A prominent physicist and skeptic of global warming spent two years trying to find out if mainstream climate scientists were wrong. In the end, he determined they were right: Temperatures really are rising rapidly.
The study of the world’s surface temperatures by Richard Muller was partially bankrolled by a foundation connected to global warming deniers. He pursued long-held skeptic theories in analyzing the data. He was spurred to action because of “Climategate,” a British scandal involving hacked emails of scientists.
He said he went even further back, studying readings from Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson. His ultimate finding of a warming world, to be presented at a conference Monday, is no different from what mainstream climate scientists have been saying for decades.
The best part:
One-quarter of the $600,000 to do the research came from the Charles Koch Foundation, whose founder is a major funder of skeptic groups and the conservative tea party movement. The Koch brothers, Charles and David, run a large privately held company involved in oil and other industries, producing sizable greenhouse gas emissions.
A new study designed to address critiques of climate science by skeptics has confirmed that “global warming is real” and that the world’s average land temperature has risen by about 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit since the mid-1950s.
The findings, released on Thursday by a group of scientists and statisticians at the University of California known as the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature project, were welcomed by climate scientists and advocates of climate policy action, who had hoped that skeptics would finally have to cry uncle.
At least one of those skeptics, Anthony Watts, had written in March on his climate-themed blog, Watts Up With That, “I’m prepared to accept whatever result they produce, even if it proves my premise wrong.”
But neither Mr. Watts nor other longtime critics of climate science seemed satisfied with the report. Mr. Watts contended that the study’s methodology was flawed because it examined data over a 60-year period instead of the 30-year one that was the basis for his research and some other peer-reviewed studies. He also noted that the report had not yet been peer-reviewed.
U.N. climate talks in South Africa next month must make meaningful progress or governments “risk permanent damage to their credibility”, a group of global businesses warned on Thursday.
At the Nov. 28-Dec. 9 summit in Durban, governments should try to adopt measures to ensure poor nations will have $100 billion in annual climate aid by 2020 and to pave the way for low-carbon investments, said a communique from over 175 companies including Tesco and Nedbank Group .
Major emitting nations must also cut their carbon emissions deep enough to contain global warming, the statement said.
“If we do not act, climate change risks seriously undermining future global prosperity and inflicting significant social, economic and environmental costs on the world,” the companies said.
“Without this agreement, business lacks the clarity and certainty needed to invest to its fullest potential.”
The companies also encouraged countries to forge bilateral and multilateral agreements to form financing partnerships and to tackle particular problem areas such as deforestation and emissions from international shipping and aviation.
This week, in a courtroom in Prince William County, Virginia, a hearing will take place that could have implications for the privacy rights of scientists at colleges and universities across the country.
It’s part of a lawsuit brought by the American Tradition Institute, a free-market think tank that wants the public to believe human-caused global warming is a scientific fraud. Filed against the University of Virginia, the suit seeks emails and other documents related to former professor Michael Mann, an award-winning climate scientist who has become a focus of the climate-denial movement because of his research documenting the recent spike in earth’s temperature.
By suing the university, the American Tradition Institute wants to make public Mann’s correspondence in an effort to find out whether he manipulated data to receive government grants, a violation of the state’s Fraud Against Taxpayers Act.
But a Facing South investigation has found that the Colorado-based American Tradition Institute is part of a broader network of groups with close ties to energy interests that have long fought greenhouse gas regulation. Our investigation also finds that ATI has connections with the Koch brothers, Art Pope and other conservative donors seeking to expand their political influence.
One plant, the Fort Calhoun Station, about 19 miles north of Omaha, was shut down in April for refueling, and the operators elected to keep it in “cold shutdown” in anticipation of the flooding. The other plant, Cooper Nuclear Station, located downriver and situated on higher ground, is still operating.
Each of the 104 commercial nuclear power plants in the United States has a unique license issued by the federal government that details conditions under which it may operate, including what river water levels, wind speeds or hurricane surge levels require shutdowns. Reactors in Florida and Louisiana, for example, have shut down in anticipation of approaching hurricanes.
A McCain spokesperson later told Salon’s Justin Elliott that “a Forest Service official” told McCain that “illegal immigrants” were involved in setting the fires. However, that directly contradicts what U.S. Forest Service spokesman Tom Berglund told ABC News yesterday:
When asked if there is substantial evidence that some fires were caused by undocumented immigrants, as McCain said at a news conference Saturday, Berglund said: “Absolutely not, at this level.”
