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Archive for January, 2015
Drought worsens as state warms up
Posted by Gazettes: None Given on January 29th, 2015
Gazettes: Don’t look now, but the drought just got worse. A lot worse. Yes, it did rain Monday here in Long Beach. All of .003 inches. But, short of allowing folks to skip a day of watering, it didn’t do anything for the water supply. More importantly, it didn’t rain, or snow, in northern California. And it hasn’t rained or snowed significantly for the entire month. The record will be official come Sunday, but it already is a given that 2015 will be the driest January ever in northern California. That’s...
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Climate models don’t over-predict warming, study shows
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on January 29th, 2015
LA Times: If you listen to climate change skeptics, Earth`s surface hasn`t warmed appreciably in the last 15 years, and any "record" set last year is just the result of the planet doing what the planet naturally does.
It turns out they`re right, but for the wrong reasons, according to a study published online Wednesday in the journal Nature.
There is no inherent bias in climate models that make them over-estimate the effects of human activity, according to the study.
"Cherry picking" the most recent...
Massive Current And Future Climate Impacts For Australia
Posted by CleanTechnica: None Given on January 29th, 2015
CleanTechnica: A new report from Australia`s CSIRO and Bureau of Meteorology has found massive current and future climate impacts for the country, and highlights the need for ambitious post-2020 pollution reduction targets - targets that are sorely missing in the current national political climate. According to Australia`s Climate Institute, "the report highlights the need for ambitious post 2020 pollution reduction targets, a transition plan to decarbonise our economy, and far greater integration of climate resilience...
As gasoline prices drop, Americans swing favor oil exports: Poll
Posted by Reuters: Jonathan Leff on January 29th, 2015
Reuters: Americans are more likely than ever to favor easing a ban on exporting crude oil, so long as it does not lead to higher gasoline prices that have recently sunk to near $2 a gallon, according to a new Reuters-IPSOS poll. In questions posed to more than 2,000 voting-age Americans earlier this month, around 45 percent generally agreed that oil drillers should be allowed to export domestic crude abroad, while just over 30 percent broadly disagreed. In September, supporters and opponents were both at...
British Belief in Climate Change on the Rise, Research Finds
Posted by Guardian: Fiona Harvey, on January 29th, 2015
Guardian: Britons are more likely to agree the climate is changing than at any time in recent years, with nearly nine in 10 people saying climate change is happening and 84% attributing this somewhat or entirely to human activity, new research has found. Two-thirds say they are concerned by global warming.
When asked to name major threats to the UK in the next two decades, 15% of those polled listed climate change without prompting, putting it in fourth position behind immigration, the economy and health....
Canada: Did Alberta Just Break Fracking Earthquake World Record?
Posted by Tyee: Andrew Nikiforuk on January 29th, 2015
Tyee: Hydraulic fracturing, a technology used to crack open difficult oil and gas formations, appears to have set off a swarm of earthquakes near Fox Creek, Alberta, including a record-breaking tremor with a felt magnitude of 4.4 last week.
That would likely make it the largest felt earthquake ever caused by fracking, a development that experts swore couldn't happen a few years ago.
Fracking operations in British Columbia's Montney shale generated similar seismic activity of that magnitude last year,...
Gov. Tom Wolf Plans to Ban New Fracking in Pennsylvania Parks, Forests
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on January 29th, 2015
Associated Press: Gov. Tom Wolf plans to sign an executive order ending a short-lived effort by his predecessor to expand the extraction of natural gas from rock buried deep below Pennsylvania's state parks and forests, his office said Wednesday.
Following through on a campaign pledge, Wolf will sign the order restoring a moratorium on new drilling leases involving public lands on Thursday at Benjamin Rush State Park in northeast Philadelphia.
It will supersede an order that Republican Gov. Tom Corbett signed...
Plunging Oil Prices Choke Off Boom Bakersfield
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on January 29th, 2015
LA Times: Each year, the American Assn. of Drilling Engineers hosts a meeting here affectionately called the Liar's Club.
A cocktail-fueled crowd hears oil companies' well-drilling and production forecasts - estimates often so grandiose everyone understands they are exaggerations. Pledges to drill thousands of wells are common.
But at this month's meeting, no one felt like telling tall tales. Fewer than 10 wells were promised, all by small, independent companies. Giant firms - Chevron, Occidental - promised...
Movement to Take Down Thousands of Dams Goes Mainstream
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on January 28th, 2015
National Geographic: This spring, for the first time in more than two centuries, American shad, striped bass, and river herring may spawn in White Clay Creek, a tributary of the Delaware River in northern Delaware. Early one morning last month, a five-person crew waded into the frigid creek and pulled down most of a timber-and-stone dam that had blocked the river's flow since the early years of the Revolutionary War.
The White Clay Creek dam was the first ever removed in the state of Delaware, but it was far from...
Scotland announces moratorium fracking for shale gas
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on January 28th, 2015
Guardian: The Scottish government has announced a moratorium on all planning consents for unconventional oil and gas extraction, including fracking.
Welcomed by campaigners as “a very big nail in the coffin for the unconventional gas and fracking industry in Scotland”, energy minister Fergus Ewing told the Scottish parliament on Wednesday afternoon that the moratorium would allow time for the government to launch a full public consultation on the controversial drilling technique, and to commission a full...