tagged w/ drilling
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The general public has not seen images of Shell Oil Co.'s Arctic drilling rig, the Kulluk, on site off the coast of Alaska, and a sense of the rig's proximity to protected lands has been hard to grasp. Until now.
I don't think the public has realized how close it is.
- Gary Braasch, photographer
Oregon-based photographer Gary Braasch flew to Alaska, chartered a plane in the town of Deadhorse, far above the Arctic Circle, and flew out to the rigs. His photographs provide, for the first time, a sense of perspective of the Kulluk rig in its environment, 12 miles offshore of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
"The location has been published for years in Shell's permits," he said in a phone interview. "We just went out there and, sure enough, there it was. But having the landscape just behind it was so amazing, and I don't think the public has realized how close it is."
More at the linkThe general public has not seen images of Shell Oil Co.'s Arctic drilling rig,... more
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Drilling Set to Begin Immediately Risks Massive Spills, Polar Bears, Walruses, Bowhead Whales
The Obama administration today gave Shell Oil the initial approval to begin controversial and dangerous oil drilling in the Arctic Ocean off Alaska, despite the fact that a critical oil-spill containment vessel is still awaiting certification in Bellingham, Wash. Until now, the Arctic Ocean has largely been off limits to offshore drilling. Shell Oil is expected to begin the initial phases of exploratory drilling in the Chukchi Sea as soon as it can get its drillship in place, in the heart of habitat critical to the survival of polar bears.
“By opening the Arctic to offshore oil drilling, President Obama has made a monumental mistake that puts human life, wildlife and the environment in terrible danger. The harsh and frozen conditions of the Arctic make drilling risky, and an oil spill would be impossible to clean up,” said Rebecca Noblin, Alaska director at the Center for Biological Diversity. “Scariest of all, the Obama administration is allowing Shell to go forward without even having the promised oil-spill containment equipment in place.”
Since 2007, the Center and its allies have successfully protected the Arctic Ocean from Shell's exploratory drilling plans. So far in 2012, a series of blunders and broken promises has prevented Shell from moving forward with its aggressive drilling plans. Last month the company announced that it could not comply with its air-pollution permits and asked the EPA to waive Clean Air Act requirements. Days later its drillship Noble Discoverer slipped its moorings in Dutch Harbor, Alaska, and drifted dangerously close to shore. Right now, Shell’s oil-spill containment vessel, which was supposed to be onsite for any drilling, is still stuck in Washington state.
“While opposition to Shell’s drilling plans has resulted in significant safety improvements, Arctic drilling can never really be safe. The president is putting America’s natural heritage on the line just to add to Shell’s bottom line,” Noblin said. “Make no mistake: Once we’ve ruined the Arctic for wildlife, we’ll never get it back. The unique animals that evolved over millions of years to survive in this frozen wilderness — and nowhere else — will be condemned to extinction.”
More than 1 million people have sent President Obama messages asking him to save the Arctic from drilling. The Center for Biological Diversity, staunchly opposed to offshore drilling, will continue working to protect the Arctic Ocean’s sensitive wildlife.
“Pursuing fossil fuels in the remote Arctic will destroy the life there, even as it speeds up the climate change that’s already destroying the polar bears’ home and poses enormous risks to people, too,” Noblin said.
The Center for Biological Diversity is a national, nonprofit conservation organization with more than 375,000 members and online activists dedicated to the protection of endangered species and wild places.Drilling Set to Begin Immediately Risks Massive Spills, Polar Bears, Walruses, Bowhead... more
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Answer: One Trillion Tons of Carbon Pollution
40,000 heat records have already been broken this year across the United States, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Here in Fredericksburg, Virginia, the signs of an unbalanced climate system have been felt in recent years not just in heatwaves, but increasingly in the form of unusually severe wind storms. This past weekend’s storm brought 80 mph wind gusts that snapped three trees in our backyard like pretzels, even though they were each a foot thick. Once again, my insurance company is teaching me new weather terminolgy to explain the latest climate disasters. A few years ago, the term was “micro-bursts” (not quite tornadoes, but similar impact). Now it is “derecho” (not quite hurricanes, but similar impact).
Whatever you call it, we need to face up to the fact that our weather has turned dangerous because our climate is breaking down. Virginia has had 27 national disaster declarations due to storms in the past 20 years, three times as many as the prior 20 years. Meanwhile, wildfires and droughts are threatening people and wildlife elsewhere in the nation, particularly in the West, including the National Wildlife Federation’s staff in Colorado. More than two million acres have burned in U.S. wildfires already this year. Global warming has created longer wildfire seasons in the West due to heat and drought (warmer winters has also allowed pests to floursih, killing large numbers of pine trees that add fuel to the fires).
