Please rec the Gulf Watchers Mothership!
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Tonight's editor: Ellinorianne
All views expressed by today's editor do not necessarily represent those of eKos or eKos listed diarists.
My interest is in conflict resolution, and when I can, I volunteer my skills as an analyst and writer to help bloody circumstances in Democratic Republic of Congo. I've been writing about it a lot lately, because conflict minerals are getting some action in congress.
This is an EcoJustice issue because mineral rights are at the root of this horrible violence. And it's more than a regional war. It is a looming climate threat. Many ecology groups work to stop the conflict; the Dian Fossey Foundation was one of the first. The heart of Africa's ecology lives in the Congo basin, and it is threatened by the instability. Our industry empowers the warlords that destablize the country. As we put wealth and technology into their hands, their power to plunder increases.
But the violence and suffering does not make the whole story. There is hope and grassroots action taking the country to a new place. One of the groups behind this excellent work is my favorite NGO, HEAL Africa.
OK, too easy a title, but it all fits. The NYT did the story on the lack of adequate review by the Fish and Wildlife staff of the Department of the Interior on the need to protect wildlife in the Gulf when doing the BP deep water drilling. For some reason the NYT story fails to mention that the oversight, theoretical and legal, if not in reality, of the Fish and Wildlife Servied was Dirk Kempthorne, former Governor of Idaho and, until now, his biggest embarrassment was the money he spent on a fancy bathroom for himself during the less than two years he spent in the position. Why the NYT did not do any real research or point out who was really supposed to be in charge under Bush/Cheney, in reviewing this Fish and Wildlife study, remains to be determined, but here is at least part of the background.
Much of California is an environment that is clearly set off from its neighbors much less from the eastern part of the country. Its climate and geology is fundamentally different and it has many species of animals and plants that are found nowhere else in the world. This diary will look at the forces of nature that created such an unusual place.
In this weekly series we have been discussing the benefits of a vegetarian diet including: better health, animal rights, frugal living, global food crisis,food safety/public health, and the immense contribution of meat production to climate change/greenhouse gas emissions.
by reducing the amount of meat and dairy eaten and changing farming practices, by 2055 we could reduce emissions of methane and nitrous oxide--two greenhouse gases far more potent than carbon dioxide--from agricultural sources by more than 80%.
Acid rain is back, and thanks to farming, worse than ever..
This diary is really just a report on the state of booming and biodiversity in the northeastern gulf which is still awaiting its first oil (at least on the surface). No analysis - just a feel for what things are like. Today I visited the Gulf of Mexico for the first time in a month. During May I visited virtually every week and each time I left I remember taking a final look and wondering what I would see the next time. It is now two months since I made the first of those visits and, at least on the surface, the far northeastern reaches of the gulf are much as they were. However when I made my way down to St. Mark's NWR with the idea of doing some bird censusing I did notice one rather obvious difference.
Asteroids can Kill. No doubt about it.
Just ask the Dinosaurs!
Anyone unfortunate enough to be stuck in the path of one --
doesn't really stand a chance.
Unless that "Someone" happens to have the Intellect,
to channel, and re-direct the immense power of Nature,
towards a Better Outcome.
That someone, should be Us.
Mirror satellites 'could divert asteroid'
The best way to divert an asteroid from a potentially catastrophic collision course with Earth is to deploy a "swarm" of mirror-bearing satellites to focus a beam of sunlight onto its surface, scientists say.
Is there a bigger lesson here?
"Give me a place to stand on, and I will move the Earth."
Of course Archimedes was well versed in the principles of Physics,
and the prime mover in the concept of ... Levers ...
The original version of this (with graphics) was posted here.
Any chance for good cooperation between the federal government and the state of Louisiana in the response to the BP Gulf Gusher died on May 30 when the U.S. Department of the Interior declared a six-month moratorium on deep water drilling in the Gulf of Mexico in the wake of the then month-old disaster.
Although the New York Times reported that Governor Bobby Jindal's personal dissatisfaction with the federal response to the disaster had gone public by May 3, the moratorium ratcheted up the pressure in the already tense situation by threatening losses in the industry that had caused the disaster.
Magic Monday and science talk comes once again. Today is the time to gather around and take a well deserved hiatus from all the politics of the day. New discoveries, new takes on old knowledge, and other bits of news are all available for the perusing in today's information world. Over the fold are selections from the past week from a few of the many excellent science news sites around the world. Today's tidbits include for platinum catalysts smaller may be better, the effect of competition in disturbed ecosystems, 2-billion-year-old fossils may be earliest multicellular life, nitrogen pollution alters global change from the ground up, saber tooth tigers also had strong forelimbs, oil spills may raise arsenic levels in the ocean, and melting ice allows a new realm for archeology. Pull up that beach chair and settle in for one more session of Dr. Possum's science education and entertainment.
The Bush administration agency charged with assessing the impact of new deepwater drilling on endangered species in the Gulf of Mexico based its 2007 conclusion that expanded drilling was "not likely" to "destroy or adversely modify designated critical habitat" on a worst-case scenario that a single spill would dump no more than 630,000 gallons of oil into the Gulf.
