $4 per gallon or higher are "tough" for most Americans, President Barack Obama told an audience in Reno, Nevada. "We are going to make sure that no one is taking advantage of American consumers for their own short-term gain. " Diana Beresford-Kroeger: the woman who speaks for the trees - Make a difference. Three hundred to four hundred million years ago earth was toxic. The amount of carbon dioxide in the air made human and animal life impossible. Trees evolved from ferns and evergreens into what we know as the flowering kingdom, giving life to all the species on earth that need oxygen.
Trees made human life possible and as we destroy the world's forests we are unwittingly wiping out the lifeblood that sustains us. In conveying this message to the public, botanist Diana Beresford-Kroeger has written a homage to the power of trees in her new book, The Global Forest: 40 ways trees can save us. Diana, pictured left, is one of the world's experts on how trees chemically affect the environment. She works from her ‘laboratory' in Canada, her own garden which contains over includes over 100 species of trees and is designed to bring in pollinating insects and huge numbers of birds. Replanting the global forest An army of tree planters How are you going to do it, I ask? Ways we depend on trees: 1. 2. Video: Sustainability at Virginia Tech | University Relations | Virginia Tech. Mercury climbing in food chain, new study shows.
Levels of mercury have risen dramatically in some Pacific seabirds in the past 120 years, suggesting that industrial emissions containing the poisonous metal associated with fetal and brain damage may be climbing the food chain and endangering sensitive species, according to a new study. While the study did not specifically address human-mercury exposure, there is rising concern among scientists that more people are consuming the heavy metal through tainted seafood, where the compound is known as methylmercury. "It's possible that any human populations that largely depend on the same marine sources (of food) may be exposed to more methylmercury and be at risk," said study co-author Anh-Thu Vo, a doctoral student in integrative biology at UC Berkeley.
Through the food web What Vo found indicates that mercury emissions from mineral mining and burning coal may be invading the birds through the food web. That is, microscopic organisms ingest mercury pollution in seawater. Limiting intake. B'More Green: Report: Climate inaction could cost Maryland - Going Green: Environment, energy, living green, conservation and more in Baltimore, the Chesapeake Bay and beyond. There's been a lot of debate lately about the costs of building commercial wind turbines off Maryland's coast to help ease climate change.
A new report makes the case that failure to reduce greenhouse gases at all - whether by wind turbines or some other action - could cost state residents jobs, income and maybe even the culinary star of their summertime feasts, Chesapeake Bay crabs. According to "Pay Now, Pay Later," by a group called the American Security Project, continued inaction to mitigate the effects of climate change could begin to weaken important state industries and erode jobs.
Between 2010 and 2050, the report warns, Maryland could lose $23.7 billion in GDP and 163,000 jobs. "Climate change is happening, and it will ultimately have a costly effect on the economy of Maryland," says Jim Ludes, executive director of the American Security Project, a nonprofit group dedicated to emphasizing the national security implications of climate change and energy policy. Unsure about nuclear power? Here are the five questions you must answer to decide. Chernobyl begs a lot of questions 25 years later.Photo: Pedro Moura PinheiroCross-posted from The Guardian. Containing the elemental forces that rage inside a nuclear reactor is one of the great achievements of science, but losing control, as happened 25 years ago today at Chernobyl, is one of its greatest failures. So what to think of nuclear power? People often ask me if I support or oppose the building of new nuclear power stations, presuming that because of my job, I’ll know the answer.
If only it were that easy. Until the disaster at the Fukushima nuclear plant, I would say I was 51 percent in favor, on the basis that we need all the low-carbon electricity we can get to avoid the worst impacts of climate change, and that I tend to trust scientists, having been one. But 51 percent in favor is a pretty unsatisfactory position — it’s 1 percent off “I don’t know.” 1. But perhaps you think there is enough momentum in the current non-proliferation efforts to be more successful. 2. 3. 4. 5. Me, in NYT’s Room for Debate, on the Endangered Species Act. Photo: Reed LakefieldLast week, Todd Woody wrote a great piece in The New York Times about the growing crisis around the Endangered Species Act, as the Fish and Wildlife Service is overwhelmed with new applications for species in danger.