The current heat wave and climate disasters shouldn’t be catching us by surprise. Since the year 2000, we have witnessed nine of the ten hottest years ever recorded, according to NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, which tracks global surface temperatures. The first three months of this year has been the warmest first quarter ever in the United States, and March was an alarming 8 degrees warmer than average. As the planet heats, weather patterns are destabilized. Warm air sucks more water from the ground and holds more water (about 4% more for every 1 degree F increase in temperature). That’s one of the reasons our warming planet has been creating historic droughts out West and dumping torrential rains in the Midwest (in Iowa, for example, there have been four “100-year” flood events in the past 5 years, and 17 emergency disaster declarations for floods in the past two decades).
Scary Weather is a Warning: We Need to Act
For the moment, we are paying attention to the weatherman, and the weather is scary. But the media is still asleep at the switch when it comes to reporting the real story: What is causing this climate to unravel? The U.S. National Academy of Sciences completed an exhaustive review of scientific research and concluded more forcefully than ever in a landmark 2011 report that pollution from smokestacks and tailpipes is destabilizing our climate. Here is how they put it in scientific terms:
“Climate change is occurring, is very likely caused primarily by the emission of greenhouse gases from human activities, and poses significant risks for a range of human and natural systems. … The sooner that serious efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions proceed, the lower the risks posed by climate change, and the less pressure there will be to make larger, more rapid, and potentially more expensive reductions later.”
Clear enough? If not, here is a strong hint of what is going on: In the past 50 years, we have added one trillion tons of heat-trapping carbon dioxide emissions to the atmosphere from burning coal, oil and natural gas (Source: U.S. Department of Energy). Over this time, the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has increased 23%, from 322 ppm to 397 ppm (Source: Mauna Loa Record, Scripps CO2 Program).
We can’t do anything about yesterday’s weather, but we need to be responsible stewards of the world we shape for our kids and future generations. We want to pass on a natural world full of abundant wildlife, but wildlife species are increasingly at risk as climate change threatens the very existence of thousands of species. Pollution from smokestacks and tailpipes is loading the dice and increasing the likelihood of more frequent and increasingly severe storms and heat waves. If we don’t talk about the source of the problems, then we can’t do anything about it. The decisions we make today will shape the future for generations to come. Why? Because much of the heat-trapping carbon pollution we put into the atmosphere will increase CO2 levels for centuries and even millennia. According to the IPCC’s 2007 report on the state of climate science:
“About 50% of a CO2 increase will be removed from the atmosphere within 30 years, and a further 30% will be removed within a few centuries. The remaining 20% may stay in the atmosphere for many thousands of years.”
So What Can We Do?
All we lack is the determination and leadership to change course on energy. We need more businesses to provide better energy options than are currently available to families. Some companies are out in front, including automobile manufacturers who have embraced goals of doubling the fuel economy of their vehicles by 2025. But other companies, such as Dominion Power here in Virginia, are dragging their heels and doing more to block the march to cleaner energy than help.
The best and first solution to reduce our “carbon footprint” on the planet is to stop wasting energy. Energy has long been taken for granted by consumers and businesses alike; we waste far more of it than we need to. We need to each do our part and pay more attention to how we use energy. But we also need to get more ambitious as a nation to bring to market the abundant ideas and technologies engineers and entrepreneurs have to cut energy waste.
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But there is one bright spot that could mark a turning point in whether we are getting serious about carbon pollution. The Environmental Protection Agency has proposed clean air standards to limit industrial carbon pollution from new power plants. Polluters are launching a fierce counterattack and spending lavishly on lobbying and campaign contributions. One thing you can do right now is to join the more than two million Americans who have written the Environmental Protection Agency to support their new carbon standards. More Americans have supported this rule than any other federal rule in history.
It’s only a start, but standing up now for a better future is the right thing to do. And who knows? Perhaps we can get some wind at our backs to take us where we need to go.
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Evidence that humans are causing global warming: A summary is provided at http://sks.to/evidence and http://sks.to/agw with links to the many peer-reviewed papers that provide empirical evidence for human caused global warming.
For those who wish to keep track of CO2 emissions:
http://co2now.org/
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An entire collection of scientific and informational videos on climate change and deniers crocks and myths debunked is available at this link:
http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=029130BFDC78FA33
Make sure you watch these and pass them on. They really rile deniers.
Just look at the desperation in here with the usual Al Gore sued by failed weathermen videos ( after whining about content amount) which isn't even true and has nothing to do with this post. Sad isn't it? (waaaah I want to be voted up because that means the junk I post is true!) What a shame to see such a "meltdown."
