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Archive for October 1st, 2011
Oil and water don’t mix in Nebraska debate over pipeline
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on October 1st, 2011
Reuters: The old adage that oil and water don't mix is proving true in Nebraska, where hundreds of people filled a small town gymnasium to protest a proposed oil pipeline they fear could pollute a major U.S. drinking water source.
They came on Thursday in tour and school buses, vans and a few even on horseback to the West Holt Junior and Senior High School, some wearing cowboy boots and seed company caps, to testify at a U.S. State Department hearing on the proposed $7 billion Keystone XL oil pipeline...
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United Kingdom: Energy policy: What the frack?
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on October 1st, 2011
Economist: HAS Britain hit the jackpot in Blackpool? On September 21st Cuadrilla Resources, the first firm to drill for shale gas in the country, estimated that 200 trillion cubic feet of gas lie in an area near the seaside town in northwest England--nearly 40 times previous projections of all of Britain’s shale resources and, in theory, four times as much gas as is still recoverable from the North Sea, according to Oil & Gas UK, a lobby group. Cuadrilla hopes to drill 400 wells in Lancashire in the next...
Temperature Rising: With Deaths of Forests, a Loss of Crucial Climate Protectors
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on October 1st, 2011
New York Times: The trees spanning many of the mountainsides of western Montana glow an earthy red, like a broadleaf forest at the beginning of autumn. But these trees are not supposed to turn red. They are evergreens, falling victim to beetles that used to be controlled in part by bitterly cold winters. As the climate warms, scientists say, that control is no longer happening. Across millions of acres, the pines of the northern and central Rockies are dying, just one among many types of forests that are showing...
Japan Reopens Areas Near Fukushima Daiichi Plant
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on October 1st, 2011
New York Times: Despite continued fears over radiation levels, Japan lifted evacuation advisories for an area spanning five towns and cities around a tsunami-ravaged nuclear power plant on Friday, the first such move since multiple fuel meltdowns at the site led to a substantial radiation leak and forced more than 100,000 surrounding residents to flee.
The easing was a bid by the government to bring the country a step closer to normalcy after the March 11 quake and tsunami, which destroyed wide areas of Japan's...
Myanmar Suspends Construction of Myitsone Dam
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on October 1st, 2011
New York Times: In a rare concession to public pressure, Myanmar's government on Friday ordered the suspension of a controversial hydroelectric project financed and led by a state-owned Chinese company.
Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, left, and Labour Minister Aung Kyi spoke to reporters after a meeting on Friday. Mrs. Aung San Suu Kyi, who had opposed the dam, welcomed the government's suspension of the project.
The Myitsone dam project would have been the first to span the Irrawaddy River, the largest waterway in...
Soot and CO2 In The Arctic
Posted by Forbes: None Given on October 1st, 2011
Forbes: The latest candidates are “short-term climate forcings”. These are pollutants, particularly ozone and soot, that do not hang around in the atmosphere as carbon dioxide does, but have to be renewed continually if they are to have a lasting effect. If they are so renewed, though, their impact may be as big as CO2’s.
At the moment, most eyes are on soot (or “black carbon”, as jargon-loving researchers refer to it). In the Arctic, soot is a double whammy. First, when released into the air as a result...