NYT’s Room for Debate asked me and some other folks to weigh in on the piece. You can read responses from: Jonathan H. Adler, Case Western Reserve law school: Overdue for Reform Holly Doremus, U.C. First, let’s pause for a moment of silence. In the U.S., concern over human impacts on the natural world began with conservationism, an attachment to particular beloved places and creatures. The Endangered Species Act is one of an extraordinary set of environmental laws passed in the wake of that event. In 1988, a new chapter in that story began, when the Congressional testimony of climate scientist James Hansen revealed to the broader public that human impacts now extend beyond species and ecosystems to the atmosphere itself. The Rev. Billy Pulpit. USING WAR ON TERROR LANGUAGE FOR THE WAR ON EARTH ACTIVISTS. It’s one thing to get boos from the audience when you wanted a standing ovation. But for the prosecutor to shout “Riot!”
& “Menace!” & “Unlawful Assembly!” & “One year in Jail!” & “$30,000 Bail!” From the front row… that can ruin your day. A global green economy: ‘Let no man say it cannot be done’ America was able to convert from a peacetime to a wartime economy at a stunning speed.We need an economy for the 21st century, one that is in sync with the Earth and its natural support systems, not one that is destroying them. The fossil fuel-based, automobile-centered, throwaway economy that evolved in Western industrial societies is no longer a viable model — not for the countries that shaped it or for those that are emulating them.
In short, we need to build a new economy, one powered with carbon-free sources of energy — wind, solar, and geothermal — one that has a diversified transport system and that reuses and recycles everything. We can change course and move onto a path of sustainable progress, but it will take a massive mobilization — at wartime speed. Whenever I begin to feel overwhelmed by the scale and urgency of the changes we need to make, I reread the economic history of U.S. involvement in World War II because it is such an inspiring study in rapid mobilization. Underground environmentalism in communist East Germany. When I had a free afternoon during my recent trip to Berlin, I headed down Unter den Linden (I love German street names — my hotel was on the Albrechtstraße, which is a whole meal in a word) to the relatively new DDR Museum, which showcases ordinary life under socialist rule in East Germany.
It’s a fascinating place. It doesn’t downplay the crushing conformity imposed on living quarters, cars, and work conditions under the German Democratic Republic (GDR), but it still shows the idiosyncrasies and spirit that no regime can ever entirely suppress. If you’re in Berlin, I recommend it. Strangle creepily ethnic looking Wattfraß, Aryan-looking boy! Source: Energy Saving MuseumOne of the most interesting aspects was finding out how central environmental consciousness was to the rise and fall of socialism in Germany. When the GDR was founded, one of its many promises to workers was clean working conditions, without the polluted air and water imposed by capitalist industrialization. Delightful. Van Jones At Power Shift 2011: 'While They're Stuck On Stupid In DC, Your Generation Is Rising' From Brad Johnson, The Wonk Room: In a passionate keynote address, green jobs leader Van Jones exhorted the 10,000 youth climate activists at the Power Shift conference in Washington DC to “shift the power” and lead the clean power revolution.
He argued that both parties need to be held accountable for their failures, and that activists must explain that the climate movement isn’t just about “hippie power” but that it is a vision of liberty and justice for all. Van Jones had harsh words for the national political establishment. “You have to be wise enough to hold both parties to high standards,” he said: While they’re stuck on stupid in DC, your generation is rising. Van Jones also discussed President Barack Obama, who hired him as a green jobs adviser but then let him go after Jones’ politics and person came under a relentless barrage from Fox News’ Glenn Beck. We pull out of the ground death. The stereotype is that solar power is just hippie power.
“Shift the power!” Rocky Kistner: Gulf Residents: Please Take our Dolphins and Turtles Away. Laurel Lockamy was upset that a dolphin had been lying dead in the sand near Pass Christian, MS, for more than five days. It had been painted orange after being counted by the Institute for Marine Mammal Studies and tagged as counted. But it still was not moved and was decomposing in the sand. So Laurel decided to take matters into her own hands and posted a note and a few photos of the dolphin onto the local WLOX-TV website: Dead Dolphin on Pass Christian Beach. this is the dead dolphin that is still out there 5 days after the marine institute for mammals came and spray painted and tagged it in orange..it stinks..it is rotting and it is so wrong that this beautiful creature is rotting on the beach after 5 days..go look its still out there on the beach in Pass Christian where people are still swimming in this BAD water..SOMEONE PLEASE HELP THIS DOLPHIN!!
The next day, Laurel went out to check on the dolphin and it was gone. “It like I go out every day and find at least one turtle. Mountaintop Mining Consequences. Spotlights on the Inspirational Risk-takers - Part 1. Shredded Fish and Dirty Coal -- Sierra Club Statement on Cooling Water Rule. Yes for Real, We Now Have a Genuine Artificial Solar Leaf – CleanTechnica: Cleantech innovation news and views. Coming Clean - The Blog of Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune Blog - Sierra Club.