**I have also posted other videos between pages 1 and 2 of this thread which include actual scientists and not FOX News mouthpieces.**Answer: One Trillion Tons of Carbon Pollution
40,000 heat records have already been... more
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Our public lands, set aside for the American people and for generations to come are now seeing the influence of corporate money working to take them from us. This video series beginning on July 10 will explore three such instances in a fight to protect these lands from resource extraction. Uranium mining on the edges of the Grand Canyon, a proposed coal mine close to Bryce Canyon National Park and natural gas drilling in the Bridger-Teton National Forest.
Next Wednesday you can also watch a live stream of an event featuring a discussion of “The Status of American Conservation in 2012.”
Public lands need to be protected.
Hands off.Our public lands, set aside for the American people and for generations to come are... more
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The Arctic is warming at an alarming rate – twice as fast as the rest of the planet – and according to a new report, those changes will be a key driver of geopolitics in the coming years.
As the rapidly melting ice unlocks commercial opportunities in shipping, tourism and oil and gas extraction, the world’s largest economies are jockeying for control of the region. According to the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions, the melting of the Arctic is a “bellwether for how climate change may reshape geopolitics in the post-Cold War era.”
The widely held notion that climate change will occur gradually over the 21st century, allowing ample time for society to adapt, is belied by the unprecedented pace of both climate change and policy developments in the Arctic today. Such rapid changes will challenge governments’ abilities to anticipate and diplomatically resolve international disputes within the region.
Accelerating changes in the region are causing sea ice to melt at a rate exceeding scientists’ predictions. The absence of ice will open up strategic waterways, such as the Northwest Passage, for longer periods of time and allow more opportunity for activities like offshore oil exploration that require open water. Analysts believe the economic impact could be significant – new and expanded shipping routes can significantly reduce the transit time between Asia, North America and Europe, and oil companies like Royal Dutch Shell are eager to unlock the “great opportunity” for fossil fuels they believe lies beneath the pristine Arctic waters.
But increased opportunity will also lead to increased conflict. In analyzing recent policy statements and actions of the Arctic states, the report notes that while the countries seem “focused on building a cooperative security environment in the region,” there is an “apparently contradictory trend toward modernizing their military forces in the Arctic … Consequently, if political cooperation in the region should sour, most of the Arctic nations will have forces that are prepared to compete in a hostile environment.”
Further complicating Arctic claims is the absence of the U.S. in the Law of the Sea treaty, or UNCLOS, which details the rights and responsibilities of nations when it comes to use and protection of the world’s oceans. The treaty also provides an important framework for resolving territorial disputes in the Arctic. UNCLOS is ratified by every other developed country and is supported by a broad coalition that includes five former Republican secretaries of state, the Chamber of Commerce, and major environmental groups. America’s failure to ratify this key treaty puts us at an immediate disadvantage in frontier regions like the Arctic.
And what of the environmental implications? With more vessels trying to navigate the narrow straits and channels of the Northwest Passage, commercial fishing vessels, cruise ships, and drilling rigs operating in the previously inaccessible Arctic Ocean, the risk of a collision or oil spill increase exponentially.
As detailed in the Center for American Progress report, Putting a Freeze on Arctic Ocean Drilling: America’s Inability to Respond to an Oil Spill in the Arctic, the U.S. lags far behind other Arctic nations in infrastructure and preparedness to respond to a major event. There are no U.S. Coast Guard stations north of the Arctic Circle, and we currently operate just one functional icebreaking vessel. Alaska’s tiny ports and airports are incapable of supporting an extensive and sustained airlift effort. The region even lacks such basics as paved roads and railroads.
This dearth of infrastructure would severely hamper the ability to transport the supplies and personnel required for any large-scale emergency response effort. Furthermore, the extreme and unpredictable weather conditions complicate transportation, preparedness, and cleanup of spilled oil to an even greater degree.
The co-author of the C2ES report noted that “a prevalent theme in nearly all the policy announcements was the need to protect the region’s environment in the face of rapid climate change and increased economic activity.” However, it is difficult to imagine how forces as strong as rapid climate change and increased economic activity will lead to anything other than environmental destruction.
And as NOAA Administrator Dr. Jane Lubchenco explained last year, the potential ramifications of this industrialization extend far beyond the region itself:
Well, what happens in the Arctic doesn’t stay in the Arctic. It has huge implications for the global system. And one of the reasons people are legitimately concerned about melting of sea ice are the uncertainties associated with the consequences of that for the rest of the planet. We’re entering a no-analogue world here. We’ve never experienced the kinds of changes that we’re seeing now in the Arctic and elsewhere. And we don’t fully understand what the consequences of that are going to be.
http://www.c2es.org/press-center/press-releases/climate-change-international-arctic-security
This is the analysis.
