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Archive for July, 2013
BP’s profits still being buffeted by Gulf of Mexico oil spill
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on July 30th, 2013
Guardian: Estimating BP's quarterly profits has suddenly become a finger-in-the-air affair. One factor is the tax rate, which exploded to 45% in the latest period, driven by the interplay of various currencies. The Russian angle is also confusing after last year's cash-plus-shares sale of the 50% share in TNK-BP to Rosneft, which left BP with an enlarged stake in the latter. Earnings from the 19.75% stake in the Russian energy titan are harder to read and disappointed this time. Now the truly wild element...
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Hawaii’s ocean debris could fill 18-wheeler
Posted by LiveScience: Elizabeth Howell, on July 30th, 2013
LiveScience: In an area of Hawaii, far removed from most human habitation, a recent cleanup effort yielded an 18-wheeler's worth of human debris during a 19-day anti-pollution campaign this year. The region, which includes Midway Atoll, some 1,200 miles (1,900 kilometers) from the Hawaiian mainland, acts as a "fine-tooth comb" in picking up debris from elsewhere, officials with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) told LiveScience. Broken fishing gear, tattered nets and plastic fragments...
Farmers Warn of Threats to Global Food Supply Due to Climate Change
Posted by tcktcktck: None Given on July 30th, 2013
tcktcktck: The head of the United Kingdom’s National Farmers’ Union warns that extreme weather events could hit the country’s food production. Increasing exposure to extreme weather means a massive threat to British agriculture and food supplies, the head of the UK’s National Farmers’ Union has warned. Peter Kendall warned that the ability to feed the population is being severely hampered by erratic swings in the weather that damage crops. He stated: “The biggest uncertainty for UK agriculture is extreme weather...
Fracking protests ‘puts strain on police resources’
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on July 30th, 2013
Telegraph: Up to 90 officers have been on duty in Balcombe, West Sussex, every day since demonstrators launched their campaign to blockade attempts to drill for oil and gas last week. Sussex Police have yet to put a figure on the cost of the operation, which has so far resulted in 23 arrests, but it is thought to have run into tens of thousands. Such protests are expected to spread across the country, with fracking campaigners vowing to resist any attempts to explore for oil in areas including Lancashire, Cheshire,...
Fracking can take place in ‘desolate’ north-east England, Tory peer says
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on July 30th, 2013
Guardian: Fracking should be carried out in the "desolate" north-east of England, a former Conservative energy adviser has said, prompting criticism and claims the remarks highlighted the party's "problem with the north". Lord Howell, who advised William Hague on energy policy until April and is the father-in-law of the chancellor, George Osborne, drew gasps of astonishment in the House of Lords on Tuesday for suggesting that the controversial form of gas production could take place in the north-east without...
In this time-lapse video, you can see Texas’ reservoirs disappearing
Posted by Grist: Sarah Laskow on July 30th, 2013
Grist: In 1965, the federal government dammed up a river to create Lake Meredith in Texas. It’s a reservoir that provides drinking water to 11 cities, and locals use it to swim and boat and be outdoors, as well, Next City reports. But it’s been shrinking, as you can see in the video below. The time-lapse begins in 1984, with a full, deep lake, and it ends in 2012 with a stub of water. Why’s the water disappearing? Many reasons, Next City says: One study found that there was no single factor causing the...
Harsh Drought Is Drying Up New Mexico’s Largest Reservoir
Posted by Atlantic Cities: John Metcalfe on July 30th, 2013
Atlantic Cities: Right now, El Paso’s drier than an cow bone baking in the Chihuahuan Desert, and an important source of water for drinking and farming has shrunk into the sandy puddle you see below. The vast desolation of the Elephant Butte Reservoir – named so not because of the presence of pachyderms, but due to a hump in the landscape vaguely shaped like a hulking animal – is a weighty concern for residents of El Paso, who get about half their water from it. During flush times in the late 1980s and ’90s, the...
Fracking protest: who’s who in the battle of Balcombe?
Posted by Guardian: Jon Henley on July 30th, 2013
Guardian: The battle of Balcombe – as it was instantly and inevitably dubbed – has pitched police trying to ensure energy company Cuadrilla can drill an exploratory well outside a pretty, prosperous and hitherto sleepy West Sussex village against a coalition of protesters who fear the operation will lead to full-scale oil or gas production through the controversial process of fracking. The opposition alliance are a disparate bunch: Local residents According to a survey by Balcombe parish council last year,...
A Decade of Legal GM Soy in Brazil
Posted by Inter Press Service: Fabíola Ortiz on July 30th, 2013
Inter Press Service: Ten years ago, Brazil yielded to agribusiness pressure and legalised the cultivation of genetically modified (GM) soy. Today it is the world’s second leading producer of GM crops, surpassed only by the United States. Transgenic soy had been grown clandestinely in Brazil since the second half of the 1990s. In 2003, the adoption of Decree 4680, which stipulated the labelling of foods with a genetically modified organism (GMO) content of at least one percent, was considered a landmark decision. But...
Japan: Fukushima Fallout Hits Farmers
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on July 30th, 2013
Inter Press Service: Life for Yoshihiro Watanabe and his wife Mutsuko, mushroom and rice farmers from Fukushima, has changed drastically since the disastrous meltdowns in the Dai Ichi nuclear plant that was hit by a massive tsunami after a 9.0 strong earthquake struck on Mar. 11, 2011. “Dangerous levels of radiation from the crippled nuclear reactors have effectively forced us to stop our mushroom cultivation and reduced our farming income almost 80 percent,” Watanabe told IPS. He added that the family is also taking...