“There’s no evidence that I’m aware, no evidence that’s been public, indicating such a thing,” he said.
The cave fishes of Madagascar are very poorly known, primarily because of the inaccessibility of their remote habitats — underground streams and pools within razor-sharp karst formations. We studied cave fishes of the genus Typheleotris in the south of Madagascar in 2008, discovering new species and expanding our knowledge of the evolution of this entirely subterranean group of fishes. Now we want to see if the cave gobies of the north, genus Glossogobius, are similarly diverse. We want to know what these cave-adapted species are related to — is their closest relative a sighted and pigmented species found nearby or on a distant landmass separated from Madagascar for nearly 100 million years? This question, and an examination of how the various subterranean freshwater habitats are connected, will be determined using DNA analyses.
Within the large Gondwanan family Cichlidae (also found in Africa and the Neotropics), only the Malagasy and Indian-Sri Lankan cichlids exhibit a suite of structural modifications of the gas bladder and the posterior portion of the skull. In some of these species this anatomy creates a direct mechanical link between the gas bladder and inner ear, analogous to the human tympanum, or eardrum. This grants these fishes the ability to hear much fainter sounds and a wider range of frequencies. We are here to test the hypothesis that this super-sensitive hearing has evolved as an adaptation to very quiet habitats. We expect to increase our understanding of the diversity of this linkage and characterize the acoustic natural habitats of each species.
When congressional Republicans cut the Environmental Protection Agency’s budget 16 percent as part of a deal with President Obama in April to keep the government running, they hailed it as a blow to a federal bureaucracy that had overreached in its size and ambition.
But now that the agency has detailed how it is making the $1.6 billion cut for fiscal 2011, the reality is somewhat different. Because the EPA passes the vast majority of its money through to the states, it has meant that these governments — not Washington — are taking the biggest hits. Already constrained financially at home, state officials have millions of dollars less to enforce the nation’s air- and water-quality laws, fund critical capital improvements and help communities comply with new, more stringent pollution controls imposed by the federal government.
The 8-0 decision Monday was a setback — but not a surprise — for environmentalists. The outcome puts more pressure on the Obama administration and the EPA to follow through with promises to propose new regulations in the fall that will restrict carbon pollution from power plants.
The EPA under President Obama has already adopted stricter emissions standards for cars and trucks. However, more ambitious moves contemplated by the administration could be difficult to implement because the Republican-led House has voiced opposition to new regulations that would affect energy producers.
Eight states had filed suit against Midwest and Southern power producers based on the old doctrine that a state or a private party could file a “public nuisance” suit against another party for polluting its air or water.
In throwing out the suit, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said it posed a classic “who decides” question. In this instance, she said, it is clear that environmental policy should be decided by the EPA, not by a single federal judge overseeing a legal dispute.
The Army Corps sets national standards for levee safety. In 2007 it unveiled a revised maintenance policy that forbids trees or shrubs on levees. Instead, only short grass is allowed on levees and within 15 feet on either side.
The policy raises significant concerns in California, where levee vegetation composes much of the remaining 5 percent of the Central Valley’s historic riparian forest. As such, it is crucial shade and habitat for migrating endangered fish, as well as nesting habitat for many endangered birds.
“This would be the most massive intentional infliction of environmental damage on our rivers that we’ve seen in modern times,” said Bob Wright, senior counsel at Friends of the River in Sacramento. ”It’s mind-boggling.”
Gov. Rick Perry has signed a bill requiring drillers to disclose the chemicals they use when extracting oil and gas from rock formations, making Texas the first state to pass such a law. Some state agencies have passed rules forcing some disclosure, but no other states have made it a law. Texas’ law will force drillers to post the chemicals and the amounts used beginning in July 2012. Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, is being used in more states. In the fracking process, drillers pump chemical-laced water into the ground at high pressure to crack the rock. Environmental groups worry that the chemicals could taint water supplies. The industry says the process is safe.
Time after time, officials at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission have decided that original regulations were too strict, arguing that safety margins could be eased without peril, according to records and interviews.