Based on human nature, war is not too farfetched.
More at the link
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http://current.com/technology/93791819_clinton-to-assert-u-s-claim-in-scramble-for-arctic.htm
Actually, the one good thing about this is that it totally blows the denier lie that the Arctic isn't melting at a faster pace. Now you know they are all fakes and fossil fuel minions just guarding their own stashes.The Arctic is warming at an alarming rate – twice as fast as the rest of the... more
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We have a strong reputation for balancing global excellence with local delivery within the oil and gas industry. We have managed some of the largest and most complex projects in the world and our international supply chain has been an invaluable resource to our customers. We are dedicated to supplying the best in the existing market of quality maintained API 6A Wellhead equipments, backed up with full-length services.
Original Source
http://www.airglobalenergy.com
http://www.mpsantoshkumar.infoWe have a strong reputation for balancing global excellence with local delivery within... more
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A spate of earthquakes across the middle of the U.S. is “almost certainly” man-made, and may be caused by wastewater from oil or gas drilling injected into the ground, U.S. government scientists said in a study.
Researchers from the U.S. Geological Survey said that for the three decades until 2000, seismic events in the nation’s midsection averaged 21 a year. They jumped to 50 in 2009, 87 in 2010 and 134 in 2011.A spate of earthquakes across the middle of the U.S. is “almost certainly”... more
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"Natural Gas Exxposed tells the stories of Americans whose lives have been devastated by gas drilling.
All across the country, gas companies are poisoning water, tearing apart communities and destroying the American dream for thousands of families who can't protect their children from what comes out of the tap.
Please join us in rejecting this dangerous bridge to nowhere and working to build a renewable energy economy."
Natural Gas Exxposed video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=fSFDNyhKcSY
http://www.waterdefense.org/content/natural-gas-exxposed-3"Natural Gas Exxposed tells the stories of Americans whose lives have been... more
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It took researches 30 years of drilling through a four-kilometer-thick ice to reach the renowned subglacial lake. Most importantly, million years-old secrets will be unveiled without causing harm to the lake's ecosystem. "2/5/2012 our scientists at the Vostok polar station in the Antarctic completed drilling at depths of 3,768 meters and reached surface of the subglacial lake," RIA Novosti quoted unnamed Russian scientist. Lake Vostok is a unique aquatic ecosystem hidden under some four kilometers of ice. Its water has been isolated from the atmosphere -- and therefore from the outer biosphere -- for millions of years. Scientists believe that surveys of the lake can provide invaluable details on past and future climate changes. http://www.makeahistory.com/index.php/your-details/43060-20-million-years-old-antarctic-secret-scientists-find-ancient-vostok-lake-under-4-kilometers-of-iceIt took researches 30 years of drilling through a four-kilometer-thick ice to reach... more
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worrg
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1 year ago
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Help bring emergency aid to Dimock: http://j.mp/4dimock
On November 30th, 2011 the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) will allow Cabot Oil and Gas co. to halt delivery of water to families in Dimock, leaving them with only the toxic, flammable water that has made them ill and caused skin lesions.
The time has come to take action to support our friends in Dimock. Cabot Oil and Gas, and the Pennsylvania DEP are neglecting their responsibility to aid the people whose lives they damaged. Tell Pennsylvania Governor Corbett he made the wrong choice, effectively selling out his constituents and allowing a travesty of justice to take place on his watch.
Please sign our petition: http://j.mp/rGorpS, and take a minute to call the Secretary of the Pennsylvania DEP, Michael Krancer, at 717-787-2814 and tell him to reverse the DEP decision and force Cabot to continue delivering water to the families in Dimock. You can also call Scott Perry of the DEP here: 717-576-7613 and call Governor Corbett here: 717-787-2500.
For more info go to: www.waterdefense.orgHelp bring emergency aid to Dimock: http://j.mp/4dimock
On November 30th, 2011 the... more
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Luis Garcia was close to tears. For three days, he had guided eight international journalists through a tract of Amazon so thick with wildlife that experts are yet to fully catalogue its riches. At a small Ecuadorian airport, Garcia gave a final, wet-eyed pitch on the threatened Yasuni National Park and, as he spoke, they appeared: the flashy watches, slick sneakers and logo-stitched chambray shirts of the oil industry.
