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Archive for December 20th, 2015
Most polluted US nuclear weapons building site plans influx of tourists
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on December 20th, 2015
Associated Press: Thousands of people are expected next year to tour the Hanford Nuclear Reservation, home of the world’s first full-sized nuclear reactor and the most polluted US nuclear weapons production site.
Hanford, near Richland, about 200 miles east of Seattle in south-central Washington state, is the newest national park.
Visitors will not, however, be allowed anywhere near the country’s largest collection of toxic radioactive waste.
“Everything is clean and perfectly safe,” said Colleen French,...
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Forest fires sweep northern Spain despite winter rain
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on December 20th, 2015
Reuters: Dozens of forest fires raged across northern Spain on Sunday after strong winds hindered efforts to keep them from spreading, forcing some homes to be evacuated in the worst-affected Asturias region.
More than 100 fires were still burning on Sunday morning in Asturias alone despite rain overnight in some areas, emergency services said.
Television pictures showed several rural houses destroyed by fire but officials said there had been no reports of casualties or damage to villages or towns....
A million years ago, Greenland was ice free
Posted by Environmental News Network: Carolyn Gramling, Science/AAAS on December 20th, 2015
Environmental News Network: As the Arctic warms, Greenland’s fringe of glaciers is thinning and melting—but the future of the Greenland ice sheet remains a giant question mark. Until recently, that was also true of the ice sheet’s past: Scientists have long debated whether it might have shrunk away to nothing during Earth’s warmest periods. Now, a new study suggests that Greenland was entirely ice free at some point in the last 1.25 million years. “We should be worried about the Greenland Ice Sheet,” says Joerg Schaefer, a...
El Niño Could Usher in a Decade of Stronger Events
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on December 20th, 2015
Climate Central: In Buffalo, early December meant breaking a 116-year-old record for a lack of snow. In Duluth, Minn., a newspaper reported that the temperature was 40 degrees above zero, not below. And in Miami, beachgoers stayed indoors during what had become the third-wettest December in local history, just eight days into the month.
What's going on with the weather?
It's the phenomenon called El Niño, which is happening now as ocean water temperatures rise above normal across the central and eastern Pacific,...
Has the climate change deal really averted catastrophe?
Posted by Al Jazeera: None Given on December 20th, 2015
Al Jazeera: After years of fruitless negotiations, world leaders finally reached an agreement to combat climate change, agreeing to cap greenhouse gases in an effort to slow down global warming.
It was very interesting to see this mirror between what politicians were saying and what the media were saying. They all echoed a very similar narrative - they were using very, very similar terms, language, frames.
The United Nations Climate Change Conference in Paris, or COP21, set a target of limiting carbon...
Mass layoffs in China’s coal country threaten unrest
Posted by New York Times: Jane Perlez and Yufan Huang on December 20th, 2015
New York Times: In the dank shower room where the miners soak, the coal dust from their bodies staining the water chocolate, a lone worker sat smoking a cigarette, staring at the floor. He lingered, he said, because since his pay had been cut in half, he had been eating dinner at his parents’ apartment, and he dreaded the humiliation of going there again. “If any of the leaders would do their job properly, the situation would not be like this,” said the worker, Mr. Guo, 39. “If they want to sack me, they should...
George Mitchell, overlooked environmentalist, reflects on climate change
Posted by Press Herald: Mary Pols on December 20th, 2015
Press Herald: Twenty-five springs ago, U.S. Sen. George J. Mitchell of Maine put the finishing touches on a book called “World on Fire,” subtitled “Saving an Endangered Earth.” Mitchell had worked extensively on amendments to the Clean Air Act since he joined the Senate in 1980 and now, as majority leader he’d just completed months of negotiating to get a reauthorized Clean Air Act through the Senate. The book, which addressed what Mitchell called “the gathering environmental tragedy,” sent out a clarion call...
On wrong track: Regulators miss real problem in rail-car explosions
Posted by Dispatch: None Given on December 20th, 2015
Dispatch: Track defects caused fiery crude-oil derailments that forced 1,100 people from their homes in the Appalachian village of Mount Carbon, West Virginia, this year and killed 47 people in a Canadian town in 2013. In fact, a Dispatch analysis of federal records shows that track defects and human error are to blame for most railway incidents. Yet U.S. regulators continue to focus on tanker cars instead of the rails that support the cars and millions of gallons of Bakken crude, a type of highly...
San Diego’s 18-year wait to drink sea water may hinder deals
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on December 20th, 2015
Bloomberg: The largest ocean desalination plant ever built in the Western Hemisphere is finally generating drinking water, and revenue, 18 years after it was proposed in Southern California. Some investors say it wasn't worth the wait.
Poseidon Resources Corp. this month will begin commercially desalinating saltwater from the Pacific Ocean at its Carlsbad, Calif., facility, which is designed to supply 50 million gallons of drinking water each day. That's enough for 7 percent of San Diego County, home to...
Brazil dam disaster: judge freezes assets of miners BHP and Vale
Posted by Washington Post: Juliet Eilperin on December 20th, 2015
Guardian: A judge has frozen the Brazilian assets of mining giants BHP Billiton and Vale SA after determining their joint venture Samarco was unable to pay for widespread damage caused by the bursting of a dam at its mine last month.
In a ruling issued late on Friday, the judge in the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais determined that Vale and BHP could be held responsible for the disaster at the iron ore mine, for which the government is demanding 20bn reais ($5bn) in compensation. Brazil's mining tragedy:...