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Archive for June, 2013
Boulder Approves One-Year Fracking Moratorium
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 5th, 2013
Associated Press: Boulder City Council members have unanimously approved a one-year fracking moratorium, blocking oil and gas drilling permits in the city and on Boulder-owned open space properties. Several council members said Tuesday they are also considering a ballot measure in November to approve a longer-term ban. According to the Boulder Daily Camera ( http://tinyurl.com/k7l739t), city councilwoman KC Becker says voters need to send the message to their state legislators and governor about their opposition...
BP’s Oil Spill Deal Sours as Claims Add Billions to Cost
Posted by Bloomberg: Margaret Cronin Fisk, Brian Swint and Laurel Calkins on June 5th, 2013
Bloomberg: BP Plc’s $8 billion settlement with victims of the 2010 Gulf of Mexico spill may have hurt Europe’s second-largest oil company more than it helped.
The company is relying on a U.S. appeals court to rein in awards by the settlement’s claims administrator for what it considers to be unreasonable demands, such as a $21 million payout to a rice mill 40 miles from the coast whose revenue rose the year of the spill.
BP has protested in court filings that administrator Patrick Juneau’s interpretation...
Posted in Water Conservation 
Comments Off on BP’s Oil Spill Deal Sours as Claims Add Billions to CostOil and Gas Lobby Says State Department Considering Keystone Hearing
Posted by The Hill: Zack Colman on June 5th, 2013
The Hill: The State Department is looking to hold a public hearing in Washington, D.C., on the Keystone XL oil sands pipeline this summer, the American Petroleum Institute (API) said Tuesday.
The department recently held a Keystone hearing in Nebraska, which covered its draft environmental review of the project. Cindy Schild, the API’s downstream director for refining and oil sands, said she had thought it was the last and said more public hearings would delay a final decision.
“They’ve held already...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Oil and Gas Lobby Says State Department Considering Keystone HearingPalm oil expansion endangering rare frogs in Malaysia
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 4th, 2013
Mongabay: Expansion of the palm oil industry in Malaysia is destroying key habitat for endangered frogs, putting them at greater risk, finds a new study published in the journal Conservation Biology.
Over a two-year period, Aisyah Faruk of the Zoological Society of London and colleagues documented the impact of oil palm plantations on the peat swamp frog (Limnonectes malesianus), an amphibian that inhabits streams and swamps in lowland forest areas in Peninsular Malaysia. According to the researchers, the...
China’s plastic-bag ban turns five years old
Posted by Grist: None Given on June 4th, 2013
Grist: What do you give a plastic-bag ban for its fifth birthday?
In the case of China, which over the weekend celebrated five years of restrictions on plastic shopping bags, officials are showering their ban with accolades and crediting it with keeping tens of billions of bags out of landfills and the environment.
The rules, which took effect on June 1, 2008, ban the manufacture or use of the thinnest types of plastic bags. They also prohibit supermarkets, department stores, and grocery stores from...
Climate change causing US wildfire season to last longer, Congress told
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 4th, 2013
Guardian: America's wildfire season lasts two months longer than it did 40 years ago and burns up twice as much land as it did in those earlier days because of the hotter, drier conditions produced by climate change, the country's forest service chief told Congress on Tuesday.
But the forest service was forced to make sharp cuts to fire prevention programmes, and reduce the numbers of fire-fighters and engines because of budget pressures, Thomas Tidwell, the chief of the United States Forest Service, told...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Climate change causing US wildfire season to last longer, Congress toldDrought, climate change and forest practices elevate Utah wildfire risk
Posted by Salt Lake Tribune: Judy Fahys on June 4th, 2013
Salt Lake Tribune: So is the hazard created by modern forest management, said Michael Jenkins, associate professor in USU’s Quinney College of Natural Resources. Aggressive management has been "essentially eliminated," and dry forest undergrowth has built up, turning parts of Utah into tinderboxes, he said.
"Forests today are in a much different state than they were 200 years ago when fires were more common," Jenkins said. "We have suppressed fires for 100 years, which has allowed fuels to build up, trees to get...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Drought, climate change and forest practices elevate Utah wildfire riskThe shale revolution
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 4th, 2013
Telegraph: The solution to Britain's energy problems could well be beneath our feet. On Monday, IGas, one of the leading shale gas explorers, revealed that there may be as much as 172 trillion cubic feet of shale gas in the area that it has a licence to explore in the North West of England -- equivalent to more than 50 years of UK usage. Of course, we do not know for sure if this entire amount is either there or fully exploitable, but it is a hopeful sign none the less. Cuadrilla, another energy firm, estimates...
Pakistan’s dangerous negligence of climate change
Posted by Dawn: Suhail Yusuf on June 4th, 2013
Dawn: Pakistan is no stranger to being plagued by multiple crises. News headlines are usually dominated by issues like terrorism, extremism and power shortage but an even more alarming danger could affect the future of Pakistan if it is not tackled on a priority basis.
The dangerous threat we all know as climate change has been virtually left off the radar by our less than visionary leaders when it comes to issues of national priority.
Environmental degradation costs Rs 365 billion annually to Pakistan...
Monitor lizards vanishing to international trade in pets and skins
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on June 4th, 2013
Mongabay: The world's monitor lizards remind us that the world was once ruled by reptiles: this genus (Varanus) includes the world's biggest lizards, such as the stunning Komodo dragon and many other island kings. A large number beautifully-colored and patterned, these lizards are known for their intelligence and their apex role in many island food chains. However, a new study finds that the world's monitors, especially those in Southeast Asia, are vanishing due to the international pet trade and for their...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Monitor lizards vanishing to international trade in pets and skins