That worst-case scenario proved to be wildly optimistic -- more than 100 million gallons have already gushed into the Gulf thus far in BP's Deepwater Horizon disaster.
The National Marine Fisheries Service prepared the report for the Minerals Management Service in June 2007 as part of the Bush administration's push to expand deepwater drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. The report assessed the biological impact of plans by MMS to sell 11 new lease areas for offshore oil and gas exploration, one of which included the site of the ill-fated BP well.
According to the report, "Oil-spill data derived from historical trends estimate that a total volume of 237,972-1,116,150 gal of oil will be introduced into federal offshore waters over 40 years as a result of the proposed lease sales in the CPA."
The report's worst-case scenario -- that just over 1.1 million gallons of oil would spill into the Gulf of Mexico -- was off by multiple orders of magnitude, representing less than 1 percent of the total amount that the BP disaster alone has released.
Keep in mind that this worst-case projection included the combined total of all spills over the next 40 years from each of the new lease areas proposed by MMS in the Central Planning Area (CPA) of the Gulf of Mexico. Six of the 11 new lease areas were in the CPA.
Based on this radical underestimate of the risk posed by offshore drilling, the report concluded:
The biological opinion concludes that the five-year leasing program and its associated actions are not likely to jeopardize the continued existence of threatened or endangered species under the jurisdiction of NMFS or destroy or adversely modify designated critical habitat.
In addition to dismissing biological impacts in its June 2007 review, The New York Times reports a regional office of NMFS in September 2007 told MMS that that deepwater drilling posed little risk to endangered species and their habitat.
The full NMFS report is available here. The spill data projections are on page 76.
Update -- Here's a good analogy suggested to me by Barb for using "historical trends" to estimate the amount of oil that would be released from these sites: imagine if assessments of new car safety were based on the velocity of the original Model Ts. You might get an accurate portrait of what would happen if cars maxed out at whatever the Model T's top speed was, but you'd have no idea what would happen in the real world.
Cross Posted at Legal Schnauzer
The news seems to worsen by the day on the Alabama coast, as damage from the BP oil spill hits closer and closer to home.
A low-oxygen dead zone is choking life on the sea floor in places off the Alabama shoreline, according to a report yesterday in the Mobile Press-Register. Also, submerged oil on the seafloor has been documented in state waters.
On top of that, a public official says a 15-mile-long oil slick is expected to hit the beaches of Baldwin County today.
Remember Buck Lee, the Santa Rosa official who authorized the beaches back open?
Well, now we have hundreds of folks complaining about illnesses related to getting into that water:
This is the next in an occasional series of diaries on the state of Northern Hemisphere Arctic sea ice (and other topics as warranted), written in memory of Johnny Rook, who passed away in early 2009. He was the author of the Climaticide Chronicles.
I'm starting this diary on Friday night of the Holiday weekend, having spent a nice day with my partner beginning the arduous task of putting together one of those new-fangled raised gardens in a box (well, in two boxes actually, full of cedar-scented wood panels, hardware, hoses and assorted other parts). We've had it for a month and 1/2, but between being sick and the heat this June, we just couldn't get it together to start working on it. Today and tomorrow will be it, though ... it's supposed to be 95°F on Sunday and close to 100°F Monday. Hot hot hot for the foreseeable future. By the way, June broke a record for highest average temperature in D.C., and averaged over 80°F for the first time.
There'll be a report on June climate more generally in a couple of weeks, once the compilations are done. For now, follow me below to see the most recent week's trend in Arctic sea ice.
This week's Pre-Apocalypse News and Information Quiz might provide a bit of levity on this Monday.
If you can't laugh, you can't learn.
Did you hear the one about ballast water in the Mediterranean, and the name of the new, GMO salmon headed for market in about a year?
They walked into a bar and said "That's what BP said.... last night!
"Death in the Gulf" is the subtitle.
BP and Halliburton are committing a massive ecocide. This WineRev Model series provides a home for pics and vids, plus material that focuses on corporate media distortions.
Here's the the MRGO channel. 500 yards and $3 MM for the booms:
-- Greyrath/Getty
And the CNN fable factory came up with a BP-friendly lie that the "Whale" skimmer will extract 21,000,000 gallons of oil a day.
Our whitis went to the sources and pulled out 63,000 gallons a day as a theoretical maximum.
Nice to see Recommended in the tags:::
The current ROV DIARY: Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV #176 - BP's Gulf Catastrophe - TomTech
Rules of the Road
PLEASE visit Crashing Vor and Pam LaPier's diaries to find out how you can help the Gulf now and in the future. We don't have to be idle! And thanks to Crashing Vor and Pam LaPier for working on this!
Aloha. This diary is a departure from my usual critter heavy fare. These are some random photos taken (mostly) in my neighborhood on the windward side of Oahu. I am excited that the Flame Trees out in front of the condo are blooming. These shots were taken over the past week.
There is some experimentation in the processing in a few of these shots. If you are a film purist who hates HDR and other highly processed photos I feel your pain but will probably add to it with these. I am just playing around to see what works and what doesn't.
I hope everyone had a great Fourth!