In Coca, an industrial smudge of a town on the Amazon's western edge, two types of passengers use the airport - oil executives and eco-tourists. The oil executives are Spanish, Chinese, American and South American corporates extracting, or eager to extract, the heavy crude beneath the emerald forest. The eco-tourists - birdwatchers and backpackers sporting expensive waterproofs and zip-off trousers - are headed to the biodiversity haven of the Yasuni. Two industries are feeding from the Amazon; but only one is likely to prevail.
Ecuador, and the wider international community, faces a quandary in the Yasuni. It is, scientists believe, the most species-rich spot in the western hemisphere. But an almost irresistible thing lies untapped in the park's underbelly: one-fifth of Ecuador's oil.
In his hands ... Ecuador's President, Rafael Correa, has threatened to renege on a proposal to leave $3.6 billion of oil under the Amazon.
To solve this dilemma, this poor South American nation has come up with a unique idea that, if successful, could change the way the world deals with its most precious places and provide a concrete way to reduce carbon pollution in developing nations.
Ecuador wants the world to pay compensation for leaving 846 million barrels of oil under the park. The asking price, $3.6 billion over 13 years, or half the oil's value when the proposal was conceived, will help switch Ecuador from oil to renewable energy, halt deforestation, boost scientific research and support Yasuni's indigenous communities, two of which live deep in the park in voluntary isolation. The deal would ensure 407 million tonnes of carbon dioxide stays in the ground (Australia's annual emissions: 542 million tonnes).
The trust fund, set up last year by the United Nations Development Program, already has $52 million in donations and pledges from countries, including Australia, which recently committed $500,000, Italy, Turkey Colombia, Peru, France and Belgium. A New York investment banker has donated her annual salary and Bo Derek, Leonardo DiCaprio, Edward Norton and Al Gore have lent their support. The only problem now, besides the global financial meltdown tightening Europe's purse strings, is Ecuador's left-wing President, Rafael Correa, appears to be holding the Yasuni as an environmental hostage.
Gas is flared off from an oil facility near Yasuni National Park in Orellana Province, Ecuador. Photo: Theresa Ambrose
Correa has driven the proposal to save the park, but has now issued a deadline: if pledges do not reach $100 million by December, he will reconsider Plan B - drilling for oil. ''We are renouncing an immense sum of money,'' Correa said on his September trip to the UN in New York. ''For us, the most financially lucrative option is to extract the gasoline.'' This is why the Herald and other journalists, were, courtesy of the Ecuadorian government, on a canoe in a small creek, deep in the Yasuni: Correa wants the world to see how special this national treasure is before he changes his mind.
The jungle sounds hit first. It's a twittersphere of chirps and odd calls, one like a car alarm, another the trill of a mobile phone, yet another like the yap of a small dog. The smell is like a Queensland night, frangipani-sweet and tropical. Above, a butterfly ballet: electric-blue morphos the size of small birds lope past. Strange dragonflies, like bright-red-winged matchsticks, hover above the creek and water-walking river spiders, like long-legged huntsmans, sun themselves on logs. These are just the small things.
Capuchin monkeys, the most intelligent of American monkeys, and olive-and-turmeric squirrel monkeys (our guide Luis Garcia: ''Oh nice, nice, I love these monkeys! Perfecto!'') trapeze and bungee-jump along the creek, while red howler monkeys release their unsettling horror-movie roars. But it was Yasuni's birds, creatures gilded with gold, azure, crimson and jade, that put on the most extraordinary show.
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Last year, a team of scientists who want to save Yasuni compared the richness of the park to other parts of the Amazon and globally. They found the park was one of the planet's most biodiverse places because of the concentration of species across all taxonomic groups - amphibians, birds, mammals and plants.
This is partly because of Yasuni's isolation (canoe is the main form of access) but mostly because it was a refuge for plants and animals in the last major climate upheaval, the Pleistocene epoch, which ended 12,000 years ago. Yasuni is known as ''core Amazon'' because its position near the Andes' eastern flank guarantees reliable rain. For these reasons, scientists believe it will become a species refuge in the next major climate upheaval brought to us by global warming, while much of the Amazon may become drought-affected.
But there's more to the Yasuni than its potential for a David Attenborough documentary. The director of Harvard's Centre for Health and the Global Environment, Eric Chivian, a Nobel peace prize winner, has made a plea to save Yasuni in science's name. Yasuni's potential in unlocking a cancer treatment or amphibian-based painkiller or antibiotic should not be lost, he says. ''If we destroy the Yasuni it will not just be a tragedy for those species and the people that live there, it will be a tragedy for all mankind, for human health,'' he told a government-made documentary. Ecuadorian professor of biological science David Romo told us in Quito it would take 400 years to identify Yasuni's insect species.
