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Archive for July 20th, 2013
Canada: ‘Nobody Understands’ Oil Spills at Alberta Tar Sands Operation
Posted by Toronto Star: None Given on July 20th, 2013
Toronto Star: Oil spills at a major oil sands operation in Alberta have been ongoing for at least six weeks and have cast doubts on the safety of underground extraction methods, according to documents obtained by the Star and a government scientist who has been on site.
Canadian Natural Resources Ltd. has been unable to stop an underground oil blowout that has killed numerous animals and contaminated a lake, forest, and muskeg at its operations in Cold Lake, Alta.
The documents indicate that, since cleanup...
Posted in 
Heatwave: city centre road melts and wildfires blaze across Britain
Posted by Telegraph: Daniel Johnson, Rosa Silverman, and George Ryan 1:59PM Bst 19 Jul 2013 on July 20th, 2013
Telegraph: A 15-year-old boy is thought to have drowned in a river in the latest heatwave water death.
The teenager was airlifted to hospital after the incident in Roe Valley Country Park near Limavady, Northern Ireland, yesterday afternoon, but died in hospital.
It takes the death toll of water-related deaths to 14 since Britain's longest heatwave for seven years began.
According to Public Health England, 650 people died in the hot weather from July 6 to July 14, with more deaths likely to have added...
Deadly diseases and climate change
Posted by Record Searchlight: Doug Craig on July 20th, 2013
Record Searchlight: There is so much wrong with climate change, it is hard to keep up. The whole world is changing and yet it is one of the best-kept secrets on the planet. And as it changes, and we (shhhhh) keep it to ourselves, pieces of fact and truth bubble up now and then. Well more than now and then. Kind of constantly. Just ask D.R. Tucker. But most the media world successfully ignores it. And all of us carry on with our lives as if it will always be normal. I guess we need to pretend. Hang onto our denial as...
Oil train concerns in the Pacific Northwest
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on July 20th, 2013
Living on Earth: Plans are underway to build terminals in the Pacific Northwest to transport coal from Wyoming as well as North Dakota's oil from trains to refineries. Ashley Ahearn of the public media collaborative EarthFix tells host Steve Curwood that the more local residents learn about them, the less popular the proposed fossil fuel terminals.
Transcript
CURWOOD: Concern over the climate is also feeding the debate over fossil fuel transport. In the Pacific Northwest there's controversy over proposals to...
Canada: Runaway train is a metaphor for global warning
Posted by Montreal Gazette: Henry Aubin on July 20th, 2013
Montreal Gazette: In the aftermath of the Lac-Mégantic hell, almost all the reform talk is about regulations. There are demands for rules to ensure more workers on trains. To improve the brakes on rail cars. To thicken the shells of tanker cars.
This concern for safety is imperative and overdue, Yet it also taking attention away from the underlying cause of the Lac-Mégantic nightmare: Our society’s dependence on planet-heating fossil fuel, the product aboard the runaway train. The world needs to tackle this ever-increasing...
Global power brokers ‘alarmed’ as US has a fracking good time
Posted by Canberra Times: Nick O'Malley on July 20th, 2013
Canberra Times: A few years ago when you headed from Bismarck in central North Dakota up towards Williston in the state's north-west it might have seemed you were heading from nowhere to nothing. You'd drive on empty roads by the badlands of the Theodore Roosevelt National Park and if you missed the farming town of 14,000 you would hit Canada a few hours later.
Not any more. Williston is at the epicentre of a US oil and gas boom sparked by fracking technology that some economists believe will arrest America's...
Britain battles seventh day of 30-plus temperatures
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on July 20th, 2013
Independent: The heatwave is piling pressure on England's already over-stretched A&E services, with last week being the busiest so far this year – while rising temperatures indicate accident and emergency departments could come under even more pressure next week.
Official figures show that 457,459 people attended A&E wards, minor injury units or walk-in centres in the week ending 14 July – more than in any week during the winter and the second highest weekly attendance since week-by-week records began three...
Gimme swelter: we explain the UK and US heatwaves
Posted by New Scientist: Fred Pearce on July 20th, 2013
New Scientist: After the cold, the heat. High pressure spreading across the UK from Siberia last spring brought record cold temperatures. Now more high pressure, this time from the tropical Atlantic, is bringing a sweltering heatwave. These high-pressure zones are blocking the jet stream which usually brings the country's normal changeable weather. "Blocking highs" are an increasing theme of North American weather reports too, bringing concern of a long-term shift. New Scientist looks at the issues.
What's going...
More heat, drought and floods in 2013
Posted by ClimateWire: Christa Marshall on July 20th, 2013
ClimateWire: Global average temperatures in June were the fifth highest on record, as above-average heat conditions continued a multidecade streak, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration reported yesterday. June marked the 340th consecutive month -- a span of time more than 28 years -- that global temperatures surged above the 20th century average, according to the agency. "The last below-average June temperature was June 1976 and the last below-average temperature for any month was February 1985,"...
Thunderstorms could hamper efforts to subdue California wildfire
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on July 20th, 2013
Reuters: Firefighters raced on Friday to buttress defensive lines against a fierce blaze roaring for a fifth day near the scenic mountain resort of Idyllwild in Southern California, as forecast thunderstorms threatened to hamper efforts to subdue the flames.
The so-called Mountain Fire has already burned across more than 27,000 acres of dry brush and timber and forced the evacuation of Idyllwild after destroying seven homes and other property in the rugged San Jacinto range, authorities said.
The blaze,...