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Archive for April 20th, 2011
Flooding forces CP Rail to reroute Manitoba trains
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 20th, 2011
Reuters: Flooding caused by the Red River's steady rise forced Canadian Pacific to reroute trains on one Manitoba branch line on Wednesday and to close another.
The Manitoba government is building dikes across two of CP's lines in the Red River Valley to protect the towns of Emerson and Morris against flooding from the Red and its tributaries, CP spokesman Mike LoVecchio.
The two lines connect Winnipeg with Morden, Manitoba, and with Glenwood, Minnesota. Detours are in place for the Winnipeg-Glenwood...
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Supreme Court Appears to Favor Government in Indian Trust Fund Case
Posted by Greenwire: Lawrence Hurley on April 20th, 2011
GreenWire: An American Indian tribe's efforts to win access to legal documents relating to the federal government's management of a tribal trust fund received a cool reception at the Supreme Court today.
In a case that could affect other disputes over Indian trust fund management, a majority of justices appeared to favor the Interior Department, which has cited attorney-client privilege as its reason for withholding certain documents.
The Jicarilla Apache Nation filed suit in 2002 claiming that assets...
Protected areas cover 44% of the Brazilian Amazon
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 20th, 2011
Mongabay: Protected areas cover 44% of the Brazilian Amazon
Protected areas now cover nearly 44 percent of the Amazon -- an area larger than Greenland -- but suffer from encroachment and poor management, reports a new study by Imazon and the Instituto Socioambiental (ISA).
The report, published in Portuguese, says that by December 2010, protected areas in the Brazilian Amazon amounted to 2,197,485 square kilometers. Conservation units like national parks accounted for just over half the area (50.6 percent),...
Fight Over Michigan Dunes Continues In Court
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 20th, 2011
National Public Radio: The ongoing battle over some pristine lakefront dunes in Michigan plays out in a courtroom Thursday when a township clerk faces charges of violating election law. That's the latest in a zoning fight over a planned luxury development between billionaire Oklahoma oil tycoon Aubrey McClendon and officials in Michigan's Saugatuck Township "” a resort area known for its small-town feel.
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Shale gas fracking – Q&A
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 20th, 2011
Guardian: What is fracking?
The process of hydraulic fracturing – or "fracking" – involves drilling a hole deep into the dense shale rocks that contain natural gas, then pumping in at very high pressure vast quantities of water mixed with sand and chemicals. This opens up tiny fissures in the rock, through which the trapped gas can then escape. It bubbles out and is captured in well that brings it to the surface, where it can be piped off.
Why is it controversial?
Many shale deposits are buried under...
The villages of southern France take on Sarkozy over shale gas
Posted by Guardian: Michael Mansfield on April 20th, 2011
Guardian: In the southern French region of Languedoc-Roussillon, there is a long and fine tradition of highly organised opposition to the threat of oppression and injustice.
In the 13th century the Cathars put up a strong defence of their beliefs and territory against the merciless persecution meted out by the Albigensian crusade. Following the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685, French Protestants regrouped to continue practising their religion for more than 100 years in a network of secret gathering...
‘Gasland changed everything’ – fracking firm battles to woo English villagers
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 20th, 2011
Guardian: From the outside, the UK's second shale gas drilling site looks surprisingly small – a 30 metre-high white tower that houses the drilling equipment, and about 20 huts – each about the size of a shipping container.
It is also unnervingly quiet. On a bright spring morning, in the lane just a few yards from the gate, the silence is unbroken except by birdsong.
The entire site is lined with tough plastic several feet underground so that the surface rainwater cannot permeate. "Nothing can escape,"...
Vineyards feel the heat from rising temperature
Posted by Business Report: None Given on April 20th, 2011
Business Report: Climate change was having an unmistakable effect on grape harvests, an executive of wine and spirits conglomerate Distell said yesterday, and the group was conducting a search for new areas for vineyards.
Erhard Wolf, Distell`s chief grape and wine buyer, said it had already pioneered the development of new vineyards in Elgin, near Gansbaai, and in Ceres to meet the changing conditions, extending the Cape wine-producing area.
Meanwhile, this year`s crop for Distell was 8 percent less than last...
Soils of northern U.S. forests are high in mercury
Posted by PUBS: None Given on April 20th, 2011
PUBS: The carbon-rich soils in northern U.S. forests contain up to 16 times as much mercury as do soils in southern forests, according to a new study conducted in 10 states (Environ. Sci. Technol., DOI: 10.1021/es104384m).
Between 5,000 and 8,000 tons of mercury, a toxic metal, enter the atmosphere annually, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. While natural sources, such as volcanoes, emit some of the mercury, much of it originates from industrial sources, such as coal-burning power plants....
Mekong River nations defer dam decision
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on April 20th, 2011
Guardian: Conservationists hailed a partial reprieve for fisheries on the Mekong river Wednesday after downstream nations deferred a decision on a controversial dam in Laos.
The Mekong River Commission had been expected to make an announcement about the Xayaburi hydropower plant at a meeting in Vietiane this week, but the member nations – Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos – said there was no prospect of reaching an agreement. A decision on whether to build a first dam on the main stream of the lower...