The development of Yasuni's Ishpingo, Tambococha and Tiputini (ITT) oil blocks is also likely to affect the ''uncontacted peoples'' of the Tagaeri and Taromenane tribes. In 2007 the park's southern area was declared a no-go zone or intangible, after a series of murders and massacres involving illegal loggers and tribal reckonings. In 1987, an oil helicopter dropped a priest and nun into a Tagaeri camp; they were later found dead with multiple spear wounds. No one knows how viable these tribes are long-term (they are thought to number between 400 and 500 people) but their wish to remain in isolation is now recognised under the Ecuadorian constitution. ''Obviously we are afraid that any of the oil activity will be the end for these people,'' says Professor Carlos Larrea, an economist at Ecuador's Andean University, and a technical consultant to the so-called Yasuni-ITT initiative.
Ecuadorians already know the costs of oil extraction. In February, an Ecuadorian court fined American oil multinational Chevron $US8.6 billion ($8 billion) for polluting the Amazon. The action was brought by 30,000 people. In a country that relies on oil for 57 per cent of its export income, not even Yasuni has remained untouched. The Spanish company Repsol has wells in one area of the park, which unleashed oil spills and road damage. The day this development came to Yasuni in 1993 was a day the 47-year-old Luis Garcia never forgot. ''It was so sad to see a bulldozer on this side of the river,'' he said, referring to the great Napo River, which runs along the park's flank.
Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/environment/meet-cash-deadline-or-the-drillers-move-in-20111028-1mo86.html#ixzz1cCjLFhPMLuis Garcia was close to tears. For three days, he had guided eight international... more
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The Fossil Fuel and Natural Gas industries have launched an all out publicity blitz to skew the conversation around the highly controversial practice of Hydraulic Fracturing (Hydrofracking). Their targeted commercial spots on Fox, CNN, MSNBC and other channels during the main news casts are insidious in how they seek to make the sheep feel good about being lead to slaughter. The spots expertly lull viewers into a feeling of safety, security, and hope by focusing on 'creating jobs' and having 'energy independence' and enough energy to last for '100 years'. They FAIL to mention a few, pesky details that might dampen public opinion and get in the way of the 3 trillion dollars the fossil fuel industry stands to make in the process.
Comedian and satirist Julianna Forlano hosts this special edition of The Ironic News Report. Watch it while you can! (Like before it gets suppressed for being true.)
http://youtu.be/acBDTpZ2aLEThe Fossil Fuel and Natural Gas industries have launched an all out publicity blitz to... more
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The Fossil Fuel and Natural Gas industries have launched an all out publicity blitz to skew the conversation around the highly controversial practice of Hydraulic Fracturing (Hydrofracking). Their targeted commercial spots on Fox, CNN, MSNBC and other channels during the main news casts are insidious in how they seek to make the sheep feel good about being lead to slaughter. The spots expertly lull viewers into a feeling of safety, security, and hope by focusing on 'creating jobs' and having 'energy independence' and enough energy to last for '100 years'. They FAIL to mention a few, pesky details that might dampen public opinion and get in the way of the 3 trillion dollars the fossil fuel industry stands to make in the process.
Comedian and satirist Julianna Forlano hosts this special edition of The Ironic News Report. Watch it while you can! (Like before it gets suppressed for being true.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acBDTpZ2aLEThe Fossil Fuel and Natural Gas industries have launched an all out publicity blitz to... more
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On October 3, 2011, the Obama administration said it was moving forward with oil-drilling leases off the coast of Alaska issued by the Bush administration in 2008. The leases had been challenged by environmental groups, opposition that gained momentum after the 2010 BP Deepwater Horizon disaster.
Yet the Interior Department said it would uphold nearly 500 leases issued in the Chukchi Sea, a victory for oil companies in the battle over Arctic Ocean drilling.
Those opposing the leases say there is no proven clean-up method for an oil spill in such harsh terrain and ice-choked waters, and that the environmental assessment done by oil companies for the area is inadequate.
There are also Alaska Natives living off the coast of the Chukchi Sea who worry about how the drilling and its impacts will affect their way of life. One of them is Colleen Swan, a resident of Kivalina, Alaska. Kivalina is a largely Inupiat community on a barrier reef island in the northwest of the state. The island already faces erosion from climate change, and its residents are trying to relocate. In the meantime, they are still dependent on the local environment. Colleen shared some of her thoughts on the oil leases:
The oil leases, no matter where in the Arctic, will affect all people who live off the wild life from the ocean, because it will disrupt the migrations of sea mammals. Here are some points I like to make when the timing is appropriate:
In the event of an oil spill, the people in coastal communities are the ones whose lives are impacted directly, yet are the ones who are least prepared for such a disaster. These are communities of people who have no means to respond to oil spills to protect their shores and their villages from the oil slick.
