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Archive for August, 2015
China detains 12 Tianjin blasts, accuses officials dereliction
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 27th, 2015
Reuters: China has formally detained a dozen people over huge explosions in the city of Tianjin this month that killed at least 139 people, and has accused 11 officials and port executives of suspected dereliction of duty or abuse of power.
Anger over safety standards is growing in China, after three decades of swift economic growth marred by incidents from mining disasters to factory fires, and President Xi Jinping has vowed that authorities will learn the lessons paid for with blood.
News of the detentions...
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Q&A: The legal battle over a giant telescope atop Mauna Kea
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 27th, 2015
Associated Press: Long before dozens of people were arrested while protesting against building a giant telescope atop Hawaii's Mauna Kea, there were years of environmental studies, public hearings and court proceedings. The Hawaii Supreme Court on Thursday is scheduled to hear oral arguments in a lawsuit challenging the project's permit from the state land board to build the telescope on conservation land.
Protesters are planning a rally before the hearing outside the Supreme Court building in downtown Honolulu....
Deliberate Targeting Water Sources Worsens Misery for Millions of Syrians
Posted by Inter Press Service: Kanya D'Almeida on August 26th, 2015
Inter Press Service: Imagine having to venture out into a conflict zone in search of water because rebel groups and government forces have targeted the pipelines. Imagine walking miles in the blazing summer heat, then waiting hours at a public tap to fill up your containers. Now imagine realizing the jugs are too heavy to carry back home.
This scene, witnessed by an engineer with the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), is becoming all too common in embattled Syria. In this case, the child sent to fetch water...
The local health effects of Washington’s wildfires
Posted by Crosscut: Amelia Havanec on August 26th, 2015
Crosscut: This past weekend, the Seattle skyline and crests of the Cascade and Olympic Mountains faded behind a hovering white haze. While the scene was unexpected to anybody new in the area, residents familiar with the seasonal occurrence of summer wildfires collectively sighed — and coughed — from the understanding that we were in the direct jet stream of the state’s raging fires, burning just over 200 miles northeast in Okanogan County. Washington is now seeing the largest wildfires in its recorded history,...
U.S. Shale Gas Production Expected to Fall for First Time, Govt Says
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 26th, 2015
Yale Environment 360: Natural gas production from all seven major shale formations in the U.S. is projected to drop next month for the first time since the shale gas boom began in earnest roughly a decade ago, according to an analysis from the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Major shale regions produced gas at a record-high rate of 45.6 billion cubic feet per day in May, but that rate is expected to drop to 44.9 billion cubic feet per day in September, the report says. It attributes the decline to existing, legacy...
Expert: We’re ‘locked-in’ to 3 feet sea level rise
Posted by CNN: Brandon Miller on August 26th, 2015
CNN: It was less than two years ago that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released its all-encompassing assessment on the current state of climate change research and made projections for the future climate of our planet.
According to the latest from NASA, however, the projections the panel made for a rise in global sea levels of 1 to 3 feet may already be outdated.
According to Steven Nerem of the University of Colorado, we are "locked into at least 3 feet of sea level rise, and probably...
A look at the $50 billion battle to save Louisiana
Posted by Grist: Tim McDonnell on August 26th, 2015
Grist: I’m driving down a dirt road in the vast tangle of coastal bayous that stretch south of New Orleans, so that Reggie Dupre can show me his pride and joy. “This is the little silver lining on the very dark cloud that was over Louisiana,” he says. In front of us, construction crews are shaping mounds of rock and dirt into a mile-long, 12-foot levee. On one side is a canal, crammed with boat traffic for the offshore oil drilling industry. On the other side is Terrabonne Parish, a rural community of...
Wildfire Smoke Continues to Be a Health Threat
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on August 26th, 2015
National Public Radio: I stepped out my parents' front door last Thursday, expecting a typically glorious summer day in southern Oregon. Instead, I was hit with acrid wood smoke that stung my eyes and throat. The air was thick with haze that obscured the mountains. I quickly retreated inside.
Health departments across the West are mobilizing to protect residents from smoke generated by dozens of fires that have sent smoke as far east as the Midwest.
"It's really bad," says Janice Nolan, assistant vice president for...
Groups to sue EPA in effort to better regulate disposal of fracking waste
Posted by Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: Don Hopey on August 26th, 2015
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: Eight environmental organizations announced today they intend to sue the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to force it to set new and tighter standards for disposal of oil and gas drilling and fracking waste that they say threatens public health and the environment.
The groups, in a notice of intent to sue filed in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., allege that the EPA has failed for 27 years to update and tighten baseline drilling and waste disposal regulations, as required by the Resource...
Yes, climate change has a hand in the California drought
Posted by Ars Technica: Scott K. Johnson on August 25th, 2015
Ars Technica: The California drought may have put water in short supply, but debate about it is in surplus. Water use has come under even greater scrutiny as Californians struggle to deal with the current and future reality. Groundwater overuse during the drought has reached epic proportions, with the land surface in some locations sinking almost two inches per month as a result. In addition to arguing over how to use the little water they have, people are also debating the question of whether humans are partly...