The result? Rising fears that these accommodations by the NRC are significantly undermining safety — and inching the reactors closer to an accident that could harm the public and jeopardize the future of nuclear power in the United States.
Examples abound. When valves leaked, more leakage was allowed — up to 20 times the original limit. When rampant cracking caused radioactive leaks from steam generator tubing, an easier test of the tubes was devised, so plants could meet standards.
Failed cables. Busted seals. Broken nozzles, clogged screens, cracked concrete, dented containers, corroded metals and rusty underground pipes — all of these and thousands of other problems linked to aging were uncovered in the AP’s yearlong investigation. And all of them could escalate dangers in the event of an accident.
Yet despite the many problems linked to aging, not a single official body in government or industry has studied the overall frequency and potential impact on safety of such breakdowns in recent years, even as the NRC has extended the licenses of dozens of reactors.
Industry and government officials defend their actions, and insist that no chances are being taken. But the AP investigation found that with billions of dollars and 19 percent of America’s electricity supply at stake, a cozy relationship prevails between the industry and its regulator, the NRC.
The Environmental Protection Agency said it will extend the public comment period for a proposed mercury and air toxics rule, responding to calls from lawmakers to give companies more time to weigh in on the standards.
The EPA will extend the comment timeline by 30 days, according to a statement today. The November deadline for issuing final standards will remain the same.
U.S. Representative John Dingell, a Michigan Democrat, was among lawmakers calling on the agency to give utilities, manufacturers, environmental groups and other interested parties 120 days to comment, double the current schedule.
Former White House energy and climate adviser Carol Browner on Tuesday lamented GOP-led attacks on the Environmental Protection Agency, arguing they’re at odds with the historical success of agency protections.
“There does seem to be, among some, a lot of hostility toward EPA writ large, just toward the whole idea that we are going to set public health standards and we are going to require companies to meet them,” said Browner, who left the White House earlier this year and is now a senior fellow with the liberal Center for American Progress (CAP).
“And it is just really unfortunate, because if you look at the history of EPA standards – air, water, toxics, whatever – it shows that you are able to do it in a cost-effective manner and that you actually can create jobs and that you can provide important public health benefits,” she added.
Some teenagers are suing the U.S. government. They are claiming that the federal government is failing to protect the Earth for future generations. The suit is relying “on the public trust doctrine, which dates to Roman times,” and the doctrine was carried over into English common law and thus, American common law. The doctrine, as applied to navigable waters, was articulated in Illinois Central R. Co. v. Illinois, 146 U.S. 387, 452-53 (1892) (emphasis added):
[T]he state holds the title to the lands under the navigable waters of Lake Michigan, within its limits in the same manner that the state holds title to soils under tidewater by the common law we have already shown, and that title necessarily carries with it control over the waters above them, whenever the lands are subjected to use. But it is a title different in character from that which the state holds in lands intended for sale. It is different from the title which the United States hold in the public lands which are open to preemption and sale. It is a title held in trust for the people of the state, that they may enjoy the navigation of the waters, carry on commerce over them, and have liberty of fishing therein, freed from the obstruction or interference of private parties. The interest of the people in the navigation of the waters and in commerce over them may be improved in many instances by the erection of wharves, docks, and piers therein, for which purpose the state may grant parcels of the submerged lands; and so long as their disposition is made for such purpose, no valid objections can be made to the grants. It is grants of parcels of lands under navigable waters that may afford foundation for wharves, piers, docks, and other structures in aid of commerce, and grants of parcels which, being occupied, do not substantially impair the public interest in the lands and waters remaining, that are chiefly considered and sustained in the adjudged cases as a valid exercise of legislative power consistently with the trust to the public upon which such lands are held by the state. But that is a very different doctrine from the one which would sanction the abdication of the general control of the state over lands under the navigable waters of an entire harbor or bay, or of a sea or lake. Such abdication is not consistent with the exercise of that trust which requires the government of the state to preserve such waters for the use of the public. The trust devolving upon the state for the public, and which can only be discharged by the management and control of property in which the public has an interest, cannot be relinquished by a transfer of the property. The control of the state for the purposes of the trust can never be lost, except as to such parcels as are used in promoting the interests of the public therein or can be disposed of without any substantial impairment of the public interest in the lands and waters remaining. . . . The state can no more abdicate its trust over property in which the whole people are interested, like navigable waters and soils under them, so as to leave them entirely under the use and control of private parties, except in the instance of parcels mentioned for the improvement of the navigation and use of the waters, or when parcels can be disposed of without impairment of the public interest in what remains, than it can abdicate its police powers in the administration of government and the preservation of the peace.
Gasland, a documentary that tackles the environmental side effects associated with drilling for natural gas, is up for an Oscar for the best documentary feature at the Academy Awards ceremony tomorrow. Not surprisingly, the fossil-fuel industry attacked the claims that are made in the documentary. However, given the history of environmental litigation that’s associated with fossil-fuel companies and their wrongdoings, the efforts of fossil-fuel companies to circumvent and stifle environmental regulations, and the known environmental crimes that have been committed against the human environment by the fossil-fuel industry, I believe that claims made by the fossil-fuel industry should be taken with a grain of salt. Here is a review of Gasland via Scientific American (a comprehensive review of claims made in Gasland can be found at Greenwire):
Scientific American got its hands on a pre-release copy of the film months before it aired on HBO, and the movie convinced me to write a feature article investigating the claims of fracking critics and promoters. After doing my own research and interviews, it became apparent that, like most documentaries, Gasland revealed surprising facts, amplified a few, and chose to gloss over a couple others. What writer and producer Josh Fox did achieve, regardless, was to blow the lid off the secrecy that kept most local residents, not to mention scientists and regulators, in the dark about the chemicals used in fracking and their possible effects. And he certainly put me on the reporting trail.
[Josh Fox] spends a lot of time on three Colorado households who can all set their water on fire. All three cases were investigated by Colorado’s Department of Natural Resources, and while one was indeed traced to fracking, the other two apparently have nothing to do with it. One homeowner had inadvertently drilled his well through four coal beds, which contained natural gas.
Regardless of the arguments, will Gasland take home the Oscar? It seems unlikely that arguments about its accuracy will sway the Academy much. But for the record, my money’s on Banksy.
“Gasland” is up for best documentary at Sunday’s Academy Awards ceremony. Director Josh Fox’s dark portrayal of greedy energy companies, sickened homeowners and oblivious regulators has stirred heated debate among the various stakeholders in a natural gas boom that is sweeping parts of the U.S. The film has galvanized anti-drilling activists while drawing complaints about its accuracy and objectivity.
In a letter to the academy, Lee Fuller, the executive director of an industry-sponsored group named Energy In Depth, called “Gasland” an “expression of stylized fiction” with “errors, inconsistencies and outright falsehoods.”
He asked the academy to consider “remedial actions” against the film.
Davis, the executive director, wrote to Fuller that if the academy were to act on every complaint made about a nominated film, “it would not be possible even to have a documentary category.” He said the academy must “trust the intelligence of our members” to sort out fact from fiction.
. . .
Fox said the industry’s campaign against “Gasland” has backfired.
“What they’re doing is calling more attention to the film, so I think it works against them,” the director said from Los Angeles. “But I think it shows how aggressive they are, how bullying they are, and how willing they are to lie to promote the falsehood that it’s OK to live in a gas drilling area.”
The documentary category is no stranger to controversy. Michael Moore films like “Bowling for Columbine” and “Sicko,” as well as Al Gore’s 2006 global-warming tale, “An Inconvenient Truth,” have likewise been attacked as biased and inaccurate.
When the article was published on Friday night, it was the first time an industry spokesperson deployed a shift in strategy from the industry’s standard denials and repeated assertions that fracking is safe, despite the numerous reports of problems, such as flammable water, contamination of drinking water, trucks leaking toxic and radioactive waste-water on public highways, the pollution of streams, as well as fires, and explosions in which people have been injured.
“We have to stop blaming documentaries and take a look in the mirror,” Matt Pitzarella, a spokesman for gas producer Range Resources Corp., was quoted as saying in WSJ.
However, if you go to the article, you won’t find Pitzarella’s statement because within the hour the quote disappeared, say citizen journalists, who screen captured it and posted it on Twitter. Gasland director Fox, in Los Angeles, awaiting Sunday night’s Oscar ceremony, has the screen shot of the original version. He also has questions:
“Why did this key quote disappear from the article? Why did the WSJ censor its own piece ? Does the Gas industry get to edit the Wall Street Journal?” Fox wondered. “Who pulled the quote?”