The oil companies and the government who issues such permits will continue with business as usual and the oil companies will recover. They have reserves to fall back on. We don’t. Once we lose our livelihood, our subsistence way of life, it’s gone for a long, long time. The ocean will not recover as quickly as the oil companies and neither will the coastal communities.
The oil companies have their oil spill response plans, they have their resources. The government permit issuers don’t live up here; they will not be personally impacted. The coastal communities have no oil spill response plan that would enable us to protect our communities – we have no alternative food source identified aside from the land animals, which are not nearly enough to supply all of our needs throughout the year.
The fact that we are coastal communities, especially in Arctic Alaska, means that we would also lose our main food source, food that sustains us through the long, cold, harsh winters. The food we eat survives in the Arctic and it enables us to survive also in this climate. More than 3/4ths of our diet comes from the ocean.
These things are not thought through by neither the oil companies nor the government. As long as we are lacking in our ability to respond to oil spills, the plans that have been approved are seriously lacking. They have not begun to even comprehend the meaning of an oil spill in our already fragile environment.
Climate change is already wreaking havoc in our environment, especially in the oceans. Carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions have caused serious harm to the ocean because of how CO2 reacts in the ocean: it has caused the ocean to become increasingly acidic, especially in the Arctic oceans.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has determined that not enough research has been done in the Arctic waters.
The entire Arctic is seriously lacking in scientific understanding of the current condition due to climate change. Because of how climate change has affected our relocation project and has caused stumbling blocks for our progress, climate change needs to be a consideration to be factored into any permitting or other federal or government-based action or decision. There is no telling how a changing climate, which has affected the ice conditions in the Arctic, will impact oil development activities.
More at the link
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2010/05/20/us/ALASKA/ALASKA-articleLarge.jpgOn October 3, 2011, the Obama administration said it was moving forward with... more
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We're taking a look at some of the stories affecting our planet. Here's some news you shouldn't miss.
Panel recommending extreme climate fixes, just in caseA bipartisan panel of scientists, ex-government officials and national security experts is recommending we look into extreme engineering techniques to to reverse climate change, The New York Times reports. Members said they hoped that such extreme engineering techniques, which include scattering particles in the air to mimic the cooling effect of volcanoes or stationing orbiting mirrors in space to reflect sunlight, would never be needed. But in its report, to be released on Tuesday, the panel said it is time to begin researching and testing such ideas in case “the climate system reaches a ‘tipping point’ and swift remedial action is required.
Obama Administration OK's Arctic drilling leasesJanforGore shares a story from the Wall Street Journal, which reports the Obama administration is "moving forward with oil-drilling leases off the coast of Alaska issued by the Bush administration in 2008, a victory for oil companies in the battle over Arctic Ocean drilling."
Meanwhile, Sarkozy bans fracking in FranceFrance will maintain a ban on fracking until there is proof that shale gas exploration won’t harm the environment or “massacre” the landscape, President Nicolas Sarkozy said, BusinessWeek reports. “Development of hydrocarbon resources underground is strategic for our country but not at any price,” Sarkozy said.
Republican upping criticism on Solyndra, similar spendingRep. Cliff Stearns (R-FL), who chairs an energy and commerce subcommittee on oversight and investigations, originally supported the program when Congress created it. Now he says, "I think the administration is putting taxpayers' money at risk in areas that are not creating jobs," NPR's "All Things Considered" reports. He still doesn't like the idea of government putting taxpayers on the line for other ventures. "We can't compete with China to make solar panels and wind turbines," Stearns says.
Emails reveal excessive chumminess with TransCanada on pipelineThe New York Times reports a State Department official provided Fourth of July party invitations, subtle coaching and cheerleading, and inside information about Secretary Hillary Rodham Clinton’s meetings to a Washington lobbyist for a Canadian company seeking permission from the department to build a pipeline that would carry crude from the oil sands of Canada to the Gulf of Mexico.
Fossil fuel subsidies up by $110 billion over last year, to $409 billionThe Hill reports that global fossil fuel consumption subsidies rose in 2010 despite a pledge by G-20 nations to take steps to reduce them in coming years, according to a new analysis. The International Energy Agency (IEA) estimated Tuesday that subsidies that artificially lower fuel prices reached $409 billion in 2010, an increase of almost $110 billion above 2009 levels.