It’s more innocuous replacement from Tom Price, a Chesapeake Vice-President reads, “We need to be able to respond objectively and accurately.”
. . .
Although it’s unknown who ordered the yanking of the quote published in the Wall Street Journal, the appearance of censorship, whatever its source, does little to restore public confidence in either the industry reported on, or the media outlet doing the reporting.
Meanwhile citizens are rooting for Gasland to win the Oscar Sunday night at nationwide Gasland parties, and by writing letters to President Obama, asking for a nation-wide moratorium on fracking and safety studies. To learn more and participate, go here.
Given the large amount of water that must be used and transported during the hydrofracking process (“fracing a typical Chesapeake horizontal deep shale gas well requires an average of 4.5 million gallons per well“), the large amounts of chemicals that must be produced and used in hydrofracking, and the large amount of diesel fuel that is used in hydrofracking, I’m interested in seeing data that compares the energy input that’s required to extract natural gas during the hydrofracking process against the actual energy that’s extracted from the ground in the form of natural gas. Considering the likely high costs to the human environment and to human health, it seems to me, that if the energy return is slight or even in the negative, then why do politicians allow natural-gas drilling in such an extreme and gross negligent manner without reasonable precautions to protect the environment. Of course, the answer is money in the form of profits and subsidies. However, the price paid to land owners and the price paid for natural gas by consumers vastly undervalues and ignores the human and environmental impacts that occur during and after the drilling process.
Another problem with hydrofracking is wastewater treatment. Wastewater contains carcinogens and radioactive elements, and since “radioactivity in drilling waste cannot be fully diluted in rivers and other waterways,” it appears that wastewater from hydrofracking is a threat to drinking water supplies and to public health. Via the New York Times (emphasis added):
With hydrofracking, a well can produce over a million gallons of wastewater that is often laced with highly corrosive salts, carcinogens like benzene and radioactive elements like radium, all of which can occur naturally thousands of feet underground. Other carcinogenic materials can be added to the wastewater by the chemicals used in the hydrofracking itself.
While the existence of the toxic wastes has been reported, thousands of internal documents obtained by The New York Times from the Environmental Protection Agency, state regulators and drillers show that the dangers to the environment and health are greater than previously understood.
The documents reveal that the wastewater, which is sometimes hauled to sewage plants not designed to treat it and then discharged into rivers that supply drinking water, contains radioactivity at levels higher than previously known, and far higher than the level that federal regulators say is safe for these treatment plants to handle.
Other documents and interviews show that many E.P.A. scientists are alarmed, warning that the drilling waste is a threat to drinking water in Pennsylvania. Their concern is based partly on a 2009 study, never made public, written by an E.P.A. consultant who concluded that some sewage treatment plants were incapable of removing certain drilling waste contaminants and were probably violating the law.
The Times also found never-reported studies by the E.P.A. and a confidential study by the drilling industry that all concluded that radioactivity in drilling waste cannot be fully diluted in rivers and other waterways.
But the E.P.A. has not intervened. In fact, federal and state regulators are allowing most sewage treatment plants that accept drilling waste not to test for radioactivity. And most drinking-water intake plants downstream from those sewage treatment plants in Pennsylvania, with the blessing of regulators, have not tested for radioactivity since before 2006, even though the drilling boom began in 2008.
In other words, there is no way of guaranteeing that the drinking water taken in by all these plants is safe.
That has experts worried.
“We’re burning the furniture to heat the house,” said John H. Quigley, who left last month as secretary of Pennsylvania’s Department of Conservation and Natural Resources. “In shifting away from coal and toward natural gas, we’re trying for cleaner air, but we’re producing massive amounts of toxic wastewater with salts and naturally occurring radioactive materials, and it’s not clear we have a plan for properly handling this waste.”
It’s bad enough to blend politics and climate change, but U.S. Representative John Shimkus, a Republican from Illinois who’s seeking a chairmanship on the Energy and Commerce Committee, takes climate change denialism to another level. In the video below, Mr. Shimkus highlights everything that’s wrong with the GOP, and he illustrates how people use religion to impose their own biased and uninformed beliefs onto the rest of society. To declare that humans can’t destroy the Earth, because only God can, is foolish, ignorant, selfish, and unreasonable. Via Informed Comment.