Congressman tracking 'anti-environment' votes by 112th CongressOur boss wrote yesterday about a new, searchable database unveiled by Rep. Henry Waxman that reveals “anti-environment votes by the 112th Congress. The database details the 125 votes taken to date by the House that undermine the protection of the environment.” Check out the database here.
We're taking a look at some of the stories affecting our planet. Here's some... more
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Source: St. Petersburg Times
TALLAHASSEE — Gov. Rick Scott found himself on both sides of the fence Tuesday when he told a Tallahassee audience that he supports oil drilling in the Everglades, then hours later issued a clarification that he didn't mean "an expansion of drilling."
Scott's remarks to the Economics Club of Florida were prompted by an audience member who asked whether the governor agreed with Republican presidential candidate Michelle Bachmann's call last week for oil drilling in the Everglades for "additional energy."
"You know we already have drilling in the Everglades. We already have oil wells in the Everglades,'' Scott replied. "There's a road in Naples called 'Oil Well Road,' so we already have oil drilling. We've had it since 1943.''
The comments unleashed immediate warnings from environmentalists, who have fought for decades to shield South Florida's crucial watershed from additional oil drilling as they attempt to restore the Everglades ecosystem.
http://www.tampabay.com/news/business/energy/gov-scott-clarifies-his-support-for-oil-drilling-in-everglades/1190081
"If they are already, and have been drilling there since 1943, Should they expand and allow more oil here on our Soil???Source: St. Petersburg Times
TALLAHASSEE — Gov. Rick Scott found himself on... more
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On a small, floating piece of ice in the Beaufort Sea, several hundred miles north of Alaska, a group of scientists are documenting what some dub an "Arctic meltdown."
According to climate scientists, the warming of the region is shrinking the polar ice cap at an alarming rate, reducing the permafrost layer and wreaking havoc on polar bears, arctic foxes and other indigenous wildlife in the region.
What is bad for the animals, though, has been good for commerce.
The recession of the sea ice and the reduction in permafrost -- combined with advances in technology -- have allowed access to oil, mineral and natural gas deposits that were previously trapped in the ice.
The abundance of these valuable resources and the opportunity to exploit them has created a gold rush-like scramble in the high north, with fierce competition to determine which countries have the right to access the riches of the Arctic.
This competition has brought in its wake a host of naval and military activities that the Arctic hasn't seen since the end of the Cold War.
Now, one of the coldest places on Earth is heating up as nuclear submarines, Aegis-class frigates, strategic bombers and a new generation of icebreakers are resuming operations there.
Just how much oil and natural gas is under the Arctic ice?
The Arctic is home to approximately 90 billion barrels of undiscovered but recoverable oil, according to a 2008 study by the U.S. Geological Survey. And preliminary estimates are that one-third of the world's natural gas may be harbored in the Arctic ice.
But that's not all that's up for grabs. The Arctic also contains rich mineral deposits. Canada, which was not historically a diamond-producing nation, is now the third-largest diamond producer in the world.
If the global warming trend continues as many scientists project it to, it is likely that more and more resources will be discovered as the ice melts further.
Who are the countries competing for resources?
The United States, Canada, Russia, Norway, Denmark, Iceland, Sweden and Finland all stake a claim to a portion of the Arctic. These countries make up the Arctic Council, a diplomatic forum designed to mediate disputes on Arctic issues
Lawson Brigham, a professor at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and an Arctic expert, says "cooperation in the Arctic has never been higher."
But like the oil trapped on the Arctic sea floor, much of the activity of the Arctic Council is happening below the surface.
In secret diplomatic cables published by WikiLeaks, Danish Foreign Minister Per Stieg Moeller was quoted as saying to the United States, "If you stay out, the rest of us will have more to carve up the Arctic."
At the root of Moeller's statement is a dispute over control of territories that is pitting friend against foe and against friend. Canada and the U.S., strategic allies in NATO and Afghanistan, are in a diplomatic dispute over the Northwest Passage. Canada and Russia have recently signed development agreements together.
In the same way a compass goes awry approaching the North Pole, traditional strategic alliances are impacted at the top of the world.
http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/americas/07/15/larsen.arctic.ice.wars/index.html
More at the linkOn a small, floating piece of ice in the Beaufort Sea, several hundred miles north of... more
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In an interview with Glenn Beck, Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum claimed global warming is a hoax. Beck grinned as Santorum called for a "drill everywhere" policy and claimed that there is "no such thing as global warming"
Earlier this month, Santorum told the other enforcer of conservative thought, Rush Limbaugh, that global warming is "junk science."In an interview with Glenn Beck, Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum... more